User feedback in MMOs
by Jennie Lees 
Feb 5th 2006 at 9:30PM
The sheer number of players in WoW means that you'll run into a variety of people while levelling and otherwise passing the time in-game. Currently, the in-game feedback mechanism is one-sided, and limited: if a player is unbearable, then they can be welcomed to your /ignore list, but if they're worth remembering then they get a place on your friends list.
Depending on how you play, these lists may be sparse or full, but if you're anything like me then you wish there was something more to it: the ability to see what others think of a player, and the ability to help others stay away from bad players or gravitate towards good players.
This soapbox piece over at Gamasutra goes into the ins and outs of character rating systems as applied to MMOs. It brings up some important points; people will try to game the system, by creating characters solely to leave ratings, and there should be further requirements such as having to group for X minutes. Also, there would have to be a RP explanation for ratings, and a decision would have to be made over whether to use user-specific or character-specific feedback. The former means that everyone can be forewarned you're a jackass; the latter means you can RP a jackass without harming your other characters.
Personally, I'm not sure I want a disgruntled group member harming my reputation for life just because we disagreed on the best way to heal -- nor do I want the person who called me a n00b because I wasn't specced the way he wanted to have much of an impact on my ability to find instance parties. On the other hand, I'd definitely like to be able to avoid people like that.
It's unlikely a system like this could be shoehorned into WoW by Blizzard, but it's certainly fair game for an addon, if enough players would install it.
[Image credit: Fan art by George Tutumi]
Filed under: Odds and ends
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Silvertusk Feb 6th 2006 12:24AM
I'd hate it, personally. Especially if I was a warrior/priest in a raid, and made a stupid mistake - that'd mean like, 39 guaranteed negative comments about ya'!
Which brings me to another point - people new to instances would be quickly tagged as "really bad with instances", and would never find a group again and learn.
Baron Samedi Feb 6th 2006 9:37AM
Heh. So from your post, you want to be able to rate other players, but don't want other players to be able to rate you.
I think that's the basic reason why a system like this won't work: the majority of MMO players are pretty immature. This means that not only can they be incredibly petty and vindictive, but they are also amazingly mercurial: the guy or gal who was a complete and utter tool one day can be a valuable party member the next.
IMHO, a rating system like this is pretty much useless because of this.
jennie Feb 6th 2006 9:58AM
Baron Samedi - I think it's a bit of an over-generalisation to say that most MMO players are immature! But even so, I think the anonymity of WoW (added to the fact that each character is separate, and there's a generous character cap) does play a big factor in letting immature behaviour come to the forefront sometimes. Penny Arcade have the theory down pat in this comic: http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2004/03/19 (warning, not work safe).
I think there are two options if a system like this were to be created. The addon option might work -- its main problem is attaining critical mass, but if the sort of people who want to avoid bad players all install it, then you get a cycle of the more mature gamers leaving feedback in a mature way rather than immature players gaming the system.
The other option is to make it something extremely generic and fairly innocuous like Xbox Live. Currently Xbox Live (on the 360) allows you to leave a "I preferred this player" or "I don't want to play with this player again" rating. It's not like eBay -- you can't see who's left you feedback, they don't leave long messages (A+++ GREAT SNIPER) and it doesn't affect your ability to play. You get a five-star rating, and it starts at 3. Almost everyone that I've played with has five full stars -- I've yet to see anyone who's gone below 3. It defeats the object of such a system, of course, if everyone just leaves positive feedback. But the functional thing is that you can see an approximation of other players' reputations with no further information, and you can ensure you do or don't play against them in random games. That doesn't carry over too well to the LFG scenario, but if something like cross-server BGs came into effect, I can see it being transplanted fairly easily.
L'Emmerdeur Feb 6th 2006 11:11AM
Try the addon Ninja. It let's you create a list of people you will be warned about whenever they are in the same party/raid with you. You can add notes to each name, to remember why they are on you Ninja list. Unlike the Ignore list, it doesn't block communications, and the number of names is unlimited.
This tool isn't as severe as the Ignore list, allowing you to give someone a second chance - i.e. someone you encountered early on in their WoW experience and marked as a noob, but who might have learned2play since then.