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Phase I of Alpha Two testing will occur on weekends. Each weekend is scheduled to start on Fridays at 10 AM PT and end on Sundays at 10 PM PT. Find out more here.
Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
Our quickest Alpha Two updates are in Discord. Testers with Alpha Two access can chat in Alpha Two channels by connecting your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Comments
I don't know about Dygz but to me the reason this is different is because of how it causes/allows OTHER players to behave.
A game which has a constant FFA PvP area has both a different 'feel' and a different set of players and player behaviours than one that doesn't. Node Ruins wouldn't change it, but Open Seas does.
But.... but.... I wanted to see you in-game playing upon release
What if some servers would not have this permanent auto-flag?
I assume you will say that you could play on those servers.
But then, what if those servers would have different map? Like each of them some unique biomes?
Would it bother you that the other server which has permanent auto-flag has a biome yours don't have?
You know the next question.
With Caravans, you have a choice to be flagged as Combatant or not be flagged as Combatant via a UI interface. You can be in the battlegrounds of a Caravan as a Non-Combatant.
With the Open Seas, you are auto-flagged as a Combatant.
My problem is that I want to be able to explore all areas of a server without being auto-flagged that I am in the mood for PvP.
I'm OK with temporary auto-flag zones that last hours or a couple days. Yes.
I'm not quite sure what you mean by choosing to engage with the area's content, but...
If the game has permanent auto-flag PvP zones, I will just choose not to engage with any of the content and instead play other games where I can play everywhere, without permanent auto-flag PvP zones.
I enjoy PvP - sometimes.
And, you know, you can see the interview where I asked Steven specifically about Ashes PvP and he spun the PvP differently. In that interview, he says that Ashes won't have permanent, auto-flag PvP zones.
He has said both with the Open Seas and with the Node Ruins that these are changes made a few months ago, so... I dunno why you are trying to debate that there has been a change.
I am fully aware of most of Steven's quotes about battlegrounds over the years, including the one below:
"My definition of what a battleground is- and it's non-traditional - is not typically something that is defined in the same way in other MMORPGS, but I kind of view them as these small skirmishes that might lead up to a siege or to a war and they might have capture points during node and castle fights; and these PvP objectives may be more relevant for smaller groups than for giant raids; and you might have concurrently running objectives during a particular event where you have to dispatch groups simultaneously to go address these objectives in order to complete one particular type of event or one particular type of of success condition."
---Steven
I was already on the fence about playing and waiting to test whether Corruption deters non-consensual PvP satisfactorily in Alpha 2.
So... there has never been a guarantee that I would be playing Ashes after release.
Seems like that is not a sufficient solution. It's still saying "Hey, Ashes has these cool areas to explore, but if you want to explore them, you will have to agree to be auto-flagged for PvP."
And, for me, my response is, "No, thanks. I'd rather just play some other game."
But, if my TheoryForge co-hosts were playing on a server like I might hang out with them in game from time to time.
Yep. I've contended for some time that Ashes will be employing a social contract where the pvp opt-in is implied upon login. The open seas open-pvp zone kinda confirmed that assertion - and I wouldn't be surprised if additional such areas began to appear across Verra.
Now, before the PvP-only crowd goes nuts, keep in mind that Ashes long term success will hinge on hooking the PvE consumer base - I don't mean 'casuals' I mean the hardcore PvE-base. IMO the more Ashes swings toward MO2 the more niche it will become.
@dygz is gonna do what Dygz is gonna do. I'd really like to play Ashes with him, and also totally respect his not wanting to play. I'm also pretty happy that even though he doesn't want to play the final game he's committed to testing in A2 to make the game better. Much respect there.
When nodes get destroyed the attackers can loot freeholds and the defenders must try to protect their property.
How else were yall expecting to get this done without a temp pvp zone?
It is still a siege area.
Why are ppl freaking out?
I also may end up in the same situation because I too, have a very specifically defined principle. I can 'draw my line'.
If FFA PvP Zones are a First Order Win Condition for this game, I'm out.
Not because I don't like them, even, but because I don't ever seem to like the community of games where that is the case.
By the nature of a temporary zone, particularly one under the control of players (Caravans, Node Siege Ruins, etc), it CAN'T in itself be a true First Order Win Condition, so I support those entirely. You can add a LOT of them before I even start to worry.
But 'Open Seas are the most rewarding so they are the most risky' is a strong hint that they are at least in competition for First Order, especially if ships can be maintained without having to interact as much with harbor nodes or their politics (whether that's by having people on land bring resources, or just being able to keep yourself going at sea based on what is out there).
And I too, will test. Probably even play for a while before the game reaches the point where most stronger groups are starting to use that Win Condition (again, if it is one). Already paid for it, not gonna ditch right away. But that's how precisely I can define it. "I'll play until the point where being at Sea is a First Order Win Condition".
You could say that I have more of a problem with the reasoning for the Zone than the Zone itself, therefore.
But to speak to the OP, a very temporary zone, one that is explicitly a RESULT of an Objective based PvP situation, is very difficult to 'turn into a First Order Win Condition'. Usually you PAY resources to get that far.
Steven did not mislead you, lie to you, or stretch anything.
But he did CHANGE something.
Something that was specifically asked about, so yeah you can say 'it wasn't a lie'. And it wasn't. You can interpret it to mean that. That's the problem. There's so much stuff that people read into that could just be 'reinterpreted' at any time. Not even 'oh this always meant this but now it's been clarified'.
Just 'yeah the team decided to use one of the multiple interpretations of the vague thing we said before'.
I don't like this type of response because I feel like using it automatically diminishes faith in what the vision is. It's rough enough to take the various nebulous things that Ashes says as positives without having to constantly 'assume it means the thing you would like the least'.
If we all 'assume everything Steven says should be interpreted in the way we are least happy with', would we all still be here?
Yes there is a slight difference, a single one . You can be attacked at anytime full force by someone because their are no corruption penalties for killing you outright. The hesitation is removed from the attacking party. People are in that zone understanding that if someone attacks you they mean to kill you (in most cases).
This dynamic was always going to be a feature because battlegrounds have always been a feature listed to be in the works. The Open Seas is just a massive, permanent battleground zone.
Nah, I REALLY don't think you can say 'was always going to be a feature'.
Because it was explicitly a 'hey we made a change to this'. There was no reason to assume this was going to be a thing in a permanent zone ANYWHERE, in my opinion IF you didn't understand enough about ArcheAge or Lineage OR you got the impression somehow from Steven that he wasn't going to do the same things as those games (reasonable enough, because they could have said that from the beginning, that's why it is a 'change')
This sounds way too much like the one thing I'm really worried about, either side, PvP or PvP-nothx, going 'this is what the game always was, you should have known that'.
If Steven says "ok you can make massive Freehold Communities right next to each other now and be safe there, but I always said Freeholds would be safe zones, so it's fine", are we going to just go 'This was always going to be a feature'?
Steven said SOMETHING about 'Exp for PvP'.
Now, what does that mean? Does it mean 'Oh, well sure, gotta give people some exp for Caravans at least, to offset their investment in time'.
Does it mean "Well ok there's probably some special situation under which PvP grants Exp."
Or does it mean "Well we decided it's ok for PvP to grant Exp because if you lose you lose Exp and you can't flag on your Guild or NodeMates, so it'll be fine."
Do we then claim 'Exp for Open World PvP' as a 'feature we were always going to have'?
Will people be going out to Open Seas to PvP for Exp? That would be among the 'worst interpretations' for some people, and the only thing we'd have to go on is the APPARENT philosophy of the game to tell us 'nah that's not likely'.
The APPARENT philosophy of this game to Dygz and myself would definitely not have led to "Rewarding FFA Open Seas PvP", given Steven's answer that Dygz is referencing. That answer is in fact the ONLY reason I wouldn't have thought so, in a game that says 'nope, no Safe Zones'.
True enough, but in case I am giving the wrong impression, this isn't about the Open Seas PvP at all, I don't care that much about it other than what I said, even if I disagree, I don't know the real reason.
I could speculate, I could assume the worst, or I could do what the community needs and wait to test. It's not me that will get 'discouraged' here.
you manually choose to enter the zone, its like terms and service pop up for games so you can hit the i agree button to enter or decline to not enter, so basicly you can agree enter for potential pvp or u can go around the ruins to opt out.
Its basicly open world battle grounds like WoW wintergrasp on PvE you can avoid the area and not flag pvp or u can go in to enter PvP mode its 100% opt in
You can indeed gain exp from pvp. It has diminishing returns built in to prevent issues like kill trading and others. But you will be able to do various activities, pvp included, that will give some exp. Will you be able to level purely through pvp? Most likely not as they want people to participate in a variety of activities. Part of the often quoted "to challenge yourself". This was reinforced during the AMA that questing will also not get you all the way to "endgame" and that other activities like grinding will be needed.
"Another area perma flagged for PVP?"
Technically its the same area that was already flagged for PVP (from the siege). It just doesn't flip back to PVE as fast as you apparently assumed. Also, its not permanent. The conflict and PVP goes away after a period of time related to the time it took to develop the node.
This is true.
This is why one should be aware of anyone claiming to be speaking from the perspective of "most" players.
Generally speaking, such comments are just outright lies, stated as a means to attempt to provide legitimacy that would otherwise be lacking from the statement.
There are avid anti-PvPers on the forum?
Legit wish i could PvP in game with my guild but got years to wait.
One person here has 6.5k comments and half of them are probaly him crying bout PvP in the game lol pretty much replies to any post that has anything to do with pvp complaining bout it :P
True, actually pvp-players always not active on a forum threads in any game. It always was and, probably, will be.
I hope Steven doesn't deviate from the path of hardcore and PVP-side of a game. Also, of course he shouldn't forget about PVE, which always has good mechanics. There is ton of mmorpg games build for pve-fans, but not so much for pvp-lovers.
On Lineage 2 private server's forums always was sitting few humans, repesenting each big-guilds and tried to swear, find out who is cool and who is not. 95% of the players didn't know where to click on the site to enter the forum. That's what was L2 private servers.