Ya know what I miss

I miss having a mostly static group that played together a lot in mmos.  Lots of my favorites times in mmos were when I played with a few friends in a group most of the time in EQ and vanguard.  I've tried a few times to get some old friends back together for a game, but no go, we grew up and have too many responsibilities outside the game nowadays.  I miss having in depth discussions while playing, it feels like most of the time now when I play, it's somewhat a pug guild group.  I don't know the others well, they don't know me, and we don't really talk much.  I miss having a close knit group :) 

Anybody else feel this way sometimes?  Do you think it's more because of more out of game responsibilities, or the social interactions in mmos have changed and discourage partying together as the primary way to level up and now...people feel it's easier to just solo or duo and group when it's needed?

I think it definitely has to do with more real life responsibilities, but also that some people are naturally introverted. I try to make time for anyone in guild but I rarely have time for dungeons or organised groups unless it is planned well in advance, even when it is planned I have trouble making time in some cases. That being said, I still have my core group from Rift that I stay in touch with even though they no longer play GW2, we are going to reunite again soon. In the meantime I have another group of trolls that I game with because our schedules fit together, they aren't guildies but they are good peoples and we share a similar sense of humour where I can relax without having to watch my language or wonder if I offend someone. Finding a common group requires effort, rarely will it just fall into place.

At one point in MMOrpg gaming you pretty much had to group to advance. Then you had the "power couples" of Tank/Healer that picked up a random group of regulars around them and conquered the world. Woe betide the extra Dps when they found a CC or Buffer to be a new regular groupmate. Currently there seem to be few places in games that encourage static grouping other then Raiding, PvP and some harder Dungeons. Now it is more efficient for most players to solo. Static groups make a game more "sticky" much being part of a team or club in anything. Soloability though opens the game up to a larger audience. TV shows are in such small chunks for a reason, gaming is mirroring this more all the time.

Most MMO companies haven't tried to hide the fact that they focus on the ability to solo the majority of the game so that they can reach a casual audience and make the most money. The hardcore MMO players have grown up and have responsibilities, so they don't have the time to devote to the game that they used to. The new generation of gamers have WAY too many options to pick from, so if they suck and no one wants to group with them and that stops them from progressing in the game, they'll just flip everyone off and go on to a new game. When games allowed for server transfers it also messed up raiding like crazy, too, because all of a sudden people went from having to be happy with one of the 3 options they had to having literally hundreds of choices - same thing. The game developers have to make the most possible people happy in order to make the most money in order to continue making their games. Me - I loooove the ability to solo quest and not have to group. Don't miss the forced grouping at all. I can group if I want to, but don't need to struggle finding competent players to continue. Leveling just feels like a grind to me until I can make it to raiding. That's where I want a tight knit group of people working together. I do miss the forced family love that guilds had to fake before server transfers. Now I feel like people come and go way too freely.

I wish it was just as simple as too much solo content and hand holding in today's games. The MMO market is over-saturated, there are just too many games, now. For example, I'm trying to coordinate with some old gaming friends and we just can't agree on anything, we'll each list about 10 games we're interested in and none of us match up. As a result of having too many games to play, you'll find that people will join a guild for a game, play for a couple of months, then when they decide to move on to another game, they just join another guild in that game, play with them for a couple of months, then wash, rinse and repeat with another game. Of course, you will always find a "core" of players that get really involved with a guild and a particular game, but if some of the core decide to leave for another game and move the guild, but not all may move and things just become splintered. The smart guild admins go multi-game, but that is awful hard to really make work.

I think the problem I have had with games is that they don't allow for a lot of imagination and I'm in them longer more to stick with people to do things. Of course, lately I just haven't had the ability to sit and play games that require constant use of both hands. Actually it's more of the constant hold a button so you move deal. I've also found the table top gaming some of us are doing more fun because it is a static group and it uses the imagination. The table top gaming has even got me back into wanting to write more unlike the MMOs we have. So I do find it hard to get back into the MMOs I do have on my computer, even GW2, because after my break to do some writing and the issue with my arm for a bit, it just doesn't entirely cut it any more. I've only gotten on a couple times when I felt up to it and had the time for some of the large group events mostly for the socializing than the gaming. Another thing I find with games these days is it doesn't take that long to figure the whole thing out and level. I know a lot for the PvE side of GW2 and even if with some maps I'm not as familiar, I still have too good of a memory to forget enough to make it seem new again even with having to try it with a different character class.

For me it's a mixed bag. At times I do miss that static group. You log on and get imediate whispers to go do something. I also remember thinking, if I dont log on I will get "left behind" and then be screwed in terms of leveling (I tend to play squishy types). I also love being able to play a class I like and not have the "pressure" to be there on time every day because if I don't I wont get anywhere with my character. Now when my boys ask me to watch a movie with them more often than not I say sure and not "in a minute honey" because I know I can do content solo.

I have found more intimate groups within the guild. I think the Table Top RPG group over the months will become more and more that tight group that I enjoy meeting up with. I also have a group in the early morning that I enjoy WvW with. It's more difficult to get that feel with current MMOs for the reasons already listed in forum. RaidCall is where I find the poeple I tend to hand with. Those who use it know it helps shrink the groups into smaller tight nit groups. I like that interaction, real voices, real strategy. I know who is on and playing what I like to play. I enjoy the benefits of a large guild when it comes to events and sharing of upcoming titles. Also I would never have found the table top RPG group. Finding your right spot at such a big table takes time but is well worth the adventure. I hope MMOs in the making can bring some of that magic back from ealier versions of MMOs.

I never got to play an MMORPG back with the "forced grouping". Yeah, I do like to solo, which reflects my class choices (always play one that can take a hit, can heal self nicely, or has a pet that's really good at tanking) as usually, my level or playtimes do not coincide with those around me. I used to play with my younger sister and her hubby, but that went downhill when our work schedules didn't mesh (I worked 7am-3pm, awake during afternoon, slept 9pm-5am; sis worked afternoon, slept all night, awake morning; hubby worked all night, awake in the morning, slept all afternoon), and then they moved and had a baby. So I ended up playing solo about 90% of the time. But I haven't really played any MMORPG since around Christmas 2012, when I got back into playing tabletop RPGs on raidcall with members of this family. While I like various parts of an MMORPG (the visuals, crafting and gathering), I always ended up playing them solo with maybe chatting with people in guildchat, thus really negating my interpretation of the 2nd M (multiplayer). I lose a lot of interest in a multiplayer game when I am only doing things solo, which really defeats the whole point of a multiplayer game. And the tabletop RPGs played over roll20 and raidcall really make me happy, as they are true multiplayer (in my interpretation of multiplayer). Now if there was a way to effectively port over an MMORPG-like crafting system, I am not sure if I would play another MMORPG again. Of course, I have always viewed TTRPG (tabletop rpg) to be superior to CRPG (computer rpg) in any of its forms. I am glad to be playing TTRPG again.

I know the feeling. The first guild I joined in GW1 6 years ago was a pretty tightly knit group, we did a lot together in the game and chatted a lot about things outside of the game. But life happens, people drift away to other games and you lose touch. And at that time I was just out of college and had more free time to game. Now I've just got too much going on outside the game to spend as much time playing as I used to, but I enjoy having that balance. So being in a bigger guild where there is always something to do, but no one is depending on you, has worked out better for where I am in life right now. And as we have kids in the next couple of years I'm sure that will stay true.

My theory is that back in the EQ days it was easy to play with the same group of friends for many hours each week for a couple years because there wasn't much else out there. Now there just TONS of good quality games, many of which are free, that scratch any number of itches. So between everyone having less time and more responsibilities than we did 14 years ago there are also so many directions everyone's interests are being pulled. I absolutely miss having 3 or 4 (or more!) people I could count on spending time with almost every night. Now that'll happen for a couple weeks when new games come out but then everyone just kind of scatters to the winds until the next game comes out in a few months. It's just too difficult to find a game now that attracts everyone the same amount. Back when it was UO, Meridian 59, Asheron's Call, or EQ it was a piece of cake. 2001 Dark Age of Camelot and Anarchy Online comes along and there's a split but still a small enough pool of games to keep most people together. Then 2002 Final Fantasy XI, Earth & Beyond, and Asheron's Call 2 come out and the population spreads even thinner. 2003 EVE online, Star Wars Galaxies, Horizons... 2004 City of Heroes, World of Warcraft, EQ2... 2005 Matrix Online, Guild Wars... 2006 DDO, Auto Assault... 2007 Vanguard, LotRO, Hellgate, Tabula Rasa... 2008 Age of Conan, Warhammer... Not to mention we start seeing more and more eastern games sprinkled in there. They just keep coming! 2009 Aion, Champions Online... 2010 Global Agenda, Star Trek Online, an explosion of lesser titles and F2P... 2011 DC Universe Online, RIFT, another explosion of lesser titles and even more F2P... 2012 Tera, The Secret World, GW2, another explosion of lesser titles and even MORE F2P... How is a person to settle on just one game now?? Pretty much everything is now F2P in some form except for just a small number of games. And who knows how long it'll be before they switch over as well. It's just too tempting now to try other games.