The Theory Of
Here you'll find discussion of all manner of topics relating to the theory of multiplayer games. As I see it, anyway. A note to commentors: if you stray off-topic or if your reply contains ad hominem attacks, your comment will be deleted.

Synopsis: MMOs are designed to be intertwined single player experiences.  A means of restructuring game play to make large group interactions the norm is presented.

For some screwy reason, MMOs are designed to be intertwined single-player games.  Each player enters any given session of a game with a unique agenda born of that player character's current level, set of quests, location in the world, current faction with NPC groups and other various and sundry factors.  That combination of factors constitutes the game state for a given player.

In order to play with other players, those factors must be aligned.  The players must have the same geographic location, be at about the same level, have the appropriate faction, be on the same quest and so on.  If they want to experience the same content, they must delicately converge their single player game experiences.

This is not conducive to experiencing the game with other players.  Being on the other side of the world impairs their ability to play together.  So games invent teleportation schemes.  Being on different quests impairs their ability to play together.  So games permit sharing of quests.  Still other factors, such as level disparities, insufficient faction, lack of qualifications and so on can all impair the ability of players to play together.  There's a whole bunch of factors involved.  Those factors are part and parcel of the achievement gameplay ethic, and they get in the way.

With so many factors shaping the way the game can be accessed by a given character, players end up pursuing highly-individual goals.  They want to advance a level, get certain faction, obtain the next upgrade in equipment, and so on.  Even when the players find a common ground, they may quickly diverge because of the great number of personal goals that players can pursue.  It simply seems odd to me to have attainment of personal goals as the core of a multiplayer game.  It may be nice to see other people playing the game at the same time that you are, but I know that I would enjoy playing the game with other people.

I can get that in current games, but I have to work for it.  I'd really rather have a game that naturally brought players together on common tasks.

This takes me back to the notion that I brought up in "Raids for Everybody"; when players enter the game, they can choose between the various global tasks that players are tackling.  A game might offer a few combat-related tasks, a few crafting tasks and a few exploration tasks.  But the goal of all those tasks is to have the players work together.  That is, all the tasks are larger than any given player.  To join in doesn't require an invitation.  You simply move your character into the activity in question.

For example, the classic military conquest scenario: the players are up against a fortress or a warren of caves with lots of monsters.  It is up to the players to collectively clear it out.  A player interested in combat joins in on that.  There might be four or five such challenges going on simultaneously, but players don't group.  They don't raid.  They just go where there are other players tackling the same problem.

When that problem is solved, the game advances to the next combat problem as part of an overarching story line.  Perhaps there are roving bands of monsters in the plains, and the players must bring their baggage train through the plains.  As the train slowly moves along, the players are obligated to defend it.  If nobody defends it, it doesn't move.  In fact, the group as a whole may begin to suffer because the train is being attacked.

Those are the few open quests that all players interested in combat are involved with.  There are no levels.  The equipment permits modest variation in character effectiveness.  Modest wealth can be accumulated for vanity items.  The point of the game is to have the players interacting, fighting side-by-side, alternately healing each other, getting into sword fights and firing their bows as circumstances dictate.

Players don't have personal agendas that can conflict.  The range of agendas is artificially limited such that the players stay near each other in all the ways that standard MMOs permit them to diverge.  They are kept near each other, both figuratively and literally.  They don't diverge in personal power.  They don't diverge in geographic location.  They don't diverge in faction gain.  They don't diverge in equipment.  If divergence is permitted, then the high end players will want high end challenges, and the low end players will be unable to participate.  So the point is to keep the players bunched up.

If they are bunched up, then they will tend to compete for whatever is available, right?  So don't give them much to compete over.  Keep the rewards global to the group.  When a fortress is captured, the magic dingus in the fortress becomes available to everyone.  The magic dingus grants a +1 on any weapon that you put on it, and that +1 stays with the weapon for a week of real time.  Now the players have a nice reward for having captured the fortress, and everyone gets it.  Or perhaps everyone is simply paid the victory money of 1 gold piece that they can spend any way they want.  Of course, their choices are mostly limited to vanity items and a few equipment upgrade choices.

This technique applies to the crafters, explorers and every other activity that an MMO can support.  Whatever the activity is, it must be scaled up until it can accomodate as many players as care to join in on it.  The crafters can build whole towns according to some master plan formed by the developers.  It's up to the crafters to do the building.  The explorers would not scatter to the four winds to do their exploration, but would group together into a few caravans in an effort to find certain far-off cities, lost civilizations and such.  They have to solve vast puzzles with many small pieces in order to do that exploration.  What they find may enable the other large groups to change the way they experience their content.  But no single player gains by the exploration.  Everything is a group effort.

To put all this another way, there is a modest set of grand quests that all players join in on.  It might be that players have a character in each grand quest, and can hop between them as the mood strikes them.  That way, whatever configuration changes can take place on a character need not be compromised.  The explorer character can be pure explorer while the combat character can be pure combat.

The net result is not an MMO that is not a spaghetti ball of intertwined single-player game experiences but rather an MMO that is a set of large group game experiences.  This is where I believe MMOs must go.

As I mentioned in the comments for "Raids for Everybody", Warhammer Online begins to approach what I'm talking about with their common/simultaneous quest mechanism.  Unfortunately, it falls short because the game retains a focus on individual accomplishments.  I'm advocating grand quests, which relegate individual rewards to a secondary role; it's nice to get a temporary bonus for my weapon.  The real entertainment of the grand quest is being part of a vast undertaking that many players are taking part in.

It's just fun to storm the castle.