a thought on PVP, aimed at gamers and Devs..Warning! long post!

[Krokus]

Something occured to me the other day, and I felt it may be worth sharing, as it was so obvious, that i had overlooked it for months.

The Designers are getting quite "miffed" at us, because of our lack of pvp activity....

It appears the Designers had envisioned a game heavy with PVP, and we, the players, let them down big time when we all didnt jump on the PVP bandwagon...Players made their own game of it, cautiously skirting the pvp zones, rocketing straight up when entering a pvp zone via grid or whompa, and ignoring funcom's love child...the ongoing strife between Clans and Omni.

The game is not being played as the Designers intended...and the Designers naturally believe that this is because something is wrong with the PVP aspect of this game, rather than just not getting the customer base they had hoped for.

In general and on average (there is no accounting for the occasional person who doesn't fit this norm) PVP is not what the customer base comes to AO to do....Funcom and the Designers don't quite get that.

Making PVP enticing does nothing to change a person who has no interest in PVP, into a person who eats, drinks and makes love with pvp...you either are or you arent, prior to playing this game..these attitudes came with the player, they weren't created by the game.

There are a lot of folks who love pvp...who use terms like "leet skillz" when refering to their adeptness with keyboard and mouse versus another char's nearly equal skills...and occasionally their superior knowlege of bugs, exploits, and quirks, which are in any game.

The majority by far, however, play the game for its content...and by that, I don't mean PVP, but missions, static quests, tradeskills, unique items, and other things that any game has to offer.

To the Designers:
You should worry when a person who has showed no interest in PVP suddenly takes up interest...its one of the 3 steps to recovery (meaning theyre on their way out..not a good thing subscription wise.)

The steps are as follows:

1: player has picked his "main" char type, attached a name he is proud of to it, and levels till the going gets tough...power gamers, continue leveling to 180-200..generally however, between 110-150 is the limit...char begins to get bored, and discouranged with slowness of ip influx, rolls a noob..this is the first sign.

2: char plays that noob a while, parks it..begins the item search with his main...trying to do any and all profession specific quests for items, followed closely by, if not at the same time as, doing any other static quests/item runs he can...Like the big game trophy hunter...he started off a Deer hunter, but now only the best equipment/items etc will do...he's "seasoned"...

3: char, so bored he has no idea what to do with himself, decides to try his hand at PVP...this is usually a disappointment, because no one who did not come to this game with PVP in mind, will be satisfied with it, it wasnt their "bag" in the first place, and its never what they expect....shortly after this, they quit..occasionally come back because their char has been "un-gimped" through content, play a while, then quit again..

This is the *last* step...players who reach step 3 rarely continue with the game.


Point being:
Funcom wants us to PVP.
The majority of the playerbase (60% minimum) has no interest in doing so...nerfing items, balancing chars (as it relates to pvp) and patches that add only PVP content, is of no interest to those who didnt come here to PVP in the first place...the second we do, for the most part, we quit soon after.

I personally am not "anti" pvp...meaning I don't wish that all people who PVP should die in RL within 4 minutes of reading this post...heh..some people are that against it tho...

I do, however, have absolutely no interest in it...to me a player attacking me holds my interest about as much as a monster attacking me...i do what anyone else in a yalm does, i get away, or i get long range rooted and die, but then i saved, and i go in a different way to my mission...if I wanted to fight people, id play duke nukem, or quake...thats how i and many others (the majority) look at it.

This game has some killer content, and i dont mind paying for it, but i wont PVP for it heh...and if its PVP content, i wont pay for it...

Funcom:
You cant convert apples into oranges...I've seen the intro movie, I know you wanted us to PVP, making it better will not draw us out and make us want to PVP, however...the booster pack will not give me a new outlook on pvp...some of us (more than half by far, make a poll if you think im kidding) have little or NO interest in that aspect of the game....

PVP isnt content, its not like a static mission or quest...its a mindset...either you are or you arent.

Said my piece, and peace
Bob

[________________Nano]

I agree with Explorerbob. PvP was FunComs main driving force behind "Anarchy" Online. Think about its title for a second. Why would they call this game Anarchy. It is a word that means chaos and disorder. We the player have brought a semi-order to chaos by not PvP. That has not gimped the game. It has made it better for us. FunCom has tried to Fix their PvP game but we have turned it into something else. We have turned it into our world. It is not longer the Child FunCom put it. We have made it grow and Mature. And like any other Parent FunCom has to let go. They need to listen to the Child and not try and force all their wills and opinions upon it. PvP is fine and dandy but I don't feel like getting shot by a person close to 10 levels below me and end up dead. If FunCom insists on continuing to "Balence" the game to PvP they will destroy the world we have created. They will lose the player base. We throu our posts and information have forced FunCom at times to give us patches they did not want to give. If PvP is to remain in game why don't you simply make another dimension consisting of PvP places where Omni and Clan can come together and fight to the death far from the civilized world. You can keep certain Political zones and randomly drop the gas in other places so we can have ingame story aspects but this might completely up the problem. Also, give use the ability to transfer our character between dimensions. This way we can PvP or play our normal AO games. Thanks for your time.

[_Bonk_]

Well this n00b asked about pvp in game in the n00b zone and the general concensous by the vets who were restarting was the classes were totally unbalanced and pvp totally sucks. Now people who are playing this game dont dislike pvp if its done right. The reason they aren't pvping in AO is Funcom didnt do it right at all. Its a pity we have to pay for the fix.

The reason I dont pvp is I heard you need to be a very high level to do it and you need to be massively overequipped. Plus there are only a couple of uber pvp classes and my only pvp experience in the game was when I took my 40 fixer, who sucks, to a pvp zone and the moment the timer went out from using the grid I was ruthlessly attacked and killed by someone camping the grid terminal.

[XtroXtreme]

A nice original post.

I remeber starting amy first character, that was a neutral agent, in hope that neutrals as well as the other sides could effect the story and hopefully bring some kind of peace (hey I like peace, and so should any normal person. It is also the only realy good goal I could think of). But I sone discovered that neither neutrals side nore peace was envisioned by FC. The neutral side was so bad compared to the other that I changed side and joined omni, that at least stod for order.
But that was not envisioned either, and the system for effects from your actions by society in RK was removed from envisioned.
Left was doing missions without consiquenses and hunting.

If AO is to succed it need a dynamic story and a lot of content. being forcfed conflict might be bad for those that didn´t go for the war senario, but thought more of a cloak and dagger or negotiation. the none soldier professions gave that last idea some hope, but then we got the balancing for PvP that everyone should be able to do that.
So now when even that did not help we get a lot of guild towers all over RK that will make missions, for those not interested in the conflic, go from a bother since you always get missions farther away all the time to an almost impossibility since you never know if there is going to be a tower standing close to the mission area.

[Bionitrous]

I'm have no great hatred for PvP either. (BTW, great post at the top). It's just that this game was structured totally wrong for the PvP-dabblers and always will be no matter how many Nerfs they bring upon us in the name of 'PvP Balance'. It's totally unstructured. There's no penalty for poor sportsmanship. It's geared completely towards 1 on 1 nonsense. Player input into his character's actions mean little and will mean even less as they homogenize the playerbase through nerf after nerf. Any item that may give you an edge they nerf. The list goes on and on. It will only ever appeal to at most 10% of the playerbase. No matter what they do.

A game like Star Wars: Galaxies has PvP very well thought out from the get go. You can get as involved as you want. You can fight your buddy in peace. You can decide to join an auto-generated battlefield for your play session instead of taking a mission. There are no stupid titles for the leet to lord over you or hold onto for dear mercy. PvP in AO was ill constructed from the start. Not only don't they have anything to tempt the non-PvP'er, they don't have a thing to appeal to the 'casual' PvP'er. Losing to another player in AO is a disgrace to your character.

And yet it continues to be the biggest driver with respect to game mechanic changes and Nerfs. Nerfs which tick off the other 90% of the playerbase time and time again, over and over.

The Tower deal is interesting. But once again, there's no consolation towards consentual PvP. Your tower goes to 0% and anybody who wants to can come and **** your guild for a few hours. Somebody will end up ticked off and end their play session with a net result of non-fun.

Guild wars in UO were a hella fun. You knew who the guys were who you were at war with and both organizations agreed to duke it out. There was no 'ganking' because it was technically impossible to get ganked if both your guild presidents decided that it was KOS to each other and the membership consented. AO forces you into one of two teams and you end up being a target to thousands and thousands of people you might never have seen and will never see again after you get ganked. It's just not fun. I don't like either the Clans or Omni and as such I'm a target for both teams whenever I am forced to travel through political territory.

So my guy is now 160. I can't stand leveling anymore. Been sitting at this level for weeks. I try to get items to make him stronger. But, FunCom puts nice things on 18 hour timers, forces me into PvP in Camelot, forces me to camp for untold hours in Smuggler's, or Nerfs the crap out of the decent items I find in chests. I'm done. My character simply cannot get any better through items. Next?

Well the various alts are at stages between 40 and 120. I try buffing them to the bajeezus with all the loot I've collected in my 160 levels. It's fun and I can see that these guys are actually a bit better than the other guys around their level. It's a bit enjoyable. What does FunCom do? They put level requirements on everything and start making all buffs self-only and generally do whatever they can to ensure that my little guys are never more than fractionally better than the guy working his way up the ladder the first time. Even my knowledge of the game doesn't matter in that all mistakes are eraseable via the 20-odd reset points every character accrues nowadays. Whatever happened to the advantage of knowing game mechanics and taking the time to research.

So twinking is getting old. Next?

I'm sure as hell not going to set foot in an arena. I'm not going to zone into 2HO. What for? Camelot? I might convince the guild to go there if it was 0%.

So, my guild waits on the Towers and waits for a purpose. We hold little faith in FunCom to actually be able to make this fun and fair. More than likely they will 'force' guilds to erect these towers and 'encourage' players to destroy other guild's towers. Instead of a sense of fun, I fear all guilds will live in fear of being attacked by some uber-guild with all the Tar loot. They come and destroy your tower and you are left defeated, landless, and humiliated. I can see more than one guild disbanding over this.

Time and time again FunCom has shown an inability to encourage the 'fun' aspect of PvP. Each and every time they attempt to encourage people to duke it out, it's via some negative means. Look at the hatred spewed by the title system. Witness the hateful actions at the arenas. Read in the forums about all the negativity surrounding that god damned dragon. Every 100th post you'll actually hear someone stating they had fun. Now see that it's most likely from a lvl 200 character who has absolutely nothing to ever achieve in the game again and logs on _only_ to engage in PvP activity. If an event were to be held and two greenies gathered up troops from the two teams, you can be rest assured that there would be some sort of reward to 'entice' the sides to battle each other. It seems FunCom is into some sort of virtual cockfighting where the combatants are motivated to attack each other only for the chance to eat some choice grain if they survive.

There is no way for my guild to declare war with another guild and battle it out amongst consenting groups.

It is next to impossible for me to challenge a buddy and test my skills. Make us fly out to DAV? Weren't arenas supposed to be for this.

So I've gotten killed once by someone who rooted my Yalm as I excitedly wanted to explore Smuggler's when it first came out. I've scrapped quite a bit in the bar hoping some jackass wouldn't come in and spoil it.

I'm in the last stages of the first post's listing of a player's involvement.

And it's _not_ because I am averse to PvP either. It's because PvP in AO can _never_ be good as long as the current game designers hold their position. They are incorrigeable. They continue to drag down the majority of their playerbase while holding on to some twisted view of how to force us to fight each other and some silly notion that constantly altering how 90% of the players have to deal with their environment will make them trigger happy.

The OE rules started it. Made everybody weaker PvM and brought the smart guys down to the crowd. Now, it's bracers. Makes me weaker in PvM and brings me down closer to the crowd that didn't spend the same time I did seeking out something to set me apart.

Bit by bit you get beaten. Over and over the changes they implement to try to make PvP more 'balanced' simply go further and further to underscore one's realization that it just doesn't matter what you do with your character except level.

That last was DAoC's biggest downfall. They started out with a firm commitment to make PvP fair and ensure parity between the players. What they ended up with was crap. Everybody exactly the same. A huge collection of people at level X who were exactly as good as every other person at level X. A lot of people stopped caring and came back to AO. In AO you could suck or excel. Until you learned what you were doing and made connections, life was hard and every level was a grand achievement. Getting destroyed by a monster and watching someone else your level take it out with ease inspired you to find out what they were doing right and you were doing wrong.

I used to like AO so much better.

[_Bonk_]

I do think the way to make it fun is to make it more of a team against team or clan again omni tek affair rather than a one on one chaotic gankfest. I do think they also need to put rules in place and crack down on the few people who ruin it for others. They also need to make sure their classes are balanced and people are not able to easily exploit to level the playing field. Not an easy task by any means and I wish them luck.

[ralguramo]

I don't know the percentages, but I rarely see someone with a title in front of their name. That tells me that pvp is done by a very small minority. 5%, 10%? I don't know. Certainly less than 50%.

What does this mean?

It means that non-pvpers are paying a majority of the monthly subscription fees. Without the non-pvpers, the pvpers would not even have a game to pvp in.

I tend to agree with the original poster. You either come into a game with pvp in mind or you don't. It's a mindset...a philosophy. No amount of nerfing and patching by FC is going to change the % that want to pvp significantly.

My question is this. Why should FC give a hoot how much pvp occurs as long as the fees keep getting paid? Take out the non-pvpers and the server populations would dwindle significantly.

I've had maybe 3 pvp occurrences in my life. All occurred in "The Realm". Only one ended with me the victor. I didn't even enjoy it. It was an even fight. The other 2 encounters were gankfests by someone significantly higher than me killing me.

[Glarawyn]

Why I don't PvP:

I'm Neutral. I can't start fights in 25% Zones. And the only way I've been able to finish a fight in a 25% zone was by my death.

Every now and then I test my ability to PvP in the arenas. Every now and then I actually get lucky. Most of the time I end up in reclaim.

When I get lucky, it's usually because a nano mage challenged me, and was dead by my opening attacks before he got a chance to do anything.

Any other time it was my opponent was new to PvP. Atrox Enforcer with sticks, with twice my HP, just couldn't outlast me and my Adventurer healing abilities. MA who didn't get enough crits to overcome my heals.

Agnist anyone who has gone out of their way to tweak their character for PvP I have no chance agnist.

Team PvP could be interesting, but where are you going to find 12 people who want to duke it out to the death?

Seems the only way PvP could be balanced in this game is team PvP. Need a team effort to take out the trader and doc in the opposing team, and keep your side alive while the debuffs run their course on your teammates.

Oh, is that what the designers had in mind? Hey, the towers might actually encourage that.

I'm hopeful that it actually might work. I've tweaked my Adventurer for team play, not PvP duels. Healing, damage shields, armor boosts, and morphs are maxed at the expence of evades.

Team PvP with an Adventurer on your side could be interesting. A wolf pack (Relation to Cerebus (team)) with Howl of the Wolf going (Level 100-150ish team) would be rather formatable with the added damage, speed, and evades stacked on top of buffs from other professions. But you'll need a fixer for the extra NCU you'll need for all these great buffs. Now you're really running fast and doing evading. Throw in a Doc and you have your supporting team members. Fill other three slots with purely offensive professions (Soldier, Enforcer, MA) and watch what you plow through.

If this is what the developers had in mind for PvP, then the towers could be just what they need. And it actually sounds like fun compared to the ganking and duels. And might just put those 1-on-1 tweaked players at a disadvantage for once.

[Krokus]

bumpage