A Simple Way to Make Pugging More Attractive

Some 'dirty' jobs generate a relative high income because noone else except some dedicated people would do that job. Relative in this case is measured to education and experience.

The general idea is to give some extra reward, not because it's superior but more probably because it's considered inferior.
Remember all those Guild > Hero > Hench > PuG statements.

It's a bit the same as in real life.
Why would I with high education and work experience settle for something less unless I'm forced to do so?
There are people that do so, most because they like the job or feel they are supporting the community with that.
But it's very unusual for people to switch from a 10 euro/hour job to a 5 euro/hour job that's also less attractive.

That has something to do with '1337' behaviour, but I think most of us don't settle for a job like cleaning toilets or collecting trash.
We tend to leave those jobs to foreigners (for whom the income is quite high compared to the income in their home country) or the people that can't do anything else.
The same with charity.
There are probably many people that donate some money, but only a few that do the real work.
If you really want more people in charity or 'low' jobs, you have to force them or give better rewards.
Both have disadvantages, it's the question whether or not the benefits outweight the disadvantages.

This thread seems to have gotten off topic.

The poster was actually discussing changing the rewards structure for loot. The references to PUGs were a secondary supporting benefit, not the basis of, or for, change.

Everyone agrees that the current system is beneficial to solo farmers, when compared to other options of PUGing or using heroes and henchies.

The OP would like to see the math changed that the rewards will be equivalent, by 1) specifically making cash rewards be on a per-player basis and not the lump sum divided, so that 80 gold is 80 gold per player and not 80/8 = 10 gold and 2) increased drop percentages to make drops as plentiful as well.

Solo farming would not be affected, so solo farmers have no basis to gripe.

The nutshell explanation of the OP would be to make players in groups get the same rewards levels as if they were solo farming, thus a group of 8 would get 8x the rewards of a solo farmer, divided amongst the 8.

I see no negative to this. Once again, Solo Farming will not be affected or harmed. And if this benefits PUGs, then that's awesome.

Thx!
TabascoSauce

I started playing just alone or with henchmen, in Prophecies. I didn't intend to work with people at all, but when the missions started getting really tough in places where I'd be 3-4 levels ahead of the henchies (Yak's Bend), I started joining PUGs. Some were great; some were horrible; some were in between. Not surprisingly, the good teams lasted longer than the bad ones, so proportionally my experiences have been on the good side. All in all, I liked it and now I'm kind of 50/50 - if there's a PUG, I'll join it; if not, that's fine too.

I don't like being in groups where I can't contribute, but there were definitely times when I was with somebody who was a better player than me, and if they were rewarded for their patience with better loot - well, I'd be happy for them.

Now I'm playing Nightfall, and it's true that the heroes are great, and the people looking for PUGs are fewer - in particular, it's hard to find people on the exact same quest you're on. So I've been working almost exclusively with heroes and henchies, and I miss the PUGs.

I kind of don't get guilds - I have no idea how to tell them apart or find a good one. I don't want to work to figure out the social world of Guild Wars I guess - my social life outside the game is complicated enough, thank you very much.

I'd be in favor of something that made it easier to join PUGs.

In response and to be blunt, this is a terrible idea.

The reasons are numerous, but one of the biggest amusing things to me is that you find giving higher drop rates to entirely human groups not a disadvantage to people playing with AI. It's practically a punishment, a penalty. Saying "If you don't play with others, you shouldn't be allowed to play, oh and you'll never find any good stuff or make much money."

And you know what would happen? 8-man farming sprees. They'll have such higher drop rates that since solo farming won't be nearly as good, there will be entire parties of farmers to take advantage. You'll have potentially increased the amount of farming being done in Guild Wars by 8-fold.

And I hate farmers, they ruin the game, but that's another discussion.

You also make this silly claim that you can breeze through the game with AI in a way not possible with humans.

That's also not true at all.

There is nothing an AI henchman can do, save for interrupting quarter-second cast skills and, I don't know, make constant bad healing/protection choices (if you don't know a lot of the glaring AI flaws, you haven't played very much), that humans can't also do.

I personally only play with henchmen, ever. I refuse to play with any other humans unless I'm close friends with them. And to think I'd be punished for playing the way that I enjoy, just so that you can gain some sort of compensation for your own personal opinion on pickup groups is a bunch of nonsense.

The way to make better the Guild Wars community is not by forcing them together or else they don't get any PHAT LEWTZ, the people themselves must become better.

And let me mention for the record that people who play henchmen-only are already getting screwed enough as it is. When our drops and money is being split up for henchmen, it's essentially going nowhere, it's being trashed instantaneously. We can ask someone for something that dropped for them, we can't ask for something that dropped for a hero/henchman.

So in closing, what you're saying is people who prefer to play solo should get reamed even HARDER with drops.

I'm not following your logic.

As I posted in another recent thread:

Altering drops based on numbers is not the way to do it.
Therefore I do think also that pug helping is more about getting more drops as mentioned above......that noted, if the OP really does want to improve players desire to pug.

Create a title track, something to the effect of Charitable helper.(I suck at creating names, so I'll just put down the mechanics)

Each player earns a point when a person in his/her party level up from non-reward experience.

1000 Goody Two Shoes
5000 I ain't that good.
10000 Alright.....who Wants Some?
100000 Loud-mouthed braggart

One hint at why I chose the titles(even though they're not all titles, but then nether is kind of a big deal really.) I used them because this character begrudgingly(right word?) helps out those.....behind the times with something important.
"Oh that's just what we call pillow talk, baby, that's all. "

At different levels you could reward the title track with things, alcohols, guild shield(displays guild emblem) or something to actual add drive to non title seekers.

Okay, I see what you are thinking, but it is not what was suggested.

The current system is:

1 player solo
80g drop (/1) = 80g per
Collector drop (/1) = 1 collector drop per

1 player 7 hero/hench:
80g drop (/8) = 10g per
Collector drop (/8) = 1/8 collector drop per

8 players
80g drop (/8) = 10g per
Collector drop (/8) = 1/8 collector drop per

New system:

1 player solo
80g drop (/1) = 80g per
Collector drop (/1) = 1 collector drop per

1 player 7 hero/hench:
80g drop stated per player = 80g per
Collector drop (/8 and 8 times as likely as 1 player) = 1 collector drop per

8 players
80g drop stated per player = 80g per
Collector drop (/8 and 8 times as likely as 1 player) = 1 collector drop per


The only disadvantage to this is that there will be an incentive to team up for farming to make it easier, so everyone who participates in that behavior will get richer.

I am not convinced that if everyone gets richer then the prices will skyrocket. Since this is a system of artificial scarcity, the the relative values of items is exactly based on that scarcity, and if they want the prices of items to go down, then make them more common.

I'll bet if they doubled the drop rate of runes of vitae, the price would drop close to 50 percent. I have anecdotal proof of this, with the 3x green drop bonus weekends. What happened to the price of greens then? <grin>

That seems to me to be the way to control the economy. Selectively eliminate scarcity.

Thx!
TabascoSauce

There is nothing wrong with the system of play in GW as it exists right now. Absolutely what is wrong with pug's is the immaturity of the average player.
Unless you can address that problem and come up with some way of bringing out the best in people you will not solve this problem. My opinion is that immaturity is the number 1 worst problem in GW today. I do most of my playing with people in the guild and most of my farming and cap runs are with
heros and hench. I do not do random pugs ever and will not as long as the pug community is the way it is today.

This is ridiculous open up my thread again. I had actually thought about my system for days before posting it. This one as well has flaws.

Putting a "-" on the hero/henchmen usage will make the game more of " 7 helping 1" then "Guild Wars" Which 7 people will hardly want to do, The heroes are a great addition, but they should not increase or decrease drop rates. Your brother and mine are in the same boat. I feel sorry for him but I run a guild with good officers and wonderful members, therefore we have no problem as such. Yet since the infinite slot machine was taken away, 55 farming, the main problem is the Guild Wars economy, as rigged as it is.

If any system like this were to be implemented, your brother won't get any better help in Riverside Province. Your brother will suffer worse, because everyone will farm the Fire Islands/other elite locations just for drops.

A system needs to be in place that hits two birds with one stone, solo farming is in pure benefit of the game at this state which SHOULD NOT HAPPEN, since they are OBVIOUSLY AGAINST IT.

This is why a new system needs to be put into place, why should there exist this profit of solo farming but the nerf of the AI to make 55/SS farming less effective? Anet has a huge double-edged sword on top of their heads, and for some reason it hasn't cut anyone in half.

Your argument is slightly tainted. They're not really against solo farming in and of itself. They're against the buying virtual goods with real life currency market.

If we suddenly get more gold/drops for fighting in groups, that will make it easier for Professional Farmers to rake in higher amounts of gold/items.

Alright than. This is an idea to encourage pug participation in missions:

Upon entering a mission every player donates an amount of gold. The amount is determined by the level of the mission. Let's say 10 gold for easy missions, up to 100 gold for elite missions. Only human players donate. Upon completion of the mission every human player receives the total amound of gold donated as a bonus.

Examples:

Easy mission, 4 players, 10 gold each.
-4 human players will get 40 gold each upon completion.
-2 human players with 2 henchmen will get 20 gold each.

Very hard mission, 8 players, 100 gold each.
-8 human players will receive 800 gold bonus each upon completion
-5 human players and 3 heroes will receive 500 gold each.

You pay only per human player: Someone who enters a hard mission with 3 heroes and 4 henchmen pays 100 gold to enter that mission and receives the 100 gold back if completed. 2 human players with 6 henchies pay each 100 at start, so 200 total, and 'earn' 200 each at the end of the mission on completion.

The more human players in the mission, the more the profit at the comletion

I don't want to risk losing gold by doing missions. What if its a mission your having trouble with and you have to do it over and over again?

BrotherGilburt

This is ridiculous. Basically, you're paying to play the storyline. The storyline is the only reason I play GW, and if I had to start paying for it (no matter how small, even if it's virtual money) I would probably quit the game. Simply put, it will not cater to my needs in a game anymore.

And please! Stop trying to punish people for playing with heroes and henches! This is another one of those ideas that suggests people who play in groups should get richer quicker than people who play with AI. It makes me sick reading threads like this, because it really reminds me how selfish and inconsiderate some members of the human race can be. The game is supposed to be about balance. It's supposed to be about fairness, and about how a player can choose to play the style that suits them. These suggestions just go against that.

Furthermore, suggestions such as this won't make people PUG more. It'll make the people who prefer heroes/henches to PUGs quit the game in outrage.

/Not Signed

Note, don't read the rest of this if you don't want to hear my recent PUG Horror Story.

PUGs are forever going to be PUGs... I recently powerleveled a Canthan Necromancer and had to grab two skills in Ember Light Camp for my build, I had a guildie carry me on her back to Kaineng, I henched to Vizunah, jumped in a dual MM group where I basically stood back and watched, lead a decent PUG group through Nahpui Quarter (note I said decent) and then nabbed Closer to the Stars and shot over to LA, fought to Beacons, got run to Droks, henched Ice Caves of Sorrow, which I had to have completed in near record time, and then I got to Iron Mines of Moladune...

It's been a while since I was forced to PUG a mission. As I said I was in two PUGs prior to Iron Mines... but it was in Iron Mines that I remembered WHY I don't like PUGs anymore. I happen to know Tyrian Missions and Bonuses inside and out, so I told the simpletons I would lead them. We got past the opening fight when the Ranger, complete with his pet wolf says "I'll run it!" - he ran down the frozen creek, past the first group or two of Tundra Giants and popup Azure Shadows, to be killed by the 3rd group of Tundra Giants... Good job, winner. I don't think he even had a speed buff on his skill bar.

We fought up to his corpse and rezzed him. He continuously was shooting ahead of the party and getting killed, quickly acquiring 60% DP, rendering himself useless. Aside from him, we had another member of the PUG who kept asking "Is this the bonus?" as I continuously informed him "No, I will tell you when we get to the bonus, don't worry, we are going to do it, we need to infuse first though... calm down."

Unfortunately, our elementalist (who was probably half our firepower along with me playing SS Necro) had to leave, so with only 7 humans left, the majority of our firepower cut out since the Mesmer and Ranger kept dying, the Minion Master Hero only had Minions (yes we were pressed for team members) and the monks, heroes, but not having the best available builds on them, didn't stand much of a chance against the Inquistor and his 4 Mesmer guards... so we opted not to do the bonus... however, our Mesmer wanted to cap Energy Surge... so I began to lead us down the bonus side (past Markis making the complete circuit of the mission) and with maybe 2 mobs to go from the Energy Surge boss, the 60% DP Ranger starts bitching and screaming bloody murder about having to do the cap and that he's going AFK for 35 minutes while we do it and he's not helping.

So we cap the boss in the next 5 minutes or so... and a WHITE Accursed Staff drops... now I haven't moved any of my funding form my primary account to this secondary one to buy a curse staff, hell I still have my Starter Truncheon... and this staff drops for the Mesmer girl that I advocated for to get her elite cap... and got the other human in the team to come along with us despite him being on a time crunch too. I ask her in whisper if I can have the white staff drop that she LEFT on the ground... hell it's better than the Starter Truncheon... and she says "No, I sometimes use it." and goes and picks it up.

Sadly, because of players like this, PUGs are stereotyped as ungrateful, whiny players that are likely in the worse guilds in the game, or are in guilds that operate off of quantity vs. quality players... or just don't try to make their newer/less-skilled players better at the game.

I try to help people. I may not be the goto-guy for a build, but I'm glad to lend you my directional skills or necro services... but, one can only cope with so many PUGs. I regularly recruit the promising players from PUGs, in hopes that should they leave my guild, at least they left a better player, or got past the really hard mission that would have left them PUGing it for a week at least.

I see no reason in punishing those of us that have tried to make life easier on some of the PUGs out there, only to be spit on afterwards. Drops are already taken by Heroes and Hench, and gold is also divided amongst them also, no need to hurt our pocketbooks anymore than that, especially if we have to redo the mission multiple times because the PUG can't work together.

-MF

Nice Story ^^

Anyways, i agree.

/notsigned

BrotherGilburt

Alright than, same idea, but no donation, instead as a reward. So basically your reward increases when more human players are in the party, see my above post how it would work.
It is NOT punishing solo players since they keep the same rewards as usueal. It makes missions more attractive with human players. And I bet many experienced players would be more willing to help pugs on missions this way.

Hear Hear! And Hear again!

I've had better success with PUGs since the introduction of the Search function. Immature players tend not to use it....