Why do mmorpgs have Vertical Progression?

Faugaun · July 2015

I'm really struggling with this (as someone who has played mmo/mud/mush etc.... since the mid 90s.

What does vertical progression bring to the table that makes it a staple of mmorpgs?

Can anyone help me to understand?

Sallington · July 2015

E-Peens and longevity

Faugaun · July 2015

Sallington wrote: »

E-Peens and longevity

Care to elaborate?

xoduspaladin · July 2015

Honestly, Sallington does have a point. It really is just a way to keep people playing. It doesn't take much creativity, yet people gobble it up. From a developer's pov its perfect I would guess. Just wag a few expansions or DLCs here and there to keep the fanatics happy, and you got your typical MMO for the past 20 or so years!

Lynx7386 · July 2015

Because true mmos died with star wars galaxies.

Gidorick · July 2015

Mostly it's simply a design that has been an RPG staple since pen and paper days. Some MMOs can play with 100% horizontal progression (The Secret World). ESO being based on a game series whose progression design is very heavily influenced by tabletop RPGs like D&D really needs vertical progression to keep the game in the spirit of the series.

Faugaun · July 2015

xoduspaladin wrote: »

Honestly, Sallington does have a point. It really is just a way to keep people playing. It doesn't take much creativity, yet people gobble it up. From a developer's pov its perfect I would guess. Just wag a few expansions or DLCs here and there to keep the fanatics happy, and you got your typical MMO for the past 20 or so years!

In exchange for making gear and content obsolete?

Tennetty · July 2015

Because it's fun!! ...and that's how the original RPGs (like DnD) were made... And life in general: you progress "vertically" in almost everything in life, think about it.

HungryHobo · July 2015

Longevity. If you have a game where the gear is tough to get, it takes multiple 100's of hours to get some of the best stuff, all the while you have players who are getting more money to buy the stuff they need along with earning it trough drops, not just trade.. they'll eventually reach their goals.

Now, when an expansion comes out, and if that player has everything of that level, if the new content/gear/skills are NOT interesting and not higher level, the vet player doesn't have any motivation to play. They are happy with where they are at. If you move the bar up higher (Vertical Progression) via higher levels or the such, it "resets" their standing. They will no longer be comfortable, and they will have a new goal to achieve.

Essentially, if you hit a plateau in your gaming, you've explored/killed/geared all you can, it gives you a higher level to explore/kill/gear (albeit the same content or not, numbers are generally bigger, players feel more powerful).

It is not a super creative way to go about things, and people don't necessarily like becoming "outdated", but it is by far the most efficient way to promote the longevity of any game.

xoduspaladin · July 2015

Faugaun wrote: »

xoduspaladin wrote: »

Honestly, Sallington does have a point. It really is just a way to keep people playing. It doesn't take much creativity, yet people gobble it up. From a developer's pov its perfect I would guess. Just wag a few expansions or DLCs here and there to keep the fanatics happy, and you got your typical MMO for the past 20 or so years!

In exchange for making gear and content obsolete?

Doesn't that eventually happens anyways with most MMOs? Not saying that vertical progression isn't successful, but really, its part of the reason why MMOs are kinda look upon as the redheaded stepchild of the gaming genre. Whereas some of the other genres have kinda evolved over the years, MMOs gameplay has been rather stagnant. The progression is working as intended, but I think the lack of innovation in regards to endgame is killing this genre. I don't have the answer on how to fix the issue because I don't develop games for a living, but as a consumer of the game, I can definitely point out the problems.

Mighty_oakk · July 2015

If there was 0 vertical progression wouldnt you be lvl 1 forever?

drogon1 · July 2015

Cause it's fun. Players (at least many of them) like to see their characters become stronger and more able over time.

Tolmos · July 2015

Your average MMO player...

Ackwalan · July 2015

MMO's are a digital version of the PnP games. Levels and class, weak rats and strong dragons, it's all progression to fight strong and stronger foes.

Amiculi · July 2015

Addictive, pavlovian reward systems.

But in all seriousness, if you want to play something WITHOUT vertical progression of any notable fashion, it's not like there aren't other options. A solid 95% of the market is games with zero vertical progression.

If you want PVP you've got Call of Duty and Battlefield and Chivalry and Worms and Street Fighter and Madden to fill your twitch shooter and tactical shooter and close combat and turn based and fighting and sports voids, along with god knows how many other options.

However, very few of those types of games attract enough reason to stick around to pay a monthly fee.

MMO's get (well, got) away with it in large part due to server costs and continual updates. That's fast becoming faulty reasoning though as more and more games go full on B2P or F2P offering optional subscriptions that, like ESO, barely offer benefit. Many games are now allowing players to sell subscriptions to each other in game (like WoW), trade in premium currencies (like Warframe or Guild Wars 2) or simply buy premium content straight up with in-game currencies (like Eve).

So I suppose the main reason that MMO's have vertical progression now is because it has an audience. Does it need more reason?

Just because you don't find it appealing doesn't mean there aren't a lot of people who do. I see a lot of arguments towards changing the game to NOT have vertical progression. I doubt that will happen. It's not asking for a balance change or the addition of a feature, it's basically asking for the entire game to be rebuilt from the ground up for the convenience of that one guy who doesn't like the current system.

Thing is: that guy just doesn't like the game itself. Maybe he should play something else.

Faugaun · July 2015

xoduspaladin wrote: »

Honestly, Sallington does have a point. It really is just a way to keep people playing. It doesn't take much creativity, yet people gobble it up. From a developer's pov its perfect I would guess. Just wag a few expansions or DLCs here and there to keep the fanatics happy, and you got your typical MMO for the past 20 or so years!

Is it though...I mean the second you increase the bar then all of your previously developed is outdated and either needs to be reworked or file 13.

Gidorick wrote: »

Mostly it's simply a design that has been an RPG staple since pen and paper days. Some MMOs can play with 100% horizontal progression (The Secret World). ESO being based on a game series whose progression design is very heavily influenced by tabletop RPGs like D&D really needs vertical progression to keep the game in the spirit of the series.

TSW has a vertical gear component but it is the most horizontal that I've experienced. Yeah I played table top but why has this aspect remained prevalent while other aspects have been retired? Maybe it's time we retired the vertical progression? In pen and paper it occurred as a mechanism to increase power...but you also had creative teams consisting of 1 DM not multinational companies...and it was difficult to improve abilites without levels unless you used lots of tables or some other eccentric approach. However, in the modern electronic gaming era, creative design is by teams of people and computers can easily habdle things more complex than die rolls and tables practically instantly.

Back then level was an elegant solution. Today it's vertical progression to make up for lack of content...you know back then content wasn't lacking every adventure was different....but niw it seems we do vertical for the sake of doing vertical...it seems that in current day it has no positive value for the players or the developer.

Am I off with this observation?

HungryHobo wrote: »

Longevity. If you have a game where the gear is tough to get, it takes multiple 100's of hours to get some of the best stuff, all the while you have players who are getting more money to buy the stuff they need along with earning it trough drops, not just trade.. they'll eventually reach their goals.

Now, when an expansion comes out, and if that player has everything of that level, if the new content/gear/skills are NOT interesting and not higher level, the vet player doesn't have any motivation to play. They are happy with where they are at. If you move the bar up higher (Vertical Progression) via higher levels or the such, it "resets" their standing. They will no longer be comfortable, and they will have a new goal to achieve.

Essentially, if you hit a plateau in your gaming, you've explored/killed/geared all you can, it gives you a higher level to explore/kill/gear (albeit the same content or not, numbers are generally bigger, players feel more powerful).

It is not a super creative way to go about things, and people don't necessarily like becoming "outdated", but it is by far the most efficient way to promote the longevity of any game.

See I don't think the levels are the motivation I think the new content is the motivation....so more gear sets more dungeons, more delves....etc....

Why is vertical progression needed to make gear tough to get? Why not instead focus on challenging boss mechanics or puzzles and other such things?

See I think that the game longevity is actually increased better by halting vertical progression. Think about it if all the world of war craft expansions were set to the same level at Vanilla wow. How many dungeons, raids, etc... would a new player who started tomorrow have access too....and they would all be relevant end-game content. If I advertised a game with an endgame including hundreds of dungeons and dozens of raids and hundreds of end game gear sets ....that's a pretty strong sell.much stronger than "oh the end game for this expansion is 15 dungeons and 2 raids..."

Faugaun · July 2015

Amiculi wrote: »

Addictive, pavlovian reward systems.

But in all seriousness, if you want to play something WITHOUT vertical progression of any notable fashion, it's not like there aren't other options. A solid 95% of the market is games with zero vertical progression.

If you want PVP you've got Call of Duty and Battlefield and Chivalry and Worms and Street Fighter and Madden to fill your twitch shooter and tactical shooter and close combat and turn based and fighting and sports voids, along with god knows how many other options.

However, very few of those types of games attract enough reason to stick around to pay a monthly fee.

MMO's get (well, got) away with it in large part due to server costs and continual updates. That's fast becoming faulty reasoning though as more and more games go full on B2P or F2P offering optional subscriptions that, like ESO, barely offer benefit. Many games are now allowing players to sell subscriptions to each other in game (like WoW), trade in premium currencies (like Warframe or Guild Wars 2) or simply buy premium content straight up with in-game currencies (like Eve).

So I suppose the main reason that MMO's have vertical progression now is because it has an audience. Does it need more reason?

Just because you don't find it appealing doesn't mean there aren't a lot of people who do. I see a lot of arguments towards changing the game to NOT have vertical progression. I doubt that will happen. It's not asking for a balance change or the addition of a feature, it's basically asking for the entire game to be rebuilt from the ground up for the convenience of that one guy who doesn't like the current system.

Thing is: that guy just doesn't like the game itself. Maybe he should play something else.

So are you one of these people who like the vertical progression and gear treadmill and grinding for the sake of dinging another number?

Stealthbr · July 2015

Vertical progression is also a way for developers to introduce challenge and overall difficulty to their PvE systems. Unless a game has an extremely intricate AI and combat system, then mechanics for fights can only go so far as to provide players with a necessary challenge. On the other hand, when you vertically progress the monster's power, then you introduce a challenge to the player where not only must they deal with the encounter's mechanics, but they must also grow in power statistically in order to overcome that challenge more smoothly.

Faugaun · July 2015

Stealthbr wrote: »

Vertical progression is also a way for developers to introduce challenge and overall difficulty to their PvE systems. Unless a game has an extremely intricate AI and combat system, then mechanics for fights can only go so far as to provide players with a necessary challenge. On the other hand, when you vertically progress the monster's power, then you introduce a challenge to the player where not only must they deal with the encounter's mechanics, but they must also grow in power statistically in order to overcome that challenge more smoothly.

Or they could tune the dungeon appropriately to existing gear and use the saved time (by not having to rebalance everything to a new level cap) to develop more content? With proper tuning the content can still be challenging...also I think you underestimate the limits of fight mechanics and human creativity.

xoduspaladin · July 2015

Faugaun wrote: »

Stealthbr wrote: »

Vertical progression is also a way for developers to introduce challenge and overall difficulty to their PvE systems. Unless a game has an extremely intricate AI and combat system, then mechanics for fights can only go so far as to provide players with a necessary challenge. On the other hand, when you vertically progress the monster's power, then you introduce a challenge to the player where not only must they deal with the encounter's mechanics, but they must also grow in power statistically in order to overcome that challenge more smoothly.

Or they could tune the dungeon appropriately to existing gear and use the saved time (by not having to rebalance everything to a new level cap) to develop more content? With proper tuning the content can still be challenging...also I think you underestimate the limits of fight mechanics and human creativity.

Its probably easier to rebalance gear than come up with new content, I would wager. I'm with you though, and see where you're coming from (and agree), but I think its more the devs getting more for doing less.

Amiculi · July 2015

Faugaun wrote: »

Amiculi wrote: »

Addictive, pavlovian reward systems.

But in all seriousness, if you want to play something WITHOUT vertical progression of any notable fashion, it's not like there aren't other options. A solid 95% of the market is games with zero vertical progression.

If you want PVP you've got Call of Duty and Battlefield and Chivalry and Worms and Street Fighter and Madden to fill your twitch shooter and tactical shooter and close combat and turn based and fighting and sports voids, along with god knows how many other options.

However, very few of those types of games attract enough reason to stick around to pay a monthly fee.

MMO's get (well, got) away with it in large part due to server costs and continual updates. That's fast becoming faulty reasoning though as more and more games go full on B2P or F2P offering optional subscriptions that, like ESO, barely offer benefit. Many games are now allowing players to sell subscriptions to each other in game (like WoW), trade in premium currencies (like Warframe or Guild Wars 2) or simply buy premium content straight up with in-game currencies (like Eve).

So I suppose the main reason that MMO's have vertical progression now is because it has an audience. Does it need more reason?

Just because you don't find it appealing doesn't mean there aren't a lot of people who do. I see a lot of arguments towards changing the game to NOT have vertical progression. I doubt that will happen. It's not asking for a balance change or the addition of a feature, it's basically asking for the entire game to be rebuilt from the ground up for the convenience of that one guy who doesn't like the current system.

Thing is: that guy just doesn't like the game itself. Maybe he should play something else.

So are you one of these people who like the vertical progression and gear treadmill and grinding for the sake of dinging another number?

Yes.

Put simply: gtfo my market. You have your toys, go play with them and leave mine alone. >:(

CFodder1977 · July 2015

Go play Guild Wars 2 and see how enjoyable horizontal progression is after you're max level and new content is non-existent for months at a time. The only people who enjoy and demand horizontal progression are PvP QQers.

gatwinchester · July 2015

This might explain it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g79dWuqXe5o&feature=youtu.be

They talk about Destiny, but it could apply to MMOs

Tolmos · July 2015

CFodder1977 wrote: »

The only people who enjoy and demand vertical progression are PvE QQers.

FTFY

spoqster · July 2015

Faugaun wrote: »

I'm really struggling with this (as someone who has played mmo/mud/mush etc.... since the mid 90s.

What does vertical progression bring to the table that makes it a staple of mmorpgs?

Can anyone help me to understand?

This will sound very harsh, so apologise beforehand, but I really do believe it is the truth.

A vertical progression system gives a player the ability to trade time for the illusion of success. This is appealing to people who have a hard time at being successful in real life, as in an MMO they can get more and more powerful, even if they are such slow learners that they never learn to play better.

And this caricature of a notoriously unsuccessful person who wants to feel powerful somewhere, can be found in every single person on the planet to some degree. Some people are closer to that caricature and some are farther away. And thus vertical progression is appealing to everyone to some degree.

So the objective for a horizontal progression system must be to provide players with that same feeling of power they get from a vertical system, only to give it to them via intellectual stimulation (pick the right skills for this boss) or encouragement to practice (this boss is level 20, you will never level past 20, now figure out how to beat him). The resulting feeling of power will be more real than the illusion that is given be the vertical system, and players will fall in love with that feeling and will come back wanting for more.

RazzPitazz · July 2015

Carrots on sticks

Genomic · July 2015

As someone mentioned, it's classical and operant conditioning.

But it's also important in an MMO because you can't make any difference to the world, only your character. The world is 'painted on' - i.e. in world objects are fixed, immovable, static (barring a few scripted objects). Mobs mostly stay in one spot or a small area, and respawn in seconds. Same as bosses - kill the world's greatest evil and he pops up moments later, right as rain. Same as quests - "save my husband from the trolls!", but when you do the trolls immediately respawn and the husband re-materialises in their clutches, que "save my husband from the trolls!", ad infinitum.

Since, unlike in a single player game, in an MMO you can effect no changes to the world, more emphasis needs to be put into the only thing that you can change in the game - you.

eonowakb16_ESO · July 2015

spoqster wrote: »

So the objective for a horizontal progression system must be to provide players with that same feeling of power they get from a vertical system, only to give it to them via intellectual stimulation (pick the right skills for this boss) or encouragement to practice (this boss is level 20, you will never level past 20, now figure out how to beat him). The resulting feeling of power will be more real than the illusion that is given be the vertical system, and players will fall in love with that feeling and will come back wanting for more.

Nice post! And not harsh, it is the truth. But, and that may sound harsh, i doubt that the base of potential players that get a intellectual stimulation from beeing progressed vertically is so huge, compared to the one that prefer to have there progession measured in numbers - and if these numbers are just plain levels. You can manage a challange in ESO (if there would be one) with good skills, good gear a bit in the horizontal way. But - the majority wants to show there progression to the rest of the world through the number of a level. Thats might be the reason why so much were complaining in the past, that we dont have a way to inspect someone....

Mos-De-Atmo · July 2015

What actually is horizontal progression specifically?

Enraged_Tiki_Torch · July 2015

Lynx7386 wrote: »

Because true mmos died with star wars galaxies.

Faugaun · July 2015

CFodder1977 wrote: »

Go play Guild Wars 2 and see how enjoyable horizontal progression is after you're max level and new content is non-existent for months at a time. The only people who enjoy and demand horizontal progression are PvP QQers.

Lack of content is a completely separate issue from progression type. If anything horizontal progression should allow faster and cheaper content release because you are only balancing 1 new dungeon to the already balanced system....not creating an all new balanced system at a higher power ...which requires balancing everything instead of just balancing the one dungeon....

spoqster wrote: »

Faugaun wrote: »

I'm really struggling with this (as someone who has played mmo/mud/mush etc.... since the mid 90s.

What does vertical progression bring to the table that makes it a staple of mmorpgs?

Can anyone help me to understand?

This will sound very harsh, so apologise beforehand, but I really do believe it is the truth.

A vertical progression system gives a player the ability to trade time for the illusion of success. This is appealing to people who have a hard time at being successful in real life, as in an MMO they can get more and more powerful, even if they are such slow learners that they never learn to play better.

And this caricature of a notoriously unsuccessful person who wants to feel powerful somewhere, can be found in every single person on the planet to some degree. Some people are closer to that caricature and some are farther away. And thus vertical progression is appealing to everyone to some degree.

So the objective for a horizontal progression system must be to provide players with that same feeling of power they get from a vertical system, only to give it to them via intellectual stimulation (pick the right skills for this boss) or encouragement to practice (this boss is level 20, you will never level past 20, now figure out how to beat him). The resulting feeling of power will be more real than the illusion that is given be the vertical system, and players will fall in love with that feeling and will come back wanting for more.

Wow, a bit cynical ehh? Cannot say I disagree though....never thought of it that way, but a horizontal system might be the best thing since sliced bread for people.

RazzPitazz wrote: »

Carrots on sticks

Not buying it, there are better carrots and better sticks

Genomic wrote: »

As someone mentioned, it's classical and operant conditioning.

But it's also important in an MMO because you can't make any difference to the world, only your character. The world is 'painted on' - i.e. in world objects are fixed, immovable, static (barring a few scripted objects). Mobs mostly stay in one spot or a small area, and respawn in seconds. Same as bosses - kill the world's greatest evil and he pops up moments later, right as rain. Same as quests - "save my husband from the trolls!", but when you do the trolls immediately respawn and the husband re-materialises in their clutches, que "save my husband from the trolls!", ad infinitum.

Since, unlike in a single player game, in an MMO you can effect no changes to the world, more emphasis needs to be put into the only thing that you can change in the game - you.

But why does this require a vertical syatem?

eonowakb16_ESO wrote: »

spoqster wrote: »

So the objective for a horizontal progression system must be to provide players with that same feeling of power they get from a vertical system, only to give it to them via intellectual stimulation (pick the right skills for this boss) or encouragement to practice (this boss is level 20, you will never level past 20, now figure out how to beat him). The resulting feeling of power will be more real than the illusion that is given be the vertical system, and players will fall in love with that feeling and will come back wanting for more.

Nice post! And not harsh, it is the truth. But, and that may sound harsh, i doubt that the base of potential players that get a intellectual stimulation from beeing progressed vertically is so huge, compared to the one that prefer to have there progession measured in numbers - and if these numbers are just plain levels. You can manage a challange in ESO (if there would be one) with good skills, good gear a bit in the horizontal way. But - the majority wants to show there progression to the rest of the world through the number of a level. Thats might be the reason why so much were complaining in the past, that we dont have a way to inspect someone....

So we need to shove aside this bragging mentality and play for our own fun. I mean really who cares what level, how much gold etc....for someone else? Are you maximizing fun or comoensating?

Mos-De-Atmo wrote: »

What actually is horizontal progression specifically?

Funny you should ask! Go here:

http://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/192948/what-is-horizontal-progression/p1

It seems different people define it differently, but check out that thread and you tell us what is horizontal progression!