Better PVP for everyone, one step at a time.

Hey there, everybody!

Are there any small improvements that we can gather? Here are a few I have collected.

Consequences:
The best way I've seen to entice others to join PVP is to decrease the consequences, not increase them (I love full loot, but I do not think it's a fit for SotA). Some things we could look at are increasing the speed of the Ghost-form upon death perhaps? This way everyone can get back to the fun part quicker. Respawn timers always kill the mood.

Scene-loot:
This was talked about before and I would absolutely love to see it in game. Whatever you loot in a scene is still a part of that scene until you leave the area to "claim" it. If you are flagged or in an open-pvp scene, that loot will appear on your corpse for PVP players to loot. Even for PVE without the looting associated with it, this might be a good thing to make it more challenging for our dungeon loot runners.

Score-board Opt-in:
The current score-board that pops up in open-pvp scenes is pretty silly. It's a great piece of tech to have though for those that are holding tournaments. I saw someone else mention this, but adding it to Battle Banners that you can join or having some remote way to opt-in to the fight would be preferable.

"Invasion" Feedback:
As someone who enjoys flagging for PVP, I currently spend more time hunting through empty scenes and loading screens than running into other flagged players. Some visual feedback on the overworld that tells us which scenes are currently occupied by other flagged players would be awesome. Inversely, if we’re in a scene, it’d be great to know if someone flagged has entered (similar to being invaded like Dark Souls). My favorite part about gaming are those heart-racing moments. This would be a step in that direction.

Trophy from Kill:
Diablo had Ears, UO had Heads, it would be nice to take a trophy from a player's corpse and use it as decoration. Skulls would work cause we already have skull models in game (there's probably a few folks who would love a pile of skulls in their homes), or perhaps an Eye maybe? I heard Lord British has a collection of eyes somewhere. http://s559.photobucket.com/user/bi...s Collection/garriot2214.jpg.html?sort=3&o=13

Perhaps with a few little changes here and there, accompanied with things like Guild Warfare on the horizon, we'll get to a PVP that fits SotA snugly rather than forcing it into another games' bloodstained dress.

 

Death is a Major problem in some fights as to many time it is meaniless and you just pop right back into the fight, You should NOT be able to just bounc back and into ANY fight. Solo you could just ambush the guy looting you, and in a Field Fight you are not even really missed. Death should be for at least 5 minutes in PvP, AT least...

Already in the works ??


This contradicts you later statement as it is the thing that shows you if someone is in the scene? Leave it it is fine and yeah the opt out is ok.

Your Score Board tells you who is in and or enters :-(


Yeppers trophies are nice and should be kinda oriented toward the victim, evil ones should say you saved the world from their ilk, and good guys would be along the lines of "another vermin removed from the world"

 

Hey Crazy, some good point in your thread.

PvP needs some LOVE.

 

You could start by avoiding thinking of normally non-PVP players like they are sheep you need to lure to the slaughter.

I'll give you the number 1 way to increase the number of players involved in PVP, reduce the number of PVP players who are jerks. Get rid of the spawn-campers, noob hunters, gankers and the like and the number of PVP players will increase 10 fold. Otherwise, folks will go PVP just long enough to get whatever goodies you dangle in front of them or until they run into one of the groups above and then they never look twice at the PVP flag again.

 

Oh, sorry. I should have been more specific here. The Invasion Feedback thing was for those of us who are toggled for open-PVP everywhere, but not currently in an open-PVP scene (no score board available). Just something simple like "The Oracle whispers to you: You are not alone. Stay vigilant." Whatever would fit the lore. No names necessary. Just a "spider-sense" if you will.

Right, which is why I suggested consequences for the fallen should be decreased, not increased as more vocal PKers would most likely prefer. If you make the fallen less tasty to wolves, in theory, the wolves will go elsewhere.

PVP is already entertaining because you're not fighting AI anymore, but if you try it and you lose... have to spend hard-earned gold repairing your armor... have to wait or run for 5 minutes before you re-spawn... yeah, you're probably gonna turn PVP back off.

So... any ideas?

 

Excellent suggestions Phil. I'm on board with everything except the ghost speed for the same reason Weins stated.

This is something intended by design, that's why all pvp is consensual. Everybody who will participate in a PVP encounter will do it willingly. Nonetheless, the existance in UO of player vs sheep also made possible the Red vs Blue, which was pretty much the core of PVP. Since i backed this game i've been thinking that to be able to reenact that flow without the sheeps is something crucial to make open pvp work. That means that people posing as Reds should be able to disturb the peace somehow, so that way Blues may defend the realm. I'm pretty sure that's what devs are trying to achieve with Shardfalls... but i don't think it will work the same way. I this kind of experience should be enforced and enhanced by some game supported systems.

That's what i call an idealist! Burzmali, if there's something the PVP world needs are jerks. Can you imagine PVP without jerks?

 

Honestly? You either design so that everyone is PVP or design so the the PVP area is effectively separate from the main game in all regards a la Destiny. Any other way and the PVPers are going to whine that there aren't enough players while a subset of the PVPers do their utmost to drive away anyone willing to try it.

 

In a game like SOTA? Not really, which is why I think trying to "tempt" people into PVP is a fools errand, the jerks will just drive them off, possibly from the game entirely.

 

Oh man... I would love some sort of criminal system that doesn't have to be PVP in nature, yet somehow it would make me desirable to be hunted by PVP flagged good guys! There is something here. What would be a cheap version of this?

 

This, a million times this.

Instead of trying to drive people away or tell them to stop playing, we could create incentive to play.

People say UO died because they put in a split and people had a choice. The reality is that people had a choice and the choice was clear. No one liked being punished or forced into gameplay they didn't want so PvP players sat in an empty world with no one to play with. Why are people so quick to repeat that mistake?

 

Other way of achieving the same are guard posts, working as some sort of "open by default" control points (i hope recycling the mechanic may make them easier to implement). The objective of this mechanic is to make some scenes that may be open PVP flagged under certain conditions. Let's say there are some point of interest other than cities worth of be defended by guards, mostly crossing points or resource extraction scenes (a bridge merchants usually cross in their way to a city, a forest under the protection of some ruler); those guards are there to make sure that place remains accessible to the common folk.

Now a group of what we call "reds" want to disturb one of those points of interest... As they enter they can attack the guards (guards are supposed to be though guys so a party should be needed) and as they do, a message is displayed warning residents that the place is under attack. During this contest status reds may attack the guards, guards fight against them, and other players in the scene may attack the reds, flagging themselves for PVP by doing that (Consensual). If you're there and you don't want any trouble you may stay until the guard post is taken, nobody can attack you if you don't want.

If between "blue players" and guards the menace is expelled and the guard post is not taken life goes by. But if reds take the control point that place is immediately flagged for PVP; all players receive a message telling them that the guard post has been taking, and giving them the option to leave the scene immediately. The scene will stay PVP flagged (and guards won't respawn) as long as a certain amount of reds stay in the guard post, and every player entering on that scene (in case of resource extraction scene) or passing by (in case of a crossing point) will get a warning "this zone is raided so it's flagged as open PVP zone, do you still want to enter?". In this last case, you can't pass through if you don't enter the scene. This is where blues come in to expel the reds and take the post back, so everybody can get back to normal.

Other way of doing this (maybe cheaper?) is to forget about guard posts and allow a certain group of players to block crossing points, generating a PVP scene that you need to cross until you drive the bad guys out. I think this may be easier to implement, but the blockades come out of nowhere and may feel too annoying.

Don't know if these concepts are cheap enough, but i think something along that lines is doable. Anyway, it illustrates a way of generating conflict without killing "sheeps" first... yeah you disturb them, but they'll keep their stuff and may leave everytime without consecuences. The basic concept i'm experimenting with is to bring PVP to some zones instead of having PVP in the zones designated to it as a way of reflecting how reds carried the battle where they attacked. It's still limited to certain zones, but it comes with that "red feeling" of being a pain in the ass, and gives Anti PK guilds a raison d'être (because currently they can fight against evil people, but they don't have anything to defend)

I'd also like to add that i do agree with the intention of incentivizing PVP, just don't think making ghosts run faster by default is the right way to do it, because rez timers have a reason to exist, and making them short would make a guild battle difficult to be won. But yeah, incentives are in order (like some benefits or discounts in some shop earned by participating in battles, perhaps linked to a virtue, or something like that).

 

I like the way you think. Awesome stuff in here.

I'll say the reason I brought up speeding up the ghost-form was to simply mimic PVP-centric games like Unreal Tournament or Chivalry or even Darkfall Online. A slow moving ghost-form is like receiving a paddling after you've already been murdered. I could see how getting to a re-spawn point quicker to "zerg" from could turn the tide in some battles though. Perhaps an increased rez-time based on multiple deaths in a short period similar to MoBAs like LoL to prevent "zerging"? Still allow the ghost to move quick so it doesn't feel painful, but when they get to the ankh, they have to wait till their "shattered soul is collected and whole once more". The fast ghost movement at least lets players run back and forth quickly while they wait, maybe change their mind about which ankh they want to rez at and get there before they're kicked to the scene entrance. If it were up to me, I'd give them the ability of flight (UT spectator mode), or at least super jump and slow-fall. Your vision as a ghost is already limited, so it's not like you could help scout well. Just a thought.

Allow emotes for ghost-form so they can dance with other ghosts at the ankh while they wait. I have this feeling that making it more fun to be a ghost would help lighten the mood upon death.



Looks like I'm not alone! Totally missed this thread: https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/f...ostly-avatar-and-ghost-system-thoughts.19370/

 

problem with this is you would constantly run in and out of scenes to secure your loot. I hate the loading times I have to suffer through as it is.

This I like a lot more
and don't expect to find many flagged players before there is any meaning to be flagged, as it is now it would only be a disturbance whilst hunting.
For testing one might say but that seems to be easier to do on your own terms rather than being attacked unknowingly.
I live for the heart racing moments, though without the fear of losing gear I just don't get pumped at all... speaking for my self only here.

 

You're right, a penalty for multiple deaths seems more reasonable than slow speed. Superjump and slow fall sounds cool! Now i completely agree with your OP :O

I find interesting all the ideas you're proposing and the ones in the post you rescued... but i'm not sure if being a ghost may form part of the game experience in the same way it did in Ultima Online where you needed to find the ankh in an open world. What i find especially interesting is something mentioned in the ghost system post; to give ghosts something to do. In certain PVP conflicts, ghosts may have some role to fullfill to avoid or reduce the penalty for rezzing. What that may be or if it's worth to be implemented depends on what Devs plans for ghosts are.

Talking about old ideas, i just remembered this post where Myrcello suggested to link loot to virtues and generated some interesting discussion. Maybe you get something you like from here https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/f...pvp-system-full-loot-full-pvp-solution.14603/

 

Hopefully some optimization work is in the near future to decrease these loading times. But yeah, it'd be a gamble, right? "Do I run out of the scene now or keep hunting?" This is far less painful than Ultima Online's "should I consume reagents to recall back to Britain so I can stash this in my bank box... or keep hunting?" If I found something good, I'd leave immediately. If I'm just stacking junk, I'd wait till I'm close to my weight limit or nearly escaping death before making my exit.

 

That's just it, I want it to be more like should I run back those 600 miles to drop off loot or risk Hettar coming to eat me? In this case I am not Hettar
well this was a bit extreme maybe even for me.
I want to weigh my options continuously while out hunting with friends, when to go back should be a hard decision to make imo

then again the lazy me loved to recall/gate I'm very curious to see how much we will be able to teleport when game goes live

 

I disagree with this statement COMPLETELY. I was there and what I saw was short boost of PvE players, it was followed by the slow dying of the game as Open World(Pro-PvP'ers) "create your own story" enthusiast started leaving once PK'ers realized they can farm in the PvE world, jump in the PvP world, abuse hard working PvP environment players, then jump back to safety in the PvE world. As the hardcore Player driven experience based RPG'ers left because they were tired of the loophole in the system you got what you always get with PvE'ers (eh, done here-next best thing).

Today, you ask PvE'ers if they would play UO if it was PvE only and their response is "Nah, I'm in WoW(or what ever game)". You ask the PvP'er if they would still be playing UO if it stayed PvP, and they say "YES!" PvP'ers carry games over the long hall.

You want to know why? Time and time again, there is no substituting the MASS of creativity you have when you include your player base as part of the game environment. You make PvE'ers open to the idea that if they team together they can be a part of the solution. This is why UO had a short term boost, but was ultimately followed by an exodus long before it should have been.

 

@Sir Tim
Would like your post twice if I could

 

If the majority wanted non-consent and full loot as people think, that choice was there before them. People opted to go the other direction with the split. And then the PvP world was empty with no one there to play with.

When people had the choice, they made it. I'm not sure why people are determined to ignore that.

 

Then I have a completely different experience than you did. What i saw in UO was all of the crafters and PvE people moved to Trammel and the PvPeRs got sick of just battling skilled PvPers. No easy money anymore.

But I would love a bag of sending so I could deposit all my resources I collected in a PvP Area to my bank. Best item next to the ring of reagents.

That would get me into the "felucca x2 " resource areas that port is implementing.

Edit. Hate autocorrect. Hate autocorrect again