Forum Post of the Day: Single player instances?
by Elizabeth Harper 
Dec 2nd 2006 at 2:00PM
If you've been playing (and trolling the forums) for any amount of time, you'll know that the argument made here -- for challenging, instanced, single-player content -- is not a new one. This thread has all the usual responses, ranging from definitions of "massively multiplayer" to suggestions that solo instances would be impossible to create to suggestions that class-specific solo instances would be perfect. However, there's a lot of good discussion in the thread -- highlighted by a post by Tseric attempting to explain why this type of content is not feasible. If it requires too much healing to complete, pure melee or casters are impeded.
If it requires significant amounts of dps, you either have to spec and gear properly for one, single dungeon or pure dps classes simply have a leg up.
If you can't tank or mitigate damage effectively...well, you're dead at the first pull.
Therefore, if you reduce group size and composition to a single participant, the more generic and easy you have to make the dungeon.
And of balancing nine class specific dungeons? Tseric quips, "Do you realize how much time that would take?" And you have to admit -- he's got a point. Would you rather see Blizzard spending their development time working on nine different variations of the same dungeon, or working on nine new dungeons everyone can see?
Of course, as painful as my last PuG was, I might prefer the solo content anyway.
Filed under: Instances
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Joshua Ochs Dec 2nd 2006 2:38PM
Simple solution - two-person instances, or even more advanced 5-person instances at end-game. Yes, you'll probably need a healing class and a tank. However, that would be a lot more fun for a couple buddies than rounding up the 10, 25, or 40 people it takes now.
Peregwyn Dec 2nd 2006 3:12PM
I was thinking 3 people instances. If they balance it for the basic tank-dps-healing group...individual groups could work with that and take pretty much anyone they wanted.
oshin Dec 2nd 2006 3:58PM
I dont see why people are still begging for single player content, while it was certainly true that there was nothing for a single player once they capped the game out at 60 a 2 years ago, now there is the pvp system, and soon its going to be even easier.
Hammer Dec 2nd 2006 4:01PM
One man instances were piss poor in D&DO, and they'd be piss poor anywhere else.
Realistically, five man instances give the best experience in WoW, mostly due to the diverse range of character classes.
Antari Dec 4th 2006 6:53PM
however much soloable dungeons would kick ass, its just not possible for it to work in wow.
as for pugs, play on frostmourne, on of the australian servers and have puged every single instance ive ever run bar raids and have had a ball only really had 4 or 5 bad experiences in my 38 days in wow... we kinda have a decent culture of pugging on our server but i really dont know how you guys have it so bad everywhere else
shane Dec 2nd 2006 6:12PM
I would LOVE solo instances!
At 60 I had a heap of fun doing SM, I hardly went there when I was the correct level for the instance. It was too easy, but I still had fun. Maraudon was also a lot of fun, although I could only do a couple of bosses by myself.
Me and a friend went into Dire Maul and did 2 bosses there, that was fantastic, we got a Druid drop for him, that he could actually use at 60 too. Same for Uldaman, 2 of us did the whole thing.
So there are solo instances that you can do at high level, just not designed for solo, but still fun.
Try going to some of the lower level instances that you didnt go to much when you were at that level, its a blast.
BUT a balanced well designed instance would be a real bonus to the Xpack. I find in a lot of my instances Im dragged along by players that know the whole routine and tell me where to stand, what to do, who to pull, what to ignore etc etc. The most fun is had by figuring out how to kill an elite, or the order of events required for success. 95% of the time this knowledge is already in the group and I just have to follow...
joane Dec 2nd 2006 6:33PM
This idea has been brought up before and was slapped down by a blue. Basically, they didn't want to create content that they didn't think would be used by many people. Shortly after, the war effort came out, which featured content that only a handful of people could use (ridable bug mount).
I'd like to see a 2-person instance, personally. Yeah, MMOs are meant to be played in groups, but sometimes you just don't want to.
Dave Dec 2nd 2006 7:38PM
I think it's kinda dumb to put out solo content. So much of the outdoor content is soloable already. Frankly I'd rather see new 5-man instances being developed.
Will Dec 2nd 2006 11:30PM
Yes, more small group content would be really nice. Not solo, but 3-5 players or so.
Vaelin Dec 2nd 2006 11:56PM
This is why people roll hybrids - for the solo game.
White Rabbit Dec 3rd 2006 12:27AM
The most annoying thing I've experienced with a PUG was in Uldaman. We killed the boss and there were these platinum disks and somebody I could talk to to teach me the lore of Uldaman and everything. I was trying to read it but everyone started bitching, saying to hurry up cause they had quests to still finish. I said I wanted to finish reading *it was about 9 pages of text* so they kicked me from the group
I was so pissed off. This is why I avoid PUG as much as humanly possible
Aaron Dec 3rd 2006 2:42AM
I think 5 man instances is about right. Anything smaller than than and it's going to be a huge pain to balance.
JT Dec 3rd 2006 10:12AM
3-5 man would rock. with the right combinations even 2 (specially with a frost mage and holy priest) ;P
joey Dec 3rd 2006 10:33AM
Probably i'll be playing a lot of Wii and Xbox360 when the expansion comes out.
Deafdumbandblind Dec 4th 2006 5:21AM
WoW proports to be equally friendly to solo players as it is for groups.
Since they don't have one same-level solo-able instance, their statement is clearly lies.
I don't think it would be that hard to do. Just reduce the number of mobs to groups of 1 - 2. Or keep the number of mobs that you pull the same but reduce them to mostly non-elites or all non-elites.
We've already got too many 55th - 60th level 5-man instances and only 1 ~60th level 10-man instance.
Imo we need 1-man instances and more 10-man instances.