How to encurage PVP.

[___________Tyrathect]

I was thinking about the problem of PVP. A lot of the game is based on PVP but very few players pretisapate (parden my inability to spell.) So I came up with a posable salution to the problem.

I was thinking, it would be great to get some reward for PVP. At first I was thinking about money but that posed lots of problems so I came up with another plan, tokens. Why not? Here is my idia for tokens in PVP. If you kill a player of the opisit faction (clan vs omni) of = level you would have a 20% chance of geting a token. If you go up 1 level it would be 40% chance. Increasing 20% up to 5 levels higher. If you can kill higher than 5 then good for you, you will have 100% chance. If you kill lower then your level then you have 0% chance. This is to incurage people to kill their level or higher (as with the titles.)

Their are a number of ways to prevent token farming by players who make character of aposing sides and just kill their alts. One way would be to keep track of what player you killed to get a token and only allow you to get a token if you kill a different player, or to set a time limit. Such as 10 min between when you get a token for killing a player and when you can get a new one. I am shure you guys can come up with others.

Its an idia to encurage PVP, to have a reward for killing to aposing side with out giving to much. The tokens could act like those you get from missions or just cout for 1. It depends on how people used it. This would allow people to gain from killing players and make people more intrested in PVP. It would also be a fairly simple bit of coding for programmers. Its an idia, let me know what you all think. I am not shure if its been praposed or not, if so then oh well, if not then cool. Hope you like the idia and lets talk about it!

Thanks, Tyrathect.
(Tauriena level 137 adv, Omni)

[_______________Lovio]

Let's try not to turn this into another flame on the PvP boards eh?

Great ideas Tyrathect, I would love to see them implented.

[Bionitrous]

No MMORPG will ever be able to 'force' people to PvP. Studies have shown that those who play a game for PvP are consistently less than 10% of the playerbase. The remainder may dabble but never feel comfortable.

There is nothing you can do to make the vast majority of RPG players have fun when PvP'ing. Nothing. You cannot make people engage in PvP. Some like it. Some don't.

So what you need to do as a game service provider like Funcom, is to cater to both groups seperately if you want to keep both streams of revenue flowing. For PvP'ers, this means proper venues for fighting each other and the almighty 'balance' that they seek. For PvE'ers this means the elusive 'content' and 'something to do'.

It takes a miracle to change a PvE'er into a PvP'er. It just doesn't happen in reality. It's the mindset of the person behind the character that prohibits them from ever enjoying it fully. You can force them to engage in killing other people by dangling loot in front of their faces (Tarasque), but that doesn't mean they feel good about it.

Now, even if a PvE'er wanted to 'dabble' in some combat action, it is not worth their while in an RPG. You will have some people who are set up better to kill other people. There will be items that help you kill other people better. Once character will always be setup to kill the other person better. Take your casual PvE'er who decides to try some combat and he dies every single time. Fun for one. The 'dabbler' never tries PvP again. Ever.

PvP works for groups as the weaknesses of one character can be offset by the strengths of his party and the skill with which they act as a team. A good team can make up for a single weak player.

PvP works great for games like Unreal Tournament and Quake and Counterstrike. Your players are all equal and it's simply up to you as a player as to whether you win or lose. When you log on against your opponent neither one of you is granted and instant advantage due to levels or items. It's fair. Many, many, many 'carebear' PvE'ers play Counterstrike constantly and are good at it and love the rush of PvP in that context. In games like AO, they feel PvP is a waste of their time.

And nothing you can do will convince them to spend their two hours running around shooting at other players.

If you are tying to entice the 90% who won't PvP to give it a shot because you think they may like it, you are wasting your breath. It's been proven in study after study that that won't happen. Best bet is to ask FunCom to improve the fun that the 10% are having so that they won't quit and leave nobody to fight against.

[___________xenomorph]

Trust me "if you make it they will find away to exploit it"

instead of tokens how about something else that would be lootable off the player, like a gold coin and under some what of the same rules. And the coin does nothing to your skills but in a sense is like a title. And if they could implement a web page that would keep track of who (or even guilds) has the most coins to give everyone the incentive to keep pvping for bragging rights. But the player they kill has to have a equal to higher title to gain one.

ps sorry coins was the only thing I could think of atm, and yes I know it sounds lame.

[Bionitrous]

You remember what those meaningless 'titles' made players do when they put the 'best' PvP'ers up on a webpage?

Now we gonna have people killing alts for these coins so they can get on the webpage.

It's been shown that the most respect you get will come from other PvP'ers. They will know when you are good and give you props. They will expose you if you are an exploiter or ganker. You don't need loot, titles, or anything else to be known as one of the best PvP'ers.

What is needed are better strategic playgrounds on which to fight. A nudie bar where a force outside tries to keep the scum away. Who gives a crap about 2HO? What difference does it make if you 'hold' it? Same for Tarasque. That just forces the loot whores to PvP when they really don't want to. And once the 'raid' (and i use that term loosely) is over, who gives a crap about the cellar of some stupid castle. What ya gonna hold a guild meeting down there?

PvP'ers need to be able to hold the entrance to something cool to prevent other people from getting in. Unfortunately, the engine can't do collision detection so some jackass just flies his Yalm right in the front door.

PvP in this game is hopeless. There is no hope for it being anything other than a tool for roleplaying the story.

[nightwisp]

BUMP cant find anyone to pk or pvp. Would be nice to find some clanners out in meet or 2ho or 4 holes

[paperjockey]

Awesome post Bio.. Totally nailed it on the head.

[Nealandbob]

I'm a Neutral. So, say I start PvPing, and I kill an Omni(in self-defense, of course.....who goes to 0%?). I get a Clan token and .......do...................WHAT..............with it?

[Hajkster]

Originally posted by Nealandbob
I'm a Neutral. So, say I start PvPing, and I kill an Omni(in self-defense, of course.....who goes to 0%?). I get a Clan token and .......do...................WHAT..............with it?

/me has both unused Omni and Clan tokens. ;P What can you do with em? like nothing.

[_______________Guaje]

Give us a PvP Server like all the other MMORPGs!

[Bionitrous]

Originally posted by Guaje
Give us a PvP Server like all the other MMORPGs!

That's a good idea. Except 10% of the active AO playerbase is only about 2000 people I guess. You think it's bad now. Wait till there's 4 people logged on at certain times.

Perhaps if they could put up only the Stret East sub-server. And maybe if they made you automatically level 100 when you logged on and put basic supplies in your inventory each time. Like everyone got 5 weapons to choose from in their inventory. And they logged in Clanners at one spot and Omni at the other. Each profession would get particular gear and armor and uploaded nanos that would be very balanced.

I'd try that server out.

[ruze]

I was thinking, it would be great to get some reward for PVP

Halfdeck is organasing 2 on 2 at the Hope bar ( famous one =) and giving more than 50mil for reward...

Contact him for info.

PS. Sorry or NoProblem for the advice Halfdeck , but i thoug people who read this thread are in the majority pvpers..

-> Ruzen , R u zen , Are you zen ....... Are You Zen? I worked all along a night to understand after 7 hours that my Name is a games's word.

[Lostpacket]

"Perhaps if they could put up only the Stret East sub-server. And maybe if they made you automatically level 100 when you logged on and put basic supplies in your inventory each time. Like everyone got 5 weapons to choose from in their inventory. And they logged in Clanners at one spot and Omni at the other. Each profession would get particular gear and armor and uploaded nanos that would be very balanced.

I'd try that server out."



Its called counter-strike.

[___________wrecklass]

Originally posted by Lostpacket
"Perhaps if they could put up only the Stret East sub-server. And maybe if they made you automatically level 100 when you logged on and put basic supplies in your inventory each time. Like everyone got 5 weapons to choose from in their inventory. And they logged in Clanners at one spot and Omni at the other. Each profession would get particular gear and armor and uploaded nanos that would be very balanced.

I'd try that server out."

Its called counter-strike.

Exactly, you can't have PvP in an RPG because nobody wants to be 76th level and get killed/fragged by a bunch of 190+ players who just sit at spawn points. It doesn't make sense at all.

Quake and Unreal have millions of gamers playing them because everyone is equal, at least technically. They all have the same abilities, same weapons available and usually identical bases to work from. RPG's with levels and classes cannot and do not support an equal playing field for all players.

That's why the average RPG player is completely and totally turned off by games that say PvP on the box. That's why Sony has 440,000 players (by last count) and Funcom has maybe 30,000. Sony has four, count 'em, four servers dedicated to PvP or Team Pvp, and they all have the lowest player populations. That is stacked up against 40(!) non-PvP servers that are all over crowded on most evenings.

Most people want to come home from work, or school or whatever they do, and relax. Getting ganked in their fantasy world just doesn't rank as a form of entertainment for the vast majority of gamers out there. They won't get mad, they won't go out and try to get revenge. They'll just sign off and find a game that doesn't add stress to their already stressful lives.

It is great that Funcom wants to cater to the few that like to play PvP. However, they have spent far to much time, money and resources to ignore the vast majority of people who don't care for PvP.

So I agree, a completely PvP server should be set up to make those folks happy. Then another 10 servers should be brought up that are compeletly PvE. Then Funcom can sit back and watch the money come in, and the PvPers can have their playground, being subsidized by the non-PvPers as it is in most of the MMORPG's today.

Otherwise, if you REALLY want to attract people to play PvP, here is how to do it in one easy step: Allow everyone start at level 200 with full gear and money to do anything they want. Then the playing field will be (relatively) level, and the fun can begin. You still won't have many people to play with however, because most will simply be bored with that system and go to another game.