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Posts tagged ‘raid communication’

14
Aug

Behavior in raids – the final chapter

If we take the two last items of group dynamics that were part of the webpage referred to in the initial article they touch on the topics of rumors/topics of communication among raid members as well as group competition.

Raid communication can be divided into three main categories; pre-raid communication, in-raid communication and post-raid communication. Each of these again divided into directions from leadership, game related topics and social chatter. For quick examples; a pre-raid direction might be a raid invite, an in-game social chatter could be a joke between boss fights and a post-raid game related topic could be player suggestion for a change in strategy for a boss fight. You will find that the participants in each of the categories as well are their sub-categories will contain a different set of members, and whom you find in each group can help you understand a bit more of the groups social dynamics. Naturally it is important to understand whom gets along, who does not and who are just silently sitting in a corner. People that get along are more likely to ‘go that extra mile’ to help out someone they relate to. People that do not get along a more like to ‘add some effort’ in a competitive context. And people that are just silent will often need very specific details and orders to do anything beyond what they normally do. And if your raid goes silent its never a good sign…

Now we have mentioned individual competitions, but it scales once you add another group to it. Either a DPS-race between melee and ranged DPS or a progress race with another raiding guild. Once we step from individual to group competition we are also ‘upping the ante’ if both groups believe they can out-perform the other, or completely destroy it if either group feels that the competition is rigged or beyond their reach. In short its a tool in the raid leaders tool box, but one that requires a bit of pre-analysis to make proper use of. I have to admit that I have also been inspired by raid guild progress competition on an individual level, or even on a class progress level for that matter, but to make this effect contagious you need the whole group believe it is possible to ‘win’. Having a goal is one thing, adding some competition makes the goal more alive as a target. And whether you love to win or just enjoy achieving a goal its an added value to help bring your raid members together as a team.

In the end its all about having fun. Remember that above all else. If you are not having fun you are not doing it right, or you should be doing something else. Continuing to ‘not have fun’ just seems like a bad idea…

17
Jun

Positive goal oriented communication enhances performance?

This weekend I had two experiences with LFR (Looking for Raid) in WoW (World of Warcraft). LFR is an in-game tool that lets you sign up for a raid event with 24 other players facing some of the tougher challenges in the game. Both experiences relate to what happens once a raid is unable to handle the game challenges they encounter.

The first episode happened in a raid where there was were little communication going on between the players, and the little communication that was there was either casual or negative. The moment the raid started to have performance problems or wiping as it is often called, the negative comments in the raid chat channel increased and players were looking for someone to blame rather than looking for solutions. As the raid had no established leadership and no one trying to hold the team motivated, annoyed players left the raid rather than trying to collaborate and look for a solution. This is where episode two becomes interesting. Later during the same weekend in another raid the same level of chatter was going on, but this time there were also a few people trying to lead the group. The raid encountered the same performance problems as in the first episode, but due to the presence of leadership very few players decided to leave. The presence of leadership analyzing the problem and working on finding solutions kept most players focused and motivated, and having these solutions solving the problems kept the raid from loosing any more players as the raid progressed.

It seems that even the smallest presence of leadership or guidance is enough to motivate a team to continue working on overcoming problematic challenges that the game throws at them. For collaboration to work this part of the collaborative effort must be kept present and positive. For LFR in WoW this is a role that one or more players need to perform, but it should be possible to introduce mechanics in the game that would help motivate players into taking on these types of responsibilities. Motivational game mechanics that create a solid communication platform for positive social interactions is an interesting design challenge for MMORPGs today, but so far I have yet to see any attempts on solving this aspect of game play.