Consensual pvp???? Stay a While and Listen Why this is no fun.....

Ah, but you see, they are most certainly not me.

Happy to be helpful.
I find the suggestion of making the loot option dependent on your own looting rather eloquent. Those who want to dip their toes in are protected, and there's this constant lure to put just a LITTLE more into the water. Keep going in further and further, and you just might get boiled. But for those who want to PvP and have the self control to not loot, their "virtue" is rewarded by remaining as unlootable as they think they should be.

 

Sure to the extent that it is actually obnoxious I can't support that.

But I'd like to see a game that did open PvP and loot in a way that still discouraged obnoxiousness. Simply looting by itself I don't find obnoxious, it just part of a game. No different than in certain gambling games you put chips on the table that you know you can lose and not use again. (Not necessarily talking about real money). Or playing chess, and losing chess pieces. What makes looting obnoxious is when it actually does harm the game and the person looting doesn't care about it. Its not always the case, imo. Just losing things doesn't harm a game in and of itself.

But simply put I like the role-playing aspect of it.

 

I'm absolutely positive that RG could get regular volunteers to not only carry the flag, but risk being looted dry, and play the bad guy.

 

This is exactly how I see it.
Games like chess, checkers, risk, poker, blackjack, etc.... All games of skill, very much PvP and lots of ego involved. Anyone who seriously trys to win has their ego on the line, wether or not there actually risking something over the game. Risking money, gold, in-game items just add to the intensity. I enjoy playing games like chess, checkers, risk, poker, blackjack without putting real money at risk. Still LOADS of fun, and can keep me busy for hours. Kind of like how I can still enjoy decaff coffee or tea. Its not absolutely neccessary that the caffeine be there for me to enjoy the coffee or tea, but at some point im going to want the real stuff!
The 'real stuff' for me when it comes to an MMO game is going out adventuring in an environment where any player can attack, kill and loot me, and I can do the same to any other player. These rules are active AT character creation and from day one when I am a freshly new player. No need for anything more than a tutorial on how to get started.
But as ive said, I can drink the tea or the coffee without the caffeine. So ill play a game without full loot PvP without too much complaint at all. But ill always stand by what I like and prefer. =P

 

And I personally think that roleplay is only desirable, or even possible, when it's fully consensual. I see non-consensual "roleplaying" of any kind as simply bullying another person for fun.

(And keep in mind that I'm talking about player consent; it's perfectly possible for players to agree that their characters should disagree, lethally even.)

If two players decide to roleplay a robbery you don't actually need looting mechanics to support that; if it's consensual, the losing player can just transfer the "robbed" items to the winner. The only situation one-sided player looting is "needed" is when a player wants to impose his play style on an unwilling victim, and thus I will never support player looting, or expose myself to any risk of it. If I can lose a single copper piece every blue moon due to player looting that is already enough for me to avoid the game like the plague.

I hope that mission doesn't involve any kind of looting apart from the "flag", actually. Within certain constraints I love PvP, and that mission seems like the perfect place to introduce more limited PvP to attract players to the more "complete" experience that includes, as per current plan, limited looting with ransom/insurance. Though, of course, I would never take that second step

 

But will the player transfer the items to the winner? Or will they suddenly say "kal ort por!" and vanish in thin air? Then you'll feel silly having spent y0ur gametime "role playing" to hopefully win another player's loot that you beleive their willing to sacrifice for fun n' games, yet when you have a clear victory they dont cough up the loot. A number of players in UO would use the dice cup and sort of play a game of craps with their gold. It was very easy to just disappear if you lost. And what are you going to do? Call a counselor? Tell them you won a dice game and the player who promised you "x" amount of gold if you rolled higher just ran off? I'd probably just tell you 'well thats tough' were I a counselor.
Some players may have used the checker and chess boards to make bets and play against each other on, but there was no way of being certain that the time your putting in is going to get you the 40k in winnings that you bet for, because you really don't know if the players will follow through with it if it is up to them to transfer what they "lost" to you.
If theres going to be quests, duels, games, or scenarios where one player wins something FROM another player for beating them, then the game must be built in a way that allows the winner to pick up and stash what he or she is entitled too.
There could be an infinite number of challenges, perhaps some created by players. Things like, who can kill a dragon the fastest, who can clear dungeon "x" in a certain amount of time, who can beat who in chess.
There could be group challenges such as, Party A goes into dungeon x and is consenting to come across one other party that happens to enter the dungeon at the opposite entrance and have full loot PvP enabled, circumstances are such that they don't know if they will actually meet up with another party because its not 100% that another full loot PvP group will enter before they complete the dungeon. Even if another party does enter, they need to be able to physically catch up with the other party to actually 'meet' with them. And by that time, who knows what could happen? Just because they are flagged for full loot PvP doesn't mean they must kill each other. Circumstances could be such that they will ALL be better off joining their parties together. Parties could be allowed to put level limits on the players. So if party A is an all beginner party, levels 1-10 then any other party that joins the dungeon will be levels one thru ten as well. But if I go in there, and my party is evil, more than likely we will try to slaughter them. And if we all clearly started our characters off in full loot PvP, then I want to be able to grab all their beginner potions, bandages, their leather caps and daggers and clubs and make a good extra 60-100 gp off the victory. I also want there to be a ladder of recognition, for full loot PvP players and ill have climbed it more for defeating the other party.
Perhaps many think this kind of gameplay is completely gross, juvenille, only for 8 year olds and all that. But it was all by consent. All risks and possibilities were accepted. Maybe I had 3 level 10's on my side, and their highest level was 9. Or maybe it was reversed and my lower level team bashed theirs. But thats another risk im willing to accept. Sometimes a pair of deuces will beat a pair of aces(...and that there is why I find poker so exciting!). I see no reason why me and anyone else who decides to play our game this way should not have the opportunity. If you dont want to risk being defeated, or better yet, defeat an opponent who is stronger than yourself, who the odds is in THEIR favor then that is fine. You dont have to join us. And before I get flamed for it, no I am not saying that you can't find these challenges in PvE mode. AI critters can be tough too. A rubix cube is a challenging little puzzle that doesn't involve any PvP at all.

 

Well, it's all theorycraft, there is, to my knowledge, no such mission. (glances at Portalarium programmers and checks for guilty expressions)
The way I envision it, though, it would be a place where proponents of full loot PvP could volunteer to be someone ELSE's loot pinata, get their adrenaline rushes, and yet put no non-consenting players at risk. IF you choose to take the mission, and IF you find and kill the targeted player, THEN you will be given the chance to loot them. They consented to this possibility, and are getting a kick out of the risk of it. What you choose to take, if anything, is up to you. Then, the mission complete, you turn in the quest item, get your virtue and xp and gold, and move on with life. But presumably some players will find that they liked the taste, and the FLOW PvP community will gain another supplicant, perhaps even a convert.

As @KuBaTRiZeS has suggested, a gradual conversion from unlootable to full loot, based on how often the player chooses to loot his victims, might be involved.
Remember, the point is to let those who want zero PvP to avoid it, those who want PvP with no loot to get exactly that, and those who WANT to loot and be looted to all find their comfort level. Provided the system allows you to remain utterly safe from what you dislike whilst enjoying what you do like, it's a good system, right? I'm sure a simple checkbox in your settings that says "completely absolutely no player looting in either direction", and starts off selected, would do the job. Quest items like the plague cure could be exempted (as you pointed out, it's more of a PvP carry-the-flag item) and everyone could be in the same quest, interacting, working together or against each other, and all having fun. That would be ideal.

 

Richard Garriott himself have several times spoken about a missions with contraband as one of the ways to make PvE players enter PvP area.

 

FULL LOOT OR DEATH!!1!

quoting on pvp from here: https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/forum/index.php?threads/pvp-death-current-thinking-megapost.8247/

there are some great thigns here. i like experience debt idea. the whole take on ghosts is great.

full loot, chance of almost any item being destroyed, chance of another player chosing to suffer the penalties of malicious behavior and dying - all possible at any time outside of town - it makes the game spine tingling exciting. just think about it you gear up for a public duel, everyone comes to watch, youre glistening and gleaning in the sun with shiny decorative gear, and bam - your best sword breaks on the very first parry! thats freaking epic, man. the rush of being on the delivering end of the blow is more intense than any other game could ever produce, and ive read a few similar opinions in this forum. the drama that it unfolds over time results ina rich, deep player created culture.

i literally almost cried reading this... sigh... ill still play, but man, this just seems to be such a cop out on trying to simply solve the same problems any game designers have to face - balance.

seriously, i think this game will be cool, but im really disappointed after reading this OP. Ultima Online, before the stupid felluca / trammel patch, was the greatest game of all time, and as a lifelong gamer, ive not played a game that I liked nearly as much since. Just like it was said in the OP - the rush you got out of understanding how much skill was really required to be competative in that game was inconcievable to all those who wanted the more passive experience, and it set the game apart as unique and beautiful.

i was an extremely passionate PKer, and it was not easy. i used no hax, had a 56k modem, no automating/bot programs (unless a ghost, which i was, often), just raw talent. my items werent "junk" - they required dedication to the game to acquire and know the ins and outs of, and how to make the most out of the system without cheating. i also roleplayed a character that wore light armor anyway, but hey, stealing 5K gold worth of bandages is a loss to anyone. i put a lot of elbow grease into learning every single detail about that game, and became one of the most successful player killers on my shard over time. the bounty on my head was so high, the text for it ran off the screen. you couldnt fit all that gold in your backpack. that alone made the game insanely challenging. it was a hard, lonely world as a PK, but it was amazing fun. i found myself runnign away from hordes of blues far more often than felt like i had any advantage, and i got extremely well skilled at picking players off while fending off a crowd. it just took sheer skill and constant repition, like any great art . the penalties for dying meant being unable to play my favorite character for many days, perhaps weeks sometimes.

sure i loved chaos vs order, and i loved guild wars, and i loved the pve (LOL JK about the PVE). but the never ending drama of the underworld of thieves and PKs made for a very niche gaming experience that was accessible to anyone dedicated enough - unfortunately budgets leaned in favor of those wanting a casual experience and the most magnificent game ever bit the dust.

ive only kind of really enjoyed MMOs since. played EQ 1 and 2 for almost a decade. Played DAoC for at least 4 years. Played plenty more MMORPGS for about a year or so (even WoW). Ill admit, I liked Tabula Rasa, it just came out when at a time in my life when I had no time for gaming. I even just quit my "DAoC 2" erm, i mean, Elder Scrolls Online account since SoTA is taking off soon. NOTHING compares to the original UO, nothing.

let me stress some more about how hard PKing was in UO - nothing was harder, and i did everything you could possibly do in that game (Except own castles, i just had 2 story houses, im a simple ninja ). i played it since beta, and quit after EA nerfed the whole game. it was pointless after that.

what UO lacked was better balance in penalties for PKing and stealing, and better rewards for fighting that behavior. there are some easy modifications to the basic system that dont result in making artificaially imposed behaviors (like not being able to strike another player at any time, if you choose to do). its also easy to make it so you cant accidentally kill/attack other players, and such settings can be on by default to stop manipulating new/naive players. the severest of all penalties can be imposed for killing players with a big difference in experience.

bounty hunters need bigger incentives, and so do any nearby adventurers who happen upon a crime scene. running to the greater blue community with news of being looted and murdered should get a whole town shaking with glee at the opportunity to fight some bandits and glean some epic rewards. bandits should fear the law to such a degree that the successful become things of myth and legend, and unsuccessful killers are met with a more barren and harsh existence, striken from the benefits of the cooporative behaviors of their blue counterparts.

anyone having the ability to loot your things at any time should be a real and present danger. the rewards for catching a thief and returning stolen goods should have a high enough incentive that the game culture leans towards cooperative behavior, and working together to assist players in presenting a challenge and threat to the criminals.

to put it plainly, helpful, positively social, cooperative behavior should be highly rewarded, criminal behavior should leave a players with an incredibly rough, barren, and "frontier" lifestyle, while grief behavior should result in penalties so high that repeat offenders are better off deleting their characters and learning to get along .

again, i say this, as a PK seeking a challenge from the bounty hunting side of the game. killing noobs is pointless and hardly is the stuff of legend.

make looting more, shall we say, realistic. you shouldnt be able to loot a freshly lain corpse in 0.8 seconds. you should have to be in a compromising position for many seconds, perhaps even a minutre or more if the player has a LOT to loot. in that time period, you are extremely vulnerable to bounty hunters, vengeful blues, or maybe even the return of the slain victim. the PK/thief cant fight back while doing this, and can even suffer a very high penalty for damage/critical hits for being so exposed. the PKer, or corpse thief, is going to probably only have time to snatch one item and gtfo (if that). again, the reward for catching this thief or killer should be way to good to pass up, creating a social culture around catching PKs that players want to participate in.

also you should allow players to bind something like 10-12 items to their body at any given time. bound items can decay, but can never break (unless its some special PVE item), never be stolen, and never be looted. make a little mini/instance quest to get deeds of binding accessible to players of any level, make it challenging enough that its something not to be taken lightly, but easy enough that any player can handle it. anything not bound thats too invaluable to loose can be stored in your house or guild vault / bank. perhaps quest for scrolls of unbinding as well, and then players can bind/unbind various things to themselves.

the risk of loss is what makes ultima so freaking exciting! it makes it a game to be respected, but with some dedication and practice, accessible to anyone.

uo was an incredibly simple game. SoTA has very sophisticated combat by comparison. the risk of loss to a PK is much higher, since the luck of the draw of the skill deck can mean a ruined PK raid, and the lack of access to the "blue" towns and world can mean a far more difficult struggle for the PK in the long run.

eh, youre using some biased language . lets stop calling it junk gear, and call it every day survival gear. in a medieval-ish world, the blacksmith is going to make a heck of a lot of horseshoes, bits, farming tools, rods, shafts, axles, wheel coverings, bits and pieces for weapon maintenance, etc. these thigns are necessary for survival, and do create the economy. theyre every day thigns because they are a necessary component of this simulated world. it makes getting the uber rare bonus skill sword with cool glowy effects that much cooler, because of the ubiquitous nature of these so-called "junk" items ("an expert katana..."). afriad of losing it? bind it to yourself, or only bring itout for special occasions where you gotta dress nice and proper (like, slaying a balron).

skill based on how quickly you can react to needing a heal, removing a paralyze, and later in the game - curing a poison,
using opponent's slower connection against him

what it also does certainly need for balance is - stealing. a thief wasnt usually nearly as stacked as a toon as a PVE mage or PVE melee char. plenty of theives were very successful with PVE and being a thief too, but my 7xGM thief was no melee at all, just good at running away (and was very successful that way). the risk of dying criminal and getting (deservedly so) ganked by all the nearby blues and losing all your stuff

another reason UO's lack of heavy handed rules made it the best game ever was that my thief was still amazing at PVP in an indirect way. i had 2 small houses on our PK island, and they were literally placed right next to each other. my thief and PK toons were on different accounts, but they were neighbors. id see a group of blue chars, run up and steal their bandages, run away to my house and lock up inside. switch tabs to my PK account, walk outside, slay one or 2 of them and run back inside, and hide. tab back over to thief account, run outside (hidden), steal more bandages, healing pots, spare katanas, whatever else was critical to combat, and run back into the thiefs house and hide. tab back over to PK inside his house, now that the remaining live guys are trying to nail the thief, and kill one or two more. that was a skill that took me 3 years of ardous work to get down right, and i did many thousands of times, got looted many thousands of times, but i put in the work and became an expert at raking up PK counts with that technique. no hacks, no bot like add ons automating everything, average internet connection for the time, just really damn good at tricking groups of people out with this and taking 4-5 ppl out solo that way. Straight skill.

once more, im reiterating - those times i wasnt so skilled, id get nailed on my PK, and it was madness getting back into shape to be able to do that again. blues have no idea what a struggle that was.


so what about safety while dungeoning then? easy - just make it absolutely positively not worth the PK's time to kill blue players there. make the dungeon experience extremely unforgiving without very social and cooperative behavior. make a PK's biggest fear dying and having to recover from getting killed by a balron, dragon, ogre lord, whatever. make the penalty for dying as a player killer in a dungeon or similar area with focused/specialized player experiences something such that the PK (or band of PKs) would much rather roam the countryside like a roving band of brigands.

Ultima was such a simple game that it was easy to create exploitable situations with huge groups of PKs (pardom me for a moment while i bask in the memory of teleporting into the bone wall room...). WIth a game system, and the technology it relies upon, being so much more sophisticated today with SoTA, I feel its incredibly easy to envision a system where everybody wins while allowing PVP side by side with the PVE experience. The penalties for being a PK were far harder than people think if they never were successful as one in the long term. SoTA can make that challenge hard enough that there is equal incentive to be a bounty hunter and take out PKs without also having to worry about PKs ruining big raids and PVE events.

Its incredibly easy to envision a system where grief usage (being "level 50" and slaughtering noobs) has penalties that exponentiate over time, such that no one bothers doing it. The fact that it can happen once in a while is a good thing - it allows people to more deeply respect the game theyre playing, and sets the whole world apart from all the other games. The penalty for repeatedly killing some noob should be so severe that the PK is just one step away from deleting the character altogether. You can keep track of the %of level/experience difference that one PK kills over time, and if that user has a long record of taking advantage of lower exp players, bigger penalties like the player's house become lootable, or maybe even "catches fire." All penalties for grief killings should be able to be appealed, and a game master can look at the game's logfiles for the character and decide if mediation is necessary, or the player's avatar suffers the toll of its unvirtuous behavior.

Open PVP is a system, just like combat skills, crafting, large scale PVE encounters, etc, that has to be balanced. It will take time to balance it. Some people wont like changes or many aspects of it. But all in all, the openness of UO should be brought to a new sophisticated game engine like that of SoTA. In the long run its going to ressurrect the greatest game there ever was!

all i want is an organic experience . it just feels so 'fake' with the game world rules inhibiting behavior.

the most beautiful thing you miss out on with out this, is a richer player created and controlled culture. the player culture of the thief/PK underworld was deeper than any ive ever experienced where it was more or less imposed upon players via game design implementation. i really do believe that by forcing consensual PVP, youre really inhibiting the growth of the player/ user generated culture.

 

So what you want in a nut shell is to be able to do what you want without the game restricting you in any way? I mean, people will behave well without any rules if we go with how well that worked out in UO. You want all the freedom to do what you want without any real consequences, good for the instigator, not so much for the victim.

 

make looting more, shall we say, realistic. you shouldnt be able to loot a freshly lain corpse in 0.8 seconds. you should have to be in a compromising position for many seconds, perhaps even a minutre or more if the player has a LOT to loot. in that time period, you are extremely vulnerable to bounty hunters, vengeful blues, or maybe even the return of the slain victim. the PK/thief cant fight back while doing this, and can even suffer a very high penalty for damage/critical hits for being so exposed. the PKer, or corpse thief, is going to probably only have time to snatch one item and gtfo (if that). again, the reward for catching this thief or killer should be way to good to pass up, creating a social culture around catching PKs that players want to participate in.



looting for 0,8 seconds really ??? time should be like 40 seconds minimum. what didnt got looted should stay in bagpack except resorces. they should always drop

 

That isn't the same as there being a quest that makes a PvP player the target of an almost PvE questline. It's sorta the opposite.

 

Darkstars thinking

Since there has been at least a few people screaming, “FULL LOOT OR GTFO!!1!” in the forums, I want to dig into what the actual implications are to game play and design. Having full loot destroys the value of items because they are easily lost and, in the end, it just makes players keep any real gear in the bank because they are afraid to wear it. Players who are actually going to partake in any risky behavior just end up wearing junk gear so they don’t suffer the same risks as others who are actually wearing gear. The only time players will actually get to enjoy their real gear would be in SPO or FPO modes, where there would be little or no risk of losing all your gear.

this is not true .....
especially when a pk get punished with statslost or weightlost that he cant play 1-2 days ,or even have to deleate his char like in ultima online, people used only there best gear.
serverdowns in ultima online made everyone want to have a super awesome set and rare pet... last 20 minutes didnt got saved in ultima online before server restart , there was a massage nothing will be saved anymore. everyone had 20 min to go crazy used there vanq weapons rare pets and super armors.
on the freeshard Defiance there was a duel option (both players spawned in an arena and nobody lost something) so people wanted to use there best gear there.

but no loot in open pvp is gamebreaking , when someone have the best armor and weapon and get killed , and remains super op and just come back is an absolutly gamebreaking thing !!!! there should be risk vs reward when he use his rare gear he should risk to loose it !!! this make blue people want to hunt down red players because of there bounty and gear and because they know they wont be able to play for some time.

and the roleplaying thing i mentioned is gamebreaking for me aswell. we cant roleplay like we did in ultima , players are not scared to die !!! you cant rome arround solo, find a noob and tell him die here and now , or follow me ,and help me to make an ambush near the next town. or tell the people who are farming a spot near my area that they have to pay tax or i kill them, so you can guard different farming spots and make a buisness and rent them. destoys terretoryx controll and dont feel realistic.

destoy economy , make crafters useless and so much more !!! it change the whole game experiance .... to something ultima online player hated (the wow model)


and the only proper reason they mention is that they are afraid people would not want to use there good gear ... what is simply not true
i know a lot of players in mortal online (full loot game compareable to ultima online) who played the game hardcore they used only the best gear because they not wanted to die (with personal healers) they didnt care that there cronite armor was 800 gold worth and other players armor only 10 gold for having 25 percent more defencive

http://www.mortalonline.com/db/?cn=achilles
http://www.mortalonline.com/db/?cn=l
http://www.mortalonline.com/db/?cn=gigamo
someplayers even made a new char when they died to much AHAHAH

i personally died more often to the worl of nave to pve and fall damage , then some of them in general , but it is a good exemple that someplayers not want to die and use there super expencive gear even if it is 20 times that expencive and have only have 20 percent better protection. bescause they play the game hardcore and want to have the biggest advantage.

when someone killed on of the guys who run arround in cronite or oghnium he felt very happy and got rewarded with loot which took several days to farm.

sure a lot of players would be scared but defenetly not all , most pvpers would use there gear before it rotten in the bank

 

I really enjoy how you used 2 cases of players finding ways to avoid losing their best gear as evidence against a statement that players will not use their best gear because they will not risk losing it.

Sure they will use high end gear, but not when they will lose it.

It's not about losing or taking. It's about the down time after that loss. They spend tons of time gathering that Uber gear then poof, gone. Now what.

 

I love it when people use examples that prove the point....

This totally supports they only use good gear when they can't lose it.

This whole server down thing does not sound like a "feature".

 

RG and the devs state that PvP will be consensual and without full loot. This thread has 25 pages already and I wonder why it is still open.

 

It's not a single player thread??

 

now what ??
get new gear maybe or use some all day gear, cheeper one. where would be the fun in doing dungeons and housing if you dont store all your farmed stuff inside the house you can do the whole month pvp. housing only for rare items ??
you dont have to run arround always in the best gear, take a bit cheeper gear. kill loot a player upgrade your gearparts if he wear something better

i think most players just didnt tested out full loot games much. most players i know didnt wanted to go back to a non loot game after ultima online.




how can monsters be balanced then ?? was another question.
the answer are side materials for armors.
in mortal guardfur increased the bashing damage protection a lot. ironsilk increased the slashing damage protection a lot. you had to choose which sidematerial you want to use when crafting an armor + the ability to farm enchancement stones in dungeons. which increase one kind of protection but lower another one.

so if you make a dungeon with harder mobs doing bashing damage you could craft a pve armor with guardfur(high bashing protectzion) and use an enchancement stone which reduce slashing protectioin but increase bashing protection. if there are magic mobs you might want to have a pet. different armor sets could have different values for different protections.

 

Ahh so once someone takes your good gear, take a seat and do something else, you are out of PvP. Great system you have there. </sarc>

That's a grind fest to stock up on gear.

 

nah its either full loot and all gear is pretty much basic or u get rare gear but cant lose it everything else is stupid