Regular readers of this blog will already know that I am not a fan of cross-server “Looking for Dungeon” systems in MMOs. I’ve written at length about why they’re unnecessary at best and community-shredding monsters at worst, but even when I posted my anti-LFD manifesto I knew in the back of my mind that there was one huge exception to my argument, and that’s RIFT.
RIFT was my primary MMO for most of last year, including when the cross-server LFD system was officially introduced in August. I recall being worried at the time about server community, but afterwards unlike my experience with WoW’s LFD I can’t recall a single time that I felt my concerns were validated. Generally I had positive experiences with RIFT’s LFD system and the community on Byriel seemed as healthy as ever.
RIFT’s LFD had the same features as most: automated matching, teleporting to the instance entrance, and of course the likelihood that you’d never see the rest of your group again once the dungeon was over. So why didn’t it offend my delicate MMO community sensibilities? It’s not the LFD system itself, but the fact that there were ways of grouping with each other outside of dungeons: crafting rifts and PvP rifts!
Both are spawned by players as server-only events, and both required General or Zone Chat spam to get the raid group started. After the game launched folks naturally gravitated to popping crafting rifts in one consistent zone, which meant that during prime time anyone could ride over and spend hours in a casual drop-in/drop-out raid group of people from your server. There wasn’t a whole lot of conversation in your average crafting rift group in my experience, but you certainly got to recognize characters and guilds and occasionally meet some neat new people. PvP rift locations varied more due to their spawn mechanics, but frequently raid groups would travel from zone to zone to kill rifts and fulfil their weekly quests. If the opposing faction showed up there was usually a great bit of strategy and communication in raid chat, not to mention teamwork.
RIFT’s LFD system worked because there were other popular ways for the server to group up and get to know each other. So, see, I’m a reasonable person! I don’t hate all automated cross-server LFD systems… just most of them.
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I missed mentioning Going Commando in the list of SWTOR blogs last week, which is weird because it’s one of my favorites. Consider it mentioned now!
I wonder if it’s server-specific end-game content that kept Rift from becoming a cesspool, or some other feature of its community that allowed it to survive. Because I think that, technically, WoW also had server-specific end-game content in its raiding, and there were PuG raids in WoW as well – some very popular ones on our old server, if I remember correctly, that kept general chat hoppin’ late-night on weekdays.
It may be a chicken/egg issue – you need a strong community to survive LFD’s shattering effect, and LFD will never let you establish one – but I think Rift’s success has to be attributed to something else in addition to its server-specific end-game content. I have no idea what that would be.
Did WoW have server-specific end-game content? I am seriously straining to recall any, but I’m probably missing something.
I think the lack of a live DPS meter (when we were playing RIFT, anyway) also contributed to a more pleasant atmosphere and better community.
“Lack of a live DPS meter…contributed to a more pleasant atmosphere and better community.” <–Bingo!
I think you can have live damage meters OR you can have the anonymity of cross-server LFD, but combining the two is like mixing ammonia and chlorine. You give people a tool to grief each other and eliminate almost any chance of consequences and you are going to end up with the hostile atmosphere that permeates WoW dungeons.
Raids! Raids used to be server-specific end-game content.
Yes, WoW did. Gates of Ahn’Qiraj. Opening the gates was a server driven effort to accumulate resources for the war. I thought it was rather neat, and sad they haven’t done something similar since.
I don’t know, I don’t think you can really call it “LFD done right” if it’s exactly the same system but appears to be less unpleasant due to some outside factor. :P
I’ve never played Rift myself, but I thought I read that after LFD was introduced the groups did become less friendly, and the dungeons were all nerfed to be puggable by a typical group that doesn’t want to talk. Did that not match your experience at all?
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