Do you like to slow down just because some bureaucrat placed a 50 sign next to the road? I've yet to see anyone who says no. And besides old people everyone would prefer going faster. So there is a rule, with harsh penalty that stops us doing something that we prefer to to and force us to do something distasteful. Despite everyone suffers from this rule, the speed limits are pretty popular and supported. I've never seen serious protests to abolish them.
Also, look at the social norm of "no farting in public places". I'm sure you also had to suffer holding back a fart. It's not fun at all. Why do people still comply this norm and reject people who don't?
The reason for supporting such rules is that we know that certain other people (reckless drivers, smelly people) are much more punished than us, and we want them out more than we want to "have fun". The World without speed limit would only be fun until we'd met Arthasdklól in a car in the road crossing. The World without the social taboo on public farting would only be fun until being in an elevator with someone who ate lot of beans.
These "fail rules" are fundamentally different from "moral rules" like "Don't kill!" A moral person wouldn't commit the crime, even if it would be allowed, the law is only there to stop the immoral ones. On the other hand everyone does fail (speed, fart), but recognizes that stopping serial-failers outweights stopping ourselves from failing now and then.
The fail rules are also different from moral rules in the way that the moral rules are shared even by violators. The murderer would also prefer a World where people can't kill randomly. He doesn't want himself and his friends and family be killed. He is aware that murder is bad, but he does it anyway. On the other hand most serial-failers don't see the fail bad at all. Reckless drivers don't see them reckless and farting contests are common in primitive bars and dormitories. They honestly consider their distasteful or dangerous activity "fun".
So here I'm not arguing for more harsh death penalties in video games. I merely state that they are necessary to produce skilled play. The statement "I want skilled play but I'm against harsh death penalty" is logically just as incorrect as "I want clean air, but I think public farting is OK". Without punishment, the mentioned activity will not stop. There are only two logically correct statements in the topic:
The hypocrit claims to support skill (as it is socially desired in gaming circles), but actually he fails and that's why he doesn't want it to be penalized. He is the standard whiner who is unhappy that Ragnaros was killed first week, so the game is too easy, despite he haven't killed Shannox yet. Another form of this behavior is the "you can't penalize deaths that is not the fault of the player", which is a politically correct term for "I died and it's not my fault". Yes it is. Every single death of yours is your fault somehow. It's true that usually the death in group is not due to the lack of your gaming skills. It's usually your inability to stand up against failing M&S, either by teaching them, kicking them or leaving them for better players. One of the major reasons why our no attendance, no voice chat, no fixed team guild is in world top 10K is the fail gold. We punish fails by charging 300G fail gold and by replacing them. I'm sure they don't like it. But they dislike it less than playing with people whose response to a wipe is "lol".
Also, look at the social norm of "no farting in public places". I'm sure you also had to suffer holding back a fart. It's not fun at all. Why do people still comply this norm and reject people who don't?
The reason for supporting such rules is that we know that certain other people (reckless drivers, smelly people) are much more punished than us, and we want them out more than we want to "have fun". The World without speed limit would only be fun until we'd met Arthasdklól in a car in the road crossing. The World without the social taboo on public farting would only be fun until being in an elevator with someone who ate lot of beans.
These "fail rules" are fundamentally different from "moral rules" like "Don't kill!" A moral person wouldn't commit the crime, even if it would be allowed, the law is only there to stop the immoral ones. On the other hand everyone does fail (speed, fart), but recognizes that stopping serial-failers outweights stopping ourselves from failing now and then.
The fail rules are also different from moral rules in the way that the moral rules are shared even by violators. The murderer would also prefer a World where people can't kill randomly. He doesn't want himself and his friends and family be killed. He is aware that murder is bad, but he does it anyway. On the other hand most serial-failers don't see the fail bad at all. Reckless drivers don't see them reckless and farting contests are common in primitive bars and dormitories. They honestly consider their distasteful or dangerous activity "fun".
So here I'm not arguing for more harsh death penalties in video games. I merely state that they are necessary to produce skilled play. The statement "I want skilled play but I'm against harsh death penalty" is logically just as incorrect as "I want clean air, but I think public farting is OK". Without punishment, the mentioned activity will not stop. There are only two logically correct statements in the topic:
- I want skilled play and I want to punish unskilled play.
- I think skilled play is not important.
The hypocrit claims to support skill (as it is socially desired in gaming circles), but actually he fails and that's why he doesn't want it to be penalized. He is the standard whiner who is unhappy that Ragnaros was killed first week, so the game is too easy, despite he haven't killed Shannox yet. Another form of this behavior is the "you can't penalize deaths that is not the fault of the player", which is a politically correct term for "I died and it's not my fault". Yes it is. Every single death of yours is your fault somehow. It's true that usually the death in group is not due to the lack of your gaming skills. It's usually your inability to stand up against failing M&S, either by teaching them, kicking them or leaving them for better players. One of the major reasons why our no attendance, no voice chat, no fixed team guild is in world top 10K is the fail gold. We punish fails by charging 300G fail gold and by replacing them. I'm sure they don't like it. But they dislike it less than playing with people whose response to a wipe is "lol".
27 comments:
Just wanted to point out that there people out there with strong internal motivation to do good.
They are few and far between, and such a person can also lose his internal motivation at the drop of the hat, due to internal factors, that's why you can't really build a system around them. But they are out there.
The reason why PuG needs fail penalties is because it has no selection process to separate the bads from the goods. Or rather, these penalties are it's selection process in itself.
The reason WoW doesn't need harsher penalties as a whole because they don't want any entry-barring selection process that would reduce subscriptions count.
98.54% of your time doing Heroic Mode Progression is spent wiping. You're suggesting to punish good players.
As far as difficulty goes, nearly 2.4k guilds have downed Ragnaros within only 2 weeks. The difficulty of normal mode encounters is beyond laughable.
Nonsense.
Having to start over whatever you were doing is enough of a death penalty to motivate improvement.
Or do You gem and enchant your gear and read up on your class and encounter tactics solely to pay less repair gold?
Would you otherwise happily wipe forever on the first trashpack, because you can respawn right there instantly and resume attacking?
In game death is something you may not have control of.An individual can chose to drive faster then permitted or to fart in public space, but a sad sod can ninja pull and cause a wipe. What purpose would harsh death penalty serve in that case to those who genuinely wanted to give their best in order to succeed?
Also, what about death in PvP? Hell, the whole game revolves around dying, be it you, the boss or opposing faction player (if you can get to him/her/it).
I don't think death is right tool to educate players as to how to play their role/class properly.
As already said, death in WoW (and most Videogames) is not in your own hands. You can minimize it, yes, but you can't get rid of it.
This makes death penalties completely useless for what you want to achive:
1. Skilled people are punished for the mistakes of others
2. M&S gets the "it was unavoidable / not my fault" excuse.
3. M&S hunters (and some other classes) get the "I am better than" buff, cause they have tools to avoid death. (and giving these tools to everyone would be rather problematic ...)
If you want a penalty that makes them better players, then it would have to be something that is completely their own fault, otherwise they will find reasons why it was not their responsibility.
There are other options than just punishment.
1. Education-speed awareness courses have shown to have better results than fines alone. In WoW we get hints and tips in each loading screen, a raid leader who is philanthropic may coach a new recruit.
2. Prevention and control- If all cars had limits put on them based on the local speed limit people would not speed. If it were impossible to stand in fire people would not stand in fire, becomes a dull game though.
3. Warning- Creating awareness to a driver that they are breaking the speed limit but not punishing them, this deals with incremental speed increase that can naturally occur when driving. In the UK speed read-out signs are very prevalent. In WoW we have DBM.
I am not saying that punishment is never the answer, but its not the only answer.
If I play Starcraft 2, I don't need extra punishment (such as removing titles or dropping rank) to become a better player. When I lose a game, that is punishment enough.
"If I play Starcraft 2, I don't need extra punishment"
Except, compared to world of warcraft the penalties are huge. When you lose your game, you start the next game with nothing. You are like a brand new level 1 in Wow, starting fresh, the same as anyone else. The world of warcraft way would have you lose your game of starcraft but be able to go into another game with all the units and buildings you created already ready.
Reconsider what you are punishing.
Letting your character get to 0 hp, of course.
But what is a player actively doing to allow their character to die?
Facepulling stupidly?
Standing in fire?
Trying to get valors while friends are offline?
Carrying idiots who constantly get themselves killed?
Helping out genuine newbies who make one or two honest mistakes?
Attempting a heroic mode boss?
Exploring new areas before getting a flying mount (eg newbies climbing a hill in their starter zone)?
Trying to quest while their ISP is having a bad day?
Must one death per each of these be punished equally? Do you want to discourage all of these behaviors? Do they show an identical degree and type of unskilled play?
What is a player doing to avoid having their character die?
Never going near aggressive monsters without a super-safe, overgeared party?
Carefully planning out areas they can play in while staying near escape routes?
Never helping out newbies while questing, in case they die and the mobs aggro the player? (Kicking and leaving are "safe"; teaching is not.)
Playing on PvE realms only and/or staying in sanctuary zones?
Refusing to pug (not just standing up against failing M&S, but refusing to give anyone a chance just in case they do fail)?
Staying logged out unless internet is perfectly fast and stable?
Do all of these equal skill? Will every player think these "safe" behaviors are fun in a game?
Confusing the means and the ends, "carpetbomb" style punishment,etc are common. For example, many people don't question why they punish acceptance of physical bodies. Leaving feces in living areas is taboo for good reason. I can't see any good reason to ban farting where it can be heard but not smelled by anyone who minds, and in fact it can be unhealthy for some people to hold in gas for long periods of time. It would be nice if taking care of one's body would be socially acceptable, and causing oneself harm be what's socially frowned upon. I have no problems with people leaving the room or otherwise releasing gas without disturbing others, and can't understand why anyone would.
There's also no logic to how much people disapprove of different "fails"; getting killed/disabled in a vehicle collision is worse than enduring a few seconds or a minute of unpleasant scent, but causing the former is more likely to be made fun of.
Likewise, punishing a lag spike while questing and standing in a raid boss's fire equally makes no sense. Same with equally punishing a booster in your raid and a newbie that runs out early or late during Majordomo's orbs. In a wipe, they will equally die, and the deaths will be equally punished.
As first Anon pointed out, you will be punshing heroic mode raiders a lot. And I want to add that you will fail to punish a lot of fail M&S who get safely carried by overgeared groups. Pheredhel also had good points; the people who cause wipes now thinking "It was bad luck" etc will STILL think "It was bad luck," they will just have a larger penalty but no difference in mindset.
If you want to punish unskilled play, then punish unskilled play (like standing in fire), don't punish death. Unskilled play can result in no death, and skilled play can result in death.
I giggled at Grim's question, but then I thought of the trash pugs. Some people might actually try to do better in those solely to pay less repair gold.
P.S. Normal mode raids being easy is completely off topic, but content will always be easier for those who outgear them. If the first Cata heroic 5mans were intended for average PvEers in 333s, then you could bring in people with 359s and clear them extremely quickly.
Since t12 normal mode bosses are intended for average PvEers in 359s, you can bring in people with 372s and clear them extremely quickly. And t12 heroic modes are intended for 378s, so the easier of these will be doable for more-skilled-than-average players in gear that is less than 6 ilvl difference.
This is a bit of a "duh."
"There are only two logically correct statements in the topic:
I want skilled play and I want to punish unskilled play.
I think skilled play is not important."
The truth of this rests on the assumption that bad play is somehow deterrable, i.e. it is a rational choice that people make, which they would not make if there were a punishment.
Whilst there are some people who are deliberately bad because they don't care, most of the time it's through lack of experience, knowledge etc.
A far better solution in those cases is to provide constructive advice on how to improve. Not in a public way designed to humiliate them (a punishment clumsily disguised as help), but privately, when things have calmed down.
One can consume as many beans as one wants to as long as one also consume a supplement containing the right enzyme the human body lacks e.g. Beano http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beano_%28dietary_supplement%29
Grim, having to pay the 300g is not only merely the pay. You get a strike; if you pay 3 times you are out. It shows the whole group that the fight went bad (wipe) because of this one person who did not perform. If you do not care about the money, perhaps you care that the other 9 people see you failed. Plus, if they see you doing it 3 times A) you do not get pot B) you lost 900g C) and you are out. You may have practiced, but if they down the boss later it should give you the hint that you not only underperformed but also held back the group's progress as well as your own.
In short, I find it a _social_ rule, and it surprises me not more PuGs use this mechanism. It'd certainly make good people leave less fast, bad people leave quicker, and simply improve the progress and goals the PuG has set.
@ Anon
"As far as difficulty goes, nearly 2.4k guilds have downed Ragnaros within only 2 weeks. The difficulty of normal mode encounters is beyond laughable."
How much time did they spend on it, and how good was their gear? You cannot pull a number "2,4k guilds" out of your hat then lead to the conclusion you state without taking important factors like these into account. If you are (near) full HC geared and you spend every evening to down bosses it is expected you get them down.
Also, take into account the previous patch was 7 months away. Raiders, especially hardcore, were bored and want to return to HC raiding ASAP. For that you need to put effort in defeating the most difficult boss in FL normal. Since they play hardcore the fight on normal should not be too much challenge for them.
@ Dangphat
"In WoW we get hints and tips in each loading screen, a raid leader who is philanthropic may coach a new recruit."
That is smart egoism; not philanthropy. The RL is expecting something back from his new recruit.
"Prevention and control- If all cars had limits put on them based on the local speed limit people would not speed."
Except in the countries I am aware of you are allowed to drive as fast as you want on your private owned area.
In Germany, where the highway was invented, there are areas where you can drive as fast as you like on the Autobahn. With exceptions on Ruhr area.
I think we must look into the reasons why people speed, and when they certainly should not:
1) One should not drive when intoxicated.
2) One should not speed because it is "co0l"; it isn't. Proper education solves this. If not, don't give them license.
3) One should realize that speeding does not gain much time. Simple maths via proper education solve this. People believe that driving 10 km harder gets them earlier at their destination. In reality, they only save say 3 minutes. Calculating the maths with them will show them how their delusioned by the speeding.
4) If one decides to speed, do it in an area and state of mind where it is safe. The German rules evolve around this: only on Autobahn, and only when it is safe.
In short, instead of outlawing it (it is allowed on your private area if you happen to own a large enough ground), allow it under certain conditions.
We see the same with cannabis: outlawing it does not prevent anything. Yet, in countries where it is decriminalized the usage of cannabis by locals is less than where it is illegal. For example, in the USA the cannabis consumption is higher than in the Netherlands where cannabis is decriminalized.
It's usually your inability to stand up against failing M&S, either by teaching them, kicking them or leaving them for better players.
Where in your whole diatribe do you mention teaching the MS ? Punishing them, yes, but how does punishing a moron help them to perform better ? It doesn't - which is exactly why Maxim at the top of this thread is so correct. You're trying to justify your financialy punative selection system by pretending that it's about education or reformation.
Gevlon stop moralising about speed limits and farting and just admit that you've developed a method which provides you with a cache of good players. It's not such a big deal and doesn't need to be incorporated into the game as a death penalty.
I bet you only punish the obvious and clearly visible fails like standing in fire and dying.
The result is that people focus too heavily on that mechanic because that one costs them gold so it is best to avoid it – but then fail on other mechanics such as causing enrage timer wipes or not killing ads fast enough to stop healers getting overloaded?
Anyone can look at their feet, never die in fire but do 1k less dps than they should. Yet you wouldn't fine the entire dps team 300g each due to an enrage timer/didn't kill ads fast enough wipe.
Also when the healers get overloaded they are more prone to standing in fire. Most healers will vibe with me on that one. When people are on the verge of dying (because THEY failed) you tend to get more drawn into your healing addon. As a healer you are more likely to fail when the dps fail but the only failure visible is that of the healer who stood in fire and only they get fined.
You know the situation, people fail on a mechanic and are down to 1% health and a big boss AOE is incoming. You start casting a heal on them but then get a fire mechanic under you... If you get the cast off and run out in time you could turn a potential wipe into a success but you will get no credit for it as no one ever notices what you did.
If try to get off that cast and save the DPS'ers life but die in the fire you get fined 300g whilst the other guy stands there whistling!
Hell I'd let people die! My repair bill because they died in fire and caused a wipe is less than my repair bill + 300g because I failed!
The main arguement against adding a death penalty (which I'm assuming is what the heart of this post is), is that death in and of itself is penalty enough.
Dieing and having to run back from the GY (or rez with SS), buff, drink up - wasting 5 or so minutes - is enough of a penalty.
If recovering from a wipe took 15 secs (such as in single player games where you can reload from the last save point), then adding in some form of death penalty makes sense.
RE: comments regarding "sometimes your death is out of your hands" is a moot point. Sometimes your success is completely indpendant of your actions also - but you still get rewarded.
Some of the bloggers are also saying that if penalties are too harsh, it stops new (but not noob) players from becoming better, and getting to the "next level". There should be a distinction between a new player that doesn't know what to do, and a player that doesn't want to learn. Is 3 tries on a boss the player has never seen enough to allow the player to learn? Patchwerk, maybe yes. A fight such as Putricide, maybe not.
As I understand the 300g for causing a wipe rule - it's less of a punishment and more of a compensation. If you hadn't caused a wipe, the rest of the raid could have finsihed earlier and been doing something profitable with their time. If it were a pure penalty, the 300g would go into the guild coffers, or some other place, rather than diretly to the other "non-failers".
The PUG system is efficient and logical.
I agree that harsher death penalties are "necessary to produce skilled play." Whether that is worth the cost is subjective.
Zynga's(Farmville) recent IPO values them at twenty billion US$, which is about 20 months of Iceland's GDP and dwarfs CCP's value. EA just spent $1B on PopCap. Small game companies can stick to their founder's vision; but I think the shareholders' of large companies would greatly prefer that the game design encourage customers not skilled play.
"So here I'm not arguing for more harsh death penalties in video games. I merely state that they are necessary to produce skilled play."
Well, hmm, skilled play is of course what every player should pursue but I think punishing death is the wrong way as it's slowing the learning process and not pushing the players limits.
A better way would be mobs with mechanics that kill you if you don't act properly.
A sad example are those scorpids in Durotar.
They shoot a puddle of poison at the players location but it doesn't do enough damage to make a player consider that moving out is a how you deal with, not only the mob, but puddles in general.
As a new player you might grasp the mechanic after the first tick and move out or you die and do it better the next time - if you can.
Another idea is to have quests or mobs like the old vanilla epic class quests where you had to do it on your own and pull it off with perfection in order to advance to the next zone/level bracket/etc.
"The result is that people focus too heavily on that mechanic because that one costs them gold so it is best to avoid it"
This is possible, but then we deal this that aspect.
"Yet you wouldn't fine the entire dps team 300g each due to an enrage timer/didn't kill ads fast enough wipe."
Then we analyze the DPS meters, and take into account each DD their job (because meters alone don't say much; take lord Rhyolith for example).
The fine is to make sure players focus on not making a mistake which for example one-shots them, or leads otherwise to a wipe. If their mistake is low DPS you can set a bounty on that one, too. You can state: "X, you are doing too low DPS. Do more or you will be replaced."
In other words if by your example you don't follow your optimal rotation you may not do the best DPS you can do (say 1k less). If this leads to enrage timer, and you are low DPS, you may have to be replaced.
"Also when the healers get overloaded they are more prone to standing in fire. Most healers will vibe with me on that one."
What a load of crap, a really bad excuse for standing in the fire. DD are always overloaded since they always must perform damage. One may argue they may not have to beat enrage timer, yes, but that does not mean you as DD can slack. Because if you do, you look bad compared to the gear you have and/or the other DD. Nobody who plays this game even half serious wants to look like a clown performing bad yet the optimization lies in the top tier and the amount of time invested in downing the hard content.
Even if I could consider your argument valid (I don't): one, this can be trained. Second, you can then use instant, cD and, HoTs. There is a reason healers have Circle of Healing, Wild Growth, Holy Radiance, Spiritwalker Grace. A good healer is able find the balance and timing between performing movement and heal when necessary. If you are unable to do this I suggest training healing in PvP. A bad healer tunnelvisions on their healing addon. A bad healer has their boss mod bad configured to not notice Shannox traps.
I admit that when I heal I do have this problem every once in a while especially when I'm new to a fight.
"When people are on the verge of dying (because THEY failed) you tend to get more drawn into your healing addon."
You can do your best to save them, but if you fail you did not fail your job. Keep focussing, do your best. If you OOM the person who stood in the fire failed; not you. You should realize this. The RL, if competenet, will. If he does not, point it out to him.
"As a healer you are more likely to fail when the dps fail but the only failure visible is that of the healer who stood in fire and only they get fined."
Just because someone else makes a dumb mistake does not mean you should be allowed to make the same. The choice is simple: you let the failer die, you live, he gets fined 300g. Or: you die while trying to heal the failer. You both fail, both die, and both get fined 300g. Or: you manage to succeed healing the failer without dying. You saved the failer 300g if you won't wipe; else the failer still pays 300g even though you saved him.
The only exception is when RL has called wipe. Then you are allowed to /dance in the fire. You're actually encouraged and expected to do so, to decrease downtime. Nobody wants to fight some opposite faction half healed unbuffed in PvE gear at the entrance of instance. Nobody wants to wait 5 minutes before they can run in.
"You know the situation, people fail on a mechanic and are down to 1% health and a big boss AOE is incoming. You start casting a heal on them but then get a fire mechanic under you..."
1% health + big boss AoE is a rare situation.
Either way, it is already a wipe. To save a run through the instance you cast your Guardian Spirit, LoH, NSHT (nature's swiftness healing touch), or other expensive & quick heal on the hunter/mage/rogue/nelf and let them vanish/invis/feign/meld. They mass ress. You save time running in.
"but you will get no credit for it as no one ever notices what you did."
A good raid leader, as well as your raid peers, notices tough saves (or general good OR bad performance) from a healer. Some raid leaders or raid peers will compliment you; some don't. Based on your comments you feel underappreciated when you made a good save. Whether this problem lies at your hands or RL (and/or raid peers) is beyond scope of discussion.
"If try to get off that cast and save the DPS'ers life but die in the fire you get fined 300g whilst the other guy stands there whistling!"
You should have moved out of the fire and then cast your Healing Rain/Sanctuary/Tranquility/Divine Hymn.
"Hell I'd let people die! My repair bill because they died in fire and caused a wipe is less than my repair bill + 300g because I failed!"
Good choice. They pay and learn or get replaced. Either way, next time you aren't unnecessarily stressed by some failbot.
The penalties for failing are already quite steep within WoW, at least as far as raiding goes. The punishments are not given out during the raid, however, but instead at a later point where your further participation is at stake. In order to raid with low failure rate players, it is typically necessary to put in an application, attend a trial raid and perform at a very high level. The requirements for raiding with medium and high failure rate players are less stringent.
@ the two previous Anonymous posters that replied to me:
So you are agreeing with me that I should indeed let the failer die because that way I only incur a 10g fine where as in my attempts to save him (and turn a potential wipe into a success) I *might* get the timing wrong and incur a 310g fine.
Sorry but that is fail and probably the reason successful raid guilds don’t use such a system. If I had a dollar for every time I’d saved a wipe by taking that chance I’d be a rich man.
I fail to see how that is a “bad excuse for standing in fire” and please CoH or PoM won’t save him in the example I described, obviously if it would we would do it! Funny you describe my scenario as rare but then describe an equally unlikely scenario where an instant cast would save them. However let’s not go down the official WoW forum approach of posting strawman examples to back up our theories as it achieves nothing. I am trying to talk about the over-cautious defeatist mind set you create in your players.
You guys are also suggesting blowing my Guardian Spirit or a Divine Hymn on them? Oh well done, round of applause!! That is as bad as wasting a BR on them! Sorry but you really haven’t thought that through properly have you.
Anyway back to my scenario, we are talking about a mind set here so don’t get hooked up on details, there are many other potential scenarios where your approach leads to unnecessary wipes. As I see it I have three options:
1, Let the DPS die – in which case we can wipe or waste a BR.
2, Take the gamble, lose and die in fire/other mechanic by trying to save him – so what? We wipe or waste a BR which was going to happen anyway so what is the harm in taking the chance? If I am almost OOM at this point it might even be better to die, benefit from my SoR and take a BR.
3, Get lucky doing option 2, and succeed.
Your crazy rule results in players always taking option 1 for fear of option 2 occurring (which was no worse anyway!) and thereby you rule out option 3. Most of the time option 3 goes my way, I believe your approach results in more wipes and more wasted BR’s.
Then again if your objective here is to make money then yeah I’d go with your approach. However if you want to make money raiding is sub optimal. I thought you did it for progression and your “play it safe and protect my bank balance” approach is also sub optimal in that respect.
I also think your approach fails because you believe that by removing or deterring people who die to mechanics you create a team that never dies to mechanics. We know that is false as it happens to the best of us – if it didn’t your approach would work and you would NEVER wipe and be clearing HC raids before the nerfs – which you didn’t. A lot of people were still failing which is fair enough - as I said we all do it.
The speed limit analogy is a bit cultural. In the US, most people speed. It is not uncommon for Department of Transportations statistics to show average speed above the speed limit on Expressways.
Since one is usually above the speed limit, then getting a ticket is regarded more as bad luck; "I drove several thousand miles this year above the speed limit; this recent ticket was not caused by me speeding as much as just being unlucky that this time there was a policeman there."
Sounds pretty familiar.
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Anytime you increase the pain of the death penalty, you [slightly] decrease people's desire to take a risk: be it PUG, doing content before the 20% nerf, etc.
Yes the failure penalty will make players risk averse which I don't believe is a good idea especially on progression bosses when you are pushing the limits and crucially in a game where people need to respond to events around them (involving 9/24 people they have little control over) and think on their feet.
I am sure most of us would agree that the exceptional players shine above the just plain good players by how they react in those situations when they can pull off that bit of magic.
This can't happen in a risk averse environment.
Speed limits are an interesting analogy. In real life people are very cunning and avoid justice by learning where they can get away with being bad and where they need to pay attention...
I have no doubt that failure punishments lead to all manor of sneaky things such as the example I mentioned of playing it safe and allowing a player to die plus crafty attempts at meter padding - something that can be very hard to detect if done correctly and I doubt a RL will want to spend hours after the raid analysing the logs working out who to charge 300g. I mean if someone is about to die I could just opt for that aoe heal to pad the meter as opposed to getting in that small single target lifesaver.
When people examine the heal meters (assuming the healers are mistakenly being blamed for that person nearly dying...) I won't be on the bottom....do you think you can pick through the logs deep enough to figure out exactly what happened at that point - especially as the entire heal team was probably pulling the same stunt!
I bet as many people get away with it in the raid as they do on the road.
"So you are agreeing with me that I should indeed let the failer die [...]"
You provided 2 scenarios: one single target and one AoE. I gave solutions for each. Read! For single target I gave 3 options. 1 is the most plausible (let him die), but it depends on the situation. In either way, it is better to let the person who failed learn or he will think he will get away with it.
A CR has 10m CD, a Guardian Spirit 2.5m (3m if not glyphed), a Divine Hymn 8. Popping GS on a failer is not the same as using (or wasting) a CR (10m CD). If your job is raid healing I'd use the GS. If your job is tank healing however, I probably would not use the GS. Save it for the tank; the tank is your job.
Yes, our approach can make healers conservative however the problem started at the person who FAILED. He FAILED. It is not your or my problem he FAILED. Capiche? You must have played this game as healer with people who kept standing in the shit, and when you did not save them they complained? That is the type of attitude I don't want to play with (even as DD).
"Then again if your objective here is to make money then yeah I’d go with your approach. However if you want to make money raiding is sub optimal. I thought you did it for progression and your “play it safe and protect my bank balance” approach is also sub optimal in that respect."
The goal of fail money is to make sure people do their uttermost best hence improving, whereas the people who did not fail are compensated. I don't want people to fail. But if they do, they shall pay. We better down bosses. Loot means people bid means gold for raid. Works better than most casual guilds: there one gets boosted & leaves taking the gear with them.
"I also think your approach fails because you believe that by removing or deterring people who die to mechanics you create a team that never dies to mechanics. We know that is false as it happens to the best of us – if it didn’t your approach would work and you would NEVER wipe and be clearing HC raids before the nerfs – which you didn’t. A lot of people were still failing which is fair enough - as I said we all do it. "
People make mistakes and the mechanism takes this into account. Glotan (Gevlon's rshammy) makes mistakes although in my opinion rarely (good player). Tuesday he had to pay 300g because he died at Magma Flow from Lord Rhyolith. A person who makes 1 time 1 mistake is not removed. However, someone who keeps making mistakes is out until the break. We start every day at 19.00 with a fresh team, you never know in advance who is going to fail on what!
"[...] and probably the reason successful raid guilds don’t use such a system."
In successful HC raid guilds you are replaced and/or guild kicked if you keep failing on the same mechanism. In a normal raiding guild, at the very least the raid leader will think twice if he wants to invite you back to that particular fight. Especially if he has people on standby who can also perform your role. A wise decision would be to rotate you out. What use is it to have 9 or 24 people wipe over and over again because "Bob" keeps dancing in the Defile? In my experience this adds to mindfulness & focus similar to The PuG's system.
The PuG doesn't have a static team & no forced attendance. Every boss they need to improvise, since their composition of DD, healer, and tank is different. This drains the ability to down a boss easily even if they killed the boss before. You cannot compare this to a normal raiding guild or a HC raiding guild since The PuG is designed to be a casual guild.
"[...] do you think you can pick through the logs deep enough to figure out exactly what happened at that point - especially as the entire heal team was probably pulling the same stunt!"
I could. Any decent RL would. It is simple. People are assigned healing target, there are legio addons which help examaning why people died or why people failed. I'm not gonna name them, you can do your own homework.
In game death is something you may not have control of.An individual can chose to drive faster then permitted or to fart in public space, but a sad sod can ninja pull and cause a wipe. What purpose would harsh death penalty serve in that case to those who genuinely wanted to give their best in order to succeed?
It would serve as a motivator to actually "do their best" in order to succed right? Im sure it wouldnt take "their best" allianate that sad sod out of their circle and find a proper replacement.
Do they show an identical degree and type of unskilled play?
Yup... he deserves the penalty. Lack of knowledge of consequences is not an excuse to avoid them. That's why you dont go "unprepeared" be it yourself or with others. It's also called "taking risk" for a reason.
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