Let's talk: what would make YOU want to group?

[peterthepan3]

I am a casual player who plays to chill out after work.
I have a missis and a seven year old daughter sobI have no time for drama. I find organised groups can be a bit overly dramatic with people complaining and frustrations overflowing. Not just here, it's an issue in all games.

I am happiest left to my own devices pugging and solo roaming. I intend to join my guild's warband days when time allows, if nothing else to yell out Khazalid warcries and go full Dwarf. Roleplay is a thing for me.

Fair enough. You have other obligations that naturally take precedence. It's good to see that you still manage to participate in the BT warbands. Lots of respect for BT and their willingness to organise.

Two Biggest issue I have playing in a group

A) group leased is afk, weak, indecisive and/ or can't control his group
B) group that runs from a fight, rather have a good fight and lose than run.

A) If the group lead is weak in this respect, what would be the best course of action? Tell him what they are doing wrong? Offer to lead in his stead? I see a lot of people that seem 'forced' to lead, and don't really want to (especially in pug warbands). Perhaps what we need are more 'born leaders', i.e. people with a knack for leading, who can take the bullshit and know how best to anticipate a situation? Ocara is good at this, as was Sacrx.

B) Well, while running away from a fight can be seen as 'cowardly', surely it is often the best course of action? If you are a group of 6, does it really serve any purpose to just charge into a group of 24/let them overwhelm you?

[Samejima]

Group/player search requests in /lfg channel are more or less ignored by most players. Asking 1-2 hours without a response is demotivating to say the least.

This has largely been my experience as well. The really bizarre part is, on a few occasions I have LFG for ruin farming for hour+ with no response, then finally once I get two others we head to Orkwerks in Eataine. Every time without fail within 15 minutes a few other random people will show up uninvited, often the same classes I was spamming LFG for for ages. People are keeping an eye out to see Orkwerks light up on the map but apparently don't know how to /w to join a party.

I love this game, but I have found the community to be in some ways weirdly antisocial for an MMO. In T1 I remember there were a couple times where we had a good 20-30+ people fighting in Nordland for half an hour or more with no warband. I was in and out when Scenario queues popped but when I'd get back I'd see people ask, "Is there a wb??" and no one would reply. I thought maybe there was one but it was private, since how could there be no warband? Finally I realized there wasn't one, so I made it and it filled up almost immediately.

I recently played FF14 a bit and while I didn't like it very much people were happy to group, random people would stop to help you out, or just make conversation, and if you were not in a guild you got tons of invites. And every other MMO I've played, people have been more chatty/inclined to group, I feel.

[Telperien]

For me are required Comms. I used to hate talking while focusing on my game. Now it's ok for but only with ppl I know. Joining random /5 group and listen to their chats (v often they are bunch of friends with one or two slots open). I think some working add-on like War's Enemy calling feature would help a lot.

[peterthepan3]

For me are required Comms. I used to hate talking while focusing on my game. Now it's ok for but only with ppl I know. Joining random /5 group and listen to their chats (v often they are bunch of friends with one or two slots open). I think some working add-on like War's Enemy calling feature would help a lot.

Fair enough. For what it's worth, some of the best players I've been in comms with are those who have never said a word, but just listened.

[Crenshaw]

I assume you are speaking of joining up groups and forming warbands in rvr lakes. What makes me never ever join pug warbands is maybe fact of having to count on other people which are often not putting any effort in the game, or it may be just my loner nature. Sure i like to have some 6man plays from time to time, but the most joy i find in rvr is roaming solo, all on my own doing pvp and looking for challange. I find way more join in getting one good 1v1 with opponent that vastly outranks me than beating the other blob on lake. Joining pug to afk at BO / roam endlessly on lake getting 20 renown for tagging ? Nope, thanks. I get that its group based game, its it main focus and should be the most enjoyable thing but im not really into big commitment to rvr zone. I dont care who wins, really not at all. Big ass zergs pushing themselves from camp to camp isnt fun to me. I like good smallscale fights and thats what matters to me.
Scenarios on the other hand are the opposite, i really prefare to run with some organised group.
What would make me want to group up with pug? Dont know really, theres nothing intresting for me in zerging atm. But its personal preferance and i really appriceate effort put into trying to getting rvr pugging a better experience, even if its not my object of interest.
Theres also argument that was used here already - coms. Some voice com is mandatory to coordinate group and play better but often i just want to listen to music and run on my own, not bothering to join guild runs.

[Sulorie]

Playing in a group requires more time as well. There are 5 others who could go afk at different times, especially, when they don't have the same play schedule.
You can play half a dozen solo sc before your group is made and ready to go. Standing in IC and waiting for the last player can sometimes take a lot time, while you basically waste your game session.

Being able to listen to voice chat is all what most organized groups demand and that is fine.

[Draugris]

I love to group in organized play but

1.) i am not in a guild and i did not see any organized warbands offer or accept randoms
2.) i love organized play but not at all costs. I like to play in a friendly atmosphere (it´s at the end of the day a game and not work) and more often than not playing with progress oriented players it is the opposite. I made very bad and also very good experience in GW2, it is not easy to find people with a competitive mindset that are also people enjoyable beeing around.
3.) i dont´t have a level 40 right now so i guess i would not be that useful anyway ^^

[Darosh]

Pretty much TenTon's experience all over, with a bit of something on top ~ I wish I could group the few times I am online nowdays, but it is arguably pointless doing so without the ability to use voice chat and being on a clock constantly.

It might help to change the guild system a bit, iirc having inactive players does something to the guild ranking or w/e ~ imho, there shouldn't be a problem having a big roster/inactives, if its not years in between logins...
Sadly there is little point in joining guilds for me atm, given most act upon on a two-week limit and I
can't be arsed to deal with at times pretty petty derps in an attempt to rejoin; creating a guild isn't worth the headaches either.

Incoherent rambling:

Spoiler:

Generally speaking:
One could toss some mandatory thing into the upcoming Gunbad dungeon, or add it to BL and similar activites ~ create some giant questchain that has both, PvE and PvP components so that 'badish groups' have an incentive to stay together and an opportunity to grow together (BL is commonly considered a chore, PvP happens every once in a thousand blue moons and fails to give groups an opportinity to conclude the below); PvE components would serve as banter/break time, the PvP components might prompt 'look how good we do, lets stay together'.
At best have the above be instanced in some way (maybe use the old Skaven thing?), take a bit longer and be tuned in a way that pits pickup groups against pickup groups and proper premade against proper premade; if need be pugs against pickup group, so that players are more inclined to conclude the above ~ playing in a group > pugging.
Sure, it'd be a bit evil to tamper with the matchmaking like this, but it might be able to deliver the first fix - pickup group versus proper premade just ends in 'why bother?' or the even worse 'gawd my teammates are bad, why bother grouping (with them)?', which hardcore-pugs and new players are prone to believe upon experiencing it.

TLDR: Pug bootcamp in questchain form; playing with PvE, PvP components and instancing to basically create a narrative and incentive to stay together or atleast conclude 'grouping good; less stressful, more fun - pugging bad, eww'.

Bleh.

Abbd.: Make it so groups doing the entire chain get a some form of bonus or smth/add maybe a timer-based objective for proper premades for the luls, make sure groups that did the chain already can't join the instanced/PvP parts - so scrub premades can't farm pugs by virtue of the questchain; find a way to reliably differentiate between proper premade and pickup premade, some account/guild-based tag or guild-esque team system (like WoW's old arenateam system, with a limit to its active players)... You could incorporate something like this into the SC matchmaking and make it more likely for premades to meet each other, scale rewards and so on.
Players playing in such a predefined group/with fellow teammates get a bonus to RR/loot, this way more players would be inclined to join a group and a guild - even if just formally initially, the requirement of playing together to get more shinies woulddo its thing on the long run.
Keep in mind, people playing in 6man or any organized format don't have gear/RR issues to begin with, the bonus to shinies is basicially superficial - a pug bait.
You could more easily regulate matchmaking, progression, all the timesinks there are, balance by stats derived from team-specific makeups, content as such (e.g.: ladder-esque system for 6mans) yada yada.

Abbd.:
Note: Pug used for individuals, pickup group for groups formed via /5 and alike, premade for established groups.

E: Bloody tablet - format, words.

[szejoza]

For me it depends on what I'm about to do, sometimes I want to play solo just to keep my personal skills from rusting (which is hard to measure while you are part of WB). Outside of guild events it depends heavily on what's going on around me irl, if I know I'll have the time I'll join groups for whatever I wish to do, otherwise my gaming is pretty hectic and it's not surprising to see me afk in the middle of the fight cause something came up

[blackwatch1508]

I mostly go PuG because of lack of constant/erratic play times, and I don't have the ability and/or desire to use voice coms(biggest reason). People mostly just yap on voice coms. I understand quick accurate communication and its impact on group coordination, but most of the dialog going on is just people yapping. I like to listen to music, maybe a book on tape while I play not a bunch of cursing/bitching/whining/or stuff about the internet/RL.