ESO "Focus on Social" - Where is it? (Player Guild Features - Letter to ZOS)

Belazarus

Dear ZOS

Hi Everyone! Hope you're all doing well and as excited as I am about the upcoming DLC, The Dark Brotherhood!
This is a post I have been planning on making for a long time, and is really for the attention of the ESO development team, but I believe (and hope) that this will resonate with many of the ESO communities out there. I don't often make big forum posts like this, but this is a subject which I am very passionate about and is close to many communities hearts.

So first, a quick introduction:

I'm Bel, and I'm the guild leader of a large, social, casual, respectful, fun loving community called Alith. We've been going for 6 years now, and have been a presence on the EU server of ESO since beta days. We have 450+ active (yes, we don't have any inactive members..) and we're all fun loving ESO fans. We have organised daily PvE events (raids, social events, competitions), and also have our own ESO video podcast called Alith-Cast. You can check out our official site at http://alitheso.com. We were one of the very first guilds to submit our "Guild Spotlight" application sadly to this day, we never got a mention, anyway!

I wanted to give you guys some background about us, so you can understand how passionate we are about ESO - our guild is a 100% ESO guild, and we are ALL about community & family.
Which brings me onto the reason for this post:

The Elder Scrolls Online - Social & Community Features (or lack of)

I really want this to be a constructive feedback post and a desperate plea for help, and is in no way meant to be negative. This is also just my own personal opinions, but I know a lot of my community share these concerns.
I have been leading this community of ours for many years, and ESO has certainly been the game we have been most passionate about, and our guild has really loved calling this game our home. It's with great sadness, therefore, that I share my real disappointment with the severe lack of guild / community features in the game, in comparison to other MMO's out there.

Of all the MMO's our community has made home in, ESO has really been the weakest in catering for player guilds & encouraging us to create real family like communities. ESO fails in some really fundamental areas, core features which any MMO really needs, to help guilds to be the best they can be. There are also countless missed opportunities, that ZOS hasn't taken advantage of yet - the ESO world of Tamriel has some fantastic ways it could incorporate & support player guilds, but for whatever reasons, ZOS really has not given player guilds any priority and has really neglected this part of the game. Communities like ours are desperate, and in urgent need of support & help.

When I heard the news in Matt Firors "Year Ahead" article at the start of the year, with the title "Focus on Social". It was music to my ears, and I thought finally we're going to get some real needed guild / community features and finally we'll be able to really integrate our communities into the game, have fun rewarding ways to build our communities (like other MMO's have). 5 months in and.... nothing. (grouping tool improvements, are not community improvements).

So of course I want this feedback to be constructive, and specific. Therefore I want to take this opportunity to point out those missing fundamentals, and also share some really simple (and some more complex) ideas / suggestions that would SERIOUSLY help all us communities who are desperately trying to make the best guild experience we can:


Missing Guild Features & Suggestions:

• Server Guild Lists & Guild Recruitment Tools - nearly every MMO i've played has some basic way of viewing in game, all the guilds on the server, and some even have mechanics for you to apply to various guilds in game, and also read some basic information about the guilds, giving the players a way to read up on guilds & apply to them, in game. ESO doesn't have this.
• Guild Activities - Again, nearly every MMO we've played, has various activities in game, designed specifically for guilds. This includes, but isn't limited to guild quests which can be picked up and completed by guild members, which then generates rewards for guilds and their members. There are SO many ways ESO could incorporate this, and again would create a way for players to spend time in game, interacting with their guilds, and doing something which will benefit their guilds.
• Guild Event Calendar - granted this is certainly more complex, but again some MMO's we've played have a calendar system where officers of the guild can post up events planned for the guild, in game. Members can then view the events on the calendar in game, and even sign up to attend them. We could use this from anything from Trials Runs, Social Events, Competitions and so on.
• Guild Halls - So this is something that ZOS could easily implement alongside player housing. Create a system where players could gradually contribute towards a guild building (or purchasing) their own guild hall. The hall could then be a place for communities to meet up, and socialise, You could possibly have some additional special guild quests that you can only pick up from the hall, and hell you could even put some special crafting stations there The possibilities are endless.
• Town & Village Capture / ownership - and I don't necessarily mean PvP! In some other MMO's i've played, there are guild systems in place where player guilds can actually capture various regions or towns in the world! By capturing the town, we could then decorate the town with our own guild branding (flags, banners etc..). There are various ways you could implement this - a popular vote election campaign (like Tera did very successfully), maybe tie it into guild questing (complete a certain amount of guild quests, and earn the chance to capture towns that way. Guilds could benefit from capturing a town by receiving a certain % of tax from all merchant transactions (and traders). Anyway, there are several various ways you could implement a town ownership system, and let's face it, Tamriel isn't lacking in towns or regions! It's also another game mechanic that will encourage your players to continue to revisit old areas!
• Guild Identity in game - Oh my, where do I start. Again ESO is seriously lacking in helping us guildies to FEEL like we're part of a community and be able to easily recognise fellow guildies. I hate to tell you but the tabard system is a very poor attempt at this. Most people don't want to cover up their shiny nice armour they worked so hard for, with bland basic guild tabards.... I could write a whole thread on guild identity features which are needed, but let me summarise with: 1. Allow us to filter the nameplates settings, so that we ONLY see nameplates above people who are IN our own guild - that way we can spot our fellow guildies out in the world easily - WITHOUT the "you must wear your tabard" condition, which defeats the object. 2. Allow us to upload our own custom guild logos / branding, so that our guilds REALLY stand out in the game, and let us display our guild logo next to our player nameplates, like most guilds do. I realise there is some immersion considerations here, but you can always allow the option to toggle on / off. The bland emblems that we currently have to choose from, just don't make our guilds stand out and don't give us that real sense of identity we need. 3. Give us other ways of identifying fellow guildies without it covering up all our armour (emblems on our shields? Capes? Guild Dye Colour Schemes? etc etc) and yes, we want to be able to display our guild branding at our guild hall and villages / towns we've captured haha. 4. Guild Leaderboards - again, a very easy way to recognise guilds achievements, you could have both PvP and PvE leaderboards, but it would work even better with the "guild questing" or reputation system I suggested earlier. There are loads of other ways you can improve guild identity in game, and these suggestions so far are just very basic and fundamental ones - food for thought.
• Guild Info section on official ESO website - as it says on the tin, why not have a dedicated area of your website where you can view, interact, and make contact with various guilds in game. A real community section which would show the guild management team, and other useful info about various guilds. And yes I know there is already a forum section for guilds, but that is really not what I am suggesting here
• Special Guild Vendors - you could tie this into the guild questing / reputation system, where player guilds can unlock special vendors which can be accessed by the guild to obtain rare & useful items! Again, multitude of ways you could incorporate this.
• Guild Ranks - why not allow us to "level up" our guild and have various guild ranks. The higher our guild level, the more features & benefits we can unlock for our members. You can make it very challenging to attain the levels, and again tie it into the guild quests giving our members another reason to keep doing the quests / activities.
• Other in game guild features - you could add some really simple but useful additions such as custom guild member polls that we can create, to allow our members to vote on various topics. Why not have some cool & special cosmetic additions that guild members of certain rank can access (like special mount armour for guild officers, or special capes for guild raid leaders, etc etc). There's just a lot of little simple quality of life changes that you could implement for guilds, which wouldn't require a lot of work.
• Guild vs Guild Wars - Ok, so even though I dislike PvP myself haha, I can certainly see the value in implementing some kind of PvP system for Guild vs Guild battles - again there are many many models out there of how you could could implement this, but its just another way of helping to create some guild pride & some friendly guild competition.
• Guild Note - I think you need to fix this, so that guild members can all update their "own" guild notes, but not others guild notes. Right now there is only an option to let EVERYONE change EVERYONE ELSES notes - but not "just" their own - doesn't work very well. As a result, in our guild, members have to "ask" an officer to change their own note for them, its very silly haha.
• Why not have some random "events" that happen in the world, similar to the dark anchors, but events that are specifically for player guilds to tackle & accomplish. Again lots of ways you could implement this, I won't go into specific examples, this thread is already quite long haha. In essence though, a reason for "Guilds" to go out into the world together, and achieve objectives (non PvP).

So there is just a handful of examples of features which I feel could be considered for the game. Actually, some of the above I believe are very basic fundamentals (such as the cosmetic changes) which are SUPER important for us communities to actually FEEL like a community in ESO.

I really am struggling to understand, why after 5 months of the "Focus on Social" announcement, we STILL really don't have any significant additions to the game for us Player Guilds. Are player guilds just not important to ZOS? I'm really baffled. Some of these changes would not require a lot of work, and would not impact any other systems in game, but would make a HUGE difference for us communities.

I have no idea if anyone from ZOS will read this, but at the very least we hope there will be other guilds out there who share our pain, and at least can relate to our frustration.
Here at Alith, we love ESO, and we love the community here - we are simply desperate for some of these basic features (and certainly would love some of the more complex ones). Yes, the PEOPLE are what matter, and that's why our guild HAS thrived and succeeded - we have amazing people. But please ZOS give us something That's all we're asking, to improve the quality of life for our communities and really help us player guilds to feel meaningful in the world of Tamriel while enabling us to interact with each other & the game in new and exciting ways.

There are another 6 months to go this year, ZOS, we are praying and trusting that you hear our plea!
The game is awesome, we just need a bit of Player Guild Love

With appreciation & love
Belazarus (Alith Guild Leader)
And the whole Alith community!



Player Guilds - Feature Wish List (Master List)
From your community:

• Server Guild Lists & Guild Recruitment Tools (In Game)
• Guild Quests
• Other Guild Activities (Challenges for guilds to accomplish out in the world)
• Guild Event Calendar (In Game)
• Guild Halls (With player housing?)
• Town, Village or Region Ownership System
• Remove Tabard dependency to display guild affiliation on nameplates
• Allow uploading custom Guild Logos (emblems etc)
• Real Guild branding in game (flags, banners, emblems on shields, capes with guild emblems, guild dye color themes, etc)
• Player Guild Leaderboards (PvP, PvE and Other Activities)
• Guild Info Hub on official ESO Website
• Guild Levels / Ranks system with linked rewards
• Special Guild Vendors
• Custom Polls in Guilds (In Game)
• Guild Mount Armor?
• Guild Rank Costumes (Officers, Raid Leaders, etc)
• Guild vs Guild Wars (PvP System)
• Improve Guild Note functionality (Let members set their own notes. Let Officers set "hidden" notes for management purposes)
• Summoning guild members to Guild Hall or other locations in the world (with recipients having the option to decline / accept summon)
• Member Roster Improvement: Show member join date and who invited
• Blacklist members from guild, without the ability to rejoin until removed from blacklist
• Guild Bank Limiting - limit volume of items players can withdraw from guild bank in 24 hours
• Improvements to guild sales info (headline figures - total sales, total tax earned, etc..)
• Guild Member Interaction ranking (have a ranking system which increased with the more guild member interaction you have - dungeons with guildies, trading with guildies, etc)
• Inactive Member tools
• More coming.........

Belazarus

Oh and by the way - I'm sure there will be many of you awesome people out there with other suggestions or ideas - I would LOVE you guys to share, and I can make a "Master Suggestions List" which will incorporate all your ideas.

This might make ZOS job easier, if they have a consolidated list of all the guild features we'd love to see in the game. Perhaps if we stand together, as community leaders in ESO, we might get our voices heard

Let's make "Focus on Social" a real thing in 2016 !

ESO Player Guilds - Unite!

Zardayne

All I can say is I agree. Their guild and social systems are terrible. The worst of any MMO I've played and I've been playing them since Ultima. I never really understood why they didn't add more but then I read an article with Matt Firor a few days ago and it really shed some light on it. From what I gather they changed course and tried to capture that Skyrim single player feel for the console crowd when the PC version wasn't doing the hottest (or they just wanted to capitalize on the console gamers wanting Skyrim 2.0). Not only that but a huge chunk of the player base just wants to play solo in these newer MMOs (I've seen this in numerous MMO polls and quite a few here). With that said I sure hope they come up with some great guild and social tools but from what I've seen so far I wouldn't best on it. These new games are mainly solo worlds with a bunch of nameless PCs running around that might as well be NPCs..

Belazarus

Zardayne wrote: »

All I can say is I agree. Their guild and social systems are terrible. The worst of any MMO I've played and I've been playing them since Ultima. I never really understood why they didn't add more but then I read an article with Matt Firor a few days ago and it really shed some light on it. From what I gather they changed course and tried to capture that Skyrim single player feel for the console crowd when the PC version wasn't doing the hottest (or they just wanted to capitalize on the console gamers wanting Skyrim 2.0). Not only that but a huge chunk of the player base just wants to play solo in these newer MMOs (I've seen this in numerous MMO polls and quite a few here). With that said I sure hope they come up with some great guild and social tools but from what I've seen so far I wouldn't best on it. These new games are mainly solo worlds with a bunch of nameless PCs running around that might as well be NPCs..

Thanks Zardayne - we can just hope that when they promise a "Focus on Social" approach, that they mean it. Taking the solo player, Skyrim-esque approach is kinda the opposite of focussing on social.

ADarklore

Belazarus wrote: »

Thanks Zardayne - we can just hope that when they promise a "Focus on Social" approach, that they mean it. Taking the solo player, Skyrim-esque approach is kinda the opposite of focussing on social.

Keep in mind, if the majority of players are mostly only interested in doing solo content, then what is the financial incentive for ZOS to devote resources to the things you mentioned? In a recent article, Matt Firor mentioned how ESO is not a 'traditional' MMO and in that article he mentioned SOLO four times. While there are a large number of players who want group content, is it enough to warrant devoting major resources to implement which would mean taking resources away from the content a majority of players are interested in.

Belazarus

ADarklore wrote: »

Belazarus wrote: »

Thanks Zardayne - we can just hope that when they promise a "Focus on Social" approach, that they mean it. Taking the solo player, Skyrim-esque approach is kinda the opposite of focussing on social.

Keep in mind, if the majority of players are mostly only interested in doing solo content, then what is the financial incentive for ZOS to devote resources to the things you mentioned? In a recent article, Matt Firor mentioned how ESO is not a 'traditional' MMO and in that article he mentioned SOLO four times. While there are a large number of players who want group content, is it enough to warrant devoting major resources to implement which would mean taking resources away from the content a majority of players are interested in.

Hi Darklore

I certainly get that, however I would argue that being that the game is indeed still an MMORPG, with player guilds, that guild functionality IS something that majority of players would want improved - and as per my suggestions, they would actually contribute directly towards game play content too. Everyone wins

ADarklore

Belazarus wrote: »

ADarklore wrote: »

Belazarus wrote: »

Thanks Zardayne - we can just hope that when they promise a "Focus on Social" approach, that they mean it. Taking the solo player, Skyrim-esque approach is kinda the opposite of focussing on social.

Keep in mind, if the majority of players are mostly only interested in doing solo content, then what is the financial incentive for ZOS to devote resources to the things you mentioned? In a recent article, Matt Firor mentioned how ESO is not a 'traditional' MMO and in that article he mentioned SOLO four times. While there are a large number of players who want group content, is it enough to warrant devoting major resources to implement which would mean taking resources away from the content a majority of players are interested in.

Hi Darklore

I certainly get that, however I would argue that being that the game is indeed still an MMORPG, with player guilds, that guild functionality IS something that majority of players would want improved - and as per my suggestions, they would actually contribute directly towards game play content too. Everyone wins

Everyone except the majority of solo players who don't participate in guild or group-related content... as focusing on this would take way ZOS' focus from solo-related content that a majority of players want. Remember that ZOS has 'exact' numbers of who participates in what content, what guilds, etc... so they know how active players are in relation to group or guild-related content. Even now we have players complaining that they have trouble finding other players to complete Undaunted pledges... which IMO clearly indicates that there is not a huge demand for group-oriented or guild-oriented content. Sure you may have 450+ players that want something like this, but in a game with hundreds of thousands of players... 450 is a small drop in the bucket.

reclaimervii.sierra117ub17_ESO

let them focus on fixing the game and pvp then worry about the casual aspect of the game

Belazarus

Ok, well I'm not sure we see this the same way - it's very clear where you stand on this. For me, some of these little cosmetic changes, will add a lot of value to all those social guilds in the game, and as far as I'm concerned can only benefit the game overall.

I'm not suggesting that they should do this "in place" of single player content, but it's been 2 years, and in that time there has been PLENTY of single player content added. Is it much to ask for a little guild-related enhancements 2 years in? Particularly as this year is their "focus on social year". I don't personally feel that's unreasonable. Maybe I'm alone on this then, but I'm keen to hear what everyone else thinks.

LadyLethalla

I'm a solo-PVE-er but... not necessarily by choice.

I'm in 5 guilds but none of them have the 'family' feel to them - one is pretty much dead anyway because almost all of those players have apparently moved on, and the last one I joined is pretty much just to help people max their crafting.

However, I would love to join a guild such as you have, @Belazarus, in order to be more social... although, having said that, I need to LEARN to be more social too... The real problem is, I don't know of any PS4 EU guild like this.


So I think the changes you've outlined are great and I can only hope that ZoS would implement some if not all.

Ra'Shtar

I specially miss guild activities, although some times they felt like a chore many times they provided a good laugh. Guild Rep vendor is also something i would like to see you would gain rep by doing activities with your guild and also dynamic events could be added and this would grant you rep as well, as a last request i HAVE to say the lack of Guild Halls is disturbing BUT even more importantly WHY you can't make a Guild Banner that you can customize and buy from a guild vendor to drop in places like you are using a trophy is even more disturbing, i can't believe we can't even create guild coat of arms just an ugly tabard that looks so not fashionable only very few people wear it I WANT MY COAT OF ARMS .

GeorgeBlack

Communities are brough together by force of need. Safety, shelter and power.
None of that is needed for ESO. The only group activities that require more than 4 people are Trials.
Safety from enemies. Shelter (respawn location, teleport options, death xp loss reduction-- guild hall),
Power= dominance/competitiveness

Guilds in order to have a different identity from one another(Banners etc) need to provide a sense of belonging. If I can solo everything by myself. Craft everything by myself why join a guild?



Guilds need pvp. Not cyrodiil.

PvP makes games meaningful. Not 4man instances from lv1 to lvmax.

Oh btw... maelstorm arena giving the top weapons? Solo instance in a mmorpg? Okey then. Solo

Zardayne

LadyLethalla wrote: »

I'm a solo-PVE-er but... not necessarily by choice.

I'm in 5 guilds but none of them have the 'family' feel to them - one is pretty much dead anyway because almost all of those players have apparently moved on, and the last one I joined is pretty much just to help people max their crafting.

However, I would love to join a guild such as you have, @Belazarus, in order to be more social... although, having said that, I need to LEARN to be more social too... The real problem is, I don't know of any PS4 EU guild like this.


So I think the changes you've outlined are great and I can only hope that ZoS would implement some if not all.

I'm on DC side on PC. I feel the same way as the Lady here..I'm part of a few loaded trade guilds that talk about selling, etc but the regular guilds I've found don't have that "family" feel of old.

Zardayne

reclaimervii.sierra117ub17_ESO wrote: »

let them focus on fixing the game and pvp then worry about the casual aspect of the game

You know they've had 2 years to "fix" the game and even though they've come a long way there's always going to be something to fix. Hell every time they add 2 things 5 break. It's the nature of patching MMOs though. I do agree we need some PVP fixes, battlegrounds, and dueling (which should have been in on release). With that said though, if you don't add some social content and help some of the guilds retain their folks, guess what, you'll be PVPing alone or with the 100 other nightblades running alone chasing each other..

Americanfunguy

Yes yes yes. Please get ZoS to see this. Some things I have already mentioned to my guild and REALLY want to see in this game are:

1: Guild halls (something which 20+ members said they would be willing to put $40's or so each for.)

2: Guild quest/guild levels. Things that can be picked up in said guild hall.

3: Guild v guild instances. We have put some great thought into this and came up with; Alliance war assults (say my guild is AD and the enemy guild is EP, the goal of this is for the EP to assassinate the AD leaders in say, Grahtwood. The AD goal is to stop EP. And vise versa for other factions.)

Those three things, personally are things I, and many people I know, want to see implemented into this game.

WalkingLegacy

We have many many many years of good and bad MMOs so MMO players know what they want in their games. Things that work so well in other games, like guild calenders, wardrobes, barber shops, battlegrounds, whatever it is you want are still missing from this game two years laters.

ESO released as if it was an MMO starting off back in 2004 in a year when plenty of matured and well off MMOs are already available. This game was in development since 2007 and if you think about it, it's missing a lot of stuff we've come to expect out of an MMO. So it's not really a surprise to see it fail as an MMO and put its eggs into the TES single-player name. Problem is it doesn't do either genre any good.

So it's no surprised they've all but given up to milk easy Skyrim players. I don't mean it to be negative but it is what it is.

RAGUNAnoOne

This needs an @Gidorick review right now guilds are only good for the occasional trial or PvP or the right to sell items it needs a revamp.

Rune_Relic

Hi Bel,

I would just like to focus in a bit more specific on the suggestions.

Would be nice to have an expandable/upgradable guild hall instance as the main reward for guild progress (shack > town).
As part of that I would like to see a right click user and 'summon to craft (guildhall station group instance)/summon to combat (PvP allies)/summon to dungeon (Group dungeon)/summon to player (adventuring)/summon to meeting (guildhall group instance)/summon to arena (Friendly fire - guildhall arena group instance)'
With the optoin to accept/reject.
This would then teleport you to summoners location, main guildhall, guildhall arena or the guildhall crafting station and 'add to group' when appropriate.
You can of course take the long route on foot, horse and wayshrine too.

I dont agree with any combat stat boosting 'power' perks for guilds.
But anything along the lines above seems fine to me.

EDIT: oooo oooo....and the guildhall should be a gold or node sink
ie you can upgrade through gold OR materials and tasks
More time and/or money invested.....the greater the guild hall
Farm/Mine/Lumber + other materials.
Maybe even a degradation over time without attention.

Belazarus

Thanks for all the responses guys and girls - keep those great ideas and suggestions coming through.

ZOS are going to add new content to the game regularly, regardless of fixes that they will always be working on, so let's do everything we can to get their attention to ensure that SOME of the new content that they are inevitably working on, will include some guild / community features

If anyone knows of a way to get the developers attention to this thread, your help would be welcomed - in the meantime though, keep those great ideas coming. And of course, let's keep the discussion friendly, respectful and mature.

sirinsidiator

I completely agree with you. I made some suggestions regarding guild management a while ago over at ESOUI.com:

• member details - show join date and who invite a member
• member blacklist - allows to ban a member from the guild and prevents reinvites until he is removed from the black list
• guild bank limit - only allow members to withdraw x items per day and only y items from a stack
• sales info - instead of making us scan the history, just give us a function that returns the overall sales, item count and taxes for a member between two points in time.
• officer notes - sometimes it would be nice if we could write something in the notes that members cannot see
• member activity stats - not sure how exactly this would work, but maybe count how often they interact with other guild members (group, chat, trade) and rate it somehow, or just provide raw data and leave it to the guild what to make of it
• inactive members - allow any number of members to be put on an inactive list where they retain their notes and other information, but cannot interact with the guild and don't count towards the member limit until they are reactivated

I also just finished a new addon which allows users to filter guild members based on tags (called badges), which I hope gains a lot of popularity and will become a feature of the game at some point.

Belazarus

Thanks @sirinsidiator !

Some great suggestions there, and that addon certainly sounds super useful.
I am still praying that someone could make an addon which will allow us to only display Nameplates on characters who ARE in one of your guilds. It's a real shame that there isn't already a filter for this, and a big oversight imo.

Additionally I strongly feel that guild names on name plates shouldn't be restricted to only those wearing tabards. I really don't understand why players are basically forced to wear those tabards if they want people to see what guild they are in out in the world.

Options are good, add a toggle, but don't force tie it into the tabard system.

Belazarus

Ok, I have created a Master Wish List for Guild Features (It's on the very first post). As you guys post your suggestions and ideas here, I will add them to the list, so ZOS have an easy to look at snapshot of ALL the ideas we've posted on this thread.

I may highlight the top 10 suggestions based on your comments, to help ZOS to view the most popular features the community want to see.

Keep em coming guys and girls

Krysalan8415

Hey Guys,

As Belazarus' Deputy in Alith no-one is going to be surprised that I agree with everything that he has outlined in his original post.

To put things into perspective however, I've been a predominantly solo player throughout my MMO career, from the old days of Ultima Online right the way through to the launch of ESO and I was always ready to champion the cause of the soloist in MMO's

Faced with the latest crop of MMO's that are very solo focused while levelling which then go on to have an end-game which practically requires you to group by default it feels as if there is something missing somehow, which for me is where guilds come in. They meet the needs of every player, the hardcore raider looking for organised 12 man groups, the casual dungeoneer who needs teammates for Pledges, the soloist and regular players who simply want a community to belong to for chat and socialising etc.

Then comes the drawbacks in ESO, guild management is a chore for both the large organised guilds and the smaller family and friends guilds. The tools required are just not there. The features that gamers have come to expect from guilds in MMO's are lacking. As Belazarus has detailed, there is a lot of value added features that can be added to truly reflect the "Focus on Social" tagline.

One of the features I had looked forward to with the release of the next patch was the promise of nameplates, imagine my excitement when I read the patch notes to see that you could filter by party members. I carried on reading and thought where is the filter that allows me to filter by members of my own guild?

I'm a self confessed Zenimax fanboi but I have to say that guys, you really dropped the ball on this one, I'm hoping you can pick up the pace again and give guilds a little bit of love in the year of "Focus on Social"

Riksis

There is a fine line between encourage group work and enforce it. Most of the time games don't really hit it, but stay far on one side of it.
Back in the days of EQ1, grouping all the way was kind of required to advance, and due to severe punishment of screw ups, also encouraged guilds to 'know your usual companions'. Then came the release of WoW and the massive commercial success of easy solo play all the way to max level, so most games up to today follow the mantra 'solo to top level', usually followed by 'then you must group'.

That usually results in a 'race to the top', whereas the game in between the start and max level is devalued. As only few players use that content, it get less and less development attention, which increases the pressure to reach max. Typical vicious circle.

I have the impression that ZOS tried to avoid or at least lessen this to appeal to the traditional Elder Scrolls-crowd, which is single player and sometimes even fear the grouping pressure. I know multiple people that played Oblivion and Skyrim for ages on end, but left ESO due to some vague feeling of being pressured into social stuff that they neither know nor want (I heard more than once that ESO does not feel like an Elder Scrolls game).

Basically they needed to promote individual game styles by reducing the efficiency of grouping and by that also guild as 'organizations of people that like to play together'. A lot of things in ESO reduce the need for coherent guild structures.

Be it the solo main quest line, or be it the ability to be in numerous guilds (if you are in multiple guilds it lessens the social cohesion in each)

As much as I hope for some of your suggestions to come live, I don't think ZOS will actually do significant changes, as it might reduce acceptance with a core user group.

It was already mentioned above, ZOS will have exact numbers of players and their activities. And if these numbers make it more feasible financially to concentrate on the current way they will not change anything.


And a personal note about guild halls: I loved it when they were introduced in EQ2, but in the end they resulted in cities completely devoid of players. So I'm all for guild halls as long as they have no real game value other than the social aspect.

sirinsidiator

Belazarus wrote: »

I am still praying that someone could make an addon which will allow us to only display Nameplates on characters who ARE in one of your guilds.

It exists since long ago and is called Social Indicators. It doesn't work with the new nameplate system yet as there is no API for it, but it shows guild names in the target frame for players that are in one of your guilds. As soon as nameplates have any sort of API I will extend it to work with them too.

Belazarus

Thanks for the very insightful input guys.

Let's not make excuses for ZOS, it feels like we're justifying the lack of Guild Features with the "Well, ESO is a single player focussed MMO, and that's their target market".

I really want us to ENCOURAGE ZOS to implement some valuable and useful features to help their ESO communities, rather than encourage them to ignore it under the "ESO is a single player experience" justification. ESO already has plenty of single player content, with plenty more incoming. It's not exactly lacking on that front

ESO can be whatever ZOS want it to be, and personally I want it to be the best MMORPG it can be - for both Single Players and Communities alike

Belazarus

sirinsidiator wrote: »

Belazarus wrote: »

I am still praying that someone could make an addon which will allow us to only display Nameplates on characters who ARE in one of your guilds.

It exists since long ago and is called Social Indicators. It doesn't work with the new nameplate system yet as there is no API for it, but it shows guild names in the target frame for players that are in one of your guilds. As soon as nameplates have any sort of API I will extend it to work with them too.

Hi Sirin

I'm aware of that addon, and have tried it, sadly it does not accomplish what I was referring to.
With Social Indicators, you still need to be actually looking at / targeting an individual to be able to see the guild name. This kinda defeats the object of being able to "spot" your fellow guildies out in the world, unless you're literally running up to every player in the vicinity and pointing at them. Also this only adds the guild name up at the top of your screen, not actually above the characters head, making it even more difficult to notice at a glance.

Indeed it needs to be incorporated into the name plates. We want to be able to spot our guildies running around in the world, without having to target them first.

Rune_Relic

Belazarus wrote: »

sirinsidiator wrote: »

Belazarus wrote: »

I am still praying that someone could make an addon which will allow us to only display Nameplates on characters who ARE in one of your guilds.

It exists since long ago and is called Social Indicators. It doesn't work with the new nameplate system yet as there is no API for it, but it shows guild names in the target frame for players that are in one of your guilds. As soon as nameplates have any sort of API I will extend it to work with them too.

Hi Sirin

I'm aware of that addon, and have tried it, sadly it does not accomplish what I was referring to.
With Social Indicators, you still need to be actually looking at / targeting an individual to be able to see the guild name. This kinda defeats the object of being able to "spot" your fellow guildies out in the world, unless you're literally running up to every player in the vicinity and pointing at them. Also this only adds the guild name up at the top of your screen, not actually above the characters head, making it even more difficult to notice at a glance.

Indeed it needs to be incorporated into the name plates. We want to be able to spot our guildies running around in the world, without having to target them first.

Are you suggeting an Auto Guild Member Tag in the same manner as the Auto Faction Tag above players in PvP ?
Side by side perhaps.
That way it doesnt have to cater to 100s of potential brands but merely be an indicator for a guildy for one of the guilds you belong to.
Perhaps a friend indicator too for the friends list as well as the guilds list ?

Riksis

@Belazarus
I did not try to make excuse for ZOS, I just feel that they decided already long ago which side of the line they stand, and extend their foothold there. The result we see.

It is also a vicious cycle here, just on the other side of the line. I have yet to find a game which truly caters for both the solo and the grouping crowd.

I'd love if they would introduce more guild related features and encourage grouping. But in any change there is the risk that it alienates more players than it brings in new players, which makes it financially viable to not touch it at all and continue on status quo.

If you do only cosmetic changes, than it might not be enough for some people while on the other side the first players will shout about wasted effort.
If you do changes that effect gameplay than it might satisfy the people that want changes (but surely not all of them as their wishes will be diverse as well), while on the other side an uproar starts. If put to an extreme extend you see SWG and its NGE.

So can it be better than the current status? Of course it can. But is it worth the risk of putting effort there?
It boils down to a simple effort-impact-matrix. To make significant changes it is definitely a high effort/high impact project which most companies tend to avoid.


hmmm, re-reading it it still sounds like I make excuses, even though I wanted to avoid it.
So long story short: I hope you're right and some changes can be encouraged. But I'm inherent pessimistic about it.

And there are advantages in a more pessimistic approach: If you're surprised, it is definitely a positive surprise

Belazarus

Rune_Relic wrote: »

Belazarus wrote: »

sirinsidiator wrote: »

Belazarus wrote: »

I am still praying that someone could make an addon which will allow us to only display Nameplates on characters who ARE in one of your guilds.

It exists since long ago and is called Social Indicators. It doesn't work with the new nameplate system yet as there is no API for it, but it shows guild names in the target frame for players that are in one of your guilds. As soon as nameplates have any sort of API I will extend it to work with them too.

Hi Sirin

I'm aware of that addon, and have tried it, sadly it does not accomplish what I was referring to.
With Social Indicators, you still need to be actually looking at / targeting an individual to be able to see the guild name. This kinda defeats the object of being able to "spot" your fellow guildies out in the world, unless you're literally running up to every player in the vicinity and pointing at them. Also this only adds the guild name up at the top of your screen, not actually above the characters head, making it even more difficult to notice at a glance.

Indeed it needs to be incorporated into the name plates. We want to be able to spot our guildies running around in the world, without having to target them first.

Are you suggeting an Auto Guild Member Tag in the same manner as the Auto Faction Tag above players in PvP ?
Side by side perhaps.
That way it doesnt have to cater to 100s of potential brands but merely be an indicator for a guildy for one of the guilds you belong to.
Perhaps a friend indicator too for the friends list as well as the guilds list ?

Yup, those are good suggestions. Really if there was a simple toggle in the settings along the lines of: "Tick this to only view nameplates of players who are a member of XXX guild" so we could easily spot our guild mates out in the world.

Though an indicator would also be good, if it was directly next to the name on the name plate. Friends indicator would be great too.

Hemaka

ADarklore wrote: »

Everyone except the majority of solo players who don't participate in guild or group-related content... as focusing on this would take way ZOS' focus from solo-related content that a majority of players want. Remember that ZOS has 'exact' numbers of who participates in what content, what guilds, etc... so they know how active players are in relation to group or guild-related content. Even now we have players complaining that they have trouble finding other players to complete Undaunted pledges... which IMO clearly indicates that there is not a huge demand for group-oriented or guild-oriented content. Sure you may have 450+ players that want something like this, but in a game with hundreds of thousands of players... 450 is a small drop in the bucket.

If it's the ZOS who has the "exact" numbers as you said - how do you know that "majority" wants this or that? If you're saying that players have problems finding dungeon groups, maybe it's actually because lots of people are in guilds and do the dungeons with other members? Judging by topics on these forums I could speculate that most ESO players are PVP-oriented (balance this, balance that, don't nerf my favourite skill by 1% or I'll quit), which obviously isn't truth. We don't know numbers, but i simply won't believe that this is the only MMO in which "majority" of players are soloing.

Anyway - truth is that even 12 years old games (Lineage 2 for example) shortly after launch had more developed guild features than ESO has now. After Dark Brotherhood we'll propably have only 2 more dlcs this year and it would be wonderful if one of them (perhaps the one with housing implementation) would do something for all the great guild communities we have here.
Personally, I would love to have some kind of Guild Halls or Guild Missions (like in Guild Wars 2) awarding points that improve the guild's level. Maybe even Guild Research (again - GW2) with an option to buy some timed buffs for all members (+10% experience, gold etc.). Plenty of possibilities and we don't need all of them, just few.

Thanks Bel for creating this topic, maybe ZOS will hear us someday