For those of you who play MMOs what do you spend the most time doing? What areas do you feel should have the most time spent working on for the best possible experience? Combat type activities Crafting Farming Village Building Guild Activities or other (If other please explain) Also please give examples on how you feel MMOs should improve on the choice you pick!

Role playing would be an nice addition :) Although I don't know how it could be implemented. As most people are not familiar with role playing.

I want to be able to quickly find a pick-up group of sane, funny people, and then quickly find an area suitable to our group for hunting. I want the combat of the evening to be varied (not just grinding the same mob over and over), and the rewards to be reasonable for an evening's work. I want the session to be 1-4 hours in length.

I don't want to grind. I don't want to level much. I don't want to spend months before I can play the "nice" parts of the game. Meanwhile, I want the environment to be dangerous enough, and matter enough, that good teamwork is required. Think the death penalty in EQ: it was very harsh, but that meant that dieing was a real problem, and your group had real incentive to work well together.

I enjoy exploration. I just wandering through lands I've never seen before, and finding little touches that don't really matter. A odd rock in the middle of a woods, a small pond, some person's house set way out in the wilderness. Anything really.

I also, like hplus0603, want the world to be dangerous enough that sometimes I must explore it with other people. Dangerous enough that I feel a legitimate risk traveling through this area. If I'm killed by a huge bear in a canyon, I know that I can't handle that area. I'll probably try anyway, because it's fun to go up against danger. And if I keep getting killed, and I can't possibly succeed there, I have someplace to look forward to returning to.

I'd rather explore a dark forest populated by Shadows of Pure Evil, then wander through a flowery meadow past Bunnies of Fluffiness, even if I know I have a 1 in 5 chance of making it out of that forest alive. As long as I feel I have a chance, I would try, if I feel up to it. The satisfaction of overcoming long odds and doing something impressive, even if nobody else cares, is addicting.

And on my first point, the satisfaction of finding Pointless NPC #238, who all he does is make a witty comment about your wizard's robe, is pretty satisfying also, if I think not that many people(relative to the number who play) ever see this NPC.

I want areas I can safely train in, but I also want areas I can challenge myself in, even if I keep dying there, or even if I can only get through it by running past the monsters.

What I want in an MMO is for the game to be fun to play, and for every other aspect to be kept relatively simple.

The game should be fun enough that it shouldn't feel like a grind. That means that aspects like battling monsters or other players should be an enjoyable experience. If other areas exist, like crafting and whatnot, these too should be relatively enjoyable experiences.

Another point to compliment the above is that there should always be plenty to do. There should always feel like there's new monsters to find and fight, or new things to craft, etc. Being an MMO, however, new elements should be few and far between, always giving the impression that the world is alot more expansive then it may in fact be. For instance, certain item types might be relagated to specific towns, specific monsters, or be rare inside dungeons.

Finally, things should be kept simple. I don't want 1000 skills, just a few select ones that do specific jobs and are fun to use. I certainly don't want a billion different item attributes, leading to so many different items that I stop caring about what I pick up. There should be relatively few things that are spaced far apart, making players use the things they have and making them look forward to whatever new thing is out there waiting.

Those are my opinions on what I enjoy in an MMO based on the couple I've played.

To directly answer your other question: I don't play MMOs anymore, but when I used to play I spent the majority of my time battling monsters and exploring the land. It usually involved doing so with guild members.

Thank you to every one who has replyed! I look forward to hearing from more of you! I am the project lead for Empire Productions. We are currently developing the MMO Rise of Heroes. For me one of the things I find enjoyable is upgrading my character and the many options. Rise of heroes will give the player the choice as to how he wants to spend his time. There will be a fun, involved, rewarding crafting system. All items in game will be crafted by the players and sold to those who need them. The World it self is vast taking over 9 hours to cross from one side to the other. There will be plenty of space to explore and rewards for doing so.

I want a skill-based MMO with no levels, sort of like Ultima Online, with the death penalties of Everquest, and the PvP like old Ultima Online. I want to have the option to be able to do whatever I want to a certain extent. Example: Killing a vendor (or even the king) in a main city, even if he respawns, even if the guards attack me and slay me, or just if I can't kill him because hes that powerful, I should be able to. I want to be able to explore an interesting world, not just the same things on every zone. I don't mind a non-seamless world (Zoning). And I want good in-game support from GMs/CSRs. Placing bounties on players heads would be pretty awesome as well.

I'd suggest asking this on a gamers forum. There are people out there who play games all day who would gladly write you a 10-page essay on every single aspect they think is wrong with MMOs, and what they would like to see instead. ;)

As for me, my biggest pet peeve is cheating. It can be the greatest game ever, but if I see people cheating, or hear that people have been able to cheat in the past, I loose all interest in playing. It just doesn't seem as appealing to do something the hard way when a few individuals did it, and more, the easy way.

Please don't make your game one huge time sink. When Final Fantasy XI was released, it was one huge time sink. There was absolutely nothing in the game that provided instant satisfaction. 5 years later the game is extremely different. Even though it's successful, there's always that "what if" factor if things had been done differently. Like not losing experience points when you die. Or making soloing nigh impossible. Or not having to spend 4 minutes walking from one part of town to the other end.

Having monsters that do more than stand around like mannekins (or patrol the same pattern endlessly) til you get within the exact range which then scream and charge at you. (Even better dont lay them out on the terrain in a nice minefield pattern.) Ones that run away and you have to hunt them would be nice.

Not having them respawn immediatetly -- especially right next to you -- they should crawl out of the woodwork offstage (and logically) -- might need more special instances that the monsters/baddies dont respawn at all.

Fewer number of monsters (but many more kinds) in their appropriate environment which use that environment and act in groups (when appropriate). Have them actually use tactics (even if it has to be a selection of canned choreographed scripts).

Tactics using skills instead of the same old sequence you always use because they all basicly do the same thing and certain ones deliver the most damage(or you have to fire the attacks all off because they have reset timers which forces you to go thru most of your 'special attacks' before repeating.

Incremental crafting which adds value/improvements to items instead of the endless making of stuff (which noone except the venders usually get) to level 'crafting'. Many more crafting variations so that everyone doesnt go down the same path. Components being produced by more searching (more possible substitutions) -- with fewer repetitions -- better if you actually make something for a specific purpose/customer -- more subcomponents which can be substituted/customized/fitted.