Group Finder 2.0

pelle412

Group Finder 2.0

This is a proposal for a new tool in ESO to encourage group play and participation at all levels and content. We currently have a dungeon finder and a battleground tool, but that's for a subset of the content you may want to use a group for. The idea is for a generic but powerful group finder tool.

As a creator of the group I can specify:
- How many players of each role I am looking for
- Maximum # of group members (or no max)
- Minimum level or CP
- Distinct achievement(s) completed
- For DPS, ranged or melee or either (the DPS will provide this in their config)
- Brief description of group purpose, i.e. Auridon world bosses, vAA trial, EP Emperor Push, vDSA, Undaunted grind, etc.

As a person looking for a group I can view all available open groups that I am able to join based on my level, CP, achievement completed, etc. As soon as I join, group chat becomes available to me and I can ask or be asked more detailed questions as needed. When then group is full, it is no longer searchable in the group finder. If a member leaves group, it opens up for searching again.

If the group wants to run instanced content, they travel and begin it manually. The tool does not do this for them like the dungeon finder does.

Gythral

Explain you it can be monetized and sold (daily) on the Crwon Store, at that point you may get the attention of the pruse string holder

without it, it is a non-starter due to the way all games now are monetized and no longer entertainment

Merlin13KAGL

You want a bulletin board followed by a job interview...

CyberSkooma

WoW does this, and it's very handy. Not sure if zos would ever think about implementing it, but it would be nice.

zaria

Merlin13KAGL wrote: »

You want a bulletin board followed by a job interview...

Or you can just ask in guild, secondary zone. Its there you go to get an good group.
finder is for easy stuff.

Second problem is that how many will queue for the content you want to do who match your specifications.

Donny_Vito

Good idea. Doubt something like this will ever get implemented though.

SpacemanSpiff1

i don't see this working with any kind of efficiency in-game. sounds like stuff you'd wanna set up in a guild.

AlnilamE

That sounds like what Guild Wars 2 has for open world content, but a bit more elaborate.

Bevik

Lineage 2 does this since ages. You can even see how many people are available for different roles and can send invite to them or whisper them. You can set it up you want to be seen on the list or not. I can't belive we still use this group finder. Please update the grouping tool and the whe UI too.

Danikat

This sounds like a very good idea, even for dungeons.

For example I could put up a group with all the requirements set to 'any' and a message saying something like "quest run - listening to NPCs" and find like-minded people to do the dungeon without rushing through it.

Meanwhile those who want a quick, simple run can use the exact same tool to find people who meet their requirements and rush through the dungeon. And then everyone is happy...or at least has one less thing to complain about.

idk

What OP suggests is over complicated. The more complicated the tool the less useful it will be.

The best means for forming a group is from a tool Zos already gave us that allows us to create all sorts of settings. It is called a guild and for what it seems OP is wanting that is the best way to go.

pelle412

idk wrote: »

What OP suggests is over complicated. The more complicated the tool the less useful it will be.

The best means for forming a group is from a tool Zos already gave us that allows us to create all sorts of settings. It is called a guild and for what it seems OP is wanting that is the best way to go.

Yes I agree I _can_ do that and I do, but this proposed "feature" if done well I can reach all players in all zones, not just the ones in my guild(s). I also don't have to spend time spamming guild chats and micromanage the recruitment process.

idk

pelle412 wrote: »

idk wrote: »

What OP suggests is over complicated. The more complicated the tool the less useful it will be.

The best means for forming a group is from a tool Zos already gave us that allows us to create all sorts of settings. It is called a guild and for what it seems OP is wanting that is the best way to go.

Yes I agree I _can_ do that and I do, but this proposed "feature" if done well I can reach all players in all zones, not just the ones in my guild(s). I also don't have to spend time spamming guild chats and micromanage the recruitment process.

I do not think you get it so I will explain again. Your idea is far to compilated to be considered.

First, If Zos were to add trials, which seems to be the point of this thread, they will set the CP minimum, not you. That much should be clear. They are also not going to permit someone to require a specific achievement and I am surprised all of this is not obvious.

Second. If you are in a guild with people who like to raid it is not hard to form a group. The easiest means is to use the guilds Discord, Enjin, whatever, to get people to sign up ahead of time. If planning ahead is to much effort you will have the effort on the back end spamming guild. Of course, if your guild really does not have interest in raiding then find a new guild.

I have no issues with Zos adding trials to GF, especially normal difficulty level. Of course I would not use it because I do not need it and realize it will be a train wreck most of the time. A group filled with people who do not know what to do and there is no raid lead to help them will be funny to watch.

pelle412

idk, if you go back and read my original post, I say it is up to the group organizer to decide what content to run. ZoS would not need to add any instance based automatic anything. If the group organizer wanted to run a trial and they decide the group is ready to start it, they can go ahead. Your concern about complexity is heard, but good designs are possible with the right people behind its design.

karekiz

idk wrote: »

What OP suggests is over complicated. The more complicated the tool the less useful it will be.

The best means for forming a group is from a tool Zos already gave us that allows us to create all sorts of settings. It is called a guild and for what it seems OP is wanting that is the best way to go.

I honestly don't see what is so complicated about a group board. Its basically a serverwide LFG. Its about as complicated as:

/zone LF2M Tank/Heals for DLC motif grind - 300+ CP min - be experienced please.

The benefit over this? Simple. It is serverwide and not zone wide. WIth 3 capitals and 1 "Pseudo" raid creation zone <craglorn> stuff honestly is more complicated now.

Example: Your a new player. You want to join into raids. Where do you go to find where people are generally looking for raiders? The game sure doesn't tell you. If you have no idea what a "Craglorn" trial is than your most likely sitting in either the capital city or Morrowind city. Sure, they form up randomly there, but its not the general main stay, and some people use different capital cites so it splits the playerbase randomly.

Saying just use a guild is meaningless honestly. You might as well say never PuG a raid and just join an existing raid group.

idk

pelle412 wrote: »

idk, if you go back and read my original post, I say it is up to the group organizer to decide what content to run. ZoS would not need to add any instance based automatic anything. If the group organizer wanted to run a trial and they decide the group is ready to start it, they can go ahead. Your concern about complexity is heard, but good designs are possible with the right people behind its design.

You still seem to miss the point that I have explained in detail.

You do not seem to get it that Zos will not put into their grouping tool a means for players to set their own CP restrictions. I explained it already and you clearly missed that.

They will also not permit you to set a requirement within their grouping tool that a player have a specific achievement. It just is not happening.

As I have stated, if you want to set all these requirements you can form the group yourself.

There is nothing to argue. It just is not going to happen the way you suggest.

idk

karekiz wrote: »

idk wrote: »

What OP suggests is over complicated. The more complicated the tool the less useful it will be.

The best means for forming a group is from a tool Zos already gave us that allows us to create all sorts of settings. It is called a guild and for what it seems OP is wanting that is the best way to go.

I honestly don't see what is so complicated about a group board. Its basically a serverwide LFG.

I have clearly not suggested Zos not add anything to the existing GF. What you have posted does not even speak to what I have suggested as to why OP's suggestion will not work or be added as posted.

El_Borracho

I would like the ability to thin the herd for DLC and some of the harder dungeons. I don't know if achievements are the way to go, but I like it. Armor/weapon sets also sound good, but I wouldn't want to punish non-meta builds. I think skills or the stamina/magicka melee/ranged might be a good call, too. I just don't know if this is the best way to do it. I can seen demanding completion on normal for trials, but not so much for dungeons.

At the risk of sounding elitist, there should be some segregation along CP lines. I'm approaching CP 700 and I can tell you I am much better than I was at a CP 300, just thanks to the buffs and experience. I'm not quitting when I see a CP 300 show up in a PUG, but I can tell you I feel a lot more confident when there are three CP 700's in the group with me.

Odovacar

I very rarely have time for PuGs anymore. You run around trying to stay busy waiting and then boom, you could end up wasting all that time for nothing I.E. you finally get past forming group and see its vet BRF and then you finally load in and you have 3 lowbies jumping around waiting to start. If my guildie buds cant run I'm moving on to other content. I think a dedicated "undaunted daily dungeon" GF would be interesting though.

Bevik

Also an auto invite would be nice too. The add-on works like a charm on PC. For WBs, PvP anything really. Anyone can set it up. It even kicks afk players. Must be part of the main game.

karekiz

I would say cut out

- Maximum # of group members (or no max)
^ This can be changed to match whichever "Type" you set.
Overland/Dungeon/battleground - 4 max
Raid - 12
Cyrodill - ?

Cut these two out completely:
- Distinct achievement(s) completed
- For DPS, ranged or melee or either (the DPS will provide this in their config)

If you want an achievement link you can simply ask for one. It probably won't be used for super Organized content where there is limited space for M/Ranged, as thats more for guilds that are on raid progression etc.

So essentially it would look like this:

Dungeon group listing:
Vet BRF HM motif grind - Requirements: 600 CP
*Joe - Tank - Dragonknight - 650 CP <* = leader/poster>
Moe - Healer - Templar - 702 CP
DPS
DPS

Players wanting in would simply click "Join" or "Que" and be added to the list.

Players listed:
La - Sorcerer - 650 CP
De - Nightblade - 700 CP
Da - Dragonknight - 627 CP

The leader can then click to auto send invite to a player that listed as wanting to join the group

If you go to "look for group" its based on your current role selection just like a normal Random group.

----

Or you can go the tell route so when searching players would see

Vet BRF HM motif grind - Requirements: 400 CP
*Joe - Tank - Dragonknight - 650 CP<* = leader/poster>
Moe - Healer - Templar - 702 CP
DPS
DPS

Then simply click "Joe" and an auto whisper would appear with their class + CP sent to the leader.

Once a DPS is selected the tool auto updates to show:

Vet BRF HM motif grind - Requirements: 400 CP
*Joe - Tank - Dragonknight - 650 CP <* = leader/poster>
Moe - Healer - Templar - 702 CP
DPS - De Nightblade - 700 CP
DPS

idk

karekiz wrote: »

And my point is that Zos is not going to have a GF where players can arbitrarily set things like CP requirements. That has been pretty clear.

starkerealm

El_Borracho wrote: »

At the risk of sounding elitist, there should be some segregation along CP lines. I'm approaching CP 700 and I can tell you I am much better than I was at a CP 300, just thanks to the buffs and experience. I'm not quitting when I see a CP 300 show up in a PUG, but I can tell you I feel a lot more confident when there are three CP 700's in the group with me.

Okay, by that logic I'm someplace in the mid-900s. Reasonably speaking, I kinda know what I'm talking about.

I randomed into a dungeon on a tank a couple weeks back with my significant other on heals. We had a CP~200 DPS who was doing their best. We had a CP1k+ "DPS" who was hard casting crystal frags, and had a resto staff backbar. Which they then tried to use to take over healing duties when they were waxed by standing in a one shot.

So, on a warden tank... I was pulling about 50% of group DPS in most encounters. I'm used to that in normal, but on vet? Ugh.

I've seen a lot of characters at or above CP cap who don't have the faintest clue how to play. They got there through whatever means, grinding, buying an account, doesn't matter, because they never learned to play their role.

This is the problem with CP as a flashcard for competence: it's not.

I'm glad you're coming to grips with the game, that's cool. But there are plenty of people out there who got to 780 through Skyreach, Dolmens, or zombie grinds, who don't know what they're doing now that they're, "high enough level," "to do endgame stuff."

kargen27

I wouldn't mind having an option to get notices in chat about trial groups being formed. To work there would need to be a drop down menu similar to when you choose to do a specific dungeon in group finder. If I wanted to do a Cloudrest run I would go into the menu and select Cloudrest. If someone else wanted to lead a Cloudrest run they would use the same menu but would pick an option to be group leader. Trying to keep it simple but I suppose they would also have to choose +0 +3 or whatever. The question then becomes does the finder automatically decide how many tanks and healers such a group needs or does the leader get to decide they want two tanks two healers the rest DPS or whatever other configuration they might want. If the leader decides that adds another layer to the menu.

If I have cloudrest selected and someone decides to lead a Cloudrest run I would get a message in my chat screen. I would see that it is +? and could choose to join or not. No CP checks or anything like that other than whatever ZoS decides is a fair minimum level. Thinking a bit more a message in chat alone wouldn't be enough. Might be better if you received a notification then you get the option to accept or decline in the notification.

Lately I have been spending a lot of time in Craglorn paying attention to zone chat so I can run trials. I am in guilds that run trials but sometimes timing just isn't right so next best option is hang out in Craglorn. Would be nice if I could be in any zone doing whatever I want and still see that people are trying to form trial groups. I would even be happy with something like a 6th guild slot I could toggle on or off but instead of it being guild chat it would be for forming trial groups. /trial would get you in and it would go game wide. The people looking for a trial group would need to have it toggled on to see it. And yeah I see the potential for abuse but there is still the ignore feature.

The short of it being I would like an easier way to find a random group to run trials with but I don't think it should include a way to exclude players. If you want to exclude those below 300 champion points the guild or zone chat is your friend.

Bevik

What about making a Hub island with bonfires and benches, like chilling out sorta zone or something where you can send global message same as you do in zones but messages sent from the Hub can be seen everywhere in chat. Add a chat tab for everyone for the Global chat. And add an auto invite function where you can setup with +/- how many DDs you want, how many Healers and Tanks, setup the size of the group and from a pre-set list choose what you want, for example nHRC, vHRC, another dropdown no death, speedrun etc. Everyone know these shorties or use the full names whatever. Don't tell me it is really that hard to implement. Add-on authors can do these and ZOS can't?

Merlin13KAGL

starkerealm wrote: »

El_Borracho wrote: »

At the risk of sounding elitist, there should be some segregation along CP lines. I'm approaching CP 700 and I can tell you I am much better than I was at a CP 300, just thanks to the buffs and experience. I'm not quitting when I see a CP 300 show up in a PUG, but I can tell you I feel a lot more confident when there are three CP 700's in the group with me.

Okay, by that logic I'm someplace in the mid-900s. Reasonably speaking, I kinda know what I'm talking about.

I randomed into a dungeon on a tank a couple weeks back with my significant other on heals. We had a CP~200 DPS who was doing their best. We had a CP1k+ "DPS" who was hard casting crystal frags, and had a resto staff backbar. Which they then tried to use to take over healing duties when they were waxed by standing in a one shot.

So, on a warden tank... I was pulling about 50% of group DPS in most encounters. I'm used to that in normal, but on vet? Ugh.

I've seen a lot of characters at or above CP cap who don't have the faintest clue how to play. They got there through whatever means, grinding, buying an account, doesn't matter, because they never learned to play their role.

This is the problem with CP as a flashcard for competence: it's not.

I'm glad you're coming to grips with the game, that's cool. But there are plenty of people out there who got to 780 through Skyreach, Dolmens, or zombie grinds, who don't know what they're doing now that they're, "high enough level," "to do endgame stuff."

This. CP doesn't mean competence. Lack of CP or achieves doesn't mean lack of competence.

There are lower level players that may have switched servers, have alt accounts, or both. If you're automatically assuming anything based on just CP, odds are your gonna be very wrong.

It's why I say an optional ratings system would be a better indicator. It can factor in achieves, actual clears, even average of player votes on successful role completion, this way no one is BSing the numbers with the help of their friends, because the truth will come out eventually. It troll-proofs from the occasional *** too, for the same reason.

The 'score' wouldn't kick in until you've had so many runs under your belt, that way it wouldn't exclude newer players or players that had even opted to switch roles.

Take it to the first pull or the first boss, and you'll know everything you need to know.

Assume prior to that, either way, and you're likely to miss out on some excellent players that would get filtered out automatically by the "you must be this tall to ride this ride" methodology.

Wanna know if that person is probably a fake tank? Take a look at the average. Wanna know if that CP 200 can actually kick ass and take names, do the same.

FWIW, Once you've hit around CP500, I'd say you have a pretty good portion of the max power you're ever gonna get (personal experience from alt account), so yeah, there's a difference with CP, but it's a drop in the bucket compared to actual experience and player skill.

peacenote

Interesting discussion. I'm seeing three ideas here, two of which I like but one which I think could cause issues.

Three Ideas

• The ability to group up in a more organized fashion for more kinds of content (trials, etc.)
• The ability to advertise that you are doing something special (motif farming, speed run, etc) and reach all of the zones at once, instead of hopping from zone to zone or limiting yourself to the one you are in
• The ability to set additional restrictions on who can view and/or join your initiative

The first two ideas would, I think, encourage group play and participation. I think being able to advertise across zones could very slightly increase the usefulness of housing (potentially monetizing the idea for ZOS) because people could chill out in their homes and still look for more content in which to participate.

The third idea is much more about keeping people OUT as opposed to being inclusive, which seems to conflict with the first two ideas. And while yes, we are all sick to death of fake tanks and fake healers and bad pugs, as others have mentioned there is no real criteria for whether someone is "good" that can translate to everyone. It is possible that some of us, some of the time, would have a better experience getting like-minded people for a speed run, or getting group members that don't need to go through quest dialog, but given the wide variety I see in the ESO playerbase these days, I think we will all lose if everyone just starts looking for people who are doing EXACTLY what they want and nothing else. You thought the queue was long NOW? Well, add in the fact that some people will be sitting in a sub-queue with cp restrictions, some will be sitting in a sub-queue with achievement restrictions, someone people will be sitting in a sub-queue waiting for one melee dps, and so on.

Also, idk what kind of groups you guys are joining for pug trials, but rarely if ever do I join a "pug" that is SO put together that we can get 12 people before someone drops and a hole needs to be filled. Normally, people are chatting, saying BRB, and changing roles. "Oh, you need to go? I can tank." "Oh, can I switch to my other toon to get the coffer on this next run?" And so on. Groups change strategy on the fly based on the group makeup, which often switches rapidly a few times before we finally go in, but people work together to figure it out. Also I join a lot of "farm" runs that don't make it to a second run without half of the group having to go. I am not sure any tool would be agile enough to adapt to this type of collaboration.

Therefore, I question whether such a rigid group finder, or forum, would actually benefit the community as a whole. Have we really become so segmented that we're not willing to run a dungeon with someone who needs to finish the quest? Are we really so mistrusting that achievement checks are common now?

I'd like to see a group finder with more content options, and some ability to broadcast across the world in a non-spammy way for special activities, but I think if you want restrictions on details like achievement, cp level, etc., that should be done within your guilds as a discussion. Worldwide tools should encourage more experienced players to help along the newer ones, not give them more tools to shut them out. And our good, old "kick" functionality will still work for those situations when someone is downright rude to the group or just clearly can't handle the content and doesn't have the sense to bow out gracefully after a few tries.

idk

peacenote wrote: »

Three Ideas

• The ability to set additional restrictions on who can view and/or join your initiative

This is the part I am stating will not be added to the GF.

Zos listened concerning dungeons and set better level requirements for both normal and vet dungeons. It has worked out quite well.

However, Zos clearly steered clear of giving players the ability to set their own arbitrary requirements for people to group with them via GF, which is what OP is asking for.

So if it is to much trouble to form your own group and you want a preset requirements then join a guild where others do the work for you. Most decent players that want to do trials and such warm to such an idea. I know I raid to my hearts content and sometimes to much.

G1Countdown

That system won't work in ESO as of now. There just isn't a big enough pool of players for that to work.

You already wait 30 minutes for many dungeons because you go in as a dps. Now you want them to wait forever since they checked all of those requirements you listed? It'll be a looonnnng wait.

pelle412

idk wrote: »

You still seem to miss the point that I have explained in detail.

You do not seem to get it that Zos will not put into their grouping tool a means for players to set their own CP restrictions. I explained it already and you clearly missed that.

My apologies. It was not clear from your previous post that you know exactly what ZoS will or will not do. Unlike you, I do not have that information ready at hand.

crjs1

I’d settle for a revamped activity finder that includes Trials with appropriate level and CP restrictions.

I do quite like the idea of a group bulletin type system though where you can advertise what your looking for in more depth. I would be a bit worried about it becoming an elitist fest though.