That Guy we always end up kicking from group (You're not going to like it)

MrSensible

This is going to be a discussion about CP balance, dungeon balance, and balancing player goals.

I play ESO primarily with two friends who I've known for a long time. We all played at launch, but quickly got bored with the game and quit. 4 years later (about a month ago now) we all decided to get back into it and give it another shot. Primarily, we love to do dungeons together and have worked our way through all the normal dungeon story content. I rolled tank, one rolled dps, and one rolled healer (we didn't plan this, it just sort of happened).

First, let me say that the game is a lot better today than it was 4 years ago. And I think the ZOS team has done an amazing job. Secondly, I think every dungeon is beautifully designed and PERFECTLY tuned, however, this tuning is oddly specific (which I will get into later).

But first, let's talk about the guy we have had to kick from 90% of our dungeon runs. Because there's only three of us, and we use the dungeon finder often, we end up with a random fourth. Our pickup, more often than not, fits the following criteria:

1. Doesn't care that WE want to do the story quest in the dungeon and just wants to speed through at warp 9.
2. Pulls enemies while we talk to NPCs.
3. Rushes head first into every pull (in light armor) then expects me to pull aggro off of them.
4. Stands in every red circle ever.
5. Cries when he/she dies from the above things.
6. Has 8 billion champion points.

Going forward, I shall refer to the above hypothetical player as "That Guy".

Now let's talk about the difficulty tuning of a simple dungeon like Fungal Grotto. FG-Normal can be sleep-walked through in 15 minutes by a 750CP sorcerer who is spamming lightning splash, while eating his dinner and watching Rick and Morty. FG-Normal provides no challenge for That Guy. And in terms of fun-value, offers him nothing at all. It is not designed for That Guy. It never has been and never will be.

So, who is FG-Normal designed for? Well, as I said, the tuning is perfect and is very specific. It's designed for fresh level 10-15s, who are still learning how to interrupt, have 3 abilities on their skill bar (maybe don't even have an ultimate yet) and are wearing greens and white gear. And you know what? It is the PERFECT difficulty level for that specific goal. We ended up kicking That Guy from our FG-Normal group, and 3-manned the rest in our white, level 10 gear, and had a blast.

Additionally, I would daresay that all normal dungeons are actually tuned for 3-manning. As we have had to kick That Guy 90% of the time, we have 3-manned almost every normal dungeon. And the difficulty has always felt juuuuust right. I would like to give special mention to ICP and Mazzatun - which were the most fun 3-mans we had. They were absolutely amazing. Some of the best dungeons I have ever done in an MMO. They were perfectly tuned for 3 CP100s (and were not at all tuned for That Guy), had awesome boss fights with fun mechanics, and had great quests with interesting characters.

And look, I get it, I really do. That Guy is on his 150th run through Fungal Grotto. He only queued up so he could do his daily or so he could farm some obscure piece of equipment to complete his armor collection. Or maybe That Guy has a LOT of fun just steamrolling through content like a Mac Truck through an ice cream stand. I don't know. And to be honest, I really don't care. Because me and my friends don't. We want to DO the dungeon quests. We want to figure out the fights (which doesn't mean: watch a youtube video or read a guide). And we definitely DON'T want to be carried through by That Guy because he can ignore 99% of the mechanics due to his CP level.

The last thing I wanted to talk about is that other 10%. The other 10% of the time, we get a guy who falls right within our level range. Or, he has a ton of CP, but doesn't meet the above criteria. We ran White-Gold Tower Normal with a guy who hadn't beat it after owning it for 3 years (how is that even possible?). He had 750 CP and did NONE of the things that That Guy does. He was awesome. We had a blast with him, and added him to friends.

Which brings us to the real point of this thread.

TL;DR
"A kick happens when people's goals don't line up." - Some Smart Guy On ESO Forums in Another Thread
How do we get people's goals to line up better in random dungeon groups? Right now, they usually don't seem to line up at all. Dungeons aren't designed for That Guy. It's not That Guys fault he has too much CP or is too good at the game. How do we give That Guy more challenge? And should ZOS even care?

idk

MrSensible wrote: »

This is going to be a discussion about CP balance, dungeon balance, and balancing player goals.

1. Doesn't care that WE want to do the story quest in the dungeon and just wants to speed through at warp 9.
2. Pulls enemies while we talk to NPCs.
3. Rushes head first into every pull (in light armor) then expects me to pull aggro off of them.
4. Stands in every red circle ever.
5. Cries when he/she dies from the above things.

?

Why does an OP that states it has to do with CP balance, dungeon balance have anything to do with bad or annoying players. That list there has nothing to do with either of those two topic./

Edit; after skimming through the rest, it seems like you and your band of merry players should just not bother with the GF. It seems like you can handle the normal dungeons yourself but are also wanting a very specific type of person joining you.

You will probably enjoy it more.

AlienatedGoat

So what I'm seeing is you queued into LFG, saw That Guy, and you discriminated against him and kicked from your group, even though he hadn't been a jerk etc.

Here's the question: Why even queue into LFG? If your awesomesauce 3-man is sooo good, why not just travel to the dungeon yourselves?

Don't queue into LFG and then get on your high horse. People of all sorts queue into LFG, and they are all just as entitled to run in LFG. You have zero right to kick someone just because they don't meet the standards of your sight-seeing slowroll 3-man. We've run those dungeons a thousand times or more, and you're wasting other peoples time and yours by queuing into something and kicking people when you can do it by yourselves.

TL;DR
Don't queue into LFG with your slowroll 3-man if you're going to kick people who don't play the way you wanna play.

It doesn't make you the good guy. It makes you the ***.

MrSensible

idk wrote: »

Why does an OP that states it has to do with CP balance, dungeon balance have anything to do with bad or annoying players. That list there has nothing to do with either of those two topic./

That Guy doesn't behave that way because he's a bad or annoying player. He behaves that way because he has no reason not to. This, in my opinion, is a combination result of CP imbalance/dungeon balance and the goals that people have when they queue up. If you had read the rest of the post, you would know this. Hell, even the TL;DR tells you this.

Linaleah

the only solution I could offer you guys is not to queue and just walk in instead, since you figured out that its perfectly good with just 3 of you. you sound like a great bunch of people for a particular kind of person and good god i would have love to run into you when playing. but... walking in, or baring that - advertising for specific kind of fourth in zone chat and THEN queueing for random rewards or forming a guild for likeminded people is honestly the only way to avoid wasting your time or that of "That guy"

AH93

Good on you guys for playing the way you like, as mentioned above, I would suggest simply walking to the dungeon entrances though to save the trouble kicking, or the potential drama it could cause.
But nice to see other players who like to take their time and enjoy the story of the dungeons, didn't think there was anyone left who didn't bull rush ahead.

Odnoc

I can't stand grouping with "that guy" either.

krachall

The problem isn't with That Guy, it's with ZOS. Praise their balance all you want but That Guy has to use the same exact dungeon finder to find people who won't crawl through trivial content that you have to use to find people who want to make a 4 minute dungeon take 20 minutes.

Daily Random Normals are the best way in the game to build skill levels (in case you didn't know, once you have a character with "8 billion CPs," all your characters have 8 billion CPs) so a new level 50 has high CPs but most skills below 50. He needs the Dungeon Finder as much as you do...

Basically you've said that your enjoyment of a dungeon's slow pace is more important than his time. He could make an identical post from the other viewpoint and be equally as correct.

Odnoc

Phage wrote: »

So what I'm seeing is you queued into LFG, saw That Guy, and you discriminated against him and kicked from your group, even though he hadn't been a jerk etc.

Here's the question: Why even queue into LFG? If your awesomesauce 3-man is sooo good, why not just travel to the dungeon yourselves?

Don't queue into LFG and then get on your high horse. People of all sorts queue into LFG, and they are all just as entitled to run in LFG. You have zero right to kick someone just because they don't meet the standards of your sight-seeing slowroll 3-man. We've run those dungeons a thousand times or more, and you're wasting other peoples time and yours by queuing into something and kicking people when you can do it by yourselves.

TL;DR
Don't queue into LFG with your slowroll 3-man if you're going to kick people who don't play the way you wanna play.

It doesn't make you the good guy. It makes you the ***.

I'm sure the developers and designers put hundreds of hours into the details so they can be ignored.

Maybe if people played the game how it was designed to be played....

MrSensible

krachall wrote: »

The problem isn't with That Guy, it's with ZOS. Praise their balance all you want but That Guy has to use the same exact dungeon finder to find people who won't crawl through trivial content that you have to use to find people who want to make a 4 minute dungeon take 20 minutes.

Daily Random Normals are the best way in the game to build skill levels (in case you didn't know, once you have a character with "8 billion CPs," all your characters have 8 billion CPs) so a new level 50 has high CPs but most skills below 50. He needs the Dungeon Finder as much as you do...

Basically you've said that your enjoyment of a dungeon's slow pace is more important than his time. He could make an identical post from the other viewpoint and be equally as correct.

You are exactly correct on every point, here. Especially the last one. Yes, my enjoyment > your enjoyment. It will always be this way. BUT, that doesn't mean I don't want you or That Guy to also have fun. I get no pleasure from voting to kick That Guy from group. I want to play with That Guy, but I want him to get as much out of the dungeon as I do.

How can we make this happen? Is it possible?

Gargath

I'd say put 4 treasure master chests at each quest area of a dungeon, that would stop the people who don't have quests, from rushing ahead. Give them some lock picking job with hard difficulty .
Or maybe set a bunch of doors, which won't open untill the last quest line of all players in group is being scrolled.

krachall

Odnoc wrote: »

Phage wrote: »

So what I'm seeing is you queued into LFG, saw That Guy, and you discriminated against him and kicked from your group, even though he hadn't been a jerk etc.

Here's the question: Why even queue into LFG? If your awesomesauce 3-man is sooo good, why not just travel to the dungeon yourselves?

Don't queue into LFG and then get on your high horse. People of all sorts queue into LFG, and they are all just as entitled to run in LFG. You have zero right to kick someone just because they don't meet the standards of your sight-seeing slowroll 3-man. We've run those dungeons a thousand times or more, and you're wasting other peoples time and yours by queuing into something and kicking people when you can do it by yourselves.

TL;DR
Don't queue into LFG with your slowroll 3-man if you're going to kick people who don't play the way you wanna play.

It doesn't make you the good guy. It makes you the ***.

I'm sure the developers and designers put hundreds of hours into the details so they can be ignored.

Maybe if people played the game how it was designed to be played....

Since you only get XP for doing the dungeon once, I'd say it's design to be played without talking to the NPCs after that first time run. So That Guy is playing closer to the dungeon design than people talking to the same NPCs the 2nd or 20th time.

Linaleah

MrSensible wrote: »

krachall wrote: »

The problem isn't with That Guy, it's with ZOS. Praise their balance all you want but That Guy has to use the same exact dungeon finder to find people who won't crawl through trivial content that you have to use to find people who want to make a 4 minute dungeon take 20 minutes.

Daily Random Normals are the best way in the game to build skill levels (in case you didn't know, once you have a character with "8 billion CPs," all your characters have 8 billion CPs) so a new level 50 has high CPs but most skills below 50. He needs the Dungeon Finder as much as you do...

Basically you've said that your enjoyment of a dungeon's slow pace is more important than his time. He could make an identical post from the other viewpoint and be equally as correct.

You are exactly correct on every point, here. Especially the last one. Yes, my enjoyment > your enjoyment. It will always be this way. BUT, that doesn't mean I don't want you or That Guy to also have fun. I get no pleasure from voting to kick That Guy from group. I want to play with That Guy, but I want him to get as much out of the dungeon as I do.

How can we make this happen? Is it possible?

it's not. not in the same group. your goals and preferences are directly opposite of each other and there is nothing ZoS can possibly do to change that. you cannot make someone enjoy the slower pace when they prefer faster one. if above suggestion gets implemented of locking doors until quest is progressed, not only would they have to change how dungeon quests work, but it would STILL make "that guy" not have fun. becasue for them having to wait - is not fun.

the only way both you and That guy can both have fun is if you do it in different groups.

Smasherx74

MrSensible wrote: »

But first, let's talk about the guy we have had to kick from 90% of our dungeon runs. Because there's only three of us, and we use the dungeon finder often, we end up with a random fourth. Our pickup, more often than not, fits the following criteria:

1. Doesn't care that WE want to do the story quest in the dungeon and just wants to speed through at warp 9.
2. Pulls enemies while we talk to NPCs.
3. Rushes head first into every pull (in light armor) then expects me to pull aggro off of them.
4. Stands in every red circle ever.
5. Cries when he/she dies from the above things.
6. Has 8 billion champion points.

This is L2P issue, if you can't sustain yourself then don't pull. For people like you absorbing quest information it doesn't hurt to have the trash mobs wiped out. The other day I played with some low CP players who wanted to sit around waiting for dialog. I went ahead and took out the trash mobs then waiting for boss.

ChunkyCat

Too long.

Can someone post the answer? Who’s the guy they always kick from the group?

idk

MrSensible wrote: »

idk wrote: »

Why does an OP that states it has to do with CP balance, dungeon balance have anything to do with bad or annoying players. That list there has nothing to do with either of those two topic./

That Guy doesn't behave that way because he's a bad or annoying player. He behaves that way because he has no reason not to. This, in my opinion, is a combination result of CP imbalance/dungeon balance and the goals that people have when they queue up. If you had read the rest of the post, you would know this. Hell, even the TL;DR tells you this.

Which seems like you and your friends should avoid the GF since it is only 10% of the time you find someone that suits your group and you are able to handle the normal dungeons without the extra person just fine.

That is what seems sensible.

krachall

A clunky solution would be some check boxes you could select to narrow down the search.

- Speed run or slow run
- Experienced players or inexperienced players
- Self supporting or group reliant (BONUS: Select self supporting and the dungeon finder will not hold you to the tank/healer/dps/dps roles!)
- Loot seeking or XP seeking

The obvious problem with this is that the queues are already insanely long for DPS and this would make them longer.

VilniusNastavnik

As someone who has only an hour after work every few days to jump on and play the game, and is max CP...

If I queue into LFG, it means I have enlightenment to burn. I look for the most efficient pathway to get from point A to point B. Best way to burn that is my daily random normal. You can bet your wrasse i'm going to go bull at a gate. I'm here to burn enlightenment, not partake in the same story content I have done on several characters 100s of times. I queue though as a tank on my magsorc who can do both rolls in normal dungeons, so I'm usually the one doing 60% of the DPS and the tanking roll. Means I can pull, clear, and keep going whether you want to do story or not. I will ask when I first get in if people are doing quest. If yes, ill slow down at certain points to allow you to get the quest flag triggered so you can proceed to the next stage, but if you want to sit there and read every line of text, and listen to every bit of dialogue.. get you're three man and walk into the dungeon. Don't use the finder to waste everyone else's time.

Ectheliontnacil

MrSensible wrote: »

krachall wrote: »

The problem isn't with That Guy, it's with ZOS. Praise their balance all you want but That Guy has to use the same exact dungeon finder to find people who won't crawl through trivial content that you have to use to find people who want to make a 4 minute dungeon take 20 minutes.

Daily Random Normals are the best way in the game to build skill levels (in case you didn't know, once you have a character with "8 billion CPs," all your characters have 8 billion CPs) so a new level 50 has high CPs but most skills below 50. He needs the Dungeon Finder as much as you do...

Basically you've said that your enjoyment of a dungeon's slow pace is more important than his time. He could make an identical post from the other viewpoint and be equally as correct.

You are exactly correct on every point, here. Especially the last one. Yes, my enjoyment > your enjoyment. It will always be this way. BUT, that doesn't mean I don't want you or That Guy to also have fun. I get no pleasure from voting to kick That Guy from group. I want to play with That Guy, but I want him to get as much out of the dungeon as I do.

How can we make this happen? Is it possible?

Solo dungeons are the obvious answer.

But since your approach to doing dungeons is somewhat unorthodox, try recruiting via chat (especially in starter zones if you want lvl 10s) so that people know that what they're getting into.

Rushing through normal and veteran dungeons at high speed is what most people do. Dungeons are very old and worn out content and most people only do it because they need set pieces or undaunted points. With that in mind, it's inevitable that you will always end up with "that guy". Still, if you ask politely he may agree to do the dungeon slowly and let you do the quests.

I really can't emphasize this enough though: The group finder is a tool to find a group for completing a dungeon. Minimal social interaction is involved, you don't have to find people yourself, the system does it for you. So the very nature of the GF should hint that it's designed for quick and efficient dungeon clears. Group members have only one thing in common -wanting to finish the dungeon, not a shared love for questing.

VaranisArano

If you have specific goals from a dungeon (whether that's a fast run, slow run, gear run, whatever) anything beyond "I would be happy with getting a random group member of widely varying goals and skills"...

I strongly suggest you don't use the groupfinder to get a random group member and instead stick to making your own group from zone, guild, or your friends.

Seriously, asking groupfinder to give you a random group member gets you a random group member. Its Groupfinder, not a Dating Site for Dungeon Partners.

MrSensible

Linaleah wrote: »

it's not. not in the same group. your goals and preferences are directly opposite of each other and there is nothing ZoS can possibly do to change that. you cannot make someone enjoy the slower pace when they prefer faster one. if above suggestion gets implemented of locking doors until quest is progressed, not only would they have to change how dungeon quests work, but it would STILL make "that guy" not have fun. becasue for them having to wait - is not fun.

the only way both you and That guy can both have fun is if you do it in different groups.

Well that's a shame, and certainly not the answer I was hoping for. And I can understand that waiting is not fun. Hell, after my 50th Fungal Grotto run, I can't promise that I won't also become That Guy. But I don't want to be That Guy. I think it would be beneficial all-around if we could just find any way of bridging that gap between my goals and That Guys goals.

Something I had thought of before is just having a CP cap on dungeons. No CP for normals. 160 CP for Vets (or whatever, just an example).

Colecovision

So the rest of the forum makes many of us too uncomfortable to queue for not being good enough. CP750 and I still haven't queued for anything I can't solo. Now, I find out that I am also am the problem if I can solo it. nFG1 is about a 10 minute solo at this point. So that's bad now too.

I guess as long as I'm not good or bad or casual or hardcore or slow or in a hurry, then I can play? Awesome sauce.

Do Tamriel a favor and find your fourth guy in zone or guild chat or even here. There are lots of people that wish they had a group like yours. You are in an odd situation where you can be a great guy, by finding that lucky person who wants a group but not the pressure, or you can be a total jerk by kicking someone because they don't fit your preconceived group. Being nice is an extra effort, but I certainly hope you choose that.

Eyro

ChunkyCat wrote: »

Too long.

Can someone post the answer? Who’s the guy they always kick from the group?

I’m not that guy... obviously...

kjones0996

I say good for you OP. When I que in with my buddy and my wife (a tank and a healer) for vet DLC dungeons we kick people as soon as they pop based on their CP and class. We don't suffer MagWarden or MagTemplars for dps. We don't suffer low CP players unless they know the mechanics. Why do we do this? Because we have the controlling power. When we get a fourth DPS who can put up the numbers needed and follow the mechanics to beat a vet DLC dungeon we invite him to the party and everything goes smoothly. Some of us don't always have the time to be good Samaritans and walk people through vet content when they haven't even done it on normal. That's our right and our choice as a three man group.

Linaleah

MrSensible wrote: »

Linaleah wrote: »

it's not. not in the same group. your goals and preferences are directly opposite of each other and there is nothing ZoS can possibly do to change that. you cannot make someone enjoy the slower pace when they prefer faster one. if above suggestion gets implemented of locking doors until quest is progressed, not only would they have to change how dungeon quests work, but it would STILL make "that guy" not have fun. becasue for them having to wait - is not fun.

the only way both you and That guy can both have fun is if you do it in different groups.

Well that's a shame, and certainly not the answer I was hoping for. And I can understand that waiting is not fun. Hell, after my 50th Fungal Grotto run, I can't promise that I won't also become That Guy. But I don't want to be That Guy. I think it would be beneficial all-around if we could just find any way of bridging that gap between my goals and That Guys goals.

Something I had thought of before is just having a CP cap on dungeons. No CP for normals. 160 CP for Vets (or whatever, just an example).

I'm sorry but its not going to work. their goals will still be their goals. trying to change content will only make it onfun for either you, or them, or both. this is why in general, people tend to stick to like minded people for their enjoyment, rather then forcing everyone one way or another to enjoy the same thing. well that is if their end goal is for everyone to get to have fun.

the solution for you is NOT try to change the content in hopes that that guy may change their goals. they will not. the solution is for you to look for people like the 10% you run in to - to play through dungeons at the pace you ALL enjoy.

bear in mind. a full premade group can STILL queue up for random dungeon and get all its rewards. a full premade group can also queue up for specific dungeon and ALSO get all the rewards. you do not have to have a random person join you. last but not least, while you have to discover entrances to earliest dungeons before you can fast travel to them - DLC dungeons discover automatically, the moment you have access to that DLC. so if you enjoy white gold tower or imperial prison but don't want to hoof it through Cyrodill to get to them.. you don't have to.

Aluneth

This is perfectly fine. You're the type of guy that I kick from my groups, so it balances it out.

Yolokin_Swagonborn

Gargath wrote: »

I'd say put 4 treasure master chests at each quest area of a dungeon, that would stop the people who don't have quests, from rushing ahead. Give them some lock picking job with hard difficulty .
Or maybe set a bunch of doors, which won't open untill the last quest line of all players in group is being scrolled.

And force everyone into OP's playstyle? Don't you realize that 3 people that just want to farm the dungeon for gear and end up being paired with 1 from GF that wants to talk to every NPC is essentially the same problem?

Everyone has different goals for their dungeon runs. If you group with people who's goals conflict sharply with your own, you're gonna have a bad time.

/Thread

Merlin13KAGL

You're both in the wrong.

Don't RDF if you're insistent on requiring anything beyond capability to clear.

You don't have a right to force it on "That Guy" and "That Guy" doesn't have a right to force it on you.

MrSensible

Colecovision wrote: »

So the rest of the forum makes many of us too uncomfortable to queue for not being good enough. CP750 and I still haven't queued for anything I can't solo. Now, I find out that I am also am the problem if I can solo it. nFG1 is about a 10 minute solo at this point. So that's bad now too.

I guess as long as I'm not good or bad or casual or hardcore or slow or in a hurry, then I can play? Awesome sauce.

Do Tamriel a favor and find your fourth guy in zone or guild chat or even here. There are lots of people that wish they had a group like yours. You are in an odd situation where you can be a great guy, by finding that lucky person who wants a group but not the pressure, or you can be a total jerk by kicking someone because they don't fit your preconceived group. Being nice is an extra effort, but I certainly hope you choose that.

I'm not sure if this was a joke post or not.

You seem to have taken my post as bizarrely personal. The OP is about bridging the gap between two very drastic ends of the spectrum with regards to dungeon content, hopefully giving more longevity and quality to the overall dungeon experience.

My friends and I give every person a chance when we start up a dungeon. We inform them that we want to do the quest (if it is our first time there). We usually know right away if it'll work out. The person will say something like "cool, me too" or "NP". Or they will say nothing at all, which is usually followed by them pulling 3 groups of mobs. 5 minutes later That Guy is back in Rawl'Kha.

It has been suggested by you and several others already that we should just stop using the Group Finder. I mean that's not going to happen. You know it, I know it. Everyone knows it. But let's just say that I did. You have to know that I'm not the only one with the issue described in the OP. There are others who will also continue. So like the OP says, is there a way we can bring the goals from each end of this spectrum closer together?

krachall

Aluneth wrote: »

This is perfectly fine. You're the type of guy that I kick from my groups, so it balances it out.

hehe...but I bet you don't. I bet your approach is much better than the OP's kick approach.

You probably roll the dungeon as fast as you want, let the slow player take his time or speed up or try to catch up (basically play his way) and when the dungeon is complete, instead of having been kicked, the slow guy says "WOW! that was the fastest XP I've ever gotten and I've run this dungeon loads of times!"

When I've speed-run a random normal with a pug, I get "that was awesome, thanks!" more than anything else.

Enemy-of-Coldharbour

Make it easy with zone chat: "Need DPS for FG1 quest run"

Done.