Party Size XP Bonus

[Phaedrus101]

In many cases I run a dungeon with some close friends only(like 3), especially when I only have only an hour or so to play for the evening. The Issue I have is that we are rewarded the same XP as a full 6 member party. Being a developer I cannot imagine that it would be very difficult to allocate +% bonuses for parties that may contain like 3 members. This would allow me to play more often and not have to spend most of the night acquiring a full party.

Let me know what you think?

[Ziggy]

In many cases I run a dungeon with some close friends only(like 3), especially when I only have only an hour or so to play for the evening. The Issue I have is that we are rewarded the same XP as a full 6 member party. Being a developer I cannot imagine that it would be very difficult to allocate +% bonuses for parties that may contain like 3 members. This would allow me to play more often and not have to spend most of the night acquiring a full party.

Let me know what you think?

This has been brought up before. mostly by people who like running things with less then a full party.

THis would be a bad idea for the simple fact that it would discourage grouping.

I understand that you only party with the 3 people. but if 3 people would net you the max XP for a quest all quests would be run with 3 people. the developers made 6 people the amount of people that can get into a quest for specific reasons(imnot privy to those reasons so dont ask me) I do not believe that excluding people for XP was ever in their mission statements.

[Yoseph]

What they really need to do is adjust the XP for a fair number of the mid-level quests. When one can get around 1200xp for running New Ringleader or Info is Key on normal at level 2 which are fairly quick and easy, but get only 1000xp or so for running LOTD1 quests on normal at level 5 which are a royal pain things need adjustment.

[DraxtonSmitz]

I'm not sure on other games, but I know in Everquest you were given a bonus for having MORE people in a group. Seems kind of like an MMO (the second M is for MULTIplayer) would give a bonus for playing with MULTIple people, not less.

[Ka'ren]

My guess is that Everquest first pooled all the XP, divided it among the party and then gave the bonus. Thus if a party of 5 did a quest for 1000 XP each would get 200 plus the bonus. In that case a bonus makes perfect sense. DDO, however, works in reverse. Everyone gets 200 XP (or whatever) no matter how many characters do the work.

You mention the Multi part of MMO. I concur, but Multi means more than one, such as 2 or 3 or 4 or 5. Effectively DDO gives a penalty for playing with less than 6 characters in a party. By that logic it is a Massively 6-Member-Party Online RPG. And that is what I'd like to see changed. I'd like to be able to play in smaller groups and not feel like I'm constantly being penalized for it.

[DraxtonSmitz]

My guess is that Everquest first pooled all the XP, divided it among the party and then gave the bonus. Thus if a party of 5 did a quest for 1000 XP each would get 200 plus the bonus. In that case a bonus makes perfect sense. DDO, however, works in reverse. Everyone gets 200 XP (or whatever) no matter how many characters do the work.

You mention the Multi part of MMO. I concur, but Multi means more than one, such as 2 or 3 or 4 or 5. Effectively DDO gives a penalty for playing with less than 6 characters in a party. By that logic it is a Massively 6-Member-Party Online RPG. And that is what I'd like to see changed. I'd like to be able to play in smaller groups and not feel like I'm constantly being penalized for it.

What? What penalty? What did they take away from you? If you are being penalized for having less than 6 people in a group you should go file a bug report.

[PurdueDave]

What they really need to do is adjust the XP for a fair number of the mid-level quests. When one can get around 1200xp for running New Ringleader or Info is Key on normal at level 2 which are fairly quick and easy, but get only 1000xp or so for running LOTD1 quests on normal at level 5 which are a royal pain things need adjustment.

While I disagree that DDO should provide an XP bonus for running things with less than a full party, I agree that some of the quests (especially in the mid-levels) are way out of whack with regard to XP.

[Ka'ren]

I completely agree with the desire to encourage grouping, but I would like to see something like what Phaedrus101 suggests. I don't think he is suggesting a total pool of XP for each quest that is divided up among the party. I would not want to see that, but a bonus for running with a smaller party would be nice.

I run with two or three friends often as well and even a small XP bonus would be nice after working twice as hard when running through a quest. I think the key is in the numbers so let me suggest some.

6 party members +0% (obviously)
5 party members +5 - 10%
4 party members +10 - 20%
3 party members +20 - 30%
2 party members +30 - 50%
1 party member +50% or more

These numbers are a far cry from pool all the XP in one pot and divide it up, but they allow 2 - 4 players to have a good time without having to beat the bushes for extra party members and still get decent XP. Effectively these numbers will offset the penalty a group is going to get by having to play lower level quests, because that is all they can handle. Thus they will still be able to get roughly full XP for quests that are good challenges, but these numbers would not grant them much more than that and would still encourage grouping.

[Uska]

I completely agree with the desire to encourage grouping, but I would like to see something like what Phaedrus101 suggests. I don't think he is suggesting a total pool of XP for each quest that is divided up among the party. I would not want to see that, but a bonus for running with a smaller party would be nice.

I run with two or three friends often as well and even a small XP bonus would be nice after working twice as hard when running through a quest. I think the key is in the numbers so let me suggest some.

6 party members +0% (obviously)
5 party members +5 - 10%
4 party members +10 - 20%
3 party members +20 - 30%
2 party members +30 - 50%
1 party member +50% or more

These numbers are a far cry from pool all the XP in one pot and divide it up, but they allow 2 - 4 players to have a good time without having to beat the bushes for extra party members and still get decent XP. Effectively these numbers will offset the penalty a group is going to get by having to play lower level quests, because that is all they can handle. Thus they will still be able to get roughly full XP for quests that are good challenges, but these numbers would not grant them much more than that and would still encourage grouping.

I think flipping yoiur numbers is a much better idea this game was thought up as mainly a grouping game and solo 2nd just like its parent pnp game.

[Lorien_the_First_One]

I think flipping yoiur numbers is a much better idea this game was thought up as mainly a grouping game and solo 2nd just like its parent pnp game.

But pnp DOES give a bonus for smaller groups. And for good reason. If XP is supposed to be a measure of the work you did through combat or skillful evasion then being able to handle the same problem with less resources (ie less people) deserves a proportional increase in XP.

[binnsr]

I wouldn't be opposed to xp bonuses for soloing a quest, but bonuses for 2-5 member parties would be detrimental to encouraging grouping -- as has previously been covered.

[Uska]

But pnp DOES give a bonus for smaller groups. And for good reason. If XP is supposed to be a measure of the work you did through combat or skillful evasion then being able to handle the same problem with less resources (ie less people) deserves a proportional increase in XP.

Bad idea in a mmo to discourage grouping in pnp a gm can adjust the reward according to how hard he felt you had to work your idea can only hurt the game new players have enough trouble finding groups sometimes your idea will make it near impossible

[Phaedrus101]

That's the worst reason I have heard yet. "Becuase the progammers want it that way". When they start sending me $14.95 a month, then I might care what they want.

As far as the max xp for smaller groups, large groups will still be much more efficient gaining xp. They will move through dungeons much quicker, but unless I have a significant amount of time to spend each night acquiring a full group, I am extremely limited on the quests and/or xp I can make for the night.

[boldarblood]

As far as the max xp for smaller groups, large groups will still be much more efficient gaining xp. They will move through dungeons much quicker, but unless I have a significant amount of time to spend each night acquiring a full group, I am extremely limited on the quests and/or xp I can make for the night.

Not really, 3/4 of the quests in GH can be completed 2-3 man on elite. We regularily run Maze of Madness, Trial by Fire and Cabal of One to kill time with 2-3 people (15 min runs max). Have also done pop elite and crucible elite with only 3.

And you do not need a cleric for cabal/maze/trial by fire. 1 caster and 1 other.

[AmsterdamHeavy]

IIRC the quest design is already based on a 4 member party, not 6.

[dragnmoon]

Remember this is only an opnion

I think they Should offer more Exp with a Larger group... To encourage grouping.

I enjoy the game playing with others... not soloing, and offerring bonus for a larger group would encourage grouping.

Grouping forms bonds that help with the growth of the game( Yes I know you get bad groups to). soloing only helps you.

[Dariun]

Only my opinion...

I think they should offer more XP for smaller groups because:

1. Doing the quests with smaller groups is more of a challenge and takes more time and should be rewarded accordingly.

2. Improving solo and small group play would make this game significantly friendlier to new players and encourage a growth in player base. For everyone who stays in the game because they met a great group or guild, there are a large number who get frustrated and quit because they are uncomfortable with the forced grouping before they learn the game controls, they are intimidated by veterans with twinked alts tour guiding, or some know-it-all schmuck explained to them in detail why their TWF WF ranger is a stupid character.

3. It's very hard for small groups to advance beyond lvl 8-10. Changing the XP allocation for small groups woudl fix this problem. I play in a static group of 4, so, uh, I like this idea...

Anyway, I think "more options" = "more players" and "more players" = "more revenue" and "more revenue" = "more game development" and "more game development" = "everyone who likes DDO benefits".

My 2 cp.

P.S. I doubt this will get implemented. An alternative suggestion of mine would be to change the "too high level for this quest" penalty to be lessened for smaller groups doing a quest within 2 levels. E.g., 3 lvl 10s doing a lvl 8 quest would get 100% XP instead of 80% XP, but 3 lvl 10s doing a lvl 4 quest would still get the full XP penalty for being overlevel.

[Qwanderer]

Rewarding players for having smaller groups would just discourage grouping. New players would be screwed since everything is always much harder the first few times you do it. Imagine being a newcomer to this game and being 100% unable to find anyone to run the goodblades quests with you because the only people you would be seing running them would be twinked out alts that would solo them for the max xp possible. Nevermind how hard it would be to find a decent tank through the low-mid levels that didn't just solo everything or duo things with his guildy cleric friend.

Where does that leave the guy who just bought the game? Sitting in the wavecrest LFG for an hour and a half before giving up and going to play on his Xbox or worse yet WoW, never to return.

[dragnmoon]

Rewarding players for having smaller groups would just discourage grouping. New players would be screwed since everything is always much harder the first few times you do it. Imagine being a newcomer to this game and being 100% unable to find anyone to run the goodblades quests with you because the only people you would be seing running them would be twinked out alts that would solo them for the max xp possible. Nevermind how hard it would be to find a decent tank through the low-mid levels that didn't just solo everything or duo things with his guildy cleric friend.

Where does that leave the guy who just bought the game? Sitting in the wavecrest LFG for an hour and a half before giving up and going to play on his Xbox or worse yet WoW, never to return.

Well Said..

Alienating new Players.... Bad Idea..

[clericz]

rogues and rangers would never level...