Different types of Dungeons and Raids

I understand, all I am saying is raids should be designed under the assumption that PvP doesn't exist and player themselves must create the conditions to protect PvE from PvP.

I wholeheartedly agree that when PvE encounter is designed with PvP in mind then in turn it becomes a PvP reward and therefore PvE doesn't exist

Tragnar wrote: »

I understand, all I am saying is raids should be designed under the assumption that PvP doesn't exist and player themselves must create the conditions to protect PvE from PvP.

Ah but you see that's where the problem arises.

If you make the PvE content difficult, then players that try to clear it will be overwhelmed when they get contested while clearing that dungeon.

On the other hand, if you make PvE content easy, assuming that players will try to contest, then the content itself will be boring and un-challenging if contention doesn't take place.

So Intrepid has to find the right balance, which is going to be super difficult. But it is possible.

Exactly my point, so you will create an automatic need for PvE players to employ PvP players to protect them the same way as they would caravans.

All of this depends on how PvP specs are going to be stronger than PvE specs. And most importantly what it will cost to change PvE spec to PvP, because depending on the player population in nodes the raiding guilds are going to have 2 raid groups. One for clearing and second for a protective bench so the raid leads can request any class stack dynamically depending on what random mobs/bosses they encounter and at the same time to be somewhat protected.

It will all depend on their implementation, but that in due time since combat itself comes first.

I do see why they don't want to have it instanced. It just goes against the principles embedded into the system. They drop important loot, they want it to be contested, they want it to be limited, they want it to drive conflict in the world. Which is totally understandable from my side, that stance simply make sense.

With that being said, I really really enjoy competitive PvE Modes in the Form of Dungeons, Towers, Raids and Wave Defense. I would feel like it is a pity to design all these amazing bosses, open world raids and dungeons, without taking full advantage of the PvE Aspect of it.

Since they don't want us to earn the limited resources/gear to keep them contested, i'd suggest the following as an alternative to what @CaptnChuck suggeste:

Don't give us resource/gearing type rewards. Utilize the Raids, Dungeons and Bosses, build upon their mechanic to make them challenging PvE encounters in an instanced form, but don't give us resources for it. Instead, make it a monthly/seasonal competition that awards Titles as well certain exclusive cosmetics for the game. Score it through:

The amount of times people died.
The time it took.
The times people failed certain boss mechanics in a boss fight
...

Make certain Tiers

Bronze (3,000 Points+)
Silver (5,000 Points+)
Gold (8,000 Points+)
Plat (9,000 Points+)
Diamond (10,000 Points+)

that award increasing amounts of goodies depending on where your team places. Additionally create a leaderboard, where the top 1,2,3,5,10 receive a special Title and a recolored exclusive version of the cosmetic awarded to the people in Diamond/Plat ranking.

This would keep the open world content as relevant as it is now, but provides the PvE Playerbase a interesting type of content, many would love to do. People that aren't interested in it wouldn't miss anything at all and the base concept of the bosses already exist in the game, which would the reduce the effort they have to put in.

@Warth

Yea but titles don't mean much to a lot of people. Very few people will actually participate in content like that if it doesn't really progress their character's power in some way.

@Warth

You still miss their design goal. To keep the endgame in the open world. Your solution moves the endgame to a different instanced content

BaSkA_9x2

No matter which dungeons/raids are instanced and which are open world: open world content should always have the best loot and instanced content should have worse loot, but possibly good EXP.

CaptnChuck wrote: »

The reason I suggest this idea is because I feel like its very difficult to make open world dungeons/raids truly challenging, at least in terms of PvE. Right now it looks like the main challenge of PvE content actually lies in PvP, as you will have to constantly fight off players that come to contest the dungeon/raid. This can be great on a moderate basis, but if you have to constantly do it everytime you decide to clear a dungeon/raid, it can get tiring real quick.

I disagree with this statement. Why can't an open world dungeon be "PvE challenging"? I can't wait for the cool ideas and innovations Ashes will bring to dungeons and one of them being challenging boss fights. There will be open world boss fights where PvP is a danger, but there could also be semi-instanced boss fights: as soon as a boss fight starts, a metal gate closes every entrance of the boss room, making everyone trapped inside until the boss is dead, the people are wiped or a timer runs out.

I agree that having to PvP every time you want to run a dungeon can get boring, but if that's the audience the game wants to cater, this will not change unless absolutely needed. I believe that there will be mechanics in place to discourage PvP in boss fights specifically, but if that's not Ashes vision, then it won't be touched unless necessary.

Tragnar wrote: »

@Warth

You still miss their design goal. To keep the endgame in the open world. Your solution moves the endgame to a different instanced content

I don't at all, i'm well aware. But so do Arenas, Battlegrounds, as well as most of the RP features thrown into the game.

Having a system like this with limited amount of attempts would barely do anything to the population of the open world. It would just give something to strive for, for the interested, dedicated PVErs. @Tragnar , something they want to compete in. If you don't give that to them, then they won't be in the open world either, because they have nothing they would be in the open world for. You push them into the open world by giving them an incentive to do the open world content. For example gearing for competitive PvE Content.

It's true that AoC won't be for everybody, but if you can't make minor adjustments, that provides different crowds a reason to stay, become part of the open world PvX and something to strive for within the game, then this game will suffer the same fate, that all the other games did, which looked too narrow-mindedly at their core audience. Wildstar is the widest known victim of the exact same mindset. They were so focused on their vision of an Hardcore PvE Game, proclaiming that the game wouldn't be for everyone, that they didn't see the amount of players they got driven away by that exact mindset (which wasn't the entire reason, but certainly a big factor in its demise).

You give RPers the tools and content to stick with the game? Why? Because you want them to play the game. Will they be in the open world, participating in its content while RPing? Barely. You still want them, because in times where they aren't sitting in their ERP Tavern, they are indeed contributing to the world.

BaSkA13 wrote: »

I disagree with this statement. Why can't an open world dungeon be "PvE challenging"? I can't wait for the cool ideas and innovations Ashes will bring to dungeons and one of them being challenging boss fights. There will be open world boss fights where PvP is a danger, but there could also be semi-instanced boss fights: as soon as a boss fight starts, a metal gate closes every entrance of the boss room, making everyone trapped inside until the boss is dead, the people are wiped or a timer runs out.

I suggest you read @Noaani 's first reply and see the discussion between me and @Tragnar . We went into it in detail.

@Warth

I'm not saying the should have no instanced PvP or instanced PvE, but I believe it would be a big detriment for the game to have main PvP or PvE endgame instanced. From the design philosophies I've read about Ashes it is clear that they want to create an immersive world where everyone has the opportunity to find his/her own slice of content.

If PvP players need to cooperate with PvE players to do PvP content and PvE players to cooperate with PvP players to ensure their safety during raiding then the game will be much better than separating those two crowds.

CaptnChuck wrote: »

@Warth

Yea but titles don't mean much to a lot of people. Very few people will actually participate in content like that if it doesn't really progress their character's power in some way.

I'm not saying its the best solution. Far from it, i just believe its the most you'd ever get here.

Also serious and dedicated PvErs will gladly hop onto the chance to be the best. Exclusive Cosmetics, that show what you have achieved are always a huge driving factor.

Tragnar wrote: »

@Warth

I'm not saying the should have no instanced PvP or instanced PvE, but I believe it would be a big detriment for the game to have main PvP or PvE endgame instanced. From the design philosophies I've read about Ashes it is clear that they want to create an immersive world where everyone has the opportunity to find his/her own slice of content.

If PvP players need to cooperate with PvE players to do PvP content and PvE players to cooperate with PvP players to ensure their safety during raiding then the game will be much better than separating those two crowds.

So we are on the same page after all. I didn't intend it to be a central cornerstone of the endgame content, but something fun but limited that's right up their alley and drives them into the open world content

to gear up through open world raids and dungeons,
to farm consumables and crafting materials to ensure they are well prepared
to get the necessary money to compete

This isn't anything but a piece of side content, the same an instanced or cross-server Arena would be. These arenas do the exact same thing, just for competitive PVP players.

Tragnar wrote: »

@Warth

I'm not saying the should have no instanced PvP or instanced PvE, but I believe it would be a big detriment for the game to have main PvP or PvE endgame instanced. From the design philosophies I've read about Ashes it is clear that they want to create an immersive world where everyone has the opportunity to find his/her own slice of content.

If PvP players need to cooperate with PvE players to do PvP content and PvE players to cooperate with PvP players to ensure their safety during raiding then the game will be much better than separating those two crowds.

I disagree. I think having challenging, instanced, PvE content is going to be extremely beneficial to the game. Yes it does take a way from the social aspect of the MMO, but the idea that I suggested does mitigate that to a certain extent.

Ultimately, I think that Intrepid should be willing to adapt. So far, most of the player opinions have aligned with their design philosophies for the game. But there might come a time when it won't, and I hope that when that time comes, Intrepid will be willing to change/adapt rather than remaining adamant.

bigepeen

CaptnChuck wrote: »

Tragnar wrote: »

I don't think that it solves anything, but that it totally changes the vision for what raiding in Ashes should be.

So if Steven wants AoC to be a gold standard for MMOs, he needs a large playerbase. In order to do this, AoC HAS to appeal to the PvE community. As it stands right now though, it seems like PvE is not possible without dealing with constant PvP. And that scares a large portion of the community away.

I'd like to question this assumption. Let's look at MMORPG popularity. I think we can all agree that it is a shell of its former self. I think this is the result of developers refusing to break the mold, and the reason for not breaking the mold is due to the exact argument that you are making. "We don't need to innovate, because in the past, the largest populations for this genre has come from PvE content. Therefore we will get more players if we stick to PvE content." But is this assumption true? I personally, do not think so.

Look at the number of people who play games in general. This population is much larger than us who play MMORPGs. There is a huge market outside of WoW-style PvE content that isn't even being tapped into yet. There could be a huge number of people who are tired of the typical static PvE instanced dungeon content, and would prefer more of a PvX experience, but most developers only half-heartedly commit to taking this risk or do not have the funds or shareholder patience to fully flesh-out their vision. I think AoC is actually trying to accomplish this vision with a fully-fleshed out PvX experience, which could bring in a wider audience than just those who are already playing games like WoW or FFXIV. After all, look at all the successful MOBAs, shooters, fighters, etc... They are PvP games. Even casual platform games like Fall Guys are extremely successful with PvP. This could very well be a trend, and could exponentially increase the population of MMORPGs beyond the static PvE WoW crowd if MMORPG developers can break out of the mold. Even though we don't have the data to say that PvX or PvP could be more successful than PvE, it doesn't mean that it's true. It's really the same argument against innovation and for why people doubted that electric car companies would ever be successful. Just because everyone is driving gas-powered cars doesn't mean that it's impossible for electric cars to be better and thus do well.

@bigepeen

Yea of course. But its healthy for the game to have large populations of all types of players. Since AoC is trying to be a PvX game, it needs to have good PvE, PvP, and Crafting content in order to bring in a large population of these different types of players. It can't only be PvP and Crafting content.

@CaptnChuck

I think that Ashes will not go as far to make raids super easy and be just a reward for controlling that PvP area. We should just wait to see the ways for opening raids, but I understand the skepticism behind making the PvE part tied to PvP

bigepeen

CaptnChuck wrote: »

@bigepeen

But its healthy for a game to have large populations of all types of players.

This has very little correlation to the health of a game. Look at FFVIX for example, that game has basically a non-existent PvP population, yet the health of the game is quite good.

PvX players are PvX players, not PvP or PvE players. I agree that with PvX, you need good PvE content, but it shouldn't be a requirement to have a lot of instanced PvE content, and I would argue that's actually detrimental to a PvX open world.

bigepeen wrote: »

CaptnChuck wrote: »

@bigepeen

But its healthy for a game to have large populations of all types of players.

This has very little correlation to the health of a game. Look at FFVIX for example, that game has basically a non-existent PvP population, yet the health of the game is quite good.

PvX players are PvX players, not PvP or PvE players. I agree that with PvX, you need good PvE content, but it shouldn't be a requirement to have a lot of instanced PvE content, and I would argue that's actually detrimental to a PvX open world.

FF14 is not a PvX game. Its a PvE game.

bigepeen

CaptnChuck wrote: »

bigepeen wrote: »

CaptnChuck wrote: »

@bigepeen

But its healthy for a game to have large populations of all types of players.

This has very little correlation to the health of a game. Look at FFVIX for example, that game has basically a non-existent PvP population, yet the health of the game is quite good.

PvX players are PvX players, not PvP or PvE players. I agree that with PvX, you need good PvE content, but it shouldn't be a requirement to have a lot of instanced PvE content, and I would argue that's actually detrimental to a PvX open world.

FF14 is not a PvX game. Its a PvE game.

You said "It's healthy for a game to have large populations of all types of players".