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General: Game Designers Address Misconceptions About PvP
SBFord
Former Associate EditorMember LegendaryPosts: 33,129
In his latest article for MMORPG.com, writer Michael Lafferty spends time with Funcom's Craig Morrison, Turbine's Jared “Kelsan” Pruett, Perfect World's Jon Belliss, and Realtime Worlds' EJ Moreland in a round table discussion about the misconceptions and 'fear' surrounding PvP. It's a fascinating look at the age-old (relatively speaking) argument for and against PvP and one that you won't want to miss.
Standing on the receiving end of a brutal, well-orchestrated beat-down in PvP (player-versus-player) can be a frustrating experience. Ask those who prefer not to partake in PvP and that is the main reason likely to be voiced. For some, it is the fear of failure that sparks decisions not to indulge in that particular aspect of MMOs.
Read the entire round table discussion about PvP then weigh in with your thoughts on our forums.
Comments
We can clone animals... we can splice DNA... we can travel to outter space.. we can augment reality... BUT WE CAN'T MAKE A PVP GAME WORTHWHILE?!?! Blasphomey!
For me consent PvP is the only way I will play. After being harassed and yes it does only take a couple of bad encounters to make one wary I will not be camped. I think you can say that these instances are rare and you might be right but that is your point of view. Your experience you cannot speak for everyone. While it may be true that 90 % of the playerbase never get camped if I get camped I will form my own opinion.
I have PvPed in a few games and in Lineage right from the time I made my character and logged in I was attacked. I was unable to do anything. I cannot play in games like that I have absolutely no fun. I want to play where I decide when I want to PvP, I make the decision. If I cannot do that I won't play. No loss you say fine then.
The other thing I absolutely hate is cheating,hacking and gear advantage like the level 60 enchantments in wow bgs on level 19's. Any of these will prevent me from PvPing.
Win or lose, II dislike PVP immensely. Nothing will change that. I don't like the playstyle. It's the same as playing sports to me. Which I also dislike. There is absolutely nothing that will change my dislike for PVP.
That said, if others want to PVP, go for it. Just don't force it on the rest of us.
I wonder if others of the anti-PVP camp share this trait?
Anyways, that was a great read that many here on these forums really need to take the time to fully digest.
“The human mind is obviously the most potent tool anyone has at their disposal,” Morrison said. “I have found down the years that the best PvP players are those who want to learn, and learn how to master the systems available. So rather than nerd-rage when they get destroyed by another player, and presume some hacks were at play, they immediately want to learn how the player did that to them. Both so they can understand how to counter it in the future, and possibly learn to do it themselves. Human ingenuity is almost limitless, and the best PvP players take advantage of that, learning how they can tempt opponents into foolish moves, or traps, and learn how to time their attacks to their maximum advantage.
“Watch those who are good at PvP carefully, learn from them, and don’t be afraid to ask questions and be willing learn.”
So true.
"Mr. Rothstein, your people never will understand... the way it works out here. You're all just our guests. But you act like you're at home. Let me tell you something, partner. You ain't home. But that's where we're gonna send you if it harelips the governor." - Pat Webb
Rule-based PvP such as WoW is horrible. And yes, players do want progression from PvP too. To minimize any imbalances caused by the rewards, make it such that the rewards have a small impact on the avatar, like DAoC's realm abilities..
Whoa! Very interesting discussion on PvP.
A few choice quotes:
"" “The human mind is obviously the most potent tool anyone has at their disposal,” ""
"Situational awareness is critical, especially in more open or free-form PvP settings – knowing who and what is around you at all times is crucial."
"But when that advantage distorts the balance, it’s up to the developers to impose limitations.”
“I believe the beauty of PvP is that it is real people competing against real people,” said Moreland, “there will always be emergent tactics that developers don’t expect. Unexpected locations that are unassailable, different combinations of abilities"
“On the other hand, if the design of your game is limited to more constructed and well defined forms of PVP (such as mini-games or arena systems with set rules) you tend to limit the possibilities for that kind of emergent gameplay to surface [open world pvp]"
Not a very good pvp'er personally, but the sort of danger, randomness and keeping your situational awareness about you that pvp in openworld can bring is for me the most authentic experience of existing in a dangerous fantasy/sci-fi environment etc. That and multiple faction battle over resources to create wars-on-all-fronts with other players that have repercussions for capturing resources is the ideal. Oc, taking a step back into the "adventuring life" away from the bloody wars and doing some PvE is the ideal balance.
http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1014633/Classic-Game-Postmortem
I'm a big fan of PvP, in FPS games. In an RPG I want an epic adventure against creatures/beasts/gods of legends. I want to team with my friends to conquer seemingly impassable odds. If I want to kill Jimmy over and over again I'll pop in Halo.
Not to say I don't enjoy a friendly duel from time to time, I just am not big into the battlegrounds/arenas and I really don't like open PvP in a PvE game (I'm looking at you AoC). Not because it doesn't fit the game, but because their are players who would rather fight each other without consent than let them experience the content.
I think game design that focuses on the individual (especially FFA PVP in any form) lends itself to the "I will not participate if there is no reward" mentality. When there is nothing worth fighting over there should be a reward for doing it, because otherwise what is the point?
I think a clever game designer could come up with a system that encourages not just group play, but actual camaraderie; a reason to put aside your individual differences and take one for the team should the opportunity arise. A system that encourages loyalty and respect among teams would be far more memorable than running the same scenario 100 times just to get a new sword, in my opinion; a system that allows non-PvP combat oriented players to still participate and help out a cause.
So what should player's fight for if not for item rewards? Perhaps territorial conquest that gives access to precious resources, such as in strategy games. Heck, before the BGs were implemented in WoW, there was a lot of territorial dispute for resources even though there were no actual drawn boundaries. It was the most Warcraft-like WoW has ever been, to me. I believe DAoC had a similar system in place where players of each faction knew they had to conquer and defend certain things, not for glory or rewards, but for the good of the faction. That is what is missing in today's PvP environments in my opinion.
Vault-Tec analysts have concluded that the odds of worldwide nuclear armaggeddon this decade are 17,143,762... to 1.
Inbteresting article.
I am not a fan of PvP but, I honestly believe it has its place and time. So far, the game that STILL has had the best PvP experience is DAoC. I have played a number of games and different PvP styles and I feel no developer has been able to best this system.
At least the system that was in place at the start. No telling what it has been basterdized into by now.
Simply put, why has no one adopted this system that they used? Is it copyrighted somewhere? Does someone own the legal rights to 3 realm PvP?
Say hello, To the things you've left behind. They are more a part of your life now that you can't touch them.
I've been playing games since the days of the MUD. No game ever presented PvP like DAoC did. For some reason, despite the success the game had, and to a degree it still has, game designers haven't been smart enough to 'not' recreate the wheel.
DAoC virtually had a PvE game AND a PvP game built into one. I knew people in that game that didn't like PvP, and they simply didn't play it. There were people who hated PvE and stuck to soloing, or 8 mans, or the zerg and it's relic raids.
Then there were so many people like me who sometimes wanted to do nothing more than run around with my guild of friends, drink wine, laugh in vent, and do a dungeon, or a boss, or whatever we felt like doing. I could go solo and explore without having some snot nosed brat leaping out of the shadows and ganking me.
But then, if i wanted to fight, I had a gigantic frontier to jump into with two entrances. The way the guards were laid out, it was very difficult, if not impossible, to spawn camp, even if someone wanted to. There was the occasional archer or assassin, but it wasn't a plague, and most of those people were interested in actually inciting a fight with other stealth anyway.
I scratch my head at game designers. WAR completely destroyed me. I didn't hesitate to buy that game because I thought to myself 'how could they screw it up' with DAoC on their resume?
I have hopes for GW2, and I have my fingers crossed for KotR, but I won't buy another game ever again until it proves it can present PvP in a way that DAoC did - Open, KOS, but if you don't want that, you can detatch and go do something diametrically different.
I'm so not a PvPer, but this was a great read.
What I like about PvP, it can pay for what I like in a game. An example of this is Guild Wars -- from what people have told me, the PvP is good -- my Alliance participates. I figure that if the PvP in game like Guild Wars drives box sales of the game -- that's great. I never have to see PvP and I can enjoy the rest of the game.
I think it boils down to what you like to do in a game, compete, cooperate, or some flavor of the two. If it's going to be a combat game (like most RPGs) -- I like to feel that I'm banding together with my fellow travelers to save the world from terrible danger. But that's me.
I assumed that people like PvP because of what you did in the game, the doing it part. Now I read -- it's about the rewards, for some/many? I didn't know that -- because I shy as far away from PvP as possible. I don't even like it on the same server.
I do like little mini-games, which I suppose, is a mild little version of PvP, but there's no dying.
It does seem to non PvP playing me -- there should be some concept of a fair fight between sort of evenly matched participants. Otherwise, what's the point?
Regards,
mszv
I'm not a HUGE fan of PvP. That being said, however, my first MMO was UO, and I loved the game...and....took my share of beat downs, to be sure. I've played a lot of other games where PvP was optional, and oftentimes I was in the mood for it....and enjoyed it. But when I WASN'T in the mood for PvP....I liked having the option to not participlate.
The only PvP that I can say was 100% pure enjoyment for me, personally, was any large scale PvP raid on another faction....any of them....in any game. Some of my fondest PvP memories, however, are from WoW from back in the vanilla days when those massive 200 vs. 200 type city raids on Stormwind and Ironforge used to take place. O M G....I revel in those memories. But the joy of those events played a significant part in my leaving the game later on, as well, after Blizzard instanced most of the PvP, and made faction bosses into an "achievement." That was, by and large, the beginning of the end for the Southshore/Tauren Mill football games, and the surprise attack mass raids on Ironforge. It was also the beginning of the end of FUN PvP for me in that game.
So I have mixed feelings about PvP. I don't WANT PvP taken out of games. I DO want the option to participate. I DO want the option, most of all, to participate in large scale PvP, in either attacking or defending other players faction cities, at the very least, and perhaps their leaders and NPCs too. I DON'T want those things turned into quests or achievements that minimize the enjoyment by making it more a one time obligation for much of the population, and taking the spontaneaity and fun right out of it. I don't know.
Tough subject matter for me. I love EQ2, but I have never participated in PvP at any time in the game, even though they have made it an optional activity, there still is no large scale city raiding, and battlegrounds have always been a bore to me from their very inception. I will say...I never played DAoC long enough (I played a trial) to know if THAT game, perhaps, is more what I might like in regards to PvP, so...I have no clue there.
I'm not at all unhappy in a game that has no PvP like what I enjoyed. As I said...I love EQ2. So, for me, if the PvP is to my liking...I will participate. If it's not...I won't...and I probably won't MISS it. I like, however, having at least an option.
/shrug
President of The Marvelously Meowhead Fan Club
I would agree with that. People generally PvP for two reasons: 1) they're intensely competitive or 2) they enjoy fucking with others (sometimes it's both).
So far, MMORPGs have never provided a compelling in-game reason to engage in PvP. No territory is won or lost for good (siege timers, vulnerability, the ability to respawn/zerg and take back an objective you just lost), and no victory over another player means anything since they're right back in the fight after rezzing.
I guess item loss could be viewed as a consequence, but then again, not really since typically the games that have item loss aren't item-centric (like Darkfall), so again it doesn't really matter at all.
At the end of the day, PvP is nothing more or less than a douche-bag enabler, regardless of how devs and journalists try to spin it. To all of these devs, I say design PvP with some real and lasting consequences or STFU (and keep pumping out the systems that cater to internet tough guys and those with "little man" syndrome).
It's beyond tiresome.
I always find it surprising to see how many MMO fans don't like PvP in any form...
I personally can't stand any MMO that doesn't have a strong focus on PvP in some form. Nothing gets the adrenaline pumping and makes you hang at the edge of your chair like an epic battle against another player. No scripted NPC can compare to a live opponent who actively responds to your tactics. But I usually tend to do pretty well in PvP games as long as they are somewhat balanced. I suppose if I was always losing in these encounters I might feel differently about it....
I love competative sporting events. I love to play them and I love to watch them.
I hate PvP.
Why? Competing in sports pits my skill against another's skill. PvP pits my gear, my internet connection, and my credit card (gear again) against the other player's stuff.
Oh....and I don't get "teabagged" when someone scores against me in sports.
Don't read too much into that...Played Baseball and Football through High School...Softball every year after that and I'm a Personal Trainer...Don't PvP at all, whatsoever...Have no desire to start anytime soon...I'm strictly a PvE Player...
Fair enough, thanks.
"Mr. Rothstein, your people never will understand... the way it works out here. You're all just our guests. But you act like you're at home. Let me tell you something, partner. You ain't home. But that's where we're gonna send you if it harelips the governor." - Pat Webb
I have to agree that, unless you're playing in some gear-controlled video game arena event e-sport competition in Japan or somewhere....MMO PvP fails on the fairness front whereas real world sports tend to be more raw skills against raw skills.
This, in part, explains some of the misunderstanding between lovers of PvP and those that either don't like it at all....or, like me, like it SOME of the time.
Not everyone plays MMOs for the "adrenaline rush," that used to be attributed to FPS games and the adrenaline junkies that tend to gravitate TOWARD those types of games. Many MMO players came to the genre for the role playing, the adventuring nature of the games, the crafting, the social features, and more of an escape/relaxation reason than for "getting the adrenaline pumping."
People enjoy games for myriads of different reasons.
President of The Marvelously Meowhead Fan Club
“There is a common misconception that each encounter starts on a level playing field and that the balance of power is determined by skillful play,” Pruett said. “This is an unrealistic scenario as the majority of current generation MMOs are not skill-based"
That's the quote that sums up why I don't participate in MMO PvP anymore.
I LOVE competition against other gamers. I play FPS/RTS games with the mindset of trying to be better then the other player. The majority of the time it comes down to who has more skill, plain and simple (the rest of the time is with game bugs or major balance issues that get fixed, some player will always abuse those while they can to feel like they're good only to get stomped once the developers fix the issue).
The early MMOs had skill incorporated into the PvP, UO had some skill involved but due to "magic" arrows that you could run for a mile and they'd still hit you, it was still largely about class/gear. Asheron's Call came along and it was far more about skill then anything else, which made it a fantastic MMO for PvP AND PvE because the same skill set played into the PvE success. Unfortunatly all modern MMOs decide that skill should never ever matter in PvP (or even PvE) and instead it should be all about class/gear and that is it. That makes those games terrible for PvP, and it makes them highly boring for PvE. Unfortunatly for me, it is clear that millions of players love that type of MMO so that will be the norm until they tire of it. So I stick to old MMOs, and non MMOs for now. But I am always hoping for an MMO to come along that gets the type of gamers that I am a part of.
You can poo-poo the idea that PvP servers have an inordinate amount of griefers all you want, but the fact is, some servers do. I remember playing AoC on the Cimmerian server as a low level Barbarian trying to get a quest done - and not being able to for 4 hours because high-level players kept killing me. Not the same player, but different players. It happens.
(I'm not arguing against the Cimmerian server being PvP; I think it should be. Funcom messed that server up from the beginning, it was supposed to be the RP server but got listed as a regular PvP server. I'm just saying that the griefer issue can be a real one, it shouldn't be ignored just because you personalyy haven't experienced it.)
These devs really addressed none of my issues with PvP in an MMO. My main problem is that a lot of time is spent jockeying around class abilites (read: nerfing) that effect PvE play to "balance" PvP play. It's irritating and frustrating, especially when you suddenly lose the ability to do something you could do before out in the PvE world. PvP and PvE play differently, and the 2 areas either should have different rules and abilites or both will suffer.
PvP is an annoyance in my PvE gaming world. Occasionally I enjoy it, but the rest of the time, it's a horse fly that just won't die - and occasionally bites.
As for me playing it personally - my interest level isn't high enough for me to spend time doing much of it. I thought that would change if I pllayed AoC, but it didn't (largely because of my dissapointment in what AoC wasn't). Some of us just don't care about it.
I think this discussion shows as much about how boxed-in the devs involved are about PvP thinking as it does about how boxed in anti-PvP players are.
Have played: Everquest, Asheron's Call, Horizons, Everquest2, World of Warcraft, Lord of the Rings Online, Warhammer, Age of Conan, Darkfall
For the most part, I hate open world, non-consensual PvP. Most often there is no penalty against it, so players that enjoy ganking can sit in a low-level zone or a location where people are likely to be doing quests, killing them repeatedly until they log off in frustration. In MUDs I used to play where PvP was an occasional problem, you could report the character to the guards, sometimes getting a bounty placed on them for the PKers or making it difficult for them to enter a faction's town lest they get attacked by the guards. I don't see why that can't be done in modern games.
I hear you. In actuality, I play these games for both reasons. I also enjoy the adventuring and classic RPG elements of MMOs, believe me. I just get bored and leave if there isn't some form of meaningful PvP as well.
SnarlingWolf hit the nail on the head for me. MMOs are all about gear and how fast you can push whatever button these days. There is no thought, strategy or skill required. Hell, I can play most games while surfing the net on my other computer and watching a movie - I don't even actually have to pay attention to what's going on on my screen because I just count "x" number of seconds and hit the next thing in the rotation. In case any devs might be paying attention...that is not fun (which is a big part of the reason why no game is currently getting my $15 per month and the only game I am currently playing is the one I hold a lifetime sub to and have for 3 years - one I don't and have never PvP'd in).
And for the guy who asked about non-PvPer's and sports: I was an athlete in high school and college. Basketball, soccer (indoor and outdoor) and field hockey. I watch soccer, ice hockey and rugby all the time and because I live in an area where football is a religion, will watch that on occasion as well and love me some Mariners and Diamondbacks baseball, so in my case, disliking PvP is completely unrelated to sports. In fact, I used to PvP quite a lot. But as a personal rule, I don't care to engage in the kind of conduct I see many people engaging in when they PvP: joking around and friendly smack talk is fine, racial slurs and personal attacks based on people's sexuality, their children, their spouses, and their medical conditions (and that was the nicest stuff I saw and heard!) really doesn't appeal to me at all. In my experience (PvPing 40+ hours a week for over 2 years), some people can get far too carried away when they PvP and forget that they are playing a game. For me, it's not PvP itself that makes me get frustrated and angry, but the appalling and sickening behavior that people tend to engage in just to collect a win. Anything that makes me angry like that really isn't fun and relaxing, and it seems kind of silly to me to pay $15 a month just to get pissed off.
Firebrand Art
"You are obviously confusing a mature rating with actual maturity." -Asherman
Maybe MMO is not your genre, go play Modern Warfare...or something you can be all twitchy...and rank up all night. This is seriously getting tired. -Ranyr
For me the draw of any MMO is the people more than the particular system or even setting. Who's coming to dinner? For all the talk of nuanced tactics and strategy, of teamwork, of non-PvPers just not wanting to lose the real truth for me is that a goodly portion of the people coming to dine the PvP table enjoy kicking shins and throwing food.
I've played SWG, which is where my skeptical attitude towards PvP was born - the entire setting and feel of the game was upended to satisfy fickle PvPers who kept getting more and more until WoW took most of them away again. These were folks that would load gank at starports, go out of their way to be jerks to anyone that wasn't PvPing or, god forbid, dared roleplay in public and used language that would make a sailor blush if, on the off-chance he could even make out what they were saying. Over time, at least on Starsider, the PvP and roleplaying communities actually started getting along as the worst offenders followed the PvP flood to the next place to make a name for themselves and, lacking for anything better to do in SWG, some roleplayers started PvPing and some PvPers started roleplaying. On other servers, though, it's still the same sad story.
Eve Online is the only game where the PvP made much sense in the context of the game and the setting. Where real tactics, strategy, recon and intrigue paid off. But to get to the point you're making those kinds of decisions involves a pretty high workload and even then comes with the risk of everything you've worked on and invested in getting trashed. Paranoia is king and Schadenfreud is queen. Sure, as one of the developers stated, you can just be an Empire dweller and it seems he enjoys that but ask any Eve player where the "real game" is. Hint: It ain't there. I love Eve Online's setting, CCP's vision, the creative lengths players will go and a game design that gives them all the rope in the world. But I'd rather read about it than play it for now. For all the depth, drama and potential there are still far more shin-kickers than Sun Tzus around the place.
I've played Pirates of the Burning Sea and Conan and scads of other MMOs. I know there are great folks PvPing, some even put up with me while I was learning my own chops, and more RP-PvPers than most know lurking around. Some of them I actually admire for their level-headed and philosophical take on life, gaming and roleplaying as well. You need the patience of a saint or a real love for PvP gameplay to put up with some of the folks who make up the bulk of people involved in that playstyle. Me? I just don't have either.
If I want to play a real game of strategy I'll play a nice, complex, wargame. They are out there you know. And they tend to attract folks with better table manners.
Always notice what you notice.
DAOC made me play PvP - not in excess but frequently as it had a reason and a thrill.
Reason was to fight as famed, honorable warrior for your realm and get some advantages out of it and thrill was to fight the arch-foes of your realm controlled by human opponents and be part of the success in the big war.
I never played FPS-games beside Doom and Doom i played bcs it was such a big milestone in pc-gaming and not bcs it was a shootergame - i never liked shooters.
We played Doom in the family together in coop-mode and had much fun to send the evil home, to advance in the "misionarc".
Some friends liked to have deathmatches but it never atracted me, i won, i lost, never cared as it was no fun...
I dont think, that the FPS-Way of pvp will have such a big atraction in mmorpgs as it has in fast paced fps games that are even between the teams or players that play them.
For competetiveness - I had much fun playing sportsgames like racedriving, soccer, olympic games, etc and i won even official tournaments having countless winners-cups somewhere in a corner of my storage.
I was good in it bcs i had much fun playing this games and yes human opponents are better than ai-opponents for sure!!!
Its not competetiveness that motivates my decision to participate or not...i simple do not like the way pvp is done, have no motivation as i am not a fps gamer so i dont share the view these type of gamer/pvper has.
A RPG is about building your char, learn skills, fight epic enemys at best embedded in a great enjoyable storyarc (leaving out the other oportunity a good mmorpg offers too - these are the minimum ingredients it has to offer) and if its a mmo you are able to do this with friends.
PvP has to fit into this style of gameplay and not to be an annoyance like it was in Lineage 2 that was all about exploiting the criminal system, bringing fps content into an rpg etc...
For me Daoc did it right and no other game did the same ever again so i dont play the part of the game i only like the least.
Simple as that!
PS: Well i played PotBS but as all the guild moved to AoC that time i could not stay there alone...i have no long time experience with PotBS, but the PvP-Part sounded interesting...well the shipfights were fun the time i did them...
"Torquemada... do not implore him for compassion. Torquemada... do not beg him for forgiveness. Torquemada... do not ask him for mercy. Let's face it, you can't Torquemada anything!"
MWO Music Video - What does the Mech say: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FF6HYNqCDLI
Johnny Cash - The Man Comes Around: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y0x2iwK0BKM