Suggestions for INCENTIVISING PVP

what better time is there than the present? Ill be sure and start or join an active guild once full loot comes along. not to mention stealth! >)

 

1. Reduce taxes for players that are flagged Open PVP. - NO you want ot be flagged PvP your choice, there are skill trees and special you will have avail enjoy those!

2. Make the protection of the Oracle come at an additional cost. Currently, the Oracle says something about offering her protection UNTIL it's determined what path the player is taking. I think there may already be something baked into the cake here. But I'd like to see something definitive. Nothing should be free in this game, especially global protection from PVP. NO AGAIN - your choice to be open PvP, You do not have to be and that is my choice to be or not to be.

3. Create PVP related skills that enable stealing and the ability to tell what level a person is, or what kinds of spells and weapons they have ready. - Already stated there will be PvP relates skill trees and enchatments.

4. Create a player bounty system (this was also mentioned in passing by the devs but it wasn't clear exactly what they were talking about). - Already stated so you want clarification , OK But threr will no be murders and that such so these may be player paid and supported, as it should be.

5. Make control points that are flagged as open pvp and allow players normally flagged as open pvp to take a short cut through the control point. - NO ,NO, NO, if you are open PvP there should not be any way you can get somewhere faster, seriously??

Remember this is NOT a PvP game, it is a MULTIPLAYER game, PvP will most likely be 10 - 20 %, maybe up tp 40 if you get lucky, but I doubt it highly. You are going to HAVE to use Crafters, and gatherers even if you are PvP so just going out to kill someone will not get you thru the game as stated :-(

 

Anecdote:

played on a MMPOG for a few months whos name i will not mention. It was open PVP (except for one safe zone) and full loot, except for your armour and weapons, which would suffer a %20 durability loss per death. The name of the game was capturing territories and "world services" using player crafted items, to which end you could charge a tax to the rest of the player community.

What happened was this: one guild almost took over every territory and forced 90% of the guild joining community to join them or suffer outrageous taxes and occasionally being killed in crossfire. So a pocket of resistance arose and became an outnumbered, yet equally opposing force to the behemoth.

After a series of defections and rage quits, you had a scenario where one guild was all aligned in one time zone and the other in an opposite time zone. So, naturally the territories would turn over daily. You never actually had a full on battle. It was all fly by night operations. The game never got out of Beta over a several year period and to my knowledge still has not. The company resorted to Pay to Win business model to fund the perpetual development.

I guess the moral of the story is this: in a persistent online world, PvP incentives can be a disincentive to certain people based on geography. Let us be mindful of this going into the future.

 

So ....... ISIS?

 

The idea that being open to pvp is a choice so therefore it requires no incentive is crazy talk. The whole reason PVP is a choice is because so many people don't want to participate in it. Yet open pvp is not a choice where you get to select who you're fighting against. It's not like you get it "a la carte" where you're only open to the parts of it you enjoy.

What people seem to be fixed on is that giving some kind of incentive to people that are open PVP is somehow going to give them an advantage over people that do not PVP. While that's certainly possible, nothing that I listed in the OP does that. The person that is open to pvp is still at a huge disadvantage compared to the person that relaxes in the safe arms of PVE.

What many people are really saying here is that they don't want PVP to have a benefit because then they might be tempted to try it...and that means they might have to risk something.

 

Make it part of the "end game" as an optional choice to "take it to the next level"

 

Since becoming open pvp is a choice, it can be performed in any part of the game a person wishes.

What would be interesting to see is how many players and player owned towns choose to be OPEN PVP over the life of the game. Because there are no real incentives to do so, I doubt it will be many people in the grand scheme of things. I'll say 25%.

I'm trying to imagine explaining why someone would want to be OPEN PVP to a new person that knows nothing about the game. I think the conversation would go a lot like this.

Devs: Welcome to Shroud of the Avatar!
New Player: Thanks.
Devs: So you can flag yourself Open to being attacked by other players.
New Player: Really? Why would I want to do that?
Devs: Well because it's fun.
New Player: Fun for who?
Devs: Well maybe when you get used to the game.
New Player: How long should I wait?
Devs: Oh, I guess until you feel like you can be competitive. About level 30 is when you should be statistically ready.
New Player: Ok, but why would I want to do that at level 30?
Devs: It's fun!
New Player: Ok, but how is it fun if there are other players out there at level 60 or level 100 or whatever and I'm losing all the time?
Devs: Well it wouldn't be fun if you were losing all the time.
New Player: Right, and so if someone wins and someone loses then isn't that one person having fun when the other person is not? It sounds like a zero sum game.
Devs: Welcome to Shroud of the Avatar!

Again, I LOVE PVP. But I don't love pvp because it's pvp. I love meaningful pvp. I love pvp when it's fair and the mechanics are balanced. I love pvp when there's a reason to do it. If I wanted to run around killing everything that moved I'd just go play an FPS.

PVP is not it's own reward. Just like PVE is not it's own reward. When you kill something in PVE you get loot and experience. So what do you get for PVP?

 

Reward for simply flagging I do not agree with.

Reward for success and penalty for failure I am all for.

 

You should get loot and experience for pvp?

I mean what do you want more?

We should reward you more then the possible experience and lot you can get because you might lose something?

What I am reading here is that you love pvp as long as it gives you more then others who don't pvp.

 

You're reading incorrectly then.

I'll make it simple. If you get loot and experience for killing a monster, you should get at least that for killing a player since it's infinitely more difficult.

If you get safety for being flagged non-pvp, then you should get something of equal value for being flagged open pvp.

There's a double standard here, PVE is getting all the reward with none of the risk.

 

I think you should get loot and experience for pvp...you get it for killing a monster you should for killing a player as well....shouldn't be any more then that though....

You don't get "safety" for flagging PVE...that is not why any of us do it...(well at least not why I do it...) I certainly don't want an easy game because I chose not to participate in full pvp....what you get for flagging pve is not having to deal with people who want to fight you....

 

Fair enough. But unlike the controlled environment of PVE, players can work together to exploit experience and loot gain, which is why the devs have not allowed that. That's why I'm looking for an alternative.

That's an odd juxtaposition of logic. Safety can come in many forms, one of which might be labelled "social". There's plenty of things in multiplayer games that I don't enjoy. I try my best to avoid them, but I don't have a game mode that allows me to do that. If I did, I'd be getting the reward of "safety" to the risk of being annoyed by these things I dislike. The point I'm trying to make is that it's a feature and it's rewarding a particular style of play. I'm sure you would agree that it's far easier to PVE when you don't also have people "who want to fight you" that you have to deal with?

As a person that likes pvp, I can tell you that when you put yourself as open pvp that luxury doesn't exist. There's no "time out" or "safe zone" you can go to. You're always pvp, even when you're just trying to pve for the sake of getting experience and loot...or trying to finish a quest, or exploring, or talking to someone on the street.

And while that experience can be fun...it's never safe.

I think what I'd like to see as compensation, might be that when you are flagged Open PVP your PVE rate of experience gain and loot drops increase. Actually, I wouldn't like to see that, but it would be logical.

Instead, I'd like to see players flagged Open PVP have the ability to participate in PVP related systems that don't exist outside of PVP. So for example, sieges, bounty system, assassinations, body part trophies, special areas for OPEN PVP ONLY (that means you can't be a part time browser, you have to be the real deal).

 

Smooth as always I see.
This is easily proven false by all the players who have flagged in R12 without any extra incentives at all except for the privilege of bashing each other to bits. Simply because it's fun/exciting.

You are again simply trying to maximize your own gain. You will be PvP flagged You want more PvP players You want more perks for that type of play.

Sorry but the best way to get people on the fence to flag open PvP is to make it more FUN and not by giving tax benefits or other perks.

 

I like the idea of PVP themed PoT's and am looking forward to visiting them now and then but the last thing i want to see is quest lines blocked, hunter/gatherer areas locked down and fear preventing people from exploring the chat options of NPC. I will have invested a few thousand dollars by the time the game launches (more than i have ever backed games in the past) and my main motivation for doing so is the fact that Richard Garriott makes story rich WORLDS and not fast-food meat-grinder games. It would be a shame if the wonderful story line went unnoticed due to people being too on edge to pay attention to it. I am not anti-PVP, in fact in the past i was the leader of STATIC, a warhammer online guild that dominated to the point where we ruined the first couple of servers. I just don't think it should be forced on people in this setting, especially when they are trying to play to embody virtues like love and truth. I vote YES to making PVP more rewarding but vote NO to making it a necessity.

 

Lists like this really crack me up because they're NOT incentives...

-1, that's a penalty to me for NOT PvPing...
-2, another penalty to me for not PvPing...
-3, a bonus to thieves (bonus for behaving Bad), I don't want to steal, I'm virtuous... lets you see what I have, so you can kill me faster...
-4, Never would work, too exploitable, just let your Bounty get up high and let your friend kill you, and split the Bounty...
-5, give you a shortcut, while I have to be FUBAR...

These are all ideas that force me into your style of play, which I won't do... I would rather stop playing this game altogether, and return to WoW...

WoW cracks me up too, because they had a dueling system they stole from the UO boards, and when ever a player challenged me to a duel, I would check their stats before I accepted, and everytime they were like level 50, and I was 34... They had top gear, and I had what I could craft... How Honorable of them... Once I ran into a Horde town and accidently got flagged, so I was running somewhere, and passed another guy who promptly killed me... I can't figure out that kind of senseless behavior... other than opportunity to grief someone...

You PvPers are no different, if you can "gank" someone you will... You want full loot, well I have a solution to that problem...

When you kill another player, you don't get their personel stuff, but rather you get a game generated "Loot list" that's the same as my loot when I kill a monster... a few coins, a worn weapon, and a corpse wax or two... That way you can make the same living I do... and spend some time selling stuff, like I do... You could even get the same experience that I do, depending on where you're at... I think the developers could easily do that...

Now here's the balancing factor, to me PvP is all about "first strike", so when you challenge me to a duel when you're level 50 and I'm level 34... your skills are lowered to my level (temporarily) all your skills not just your level... our armor is equal, our weapon power is equal, just for that duel... Once the duel starts, no other player can interfear by healing you, or peralizing me or even getting in my way to slow me down...

The major problem with Open PvP is "gangs" start roving around "ganking" everyone in sight, Factions, IMO are a solution to Open PvP... but nobody wants that... You would rather spend all your time hashing out new ideas to change ME...

You don't seem to get it, I don't want to fight other players... I don't find that to be "Fun", sorry... It's not my thing, I'm not stopping you for doing it...

 

I remember people who leveled whole characters on a boat in UO just attacking a friend in full plate, him not fighting back. Stealing etc. etc.
You don't think this would be a bit exploited by players farming each other for XP?

This depends. Are you talking about open world PvP or Arena?
I guess you are referring to OW PvP. I think there will be some loot, and, maybe, bragging rights you did it! In UO you could cut up the corpse and put the head on display. But if you yourself can not find motivation to flag for OW-PvP maybe you have the wrong mindset and should stick to Arena PvP.

You seem to be the exception. Most players (and world championship participants as well) accept unbalanced PvP if it is unbalanced in their favor. They even invest much time and effort to gain better/illegal stats just to have an easy game against others.
It's like doping in the Olympic Games, everybody on a "professional level" does it.
Well, I am not an Olympic attendee, I play for fun. I don't want to cheat. If I want to run with PvP I need to get better, most times this involves shady tools or maybe only good organisation (Voice, for example, which I do not use at home while playing).

 

No I absolutely do, and I've said that either in this thread or the other one I'm babysitting. If I didn't say it here, I said it elsewhere, that's obviously a problem, which is why I suggested other incentives.

I'm talking about an open pvp world.

A well designed game doesn't allow for wholesale cheating. See Chess for reference. Have fun trying to cheat that system in real time when you're physically sitting on a park bench next to people that will punch you in the face if you pull out your cell phone.

 

Yes, pre-alpha tells us everything we need to know about how players will react to an environment that will be far different at launch. We should probably stop testing.

Actually I'm trying to balance the game. I have a very strong sense of fairness.

 

You can cheat in school at a written test and you can just as well cheat in chess.
Even chess engines can cheat.
And GM's might cheat as well.
And the thing is, we are not sitting on a park bench where I could punch you in the face - not that I'd do that anyway, I'd just walk away and ignore you.
You might just as well radio your friends in to ask for the best move now, or just tell them to stand behind me to beat me up should I try to walk away.
'cause that is what we are dealing with. Not a perfect world where we are all on equal footing. (no pun towards PWE intended)

 

Yes, of course.

What I'm saying is, often games are designed so loosely that cheating is almost a feature. It doesn't have to be that way though. You can certainly minimize it with good design.

My wife likes to play Scrabble online. She doesn't cheat and look the words up, but most people do, and when they get beat they immediately call her a cheater. It's really very funny. (Scrabble )

But that's an example where the game is not really designed to minimize cheating, it just assumes that 1. people are not so lame that they would cheat at a game where the whole purpose of the game is to "figure it out" and 2. people that want to cheat are going to find a way to cheat anyway so why bother making it harder? This is just poor game design, in my opinion. (for example, they COULD lock down someone's computer so you couldn't alt-tab...that would reduce a large percentage of cheating by house wives and old people that have no technical skills)

The same thing can be said of most MMO's. Take the SOTA combat system for example. It currently has a lot of problems with latency. And although the developers are never going to remove the impact of latency completely because of the way the internet works, they could design their game so that it doesn't mean as much as it currently does. They could introduce turn-based "elements" that reduce the importance of fast moves and twitchy timing. MUD's have been doing this for 30 years, and it works "ok", but certainly much better than FPS "elements" do. There are really all kinds of examples of this, it only takes the will of the players to ask for it and the will of the developers to listen.