Making the dungeon finder suck less
by Allison Robert 
Jan 5th 2011 at 9:00AM
Heartbourne of Lore Hound offers an analysis of some potential solutions to dungeon finder abuse. As he observes, a proposed rating system for players could be easily abused on its own, so maybe that's not the best way to go. However, I find his suggestion of a social networking angle to be pretty interesting. What if there were a priority system to be grouped with players you met and "liked" before? What if guilds across servers could "friend" each other and form pools of players from which to draw 5-man groups?
"Invisible rep"
What I like most about this is that it would form a sort of invisible reputation quietly affecting your odds of getting a fast queue. If you're a fabulous hunter or mage with whom cross-server tanks had a great experience and who got "friended" a lot, you could bypass the usual wait if one of them queued at the same time you did.
There's even a cogent point here about being able to affect how you experience content: If you only "friend" tanks who pull like a ferret on meth, you could increase your odds of landing a fast tank in subsequent runs. By contrast, if you're a jerk player who's a hassle to be around, all that other players would have to do to keep your wait times unchanged would be not to friend you.
I agree with Heartbourne's point that this isn't a perfect system and it could be problematic for newer players down the road. "New players tend to be DPS," he points out, "and if all the tanks and healers get gobbled up by small communities, it could leave new players high and dry." But I do really like the idea of a little self-organization through the dungeon finder, and when you think about it, it could also yield some interesting data for Blizzard. Is there a particular class of tank or healer that people are more likely to "friend"? Which DPS get "friended" most through the dungeon finder? And is this the sort of system that should apply across all of your characters, or just one?
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 11)
Justin Jan 5th 2011 9:08AM
They could easily solve this by making such that if you kick somebody from your group--- you go to the bottom of the queue and not the top
Trilynne Jan 5th 2011 9:24AM
and what about the copious amounts of legit kicks? People who DCed for 10 minutes, or are honest-to-goodness jerks who won't listen? It would be entirely unfair to punish those groups who are already struggling.
Alfador Jan 5th 2011 9:25AM
Because it's a fantastic idea to punish someone for getting grouped with a hostile/abusive player, right? Please, I see this complaint every day and every day it's just as farcical.
Heilig Jan 5th 2011 9:26AM
Easier fix: You are automatically queued as the spec you are in and it can't be changed until you are out of the dungeon.
For example, Ret pally tries to queue for a dungeon, the only option available to him is DPS. If he leaves the queue, he can switch to Prot and re-queue, but this time he can only queue as a tank. As long as he stays in the queue or the dungeon, he can't change his spec.
This would completely solve that hybrid problem since it wouldn't really be inconvenient at all for TRUE tanks and healers since their queues are so short anyway.
Sending people to the bottom of the queue when they lose somebody is a very bad idea. If you really do have someone who is being abusive or simply refuses to play as a team, you need to kick them. That's why the system exists, and you shouldn't be punished for doing so. The system that needs to change is the queueing system, not the kicking system.
Alfador Jan 5th 2011 9:31AM
Heilig, my paladin is a tank and a DPS. I have heroic ready gear for both and I am capable at both. I am a somewhat better tank in my opinion but I've proven competent at both. Are you to insist that I queue as only as DPS if I want to quest as ret, even though I'd actually do groups a better service as a tank? I swear to god people who suggest this don't ever think it through beforehand.
I've got news for you. A lot of, if not most, "pure" tanks and healers, as you call them, do all their questing in a DPS or PvP spec, ESPECIALLY on pvp servers.
theRaptor Jan 5th 2011 9:40AM
This is again a solution that punishes non-abusers to attempt to stop abusers. This change would mean that a-holes and terribads could do what they want and the rest of the group would try and get on with it to avoid having to wait another 40 minutes for a replacement.
The only solution to LFD problems is to go back to single server groups. The problems with LFD are all because of (virtual) anonymity. When you are one out of a pool of millions the chances of you ever meeting the people you have scammed and abused in the past is minimal. When it was a single server pool word got around about the a-holes and the ninjas (and they had to at least pay for a name change or a server transfer when their rep got too bad).
Boz Jan 5th 2011 9:42AM
@Justin
I kicked a Pally "healer" from my Botanica run the other night I was Tanking. He had all quest gear, pulled for me, never healed - not once - didn't know what Beacon was, never cleansed, went AFK during pulls, and was completely silent except when I asked, "Are you here?" If I kick someone, it's for good reason, and I shouldn't be punished for legit kicks.
@Heilig
I requeued the same run after the kick as Tank/Healer, and ended up swapping to my Healing spec and healing the rest of Botanica without any trouble. Forcing players into a particular spec will increase Dungeon Finder queues, not shorten them.
cyanea85 Jan 5th 2011 9:45AM
@Heilig
Healer queues are about ten minutes on my server. I do dailies then and farm shit. Your plan would doom me to ten minutes of sitting around twiddling my thumbs because I want to queue as a capable healer, but can't switch to my Enhancement spec to go do shit while I wait.
Boz Jan 5th 2011 9:48AM
theRaptor, "The only solution to LFD problems is to go back to single server groups. "
I appreciate what you're saying, but restricting players to their server limits your pool of players, effectively increasing queue times. The LFG was opened up to the Battlegroup for good reason. The primarily complaint is typically not jerks (that's the #2 complaint!), it's extensive wait times. Shortening wait times means encouraging more players to tank and heal rather than just DPS.
The only real solution is to make tanking and healing more attractive, and/or more widely available.
Razorbrow Jan 5th 2011 9:50AM
Even better idea: Once you are selected by the dungeon finder to fill a specific role in a dungeon, you are "locked" into that role. If you change your role, then you are moved to the back of the queue.
So when the pseudo-tank/heals combo kicks, when they re-queue as dps, they are moved to the back of the pack and have to wait just as long as every other dps does. This wouldn't effect the vast majority of people who normally don't change their role in a dungeon and have to legitimately kick someone. Further, in the rare cases where a dps who queued as dps decides to change to tank/heals for whatever reason, they would be unaffected as well, because even though they are moved to the "back" of the pack, the back of the pack for dps needs should still be an instant match since only tanks/heals are in short supply.
theRaptor Jan 5th 2011 10:10AM
@Boz
Waits times were fine if you weren't under geared or had a reputation for sucking on my server. At least during prime time I could easily get a trade chat PuG in 10 minutes.
Let's be honest here, the LFD tool was designed to enable geared players to carry through under geared players (the LFD buff, tying the daily bonus into the LFD interface, matching higher iLevel players with lower iLevel players etc).
That was fine for easy mode Wrath content, but lots of people just don't want to put up with copping abuse as tanks/heals when the content isn't trivial, especially when a large part of the non-triviality is that healers can't instantly heal the entire parties health and never run out of mana.
Nothing is going to encourage more tanks/heals to play without trivialising content OR raising the skill level in Heroics. Blizzard need to raise the bar for Heroics, IMO it shouldn't be an easily cheese iLevel gate, it should be something like completing X amount of normals without wiping and meeting DPS/HPS goals.
JoeHelfrich Jan 5th 2011 10:11AM
My main is Ret, but I occasionally switch to tanking if I want to finish a run off without a long wait--I don't like tanking, but I can do it. So keeping people from changing their choice once in the dungeon doesn't work.
Maybe the solution is to 1) only allow people to ADD roles once in the dungeon (so I could queue as DPS and then specify tank or DPS after a kick) and not remove roles, and 2) fill tank and healer roles from the existing party before grabbing new people from the queue for those roles, so the DPS who tries to queue jump keep finding themselves selected as tank and healer.
It's not perfect (it lets three people grief an unending series of DPS, if only two people at a time, and the tank who just won't get the hint that he's the problem will be stuck until someone kicks him) but it might be better than the current situation.
Gine Jan 5th 2011 10:28AM
@Heilig and those who had issues with his comment.
Good idea at the core with locking people into a single role once they're in the queue, but this could be done more simply by only allowing them to select one role when they enter the queue. It would not be much of a limitation since demand is usually tank>healer>dps and if they couldn't change their role once in the dungeon, only other people queued as dps would pop up. It would be a rough transition, but would probably make waiting for some dps who can also tank/heal so much of a hassle that they would just do things the normal way.
Tdog Jan 5th 2011 11:04AM
@ Alfador
You make a very huge moot point. You're a tank so in the end your queue is split second. Doubt you'll be doing any farming in that timeframe. It's not just your opinion they have to think about on the queues. Do what you're better at or what you feel like you want to, because it's a game. The main thing that's trying to get done is making sure more people have a better time. The game's not revolving around you, it's revolving around the whole community. Their just trying to figure out ways to help make the dungeon finder suck less with finding ways of getting people to exploit the system.
mibu.work1 Jan 5th 2011 11:20AM
What I think people are missing here is that the system, as it is, IS changing. Why were wait times so long for high-end normal dungeons and early heroics? Because cacaclysm was released on December 7th, and cost forty dollars (U.S.). for college students, highschoolers, and the 24-early 40's bracket (I.E. the majority of WoW players) that's a good amount, especially considering how hard it is to get into the work force at a young age these days.
Many WoW players didn't go to the midnight release, and thus some stores ran out of copies, or they simply waited till christmas for a relative or loved one (not that those two are mutually exclusive) to buy it for them. On my server, a mid-high population regular U.S. realm in the whirlwind battlegroup, had 47 minute que times for weeks. The week after christmas, I was in 15-20 minutes ques. All that was needed was a higher population getting into the higher-end content.
As for the problem of bad players: This is nothing new. The other day, I was in a run of Tol'vir. The tank pulled before the healer was even ZONED IN, and then group-dropped before she hit the floor, which was a few business days before the rest of us even knew what had happened. Needless to say, we wiped. The warrior said he could tank, he had gear and the spec, though it would be his first time. We grabbed a new paladin DPS, and went to it. The warrior tank was...underwhelming, to say the least, but damnit he was trying. After the healer (a good-natured priest) had died for the third consecutive pull and all three DPS were taking on individual targets while the tank ran in a circle thunderstomping for all he was worth, the druid volunteered to change to his feral spec from balance and tank. After that, no wipes, only one death (we neglected to inform the warrior of the necessity of NOT standing in the light on the third boss) we had an easy time finishing the dungeon, and I was able to leave group saying "gj" to everyone.
If there was a rating system in place, the poor, inexperianced warrior would never get into a group again, or at least would have to overcome a great number of healer deaths on some kind of record. If people were role-locked, the druid would have had to stay balance, and we would be stuck with the warrior. If we had done that, then the priest's record would show a TON of threat generation, and she would be downgraded for it.
The system works people, it's just that, like any system available to the public, like a metro system or commuter bus, there are going to be assholes on it, and they need to be put up with. That, I'm afraid, is a fact of life.
Korenn Jan 5th 2011 11:20AM
I like the basic idea of Heilig's suggestion, even if the specific implementation doesn't work.
Another approach would be to force people into the spec that has been selected for them the moment they enter the dungeon or when assigned that role in the dungeon. Queued as healer but questing as dps? as soon as you enter the dungeon you're instantly spec-changed to healer. DPS-ing as ret but after the tank disappears and you want to switch to tank? - select tank as role and when you get reassigned tank you're auto-switched to prot spec.
Obviously this would need to lock out spec changes while in the dungeon, and rechange you if you port out of the dungeon and switch spec there.
Boydboyd Jan 5th 2011 1:16PM
mibu.work1 - Quoted For Truth
I think everyone should read your post that plans on using the LFD tool.
Mir Jan 5th 2011 2:42PM
@Mibu
The only problem I see with claiming that 'role locking' would be an issue, is that you assume people adhere to the silly icon that says what role they are.
If two people agree to switch roles, the dungeon finder isn't going to stop them from clicking the talent spec swap button :)
Hollow Leviathan Jan 5th 2011 3:20PM
How about solving the issue by banning the asshats exploiting it? They pull that crap, get reported, get banned, no one does that anymore.
They could potentially just ban them from the dungeon finder and not the game as a whole, but I'm sure the people who have been kicked would rather see them get burned.
Mssr Moo Goo 2 Jan 5th 2011 3:52PM
Easy way for DPS to get shorter ques. Don't que.
A good dungeon guide makes LFD pugs easy. Here is my realistic solution.
Every time a dungeon guide finishes a dungeon he/she gets a credit towards a ranking system.
This system serves no other purpose then to increase the chance of being chosen as dungeon guide, and is instantly visable to other in the group, like a title.
I almost never have issues leading LFD groups, even with new players. It's the Kingslayer wrath babies that think they know best but really have no clue that are the problem. It's not all their fault though. It's human nature to be defencive and he has no way to know that I know better other then some unrelated achieves and raid gear.
If they saw in my title that I had led 5+ LFD groups through this same instance all ready, they would be more open to listening. And maybe a few more hunters would get a disarm pet for the High Prophet in Lost City.
Why is this tank getting hit so hard?!?!?! It's called 99 lashes, and it's a PITA.