Low population+mass zerging on thelanis,think of new server,whats yours like?

[gripshift22]

Hey everyone,was just wondering what people thought about their servers,iv noticed lately that population has been pretty low lately and my guildies have not been playing much,so i have to pug alot lately,and when ever i can manage to find a grp its just people mass tr'ing,and super zerging through everything,often without even a welcome or hello upon joining(i like to have fun and enjoy the company and game,theres nothing wrong with being efficient, but it seems almost everyone plays like its a job lately,just super zergin to 20 to rinse and repeat.). is this a game wide trend or just tough luck on thelanis? thinkin of movin servers,is yours better?

[zeonardo]

It's our new and sad reality on T-lan and probably all other servers too.
This is not a cause, this is an effect.

[Ivan_Milic]

ITs not that low population, Im still getting groups as before, but thats maybe because Im in Europe and my play time is different.
Be glad you can even get groups, other servers dont have that.

[OwenMay]

That is kind of normal, with multiple past lives and the accumulated gear the content is just trivial to many people it seems. No downtime, short completion time, running pots, group split up afterwards due to having done different quests, dosent make for a merry gathering.
I dont think you will find other servers to be very different in that regard.
Can be fixed by adding higher difficulties with more exp, merging servers (which seems needed in general and can make up for more player base split up with more difficulties.) and changing the mechanics of exp pots.
If Turbine is planning something in that regard I dont know, havent looked for it though.

[gripshift22]

ya,i supposed it is kind of the nature of the game now isnt it? even with more new content and increased cap,that will be interseting for everyone for like a month then,just back to the endless tr grind,i fear this is the beginning of the end of my time with ddo. and its a shame because i still really enjoy the game but design decisions have dictated the nature of the community now i think. like you said its an effect....

[PermaBanned]

Perhaps try adding a social note to your lfm, or simply start chatting up who ever joins? As for the undesirable zerging, put a "no zerging" note on the lfm too. Something like this as an lfm for Diplomatic Impunity:

"Lords March chain, no zerging; in need of human contact."

Granted, it may not be the fastest filling lfm, but those who join are likely to also want a social experience. Then add them to your friends list & directly invite them to group with you next time. Begin building a social circle this way and soon you should have a pool of like-minded players to group with. Since your guild has gone kaput, wait 'till the leadership goes up for grabs, usurp it & invite your friends.

[gripshift22]

Perhaps try adding a social note to your lfm, or simply start chatting up who ever joins? As for the undesirable zerging, put a "no zerging" note on the lfm too. Something like this as an lfm for Diplomatic Impunity:

"Lords March chain, no zerging; in need of human contact."

Granted, it may not be the fastest filling lfm, but those who join are likely to also want a social experience. Then add them to your friends list & directly invite them to group with you next time. Begin building a social circle this way and soon you should have a pool of like-minded players to group with. Since your guild has gone kaput, wait 'till the leadership goes up for grabs, usurp it & invite your friends.

definitely tried this. slow filling? try never filling,lol.

[Qhualor]

its actually hard to find groups these days that are not fast paced, even if it doesn't say its a zerg group. normally, the ones that are not zergy or zerg like are the lfms that say in the notes "no zerging". the "no zerging" lfms aren't necessarily flower sniffers, they just want to work together as a group and not have the group split up or watch the one man show solo the quest for the group. I emphasize nerfed DS as the biggest culprit for the fast paced groups that are common in the game. if players can blow through quests with high damage numbers and shrug off pain, picking up the pace only becomes part of the play style.

I have been doing a lot more staring at the lfm the past few days than I normally do. with CC going on, peak time and off peak time the lfm fluctuates between a lot of lfms and none in certain level ranges. low level lfms are more or less plentiful, while 14-16, my current TRs level range actually had 0 lfms for a good 5 minutes. the past few nights I have only seen 2 lfms for heroic Tor flagging between 5pm and midnight EST. epic levels lfms have had the odd quest posted, but there were the typical FOT, CITW and Impossible Demand ED farming. as the trend has been for quite some time now, most lfms ive seen the past few days were mainly the popular quests, flagging quests for like Von and Shroud and good xp quests. of course, there is the usual BYOH and zerg lfms that are usually, give or take half of what is posted. the popular, good xp and BYOH lfms usually seem to fill fast enough or they start soon after posting, full or not. the rest of the lfms usually are slower to fill. some seem to give up after 5 minutes, while some I have seen posted for 1/2 hour before coming down.

I have been staring at the lfm for a very very long time now. a few years at least. I usually play during the evenings pretty much every day and weekends can be a lot or none at all depending on what I have going on in real life. by no means is it accurate or I am claiming it to be official, but I seriously think pugging is in a serious decline today. I would say its mainly in the mid levels and epic levels. I see this as odd to me because when I get a rough number by looking at the Who list, it seems to be a lot of people logged on. its odd to me also because, depending on whats going on in the game and time of day/week, there could be a total of a dozen lfms or 2 dozen lfms posted. that seems to be about the average. the numbers doesn't seem to add up to me that with that few lfms on one of the busiest servers, there is still a ton of people not pugging. I understand there are people who prefer to solo or group with guild, but I would think the average of lfms would be more like 2 dozen during non peak times and 3 dozen or so during peak time. this is something I have noticed more recently and struck me as odd.

[AzB]

To blame Turbine is only part of the story. New players are consistently treated very badly by many, if not most of the players on my server. Not to see and understand that the players are responsible for a great deal of the new player attrition rate is simply due to most folks being completely self centered and uncaring about others. Long gone are the days of social interaction and fun pugs with lighthearted banter and helpful, friendly players.

I'm with you OP. I run efficiently, but I don't think the point of the game is to "get it over with". It's to enjoy the journey. I see so many posts about Turbine creating the grind, but I keep thinking you don't have to participate in the grind if you don't like it.

The few people that are left playing seem to be the nose to the grindstone crowd. These folks don't mix well with new or casual players. My suggestion is to get the nose off the grindstone once in a while, and smell the roses. At the rate we're going, having a super powerful toon is going to be pointless because there's going to be no one to play with.

[Ivan_Milic]

Why do you think new players are treated badly?
Because most of them have no manners, they just join the quest, dont even write hi, they write share plz, then they get in, die and log off.
All my lfms are byoh, one time someone joined didnt even write anything, he died and then logged off, thats one of the reasons I tend not to put up lfms before lvl 10.
I gave advice to one player that byoh means bring your own healing and that he should not join those lfms if he cant heal himself, he was a wiz, he died in quest, I also wrote to him not to grab aggro if he cant heal, he had like 50 hp at lvl 8, after the quest was finished he didnt write anything, I wrote to him see ya later and kicked him out of the group, he then wrote me in a tell **** off with caps on.

[Chai]

This is all the byproduct of the "its not my responsibility to teach" attitude of yesteryear. Thelanis is populated with a few uber guilds who withhold information from most everyone else and only really game with eachother. Whats left of the old conglomerate still shelters itself from the rest of the server, and many of the high end groups are intra guild.

There are at least two servers who have teaching channels with a decent headcount involved. Sarlona is one of them, and has folks who invest their time teaching others how to run specific raids and quests.

[Vint]

I do not think it is necessarily people treating it like a job.

There are many days that when I go downtown I can either take 1-70 (15 minute drive) or I can take a more scenic route that takes 35 minutes. The scenic route may be “prettier”, but it is not always the best road for me to take. Sure it can be nice to relax, go slow and see the view, but after seeing it a million times, it becomes less important to see everything; I have seen it so often that it loses something.

I see zergers as the same thing. People do not see it as a job; it is just driving the same route to work every morning. You know where every pot hole is, every speed trap, everything about the trip. If you like going the slow route, help yourself. I just don’t think it is right to tell people to “stop and smell the roses” when they have been down that road a million times.

[AzB]

Why do you think new players are treated badly?
Because most of them have no manners, they just join the quest, dont even write hi, they write share plz, then they get in, die and log off.
All my lfms are byoh, one time someone joined didnt even write anything, he died and then logged off, thats one of the reasons I tend not to put up lfms before lvl 10.
I gave advice to one player that byoh means bring your own healing and that he should not join those lfms if he cant heal himself, he was a wiz, he died in quest, I also wrote to him not to grab aggro if he cant heal, he had like 50 hp at lvl 8, after the quest was finished he didnt write anything, I wrote to him see ya later and kicked him out of the group, he then wrote me in a tell **** off with caps on.

This is exactly what I'm talking about.

Don't you remember being new, when you didn't know what byoh meant, when you dumped con, (or some other important stat) and got embarrassed when you failed miserably when everyone was counting on you?

I don't kick people like that. I generally try to diplomatically see if they need some help through tells. (It's never a good idea to attempt to give advice over group chat as that just adds to the humiliation) Some take the help gracefully, some are simply idiots or not very nice people. But a lot of those people I still see playing later on and want to join my groups months later with much better skills and builds. And I'm not talking spending all my time doing this, just 5 minutes and a sincere attempt to be welcoming and nice can go really far for someone who might end up being a good player someday. Heck, just last night I ran Tangleroot with a player that had two rogue levels and could never find traps. I spent 5 minutes with them in between chapters and discovered the problem. He was very discouraged that he had screwed his toon up, but didn't know about the enhancement pass coming. I explained that he would be able to fix his problems after the enhancement pass. He was a good player otherwise, he simply didn't understand how to multiclass rogue and keep trap skills viable. So instead of dropping group when he failed to find a trap and died in it possibly calling him a noob before I left, it took 5 minutes to diagnose his problem, and find a solution. I have no doubt he'll need help when the EH pass comes out (we all will!) so I offered to help when the time came to redo his toon.

I'm not saying everyone has to do this, but please recognize that publicly pointing out to people what they're doing wrong is rarely considered helpful, it's humiliating. And kicking people from groups is simply rude. (If they were rude, then go for it. But if they're trying and simply failing, it's like a slap in the face) And we all set the tone for future players... laughing at people, kicking them, demeaning them in front of other new players just promotes that sort of behaviour.

You have no responsibility to help people or be nice, but just remember that your actions have consequences and if you love the game and don't want to see it die, you will consider how your behaviour affects other people.

Or you can just blame Turbine.

[AzB]

I do not think it is necessarily people treating it like a job.

There are many days that when I go downtown I can either take 1-70 (15 minute drive) or I can take a more scenic route that takes 35 minutes. The scenic route may be “prettier”, but it is not always the best road for me to take. Sure it can be nice to relax, go slow and see the view, but after seeing it a million times, it becomes less important to see everything; I have seen it so often that it loses something.

I see zergers as the same thing. People do not see it as a job; it is just driving the same route to work every morning. You know where every pot hole is, every speed trap, everything about the trip. If you like going the slow route, help yourself. I just don’t think it is right to tell people to “stop and smell the roses” when they have been down that road a million times.

The only problem I see with that analogy is that you're comparing something that you are required to do every day for work with someone that people do for fun.

[Rakuda13]

There are not enough quests in DDO,I find myself running faster everyday. It not even by choice sort of like programmed in my head.
Too bad there was a quest builder like Neverwinter,I tried neverwinter and didnt like the game play but if i ever got bored of a quest i could try one of the user made ones,cant really sprint through something i dont know.

[Anarkius]

Why do you think new players are treated badly?
Because most of them have no manners, they just join the quest, dont even write hi, they write share plz, then they get in, die and log off.
All my lfms are byoh, one time someone joined didnt even write anything, he died and then logged off, thats one of the reasons I tend not to put up lfms before lvl 10.
I gave advice to one player that byoh means bring your own healing and that he should not join those lfms if he cant heal himself, he was a wiz, he died in quest, I also wrote to him not to grab aggro if he cant heal, he had like 50 hp at lvl 8, after the quest was finished he didnt write anything, I wrote to him see ya later and kicked him out of the group, he then wrote me in a tell **** off with caps on.

IMO, I believe this is a two way street - while you set parameters for your LFM that should be met, antagonizing and belittling those that don't meet YOUR expectations are not a good way to 'make friends'. While you may be trying to communicate in an upfront and friendly manner, sometimes the message is not taken that way. I'm not saying YOU are at fault for the mistake, but it can be hard to communicate in a text based manner and sometimes even in a voiced manner. Some people are easily offended and that is where a lot of the problem begins. Granted those people shouldn't be playing an MMO (again IMO), but alas the 'human' interaction is part of the fun.

While I agree with you that a lot of the new players come in with poor manners or a "know it all" attitude because of previous MMO experience (and I've said this MANY times before DDO is not any other MMO) that can be very off putting, a can also say that the 'elitist' attitude of some of the more experienced players warrants the attitude. This may not be the situation that you have given, but this 'elitistism' comes through more often than not. Even though I have been gone for almost 2 years and am now coming back to the game while it is in a "decline" state, I unfortunately still carry the 'elitist' air about me from time to time unintentionally. And it's not that I am trying to be a @$$ its just that when I KNOW what I am talking about or give 'matter of fact' advice, it comes across that way

This is all the byproduct of the "its not my responsibility to teach" attitude of yesteryear. Thelanis is populated with a few uber guilds who withhold information from most everyone else and only really game with eachother. Whats left of the old conglomerate still shelters itself from the rest of the server, and many of the high end groups are intra guild.

There are at least two servers who have teaching channels with a decent headcount involved. Sarlona is one of them, and has folks who invest their time teaching others how to run specific raids and quests.

It's hard to share information with those that 'know' what is best for them. Again, I feel this is due to generalizations that are made. A lot of the ones that have been around for a while (your "uber guilds who withhold information") have just let a few bad experiences turn them off to being openly helpful and cause a bit of xenophobia on their parts. Granted, some of them are just straight 'Richards'. I've been on both sides of the table and can say that it is bothersome for someone like myself (I enjoy the social interaction that D&D has always brought to the table or game in this form) to try and be helpful but at the same time being criticized for offering advice or telling someone how to play no matter how gently the information is offered. So, I just stopped offering, yeah, I still chime in every now and then - but I don't care at that point how the information is 'received'.

To the OP, I'm sorry to hear that you are losing interest in the game already, but it does happen, Your frustration that you have expressed is a normal part of the DDO cycle it would seem and is VERY unfortunate (both for you personally and in general). But I will say that if you want to hang or run a quest or two, I'll give you a hand or at least provide a chuckle due to my noobish comments about game mechanics that have changed over the last year or so I've been away. But maybe you need a break, I've taken a couple from time to time, sometimes a change of server helps, sometimes just walking away for a while is the answer. That's a personal choice you will have to make.

But if you have a character around the level 6ish mark and want to run a few look me up in game (character name is the same as the forum name). Unfortunately, I am still rather new on Thelanis and don't have any higher level characters, but if you end up changing servers let me know which one and I might be able to help you out there. I've done a little server hopping over the years and it never hurts to have a little twink gear or spending cash when you start over

[myliftkk_v2]

You need to differentiate between true zerging, and just efficient completion (doing most things along the way). I don't run into pure zerging very often, leaving boatloads of mobs unkilled/objectives undone, but most pugs are interested in quick completion except when new content gets immediately released and they're exploring.

Legimately, I could take say 1:30 to do a single Dragon run (both parts), or I can get 3 Dragon runs in across 3 different toons in the same time easily (technically since my best time is 22m, I could get maybe 4 in a perfect world). With everything else going on in people's lives these days, I think it's a little rude of me to expect 11 people to spend an 1:30 with me in a quest I can knock out in 22m while doing all the parts in good group coordination.

ETA: I should state that it doesn't bother me in the least if not everyone keeps up 100% of the time. I'll be the first to go back to help a toon that gets themselves in trouble, help lead them, etc. That said, I try to be judicious about the time commitment I'm asking of others, it's not that I'm actually trying to be elitist at all.

[PsychoBlonde]

The only problem I see with that analogy is that you're comparing something that you are required to do every day for work with someone that people do for fun.

The source of the fun changes. Once you're 15 lives in on a toon, many people have much more fun when they're rushing--and if they feel like taking it slow, they go solo. I know I do.

As for people being "mean" and "not teaching" new players--all the resources are there for someone to teach themselves if they want to. They can look it up online. They can just run the quest on a low difficulty, or with a higher-level character. (I do this on new content, it is fun.) They can ASK. Probably 2/3 of the problem people I run with NEVER do ANY of this IN ANY WAY WHATSOEVER.

I completely reject the premise that new players are "entitled" to be escorted around, shown the ropes, donated gear/plat, etc. etc. If you are knew and don't know, say "I'm new and don't know what I'm doing". Yeah, some people may kick you because they're not in the mood, but it's better to get that over with up-front than to have them yell at you and THEN boot you because you lied about knowing what you were doing. I take people around all the time when they ASK me to.

In a social game, social ineptitude is a problem, and many, many, MANY people in the world are completely inept socially. THIS is what ultimately ****es people off, not the fact that someone is a poor player. You can be the nicest person in the world but even then you can't teach someone who won't admit they don't know, doesn't want to learn, can't communicate when they have questions and can't hear party chat or voice chat. It may not be their fault, but the only thing you can do to get away from that level of dysfunction is to boot them.

In any case, the servers almost always slow down immediately prior to a major update (they sure did right before MOTU came out!) and the only people getting on are the ones who want to squeeze one more TR in before the expansion. From what I've seen it has nothing to do with numbers of new players because new players generally don't post LFM's in quantity.

[jskinner937]

This is exactly what I'm talking about.

Don't you remember being new, when you didn't know what byoh meant, when you dumped con, (or some other important stat) and got embarrassed when you failed miserably when everyone was counting on you?

I don't kick people like that. I generally try to diplomatically see if they need some help through tells. (It's never a good idea to attempt to give advice over group chat as that just adds to the humiliation) Some take the help gracefully, some are simply idiots or not very nice people. But a lot of those people I still see playing later on and want to join my groups months later with much better skills and builds. And I'm not talking spending all my time doing this, just 5 minutes and a sincere attempt to be welcoming and nice can go really far for someone who might end up being a good player someday. Heck, just last night I ran Tangleroot with a player that had two rogue levels and could never find traps. I spent 5 minutes with them in between chapters and discovered the problem. He was very discouraged that he had screwed his toon up, but didn't know about the enhancement pass coming. I explained that he would be able to fix his problems after the enhancement pass. He was a good player otherwise, he simply didn't understand how to multiclass rogue and keep trap skills viable. So instead of dropping group when he failed to find a trap and died in it possibly calling him a noob before I left, it took 5 minutes to diagnose his problem, and find a solution. I have no doubt he'll need help when the EH pass comes out (we all will!) so I offered to help when the time came to redo his toon.

I'm not saying everyone has to do this, but please recognize that publicly pointing out to people what they're doing wrong is rarely considered helpful, it's humiliating. And kicking people from groups is simply rude. (If they were rude, then go for it. But if they're trying and simply failing, it's like a slap in the face) And we all set the tone for future players... laughing at people, kicking them, demeaning them in front of other new players just promotes that sort of behaviour.

You have no responsibility to help people or be nice, but just remember that your actions have consequences and if you love the game and don't want to see it die, you will consider how your behaviour affects other people.

Or you can just blame Turbine.

^^

I would also like to add, what is the penalty for a death or 20 in a quest? 10%...come on really?

Personally I am a bit of a zerger, but there is a reason in most cases....mana is not finite...round them up and drops a firewall or acid storm. I wouldn't say I am into the run to the end and let everyone else die because they get harried type although. I am on my 19th life on my main and I went from soloing to throwing up LFMs and being social because we want new players in the game. I hate seeing the big guilds/channels destroying the game because it has become a closed social community. I am an officer of a small guild (15 active accts) and have turned down many invites to larger guilds because I do not want to be pigeon-holed into run with us type mentality.

If you share these feelings, send me a PM or in-game tell on Fizzymadizzy or Shizzymadizy for a guild invite. We are a level 67 PUG guild, but offer quality advice to players too. Also as a bonus we have the mid-sized Stormglory Typhoon with all the +2s and 30 resists and 3% XP shrine. Hope it doesn't look like I am advertising, but I would like more people on Thelanis to not feel as if they need to be in a big "exclusive" guild to play DDO. So if that means starting your own, or joining one that gives you all the tools to still be socially active with no-strings attached...please do so.

[Vint]

The only problem I see with that analogy is that you're comparing something that you are required to do every day for work with someone that people do for fun.

You can relate it to anything. The wife and I go camping often and we go to a national park about an hour south of us. She prefers to take back roads and see all the views. I want to get there so I can set up a fire and move on to other things.

There is nothing wrong with her liking to go slow, I simply do not enjoy it. People can enjoy their journey however they want. Would you rather sit in the car for an extra hour viewing the scenery or spending that extra hour having a beer setting a fire? It is your choice and I will not yell at you for it. At the same time, don’t pee on me for not enjoying what you think is more fun.