Can equality solve some of our conflicts?

My views happen to be the same as OP. Make it happen Port!

On another topic, I still find it weird people demand incentives to PvP here. No other PvP game I've played had incentives to do this -- people just do it because it's fun.

 

Maybe you mean there are no games where the pvp has no incentives? let me name you some ))

WoW --- Powerful gear and gems with honor points and arena
ESO --- PVP points to buy powerful items
Albion --- Best farming zones and endgame zones are pvp zones
LoA --- Best farming zones and endgame zones are pvp zones
BDO --- Points and conquer areas

the list could be endless so I stop here )

No other online game has incentives to grind in private mode with same rewards as multiplayer mode, sota is exceptional for this ))
Also No other online game punish multiplayer and pvp like sota does ))

Keep in mind i don't consider myself a pvper despite being in a pvp guild but I tell the truth about what I see )

 

For PvP to be meaningful, it has to have a purpose, a reward, a goal, a progression system....something.

If PvP only consists of "random ganking of people doing something else" then it will never succeed in this game. The main reason I avoid PvP in this game is because it isn't a thrill, it isn't competitive, or even "risk" - its...interfering with people doing PvE stuff.

For me personally, I get zero satisfaction out of killing a weaker target, or killing someone engaged with a mob, or killing someone trying to get their quest done. That isn't "PvP" that's being a jerk because you can. I'm assuming, that when most people say we need more PvP, you aren't asking for more defenseless victims - Sadly, there are some PvP players that this is exactly what they want, and those players and that attitude is a big part of the reason why PvP is in the state its in. I think though, that we have enough people who truly want an engaging, meaningful system, which encourages people to participate in it, rather than just an opportunistic fish in barrel gankfest. Right?

The problem as I see it is that to "encourage pvp" we keep trying to add that "something else" - a non-pvp objective to usher people NOT interested in PvP, into pvp scenes. This is not going to address the core problem with the PvP system, all it is doing is making people feel like they 'must' PvP in order to achieve their non-PvP related goal. And that's why everyone gets so riled up and divided over it. To make matters worse, with the ransom system, not only do you get interrupted/interfered with while trying to do "something else", you have to PAY the harasser for the privilege. Is it any wonder why so many people avoid PvP and don't want to deal with it?

First, lets remove the obstacles to entry:

• The "ransom" is clearly not considered rewarding enough, so lets be rid of it. Now you open up PvP to a lot of folks who avoid it since it has a cost for entry. If I didn't have to do 20 minutes of inventory management if I wanted to step into a shardfall, and/or spend an hour re grinding lost cash if I get jumped, I'd be a lot more likely to go.

Next, lets talk real rewards.

I agree with @Dhanas above, that dungeon rooms from the PvP place should be used for PvP dungeons.
I'd like to see more things along those lines. I'm sure there are ways to limit placement of things based on PvP status, we have those chained obsidian shards that you can only place in PvP town. There have been a lot of good ideas.

Lets add resources to PvP areas, which are limited (due to multiplayer-only) and subject to the laws of competition. Some suggestions have been like, "blood moss" that grows where players have died, chaos pollen, etc. Let these resources be used to craft special consumables (potions, food, etc.) whose effects only work in PvP areas but are far more potent than the basic food/potions we have. Say double strength and duration, whatever. This gives another edge to killing boss level creatures in PvP scene since you can do so more buffed, but with the risk of interference.

Chaos magic is more appealing to PvP, and not needed much for PvE. Lets add mine-able obsidian shards into the shardfalls, and chaos gem nodes that can only be obtained in PvP areas. Yeah, you can get obsidian chips elsewhere, but a few here and there from drops, the shardfall makes sense as a location to actually mine the shards for chips, etc.

Use these or other items obtained in PvP areas (can make some new ones, whatever) as a sort of contraband. This means loot with a high sell value to help mitigate/replace "ransom". The caveat - if you're killed carrying these items, then that's what you drop. All of it that you've acquired since setting foot in the scene. This way you lose something, (or gain something) but you're not worse off than before you stepped in the scene, so there's no discouragement to play.

These are ways to add an "economic" benefit to PvP playstyle without overlapping/interfering with the core PvE game.
And there are already other incentives in existence, the green and white dragon heads sort of things, that are fine to put in PvP zone, because their only purpose is collection/completionism. Lets have more unique stuff in PvP zones, as long as they are things that aren't gameplay essentials, it gives PvP players something to farm/sell to those who aren't willing to PvP. We will happily buy it from you.

Castle sieges? Factions? Guild Wars? Bring them on. Something sufficiently interesting that isn't just a ransom bill for stepping foot in there would be welcome.

Lift the attenuation cap (say double it) in the PvP scene. That might tempt me in, if I'm in a good group, but doesn't bother me otherwise. You'd probably need to add a more mob-dense area to one corner of the scene to make it workable.

 

I think this just touches the surface, but I'll jump in.

Equality. PvP. Player vs. Player. I'm going to suggest you can't bandage what we've got, some ideas need to be thrown out, some need to be integrated.

The best PvP game I'm playing right now is Overwatch, mostly because I'm not a fan of Battle Royals due to the extended looting cycle, I just want the action. But my Player vs. Player time goes back to Quake (didn't have internet when I was PvE'ing with Doom.) No I didn't play UO, but I know that's where a ton of the current problem comes from because I have asked UO players about their experiences many times. Usually it is one specific big moment they remember. I remember one in Unreal Tournament. The moments will exist in any system. But will the players exist here?

With no further ado, ideas of equality:

• Where are the Tier 1 PvP zones? Why do you have to be a monster to PvP? Do we expect there to ever be a healthy population if the noobs leave if frustration before becoming monsters?
  • Equality: Level capping. There is no way that a Tier 1 player will stand a chance in a Tier 1 PvP zone, sadly, because jerks. A Tier 1 zone needs a cap, or say goodbye to your potential future foes.
• Why do PvP'ers have to PvE for XP? This is dumb. "But exploits!" In Overwatch you've got about a 10 second grace period before being kicked from a match. You also get XP for PvPing EVERY TIME YOU PvP! No PvE required! (There is a Halloween one that is fun PvE, and endless wave, better than UT because of balance, but it too gets boring and I'd rather be fighting people).
• Why do PvP'ers have to grind for gold? There is a dev findable number that is the median gold/loot drop amount per hour for PvE zones. Extend that to PvP battles. (But exploits!)
  • Maybe we could drop the antiquated Ransom idea then! The Devs know that players (and monkeys) HATE to lose things. This is basic psychology. If the winners can get rewarded without the losers having to quit playing, you'll have more PvP'ers.
• Obsidian Trials are level capping instead of setting the skill at a specific level. It is at a ridiculously high level, 100 in skills. This means a new player is going to have to player how many hours before they can compete?
  • Lets see how many months it takes @Chris to get Bilbo into the Trials if he doesn't cheat. Not this year I bet.
• And finally (go ahead and scream, I can take it) levels make PvP less fun anyway. It's supposed to be about player skill, not points in skills.
  • I know, "A skilled player can beat a higher level player". Got it. That doesn't make the system a good idea. Besides, @Antrax Artek is on a break, so the guy who proves that isn't playing at the moment.
  • As a real slow progressing person playing in Virtue League, I can tell you that players who start the League on equal footing with me are FAR more powerful than me 8 weeks later. PvE time matters in PvP, and that's just bad design.

So to summarize, having PvP so heavily tied into PvE is bad. We've reached a local maxima on PvP, other than a few fixes to Obsidian Trials. Nothing can be done about it until they rethink motivations of players, what makes a good PvP battle (hint, equal power which makes player skill all that matters), PvP exp and loot.

Local maxima means you have to go DOWN the valley (rip out big parts) in order to go UP to the next higher mountain. Painful but true.

And that means figuring out how to deal with exploits (very short no move timer works pretty well in Overwatch) so that PvP can be rewarding on its own, without relying on PvE or angering (or driving away) the losers.

 

O know players do not want to hear this but, it does not matter how many items we give to the PvPer that are PvP specific. It just wont matter since it is really not what they want.

Any items in the PvP only areas are a sticking point because - ((this is quote I have from developers. . .))- "PvErs will never need to go into a PvP area." They have very effectively skirted this by adding items that sure we don't "HAVE" to go get but . . . . . SO they are just plain wrong from the get go. Will it help nope, but it will at least make them honest.

and now I will very simply refer to thread like this that no one wants to accept. https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/f...midst-are-you-own-worst-enemies-sorry.152506/ which gets locked because they can not handle their community and trolls just try and quell the issue. It doe not change the fact that that alone is the worst problem this issue has. P E R I O D.

Balance by trying to add appeaseng "items" will NOT work,
Balance thru skills is IMPOSSIBLE (unless you just make everyone the exact same levels and skills, and then there is the chose the skills, sooo IMPOSSIBLE)

I can use all the times they tried to "CREAT NEW CONTENT" for PvP and they are all dead zones, why, it is not items or skills, it is because there are not enough sheep. Blood Bay had no Decay from day one and even thow reported was never fixed until they shut it down everywhere yet it did nothing.

Now watch how many people just attack me for voicing my opinion, I did it strongly and with honest proof behind it, that does not make people happy or accepting.

I admire trying to fix what is a perceived problem but first you have to ID what the real issue is. It is simply there are not enough "Targets" for PvPers.

People run events as are going on and they are fun and successfull but the instant one of those from the "Parade Event" shows up it is over and all progress is LOST>

 

I agree with you removing ransom and making full lootable everything you get in a PVP zone is not a bad idea but needs many things to be adressed before to do it. I make you some examples: I am grinding in a PVP zone, I perceive the presence of another player in the area ( there are many way to discover if there are other player in a PVP zone) I instantly disengage mobs, use a teleport zone ( it takes a couple of seconds), clear all the resources farmed there in my bank and come back to fight in the PVP zone; second example, I don't go grind in a PVP zone because I know it doesn't worth, I let someone else do it for me and then go and kill him and take all his goods farmed in there.
If we want to add this kind of system we need:
1 exclusive stuffs dropping in PVP zones, like you stated before
2 A justice system that punish griefing and incentivize fair fight
3 A long coldown for zone out and zone in from PVP zones, mostly after engaged a fight with another player


About obsidian chips and chaos stuff I agree, but unfortunately I can drop much more obsidian chips in UT than in any Shardfall/Ruins, also farming obsidian chips in PVP zones is pretty annoying, cause you have to deal with obsidian golems wich are immune to magic, so a mage ( the one who should use more obsidian chips, cause chaos tree) can do it easier grinding UT in solo.

This is definitely a great idea and I totaly approve it, it could generate more battle for the control of zone between PVPers.

P.S. I don't usualy go to kills newbs doing PVE in Shardfall or quest in Ruins, I don't care too much. What happened when essences where dropping just in The Fall, was groups of organized PVPers coming from the bigger PVP guilds, trying to have the control of the istance/room and fighting for this. The fun part wasn't slaining newbs attempting to sneak into the istance but having battle with other groups of PVPers that were there with the intent of do PVE and fight other players for doing this.

 

I think this is it. PvP'ers (most) just want some good solid matches. Better yet if they don't have to spend all night looking for them.

Based on that as the starting point, stripping away all the band-aid's and patches, what will make it EASY and FAST to get into a good solid battle? And then maybe another one, but with a different group?

(Yeah, you don't always want to be fighting the same 6 people over and over because they are the ones you happened to find, it's nice to just suddenly be fighting someone else.)

I think it takes an overhaul. Divorce PvP from PvE so we can get a quick fix, and make sure that there is a way to get into fights that can go either way. A good fight is a close fight.

 

I agree with you about tier 1 pvp zone with a cap, or simply a protection from player lvl 50+, so that newbs can start to PVP without having to deal with high level players.
I am not too much for capping skill and Alvl, cause many builds works better than other at a certain level, and others build are underpowered compared to others at a certain level. ( Some examples: air, sun and water are the cheapest tree to raise, fire, death, earth and life are the more expensive, so for example for build a great and competitive fire mage you need much more xp and higher skills than for build a great and competitive water/air mage ).
In my opinion best solution is having zone for newbs and casuals, most Battleground like, where you can't join if you are above a determinate level, example, having an obisidian trial <100 and an Obsidian Trial >100, same Map, same mechaninc, just having 2 separate istances joinable with a queue. Let's say battleground no ransom are something that appeal more casuals and new players, while hardcore PVPers prefer world PVP loot based, so both the playstyle should have their place, we already have OT, add a queue wich you can join from wherever you are and you got teleported there while the group is full, and add a version <100 for casuals, at the same time incentivize rewards and add a meaning for do world PVP, some examples factions, conquering zones, and all the other stuffs said above.

 

I dont think the player base is big enough to sort pvpers by level. Most of the differences seemed to be balance issues rather than levels because the difference between level 80 and 100 is like 80 HP and i think the difference between 100 and 120 is even less. Attunment is an incredibly powerful stat and higher level people have more skills leveld for the purpose of jsut increasing attunment rather than leveling skills they use but that another thing entirely. I dont agree seperating players would be benificial, BUT revisiting PvP gear with PvP stats.

Dont like the PvP gear thing because it requires you to segregate the pvp population by power to allow a fair ground to enter on BUT, maybe if INSTEAD of jsut recieving PvP gear, you got PvP components to use in crafting gear that gave PvP stats. THAT would make it possible for entry level PvPers to get ahold of some PvP gear without being forced to beat those people that already have it.

Or you could have the winenrs of a scenario recieve PvP gear/components AND a debuff tward the next battle in that scenario, so that the more they win, the harder it gets for them to continue winning. Probly wouldlt work because the goal for alot of PvPers is to become as close to unbbeatable as possible, but I personally wouldnt mind something like that

 

What makes the difference is the xp into the skills not the level itselfs, let's take in example passive skill of fire mage for raise fire time. Every fire dot hits every 1.5 seconds since you don't bring your fire speed skill to something like 123 ( don't remember which is the excalty level but something near that), after that level it hits every 1.4 sec. A fire mage isn't competitive as someone else who can have his full power with skills 100/110, capping a zone to level 100 skills it's just a lazy solution wich doesn't consider the mechanic of this game. Same thing happens with archers, lot of stuffs, weapond damage become +2 after level 120 if I am not wrong, and same with rapid fire wich take the additional arrow after a certain level. This how sota works, and if you want to min-max your character for playing in an hardcore and competitive contest you have to take in consideration those stuffs.

I am with you, I don't like at all PVP gear, I prefer much more PVP components that can be integrate to the market and involves also crafters into the process of making PVP gear, since best gear in this game should be crafted by players and not dropped.

 

It goes without saying that if they want to encourage people to go into ruin/shardfalls they need to disable/get rid of this magic shutdown mechanic.
I used to go in there from time to time to farm chips and chaos pollen but as a mage, this sort of 'nuisance mob' is a non-starter.
Can't expect people to go player vs. player in a zone where "all mages" have a wandering mob that makes them helpless.


Further to your other comments,howabout this -

What if stuff you got/farmed/mined in a shardfall was "tainted" - since its in proximity to big obsidian things.
You could get tainted cottons, tainted wood, tainted ores, etc. from these scenes.
Could even say you get them at a slightly higher rate in these scenes.

All tainted items are lootable upon death if you're in there harvesting them and someone gets you, goodbye stuff.

Teleport/recall/scrolls don't work when carrying tainted items (similar to being encumbered) - you could still walk out of the scene, but you'd have to make it to an exit...

Unique tainted resources in scene as well (chaos gems/bloodmoss, as described, tainted garlic, tainted mandrake, etc.) EDIT: You could even add tainted seeds, but they can only be grown in pvp pot....in the presence of the chained sharrds or w/e
Making consumables with tainted ingredients makes them more potent, but they remain tainted (droppable) and their extra powers only work in pvp scene (but no longer block teleportation, refining the materials removes that effect).

Making "tainted components" like, sword blade or heartwood, has extra property of doing more dmg vs. players (in addition to base properties, so like, "tainted hard maple wand" is same as hard maple wand but additional% to players) but these items are subject to drop/ransom.

There'd obviously be a market for all of this stuff and you could bump npc sell values on things like tainted tree borers and tainted cutworms as an additional incentive.

 

Indeed, I hate fighting in those zones with golem, cause if they jump on me while I am fighting another player I can't heal, blink and use any of my skills ( I am a pure mage).

I like those solutions, but dunno if they have the tech to implement something like that in the near future

 

The thread got locked because you tried to call out another player. Still want to talk about trolling?

 

Yeah, prioritization of resources is going to be an issue, but I'd prefer to see a patient roll out of a good, robust system, this sort of 'shadow economy' to support PvP, rather than a few more bandaids thrown on the existing system.

I am a mostly PvE player 'cause I play to progress my character, and get 'stuff'. PvP scenes have no appeal for me in either of those regards, being poor for experience and poor for money/resource farming with additional risk of being splatted by someone and paying ransom, there is no question, it is not a lucrative use of my time.

If there was unique stuff in there, I mean, if I could get my hands on that special pvp-bonus material and then use my lvl 140 crafting skills to make it into something really good, that might be worth some gold, and worth my time and interest to go into that scene and get the things. Might even make some for myself if its going to be a frequent trip. How many players like me would be tempted in? Probably quite a few.

But if you push too far, and say okay, this component which is best for PvE killing, only drops in PvP, then you cross a line and say "now to get this you must pvp or buy it." That's the line that a lot of people have trouble with - pushing people outside their preferred playstyle is always going to be met with resistance. It would be like saying, "in order to enter this PvP scene, you must stand here and listen to pop music and do dance emotes for 30 minutes as a cost to entry." Nobody wants that I think. LOL

 

This is excatly what I would like to see in a Sandbox game, and probably many others like me.

Since they probably need lot of time to implement something like that, I think a good solution could be starting with an higher attenuation window in PVP zones ( like you said before), let's say you can go up to 1.5kk in 1h in PVP zones, of course for that we need a little boost to shardfall, with more contents CP likes. It shouldn't be too hard to do, they can just copy superstition canyon or UT and put in the center of a Shardfall ( removing nullify magic from Obsidian Golems should be a priority in that case or mages can't play).

 

Yeah, I would not object to that (from the PvE point of view) -
Yes, you could get more xp per hour in PvP scene, but also yes, people could come and compete over the spawn, kill you etc. That risk means that you may end up not making as much as you would grinding safely elsewhere. That is how risk vs. reward should work. I can make an assessment - do I go for the extra XP knowing there could be an interruption/competition/issue/etc, or do I grind safely elsewhere and get a bit less. Everyone can make that decision for themselves. For some people, having a little pvp battle over the spawn makes the whole thing more fun and interesting too. If that's not your thing, then, you don't need to be there - go get your million and then go mining like you do now ^.^

The key here is you ARENT getting more xp for less effort, you just have a larger cap.

 

It shouldn't be so rigid. 100 is actually really freaking high, I know it doesn't seem like that once you've been here for a while but casual players take forever to get up there.

So a better solution is probably an LFG style set up.

Player wants to get into a game and there aren't any in his range, he hits "Create New"' and sets the skill cap manually. I bet we'd see a fair number in the 50's, probably not so much down around 30. Lots in the 80's, and then some clustered around 100.

 

Level 50 can be reached with 2 or 3 Upper Tears control point runs ))

 

Wow.... really?

"Hey new player, why don't you just blow by all low level content instead of enjoying because we have zero support for PvP until then. Here's one place you can go and thus have very little fun in all zones up through Tier 3. Enjoy!"

Edit: And there's a fundamental flaw of PvE being what drives PvP power. Unfixable without rethinking everything in my opinion.

 

Im kinda excited about this pvp crafting component idea