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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.
Non consensual PvP will not exist at launch
PherPhur
Member
Intrepid will 1000000% tune corruption so tight against non consensual PvP at launch that most every player will not see the same person do it twice.
I imagine it'll be tuned so tight that it will damn near brick your account just from the first time, the second time making most people uninstall.
If they don't tune it this way on launch then the game is going to take a hard and unnecessary nosedive.
Anyone who thinks that the corruption system won't be tuned like this is thinking that Intrepid is incompetent. And everything we've seen/heard so far shows us this is lightyears away from the truth.
Just for reference, I'm eagerly awaiting the time when they loosen it up, cause my plans are to gank farmers, not for mats, just because I'm so friggin tired of hearing people complain about the games PvP situation. As if it would just be so devastating that they get ganked once or twice in a week with a bag full of mats and lose them. Or that they have a little adrenaline rush and try to actually put up a fight, possibly winning.
Those people instead want to go face a boss that is predictable and that they could probably down with half their fingers, half blind, and doped up on like 4 Xanax. Or better yet go farm herbs for 4 months straight while drooling on their keyboard, watching a Youtube video on the other monitor and eating a taco with the other hand.
That's what's annoying, that these people come into MMO communities and raise such a fuss about PvP that the systems get gimped. When they aren't even really playing the game when they're on it anyways.
BUT, I love em, my best friends like this and I do hope that those people come to AoC, have fun, and hopefully either get great at player vs player combat or enjoy the fact that their pacifism is supported by the universe Intrepid has created and bricks someones account for "being a dick" lol. End of my rant
I imagine it'll be tuned so tight that it will damn near brick your account just from the first time, the second time making most people uninstall.
If they don't tune it this way on launch then the game is going to take a hard and unnecessary nosedive.
Anyone who thinks that the corruption system won't be tuned like this is thinking that Intrepid is incompetent. And everything we've seen/heard so far shows us this is lightyears away from the truth.
Just for reference, I'm eagerly awaiting the time when they loosen it up, cause my plans are to gank farmers, not for mats, just because I'm so friggin tired of hearing people complain about the games PvP situation. As if it would just be so devastating that they get ganked once or twice in a week with a bag full of mats and lose them. Or that they have a little adrenaline rush and try to actually put up a fight, possibly winning.
Those people instead want to go face a boss that is predictable and that they could probably down with half their fingers, half blind, and doped up on like 4 Xanax. Or better yet go farm herbs for 4 months straight while drooling on their keyboard, watching a Youtube video on the other monitor and eating a taco with the other hand.
That's what's annoying, that these people come into MMO communities and raise such a fuss about PvP that the systems get gimped. When they aren't even really playing the game when they're on it anyways.
BUT, I love em, my best friends like this and I do hope that those people come to AoC, have fun, and hopefully either get great at player vs player combat or enjoy the fact that their pacifism is supported by the universe Intrepid has created and bricks someones account for "being a dick" lol. End of my rant
4
Comments
Intrepid have dedicated an entire progression path to confronting people with corruption. They have the levers in place to alter player behavior in regards to how much corruption they gain, and so they will want to set those levers at a point where people are gaining enough corruption as to make bounty hunter a viable path.
It'll loosen up, but it won't start in a state where anyone would dare do it twice. Not quite harsh enough to scar them for life, but right before it eh.
None of those systems matter in the grand scheme of launch anyways. It'll be quite some time until bounty hunter systems are available to anyone or really even relevant in the slightest honestly.
It's the most major concern of the MMO community, there's no reason to launch the game like this otherwise the countless people like me who are deliberately going to go corrupt for almost no reason at all are going to grief the casuals out of the game, most permanently.
They'll tune it back from there, better safe than sorry.
The first is that in the first week or two of launch, player wealth is significantly lower. Most of what players have will be carried on their character. Some of it in gear, some of it in resources or certificates, and some of it in gold and other things that aren't a factor in this discussion.
If you attack and kill someone that has a few certificates on them, you could actually stand to double your entire character wealth based on the certificates they drop.
If your gear isn't worth all that much, that seems like a no-brainer to me. Some people would still be averse to it, but running the odds, I can see times where people absolutely consider it worth it.
The second thing I can see pulling on players is that same gear. If players have a piece of gear that is significantly better than the rest of their gear, that may well be a significant chunk of their combat ability as well as their wealth. People in this situation are likely not willing to risk it.
I do see there being a real desire to work off any corruption before gaining more, however. In this regard, your
not doing it twice thing may be accurate - but in a not doing it twice in a quick succession kind of way.
And wishful thinking.......
As for the topic, I'm gonna be giving Intrepid feedback to rebalance the corruption even more towards "the more you kill the worse it gets" instead of "kill once and your character's done existing".
I see your pain.
Keep giving feedback to get the game you want. Like everyone here.
To conclude I could imagine (and kind of agree) that in many cases corruption risking PvP will be lower than at any other time. But the reason will not be corruption not being balanced incorrectly, but progression incentives being way higher. Why? Because PvE in almost all cases is productive while PvP tends to be distributive with the things that are already there. The less there is, the less PvP incentives. That is what I also said a few times before, if Ashes becomes the good PvX game it sizes up to be, PvE will generate the incentives for more PvP and PvP will generate the incentives for more PvE, indivisible locked together.
But should not turn 180% and become the opposite of what they initially advertised.
One of my favorite things to do in Archeage was to murder people for their trade packs and go turn them in for gold. The reactions from some people were priceless, not to mention being put on trial and put in jail, and then escaping from jail. Ah good times, good times. Going red in Archeage definitely felt like more of a fun gameplay loop than a punishment. The Free For All mentality was out of control, people would get murdered for no reason all the time, sometimes within cities just trying to use the Auction House surrounded by guards. So there needs to be more of a balance in Ashes for sure.
As for Corruption, I think it will start out more balanced and be fine tuned from there. They've likely already been testing it like everything else internally. There will be plenty of people testing this vigorously in A2 as well, I guarantee you that. Keep in mind the Corruption and Bounty Hunter Systems are mechanics they're developing together. If one fails in their design and becomes meaningless, they both do, and that would just be wasted effort on the developer's end.
Thanks for a good laugh.
That would be my worst nightmare. I'm looking forward to seeing the corruption system in action.
In that case, it really just depends on how many gamers on your server enjoy that kind of fun.
It probably won't be too difficult to find a server where muder-hobos are so scarce, you never encounter them.
So, that point is kinda moot. Especially for Casual Challenge Explorers.
But... we can expect lots of gamers to feel comfortable with the final tuning of Corruption on the mainlands, sure.
If LadyZel has no problem avoiding non-consensual PvP by never going to the Open Seas... it seems likely she will be able to find a server where Corruption works to her satisfaction.
Preferably, the server all the RPers choose lol. At least, their idea of fun isn't ruining someone else's day.
In truth, I don't know if I'll play Ashes by the time it releases. I am very much undecided. And it isn't just me I have to convince. If my boyfriend feels like he's going to be pvp fodder when he's out questing or harvesting mats, he won't even consider this game, despite the fact other aspects would otherwise appeal to him.
That will depend on the final tuning of the corruption feature, because if the damage and resistance corruption is too high it will end his ability to do what he has described. Sure, the corruption system will not deter him from doing it all together. As mentioned before: That doesn't seem to be what Intrepid is aiming for, so it is up for players to decide if the remaining chance of PKs is too high to them or not. And of course same applies to the open seas. I think there will be people offering "the safest passages possible" for peaceful players to cross, build ships that specialize in quick passage and enemy evasion and with that peaceful players will have to decide whether that is safe enough for them or not.
Also, no telling how many alts Voeltz will have devoted to this form of fun.
And we would have to hope that LadyZel did, indeed, find herself on a server with relatively few gamers who find that kind of gameplay fun.
For me, this is irrelevant because I refuse to play a game that has permanent auto-consent, Corruption-free FFA zones.
Because I find the concept of auto-consent PvP to be repugnant. Which tends to be true, I think, for most players who abhor non-consensual PvP.
I remembered this image, so funny
"Give me infinite gold, teleport, let me fly and let me walk inside that volcano!! I paid for the game so my game my rules!"
Such an angry cookie.
The hard fact of reality is that if Intrepid didn't want people to "grief" they wouldn't have put the ability to do so in the game, period.
There are going to be those people and I wouldn't call them a problem, more like "a problem". They're content, a "F around and find out" thing. I enjoy playing the villain, though I know most people in the same boat as me are just cold blooded griefers out to really ruin someone's day full stop. There isn't much distinction between us, and that's why the system exists, for people like me, but it's going to have to be tuned giga tight for the.. OTHERS.
for example, in l2 (not at first but it was eventually added) you get a newbie weapon which is decent, but you lose it if your pk count is 1...so you go back to having a shit weapon. i expect something similar in aoc, people wont want to lose their starter gear and then farm to get something from the store wasting time.
also, lots of people concentrated in the same place, which means less people pvping or going red early on
Yea he did say they made most of the data server side and made those "dials" he's mentioned several times so that they can adjust things while the game is live without having to repack and push an update.
I was just referring to how it'll be immediately on launch and shortly after.
I'm sure after having sifted through community posts for long enough they realize what a big problem it's going to be. There's almost no amount of penalties that will deter some griefers, that'll be the 2% I think. But there's a much larger percentage of people who will need it to be very very tight.
People underestimate how determined and destructive a lot of gamers are. They are a special breed
We could hang out for a while in a tavern, sure. But, I wouldn't be doing anything much besides that.
I doubt alpha is a great representation in regards to tuning corruption. Most of the alpha players didn't drop hundreds of dollars on a key to come in and grief. I imagine the vast majority of alpha players are there for hype, support and content.