• Sara: How do we choose people to run instances fairly

    Characters: Elveria[80] Sevelyn[80] Tesandra[80] Valediren[80] Santorini[74]
    Created: 2008-10-28 14:56:56

    I just posted about a MgT run in the planning forum, and I realised I really need to ask people's opinions on how we choose people to go instance running.

    As things stand at the moment we have 8 people who would be eligible to run level 70 dungeons. Of that two are tanks, and one is a healer. That leaves five interchangeable DPS for only three free places, and it's you guys I really want to talk to.

    I don't feel comfortable with running any kind of player ranking method of choosing players at the dungeon level. I don't think it's necessary, everyone deserves a chance to learn to play their class, and new level 70s have to earn their new gear somehow. Maybe my perspective will change if we're running raid instances, but somehow I don't think we'll have much choice of the 10 players needed ;-)

    I also don't like running the selection based on a first come first served basis, because those of the guild who work set hours away from the computer don't have a fair chance at saying they accept first, and might repeatedly miss out.

    I was pondering some kind of rotation system, but I have no decent way of keeping track of when people have run instances, nor do I know what would be best to do when people are unavailable for their "turn".

    If we end up in a situation where we have 10 people, and effectively two entire instance running teams, maybe this could be forgotten, but somehow I don't think we're hardcore enough to have enough people to run the same instance on the same night every time.

    Please, tell me what you think, and suggest ways we could deal with this fairly. How have you seen it done in the past? Could we create a nice way of guild leaders keeping track of who ran which instance when?
    "And then there's aggro to worry about."
    "What's 'aggro'?"
    "Well, it's complicated. But loosely translated, it means 'The Priest Dies.'"

    • Mike: Re: How do we choose people to run instances fairly

      Created: 2008-10-28 15:19:21

      Have just been having a ponder about this.

      Firstly, I would hope that everyone sees the need for such a system, and will try and be fair about who runs what and when.

      On the assumption that people aren't going to try and 'ninja' runs (because it will be noticed and dealt with in the same way as ninja looting), we could go for something like the following:

      Each player has a list of dungeons on the website, with a 'want' rating and a 'last run' time. The 'want' rating is one of the following:

      A - I really really really want this one. I have quests or need rep.
      B - I'd quite like to do this one - perhaps for a non-quest drop.
      C - Meh. I don't mind doing it to help out other people.
      D - Ye gods! I'm washing my hair...

      That seems like a fairly simple way for someone coordinating a run to pick a group based on a good balance of classes, how much people are interested, and when they last did the run.

      Flame away!

      • Mike: Re: Re: How do we choose people to run instances fairly

        Created: 2008-10-28 15:22:07

        Oh... perhaps also a list of days when you're regularly not available for runs?

        • Sara: Re: Re: Re: How do we choose people to run instances fairly

          Characters: Elveria[80] Sevelyn[80] Tesandra[80] Valediren[80] Santorini[74]
          Created: 2008-10-28 15:24:06

          I think that was a planned feature of the event planner, I'm not sure on a feature basis how much of this already crosses over into the ideas for that?
          "And then there's aggro to worry about."
          "What's 'aggro'?"
          "Well, it's complicated. But loosely translated, it means 'The Priest Dies.'"

      • Sara: Re: Re: How do we choose people to run instances fairly

        Characters: Elveria[80] Sevelyn[80] Tesandra[80] Valediren[80] Santorini[74]
        Created: 2008-10-28 15:26:20 Edited: 2008-10-28 15:29:04

        I like this idea, but I think it requires a bit of thought regarding how we keep track of who did what dungeon when. At the moment as the only healer, it's easy for me as guild leader to manually enter who ran what instance as I'd be there, and I would have no issue about doing that.

        I just don't know how that would change when we perhaps have multiple teams or runs that I am not part of, it might get a bit trickier to keep track of. I suppose it's a policy thing rather than implementation.

        -Edit-

        Unless this ties into the event planner again, people plan an event, they confirm their attendance. Unless someone marks the event as not having taken place then we presume that run to have occurred and attendees to have last run that dungeon at that time.

        It'd just need a way of saying "this run didn't occur" or "we wiped :-(" I suppose.

        ...I am beginning to realise that what we're creating is actually just a feature of the event planner, which I suppose it should be, except for the fact that creating the whole event planner is a much bigger job ;-)
        "And then there's aggro to worry about."
        "What's 'aggro'?"
        "Well, it's complicated. But loosely translated, it means 'The Priest Dies.'"

        • Mike: Re: Re: Re: How do we choose people to run instances fairly

          Created: 2008-10-28 15:33:51 Edited: 2008-10-28 15:36:48

          It does sound like it would be part of an event planner of some kind. Assume each (planned) run has a co-ordinator of some sort. They could select a group of people for the event based on the list suggested above, and then create the event.

          This would fire off an invitation (mail / forum / in-game) to the other people. Then after the scheduled time, the system could bug the co-ordinator to confirm that the run took place at the time planned, with the people planned.

          Come on Pete, get busy! ;)

          --EDIT--

          This also ties in to the 'help with instances' section, which is why I say 'co-ordinator' above rather the assuming everything is an end-game run managed by the guild leader (not that I'm trying to sack Sara ;) )

          For example, I need to do Underbog. I could take a look at who else wants to do it; select anyone else who's marked as 'A', and then make up a sensible party of 'B's and 'C's, and then go from there.

        • Carrot: Re: Re: Re: How do we choose people to run instances fairly

          Characters: Brevil[80] Glorif[80] Heclan[61] Roomba[27] Marindus[21]
          Created: 2008-10-28 21:32:57

          It's not Pete's fault. I said i'd do the event planner. So far I have done sweet FA. I have ideas, but haven't got around to putting them into code yet. At the mo i'm focusing on levelling to 58 with Mike, so he doesn't feel he'#s not got his money's worth from a second account.
          Wash: This is going to get pretty interesting.
          Mal: Define interesting...
          Wash: Oh god, oh god, we're all going to die?

        • Peter: Re: Re: Re: How do we choose people to run instances fairly

          Characters: Mieville[80] Rittal[80] Terlan[80] Caltera[64] Dynia[60]
          Created: 2008-10-28 22:05:46

          It ain't Dan's fault either, we agree'd we wouldn't do any serious development until the in game calendar had been release for usage.

          It now has, and from my point of view, it's lacking from any serious or even casual raiding guild point of view. (Not to mention thinking about it, it must be incredibly inefficient on their end).

          You can create guild events and them be open to all, and even if they had that doubt they'll implement the various groups that people would fit in... like Tank, Off Tank, Healer, DPS/Melee DPS/Spell DPS.

          I'm kinda inclined to suggest that we in fact don't use the in game calendar. At least until it gets vastly better, but as Dan has pointed out before with the LFG functionality, Blizz implement something which is lacking and don't fix it later.

          I have/had a rough diagram of database structure for the event planner, I'll try and find it now I sit behind Dan and work I can be sure to sneak a few questions to him :) and see if we can come up with a nice solution.

          Comments?
          "It's Tuesday night, let's do this raid!" - Game On, The Guild.

        • Mike: Re: Re: Re: How do we choose people to run instances fairly

          Created: 2008-10-28 22:19:41

          Wow, I wasn't trying to get at anyone! I was just referring to the fact that we seemed to be busy speccing up a big hunk'o'work!

        • Carrot: Re: Re: Re: How do we choose people to run instances fairly

          Characters: Brevil[80] Glorif[80] Heclan[61] Roomba[27] Marindus[21]
          Created: 2008-10-29 00:09:52

          Wasn't suggesting you were trying to get at anyone :P I just feel guilty cos I said i'd do this yonks ago, and have done bugger all thus far.
          Wash: This is going to get pretty interesting.
          Mal: Define interesting...
          Wash: Oh god, oh god, we're all going to die?