The LFG system is bad

[SoftFootpaws.9134]

This is something I've been wanting to talk about for a long time, and there's numerous posts on the subject disorganised into various threads regarding stuff like instanced content, but hopefully I can provide something a bit more concrete in this thread.

 

Basically, the LFG system is bad, completely bad, and is a large part of why multiplayer content in this game is so frustrating. At times, it feels like playing the UI more than the game.

 

First of all, the biggest problem is organisation. The devs seem to think that players will use all these various empty categories that are not used, have not been used and never will be used. On top of this, there's way too much distribution of the listings which makes finding something to do time consuming when it should be nearly instant and easily accessible.

 

Examples:

- All the unused categories such as Story Journal (players use the associated map category instead), Festivals (for Halloween and the like players use Central Tyria-Squads), Achivements (players use the associated map/dungeon categories instead), Guild Recruitment (players recruit primarily through map chat), and Mentoring (never seen it used whatsoever). There's others, but these are the most obvious ones that are basically just there to take up space and make finding the category you want more time consuming than it should be.

- Player Vs Player and World Vs World categories are useful in theory, but in practice aren't ever used because PvP uses an automatic matchmaking system (which PvE should have!) and in WvW you just join whatever tag you see on the map or ask whats going on in Team chat.

- Excessive splitting of categories like Living World, which could all be consolidated. LWS3, 4 and IBS have so few listings that they could all be in just one category per season, which would make those listings much easier to find. Dungeons have the same problem, they could easily all just be in one category like Raids and Strike Missions are. The only time this splitting really works is for Fractals due to the Tier system.

 

All in all, the LFG tool should be drastically scaled down with data recorded about which categories actually get used and how often. Players should be able to bring up the LFG tool, click a category, and already see multiple listings without having to click on all of them one by one searching for something.

 

Which brings us to:

The second biggest problem, which is lack of a watch/notification system. This is one of the biggest roadblocks to players getting into raids, because raid listings (especially training), are so rare that players have to sit with the LFG tool open for up to several hours waiting for a listing. Instead, they should be able to click an eye icon (like you do with daily achivements, etc.) to watch the category, and be notified of when a listing is available with a message in their chat window and a link to open the LFG tool automatically.

Because of this, players often miss listings that they would normally join in on, just because they weren't camping the LFG tool and were instead playing the game itself.

 

And the final, and potentially most severe problem, is no way to specify your role. This makes it difficult for players to join modern group content which has very strict role requirements, and becomes a hodgepodge of joining the squad (taking up a slot, and potentially causing it to delist if its full), stating your role, working out what other players roles are via chat, and trying to get all your builds sorted out which is okay for content like Fractals, but for content like Strike Missions can sometimes take even longer than the encounters themselves.

 

The lack of ability to state your role, and have this role displayed somewhere like next to your squad icon, hurts uptake. A system where players can just join in would benefit everyone. Furthermore, the additional of a role system would pave the way for automatic matchmaking in PvE in the future.

 

There's probably more points that can be made, but these are the worst ones I've seen in my years playing the game. It seems to me like the LFG system was designed by someone who has never played the game.

 

Edited July 13, 2022 by Mariyuuna.6508

[Einsof.1457]

anet knows. anet dont care. 

[Danikat.8537]

I agree that some of the categories could be merged or discontinued, but I disagree with many of the specific ones you mentioned. For example dumping all the festival ones into Central Tyria probably seems fine if you want to find a group for festival activites, but if you want to do anything else the misplaced ones are already annoying. I wouldn't want to have to wade through all the listings which do use the appropriate category (especially at Halloween) to find one for something else, especially time sensitive things like the leyline anomaly.

I think Achievements could be removed because anyone looking to get an achievement has a better chance putting it in the section for the type of content, and Mentoring for much the same reason: anyone looking for a mentor is likely to be looking at the area they're in. Other than that though I think it makes sense to have seperate sections for each area of the game so it's easy to find listings for the specific thing you want to do.
 

5 hours ago, Mariyuuna.6508 said:

The second biggest problem, which is lack of a watch/notification system. This is one of the biggest roadblocks to players getting into raids, because raid listings (especially training), are so rare that players have to sit with the LFG tool open for up to several hours waiting for a listing. Instead, they should be able to click an eye icon (like you do with daily achivements, etc.) to watch the category, and be notified of when a listing is available with a message in their chat window and a link to open the LFG tool automatically.

Because of this, players often miss listings that they would normally join in on, just because they weren't camping the LFG tool and were instead playing the game itself.

Why would Anet want to encourage these players to sit waiting for someone else to create the group they want to join instead of creating it themselves? Anyone can create a listing in LFG and that's always faster than hoping someone else will do it for you.

I'd ask why players do it, but I've been in that situation myself and I don't know why. In general I'm fine with creating a group listing, I know it doesn't mean I'm committing to lead the group or whatever and I know it's always faster but sometimes for reasons I don't understand I just don't feel like it. I wouldn't expect Anet (or anyone else) to fix that behaviour when I can't always get myself to do it, but I don't think it should be encouraged.

If anything it should be the opposite - maybe if someone sits with one specific LFG window up for 5 minutes or whatever they get a pop-up notification letting them know they can create a group listing for other people to join and reminding them that no one will know they're waiting until they do.
 

5 hours ago, Mariyuuna.6508 said:

And the final, and potentially most severe problem, is no way to specify your role. This makes it difficult for players to join modern group content which has very strict role requirements, and becomes a hodgepodge of joining the squad (taking up a slot, and potentially causing it to delist if its full), stating your role, working out what other players roles are via chat, and trying to get all your builds sorted out which is okay for content like Fractals, but for content like Strike Missions can sometimes take even longer than the encounters themselves.

 

The lack of ability to state your role, and have this role displayed somewhere like next to your squad icon, hurts uptake. A system where players can just join in would benefit everyone. Furthermore, the additional of a role system would pave the way for automatic matchmaking in PvE in the future.

 

There's probably more points that can be made, but these are the worst ones I've seen in my years playing the game. It seems to me like the LFG system was designed by someone who has never played the game.

The problem there is that aside from a few raid mechanics those roles are entirely player created and shift frequently as the meta changes (which can happen as a result of players discovering new builds or tactics, not just balance updates). I don't think it would be practical to add something to automatically show your role, or even icons/names players can select because Anet would have to keep changing what those are every time the meta shifts. Also as you said the roles can shift depending on who else is in the group, which adds another layer of complication because then the LFG tool would have to keep updating which roles you can choose based on who has already joined.

Finally I don't understand why talking to other players in your group is considered a problem. I know that's common in MMOs, in my other game it's fairly standard for the only thing anyone says in a dungeon run to be one person typing 'gg' at the end. But if you're playing a multiplayer game I think it should be expected that you'll talk to the people you're playing with, especially if you're trying to agree on tactics.

[Ashen.2907]

8 hours ago, Mariyuuna.6508 said:

This is something I've been wanting to talk about for a long time, and there's numerous posts on the subject disorganised into various threads regarding stuff like instanced content, but hopefully I can provide something a bit more concrete in this thread.

 

Basically, the LFG system is bad, completely bad, and is a large part of why multiplayer content in this game is so frustrating. At times, it feels like playing the UI more than the game.

 

First of all, the biggest problem is organisation. The devs seem to think that players will use all these various empty categories that are not used, have not been used and never will be used. On top of this, there's way too much distribution of the listings which makes finding something to do time consuming when it should be nearly instant and easily accessible.

 

Examples:

- All the unused categories such as Story Journal (players use the associated map category instead), Festivals (for Halloween and the like players use Central Tyria-Squads), Achivements (players use the associated map/dungeon categories instead), Guild Recruitment (players recruit primarily through map chat), and Mentoring (never seen it used whatsoever). There's others, but these are the most obvious ones that are basically just there to take up space and make finding the category you want more time consuming than it should be.

- Player Vs Player and World Vs World categories are useful in theory, but in practice aren't ever used because PvP uses an automatic matchmaking system (which PvE should have!) and in WvW you just join whatever tag you see on the map or ask whats going on in Team chat.

- Excessive splitting of categories like Living World, which could all be consolidated. LWS3, 4 and IBS have so few listings that they could all be in just one category per season, which would make those listings much easier to find. Dungeons have the same problem, they could easily all just be in one category like Raids and Strike Missions are. The only time this splitting really works is for Fractals due to the Tier system.

 

All in all, the LFG tool should be drastically scaled down with data recorded about which categories actually get used and how often. Players should be able to bring up the LFG tool, click a category, and already see multiple listings without having to click on all of them one by one searching for something.

 

Which brings us to:

The second biggest problem, which is lack of a watch/notification system. This is one of the biggest roadblocks to players getting into raids, because raid listings (especially training), are so rare that players have to sit with the LFG tool open for up to several hours waiting for a listing. Instead, they should be able to click an eye icon (like you do with daily achivements, etc.) to watch the category, and be notified of when a listing is available with a message in their chat window and a link to open the LFG tool automatically.

Because of this, players often miss listings that they would normally join in on, just because they weren't camping the LFG tool and were instead playing the game itself.

 

And the final, and potentially most severe problem, is no way to specify your role. This makes it difficult for players to join modern group content which has very strict role requirements, and becomes a hodgepodge of joining the squad (taking up a slot, and potentially causing it to delist if its full), stating your role, working out what other players roles are via chat, and trying to get all your builds sorted out which is okay for content like Fractals, but for content like Strike Missions can sometimes take even longer than the encounters themselves.

 

The lack of ability to state your role, and have this role displayed somewhere like next to your squad icon, hurts uptake. A system where players can just join in would benefit everyone. Furthermore, the additional of a role system would pave the way for automatic matchmaking in PvE in the future.

 

There's probably more points that can be made, but these are the worst ones I've seen in my years playing the game. It seems to me like the LFG system was designed by someone who has never played the game.

 

The eye icon to watch for a listing is all that I would need for LFG to be 1000% better. Currently I will watch for a squad for a few minutes and then give up and go on about my business. I dont mind not finding a group if none is forming, but I am not going to waste my limited play time sitting staring at LFG.

Edited July 14, 2022 by Ashen.2907

[Labjax.2465]

Great points.

[angrax.1372]

A simple list with all open parties would be great. Together with the notification, what else would you need?

[Voyant.1327]

Like the options you provided, but yes it is one of their major issues not having a good group finder type system for PvE.

The LFG just isn't intuitive or easily accessible. There are a lot of great examples and it would certainly increase activities if it were fixed to something more standard in the industry.

Imo its one of the things that makes the game feel empty/lifeless bc it does such a bad job of letting group content be accessible. 

And the reason a lot of people don't post is personality types, this is an MMO. A large portion of MMO players have either social awkwardness or anxiety etc. Commonly the type to look for something to join vs. something to start themselves. Its what I mean by intuitive, it doesn't account for the human element. There would be so many more games listed if it were button clicks to group find vs. "think of something to say and post hoping to get people" which immediately flares up anxiety for a lot with that personality type. 

 

Edited July 14, 2022 by Voyant.1327

[Labjax.2465]

27 minutes ago, Voyant.1327 said:

Like the options you provided, but yes it is one of their major issues not having a good group finder type system for PvE.

The LFG just isn't intuitive or easily accessible. There are a lot of great examples and it would certainly increase activities if it were fixed to something more standard in the industry.

Imo its one of the things that makes the game feel empty/lifeless bc it does such a bad job of letting group content be accessible. 

And the reason a lot of people don't post is personality types, this is an MMO. A large portion of MMO players have either social awkwardness or anxiety etc. Commonly the type to look for something to join vs. something to start themselves. Its what I mean by intuitive, it doesn't account for the human element. There would be so many more games listed if it were button clicks to group find vs. "think of something to say and post hoping to get people" which immediately flares up anxiety for a lot with that personality type. 

 

Add to this the fact that anxiety or no, a lot of people in general in life do not want to lead others and making a group in this context essentially makes you the de facto leader. Whether you intended to be one or not, people will tend to see it that way and that means they are now implicitly expecting you to know what you're doing and handle issues that arise. I'm not saying it will explicitly play out that way every time, but that's going to be how it's generally perceived.

With automated queue systems, there is no de facto leader* and IME, it's easier to see leadership as shared responsibility that gets worked out organically. Maybe someone who knows more says more or someone more confident runs ahead of others, but that's about it.

*the one exception being the tank in some trinity game situations, but even then, it's not necessarily expected that they are leading by all players present

Edited July 14, 2022 by Labjax.2465

[DexterousGecko.6328]

something something "i'm able to get groups using it therefore nothing is wrong with it"

[Danikat.8537]

59 minutes ago, Labjax.2465 said:

Add to this the fact that anxiety or no, a lot of people in general in life do not want to lead others and making a group in this context essentially makes you the de facto leader. Whether you intended to be one or not, people will tend to see it that way and that means they are now implicitly expecting you to know what you're doing and handle issues that arise. I'm not saying it will explicitly play out that way every time, but that's going to be how it's generally perceived.

With automated queue systems, there is no de facto leader* and IME, it's easier to see leadership as shared responsibility that gets worked out organically. Maybe someone who knows more says more or someone more confident runs ahead of others, but that's about it.

*the one exception being the tank in some trinity game situations, but even then, it's not necessarily expected that they are leading by all players present

That's not been my experience at all. Even when I create a group saying I want to do a specific achievement or something I never feel like I'm expected to lead. The rest of the group might ask me what's involved, like where the thing is I need to find or when a timer starts, but that's because I'm probably the only one who can see the achievement text (or they're expecting I've already looked it up) and often when we get to that point someone else will prompt me to get it or tell the group to wait while I do whatever extra bits need doing, which from my perspective is putting them into a leadership role, not me.

Most often there's no specific leader, especially in groups for things like daily Fractals or dungeon paths. Someone has to select the Fractals of course but that can be different people all times and definitely isn't always the person who started the group (especially if that's me). Various people will explain mechanics or ask for/prompt the group to do different things, but there's no guarantee it will be the same person each time.

It's a bit different for meta-events because the person who starts a group is usually the commander and then they are expected to lead, but even then it doesn't have to be that way. I've been in groups where the person giving instructions is not the one with the commander tag, often because the commander isn't fluent in the language most of the group knows, can't type detailed instructions and keep the tag where it needs to be or because someone knows the event but doesn't have a tag and someone else has a tag but doesn't know the event. (Like the few times I've commanded a lane in Dragon's Stand, because I can never remember how to get to most of the side events.)

[Linken.6345]

1 hour ago, Labjax.2465 said:

Add to this the fact that anxiety or no, a lot of people in general in life do not want to lead others and making a group in this context essentially makes you the de facto leader. Whether you intended to be one or not, people will tend to see it that way and that means they are now implicitly expecting you to know what you're doing and handle issues that arise. I'm not saying it will explicitly play out that way every time, but that's going to be how it's generally perceived.

With automated queue systems, there is no de facto leader* and IME, it's easier to see leadership as shared responsibility that gets worked out organically. Maybe someone who knows more says more or someone more confident runs ahead of others, but that's about it.

*the one exception being the tank in some trinity game situations, but even then, it's not necessarily expected that they are leading by all players present

So tell me after the first person join how do person 3, 4,5-10 know who started the lfg?

[Lottie.5370]

I love the LFG system because I can clearly communicate what I'm looking for when I make a group.

There's a lot of sections that I don't use, but I would hate if it was replaced with a queue system or whatever.

[Doggie.3184]

Reading their 'road map' I really feel like they really don't understand what their game really needs. Many of the things you mention feel so obvious but they don't bring up anything actually useful in their article. 

We need some UI indicators of what role people are. I have no idea if they still pretend to be Anti-Holy-Trinity but they need to finally embrace what they created into the LFG UI. Let people put an Alacrity Symbol next to their name for example to make organization less annoying.

[mythical.6315]

7 minutes ago, Doggie.3184 said:

Reading their 'road map' I really feel like they really don't understand what their game really needs. Many of the things you mention feel so obvious but they don't bring up anything actually useful in their article. 

We need some UI indicators of what role people are. I have no idea if they still pretend to be Anti-Holy-Trinity but they need to finally embrace what they created into the LFG UI. Let people put an Alacrity Symbol next to their name for example to make organization less annoying.

The game doesn’t need a group finder though. Everything that they brought up in the article is useful to someone; just not you apparently. 
 

UI indicators for roles are unnecessary as well.  Especially when certain builds can provide multiple boons. 

[Hashberry.4510]

This is just one of the many ways the game was never really high quality. Many of us would use a queued system. Folks who are happy with the current set up could keep doing their thing, but insist that no one else should get a robust queueing system. Kind of stinks really.

[mythical.6315]

Why does there need to be a queue system?

[Cuks.8241]

LFG has many many problems. Accessibility (just plain UI) and functionality is severely lacking. I'm pretty sure Anet is aware otherwise I just dont know what they are doing. In a game like gw2 good lfg should be a priority. When I say like gw2, a game that doesnt even have a hub where all players could meet. Hubs are instanced so you cant even advertise old school via chat because only players in your instance will see it.

On 7/13/2022 at 7:38 PM, Mariyuuna.6508 said:

The second biggest problem, which is lack of a watch/notification system. This is one of the biggest roadblocks to players getting into raids, because raid listings (especially training), are so rare that players have to sit with the LFG tool open for up to several hours waiting for a listing. Instead, they should be able to click an eye icon (like you do with daily achivements, etc.) to watch the category, and be notified of when a listing is available with a message in their chat window and a link to open the LFG tool automatically.

 

How I would do it. You click the watch button for a category and you get a non intrusive window under the event and story notification with that group's listings. And even though I am prepared to lead many activities there are numerous times when I am also not prepared to do it for many reasons and just want to join someone else's group. 

[Necrosian.1359]

1 hour ago, mythical.6315 said:

Why does there need to be a queue system?

Why not. It would be superior to what we have now.

[mythical.6315]

3 minutes ago, Necrosian.1359 said:

Why not. It would be superior to what we have now.

Would it be though?

[MajinSoul.4512]

Definitely agree that the LFG tool needs a lot of improvements. Simply remembering the tab you were last looking at would go a long way to improve the experience and should be relatively easy to implement I think. It's such a hassle to navigate to the specific tab everytime you close the LFG window.

[Necrosian.1359]

6 minutes ago, mythical.6315 said:

Would it be though?

Yes, because, at least for me, it's not fun standing, doing nothing, hoping some group appears for content i want to do.

[Freya.9075]

2 hours ago, Doggie.3184 said:

Reading their 'road map' I really feel like they really don't understand what their game really needs. Many of the things you mention feel so obvious but they don't bring up anything actually useful in their article. 

We need some UI indicators of what role people are. I have no idea if they still pretend to be Anti-Holy-Trinity but they need to finally embrace what they created into the LFG UI. Let people put an Alacrity Symbol next to their name for example to make organization less annoying.

I wouldn’t mind adding symbols to lfg options, however this is not needed. It is what you want. Which is totally fine. We all want different things for this game.
 

Anet makes their roadmap based on data they have. Since most players do open world content, it’s logical they want to focus on that now. Maybe they will focus on lfg tool later who knows. But saying they don’t understand what the game needs is a stretch. It’s not useful for you, but that doesn’t mean it’s not useful for others 

[Hesione.9412]

I wish I could favourite some categories and have them in a Favourites folder up the top of LFG.

[mythical.6315]

27 minutes ago, Necrosian.1359 said:

Yes, because, at least for me, it's not fun standing, doing nothing, hoping some group appears for content i want to do.

Then you create a group instead of waiting for one to magically appear. 

[Linken.6345]

50 minutes ago, Necrosian.1359 said:

Yes, because, at least for me, it's not fun standing, doing nothing, hoping some group appears for content i want to do.

To add on what mythical.6315 said.

Just because you start it dont mean you have to lead it type in something like -- chill run all welcome --

And you will have the same experience as a auto lfg.