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Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest news on Alpha Two.
Check out general Announcements here to see the latest news on Ashes of Creation & Intrepid Studios.
To get the quickest updates regarding Alpha Two, connect your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Comments
This ties back to the gear acquisition pace, and that's a whoooole different discussion (that we've also already had).
I disagree with this, so it's up to Intrepid to design the game however they see fit.
Yeah, I disagree with this too, cause, like I said, to me the whole packages IS the content. But we won't agree on this particular topic either way. I got your point, so now I just gotta remember this for the future, so that I don't repeat the question ONCE AGAIN
If you want to say that the whole thing is the content, then you have no appeal to PvE players. There isn't any more to that specific conversation.
To a PvE player (especially a top end PvE player) an MMORPG is a series of halls and tunnels and stairs and paths that all lead to various pieces of content. Make that series of halls and tunnels and stairs and paths as PvX as you like, as long as the content at the end of it is what we expect.
That is the really short version of the only way to get PvE players in to Ashes. The only way to get a good PvE game in to Ashes.
You don't need to like it, I don't expect you to like it, I am just stating that this is how it is.
- you run from the node to the dungeon
- you run through the dungeon to the room that has your desired loot
- you kill some mobs that aggro onto you throughout the dungeon
- you kill some people that are your GWs/NWs/flagged randoes/PKers
- you come to the room and fight a few respawns of increasingly difficult Named mobs
- you, potentially, fight off some newcomers that wanted to farm the same room
- after, say, 3 respawns you drop a key to a door that takes you into an instanced room with the same boss as the situation above
What is the functional difference between these 2 situations? Do you expect the instance at the end of your 75min travel to be slightly more than a single good group boss? Cause the same thing could be accomplished through smth like "one you defeat the boss, it opens a hidden path that takes you to a new room" and you just "change cages", to allow another group to take your previous room.If you want a repeatable instance at the end of that 75min travel, then what exactly would people fight over throughout those 75 mins, if the best loot is in the instance itself? And then, what about different loot tables. Would each loot set have its own repeatable instance?
And what would be the impact of such a design on the crafting system of "even low lvl stuff is valuable", cause to me this sounds like a "if you have 8 alts of whichever lvl - you can clear 8 dungeons and multiply your loot by that amount" situation. Cause this is exactly what we did in L2 once it got more instances. And I definitely don't want the game to devolve into that.
And if those instances are not repeatable, then how many of them exactly would it take to fill up months of content consumption by the players and how much dev time would that require?
And again, I'm talking here about raid-sized stuff that's on a weekly timer. I'm talking about a "your guild doesn't have a highly valuable event right now, so your group gotta do smth today, and you decided to farm a dungeon"-type deal.
However, the difference between these two is simple. I'll give you two.
The first is that I can cheese the first one to prevent others having access to it. Even if there is a timer on it, all that means is I need a few friends.
Anything that is open world can be blocked - whether by legitimate means or by cheesing/exploiting game systems. I've yet to see any game with open world content where players have not been able to block off portions of that content in unintended ways to the point where developers need to get involved (developers - not CS).
Instances do not have this weakness.
The second is that because the first of these would require a timer, the content within it actually can't be all that hard. Actual hard content takes hundreds of attempts to get right, which would mean actual years with this kind of thing. As such, if this is what we have, we have mid tier PvE at best.
If the idea is to get actual good PvE, then group or guild wanting to participate needs access to the content at the same time - not just one.
That is two reasons that are irrefutable assuming you want actual good PvE.
Now, you are claiming you don't see the difference - why are YOU so adamant for the first of the above?
And also the pvxness of this part of the content, cause your road there might not have any pvp, but then the room itself might have people in it (or you might be the "people" to other players).
I don't really get this point. What exactly are you trying to stop here? Other people from accessing the room at all? Then this would either require a ton of bodyblocking or the exploiting means you mentioned, at which point Intrepid should do smth about it.
But even then, you'd only be stopping them from the preliminary mobs, because the final boss is caged. So I still don't really get the point of this blockade.
You can still block someone's access to the instance entrance. That's kinda the whole point of "pvp before pve" in my previous examples of what I'd like as a representation of pvx for Ashes.
Again, I don't think I understand what you're trying to say here.
Are you implying that the instanced version would not have a timer on it? Then where's the difficulty, if you can simply farm the boss for however long.
Or are you talking about a respawn timer? But then how does it even matter if the boss is so damn hard that you can't even kill it. It wouldn't even go on respawn. Well, maybe the preliminary mobs could be considered a respawn timer for it, but, as I pointed out above, those mobs could show what the boss setup is today, so if you're attempting it on a different day - you might have change your build (the thing you wanted iirc).
As for the overall time required to beat the encounter - yes, it would take a lot. And only the guilds with highly skilled pvxers (or pvp and pve groups) would be able to accomplish that. You gotta defend your attempts, otherwise someone else might beat it before you.
This does bring up another question though. If this was an instance, do you expect a wipe inside of the instance to bring you right outside the room with full HP/MP, so that you can reattempt it all again instantly? Cause that's what you make it sound like.
And if that is what you want, then the 75min travel doesn't matter at all and everyone would simply sit at the boss all day, attempting the farm. Like, hundreds of people in one place. One could argue that there might be some wars for it or whatever, but as several people in the past have pointed out - people like to cooperate when it's way more beneficial to them. And when the award simply comes from finishing an instance - there's 0 point in fighting over an instance that's available to all.
I think I've given this example before, but just to explain my point better here. There was an instance in L2 that gave out best gear at that point in the game (for other L2 players, this will be in the context of a new server). It had "twice a week" respawn timer and a limit on the amounts of kills per "cycle" (let's say 20 for this example). When cycle ended, the instance would change to an open world enhancement stone farming location for 12h.
And so guilds would at first rarely fight around this instance, because there'd only be so many guilds that could even clear the instance, so spending time trying to prevent other farms wasn't as viable. But with time, there'd not only be more guilds clearing it per cycle, but even repeat alt groups from the same guilds. And at that point, as soon as news of "another group is gathering to fight the instance" got to a guild - they'd immediately go to the entrance and try to stop their competitors.
In other words, pvp was only present when there was scarcity (or at least a perceived one). Your suggestion seems to imply no such scarcity, so I see no reason for people to fight over these instances. At which point the entire game just becomes "we sit at an instance, trying to clear it; day in day out".
I don't want that in Ashes, exactly because I've already experienced that in L2 and the game only got worse because of that. And to me it seems that Steven has a similar mindset on the topic.
I do agree that we should have at least a few instances with super hardcore raid content (and probs a few with SH party content), but those things should be the aspirational content that people work towards. In other words, the bosses that we're talking about right now would not be the pinnacle of difficulty in the game, so they wouldn't require hundreds and hundreds of attempts.
The bosses I'm talking about would be the base lvl supplier of mats for gear crafting. You'll still have a chance to drop a few mats from mobs, but once you "crack the code" of farming the bosses - they're the main source. And this is why I keep saying that even plain dungeon mobs should be at the complexity of Named ones. Dungeons should be the day-to-day goal of anyone who's in the stage of mats acquisition, and that stage should take a long while and have pvp in it. And in order to justify the pvx name, this pvp gotta be counterbalanced with good pve in the form of hard mobs that lead to an even harder boss. All of which then culminates with a raid on a truly hardcore boss that gives best mats (and rarely full things).
To me, this is the "L2 but better" approach to pvx, which seems to at least somewhat align with Steven's desires for the game (at least right now, with the limited amount of knowledge on the far plans for pve).
Hierarchy of PvE content vs exclusivity of PvE content.
To me it should be both. The one who earn the right to fight first is the one who gets the exclusive reward if they manage to clear the content. So you either have a strong pvx team that can both pvp and pve, or you have more people part of whom protect the pvers' rights to farm. And any contenders gotta figure out how they'll approach the situation.
And if that's still just exclusivity of content, then I don't think I understood the second part of your example.
I understand your perception, but remember that for people other than you, the fight is itself the reward in many ways.
The reason for logging in to the game is 'to experience the fight'. This could still be a PvX fight situation, for some, but for the PvE raiders we are supposedly talking about, they may not mind being the third or fourth to get to fight the content, if they were the third or fourth strongest on the server.
But the dynamic of a game where 'Third place gets their turn when first and second place are done or don't want it, and might not get their turn if the previous fourth or fifth place overtakes them (because they run out of time)' and a game where 'only first place gets to experience the content' are very different.
I've said before that I am not much of a PvE 'raider', but this isn't because of disinterest, and I will be nice enough to myself to say that it isn't because I suck utterly and couldn't do it. But FFXI is the 'exclusivity' type of game design. So I never got to 'open world raid' much because only the top groups ever got to raid (PvE MPK tactics meant they would just kill off weaker groups anyway).
There was no access to 'top end content' for me during the time that it was considered top end content, I was too young to follow the schedules of any top groups even if I tried. And there was never any incentive for additional competitive groups to form. Everyone who wanted to face the content 'wanted to join the winning side'.
Hierarchical content access leads to 'matchmaking'. Exclusive content access leads to 'gatekeeping'. PvEMainly raiders have no incentive to play a PvX game built on gatekeeping.
EDIT: Changed a 'players' to 'raiders' for absolute clarity.
I feel like it's always both idealistic and nihilistic to say that it'll always be the big groups who get every farm/attempt of the boss, because everyone would always go to that big group first, rather than trying to stand up against them.
And I know it's naïve to hope that there'll always be someone who does choose to stand up against them, but that's usually what I've seen in my experience (and have at least attempted this as a leader myself), which is why I keep naively hoping that this will be the case in Ashes as well.
And now that I think about it, this kinda plays into pve elitism (usually coming from Noaani) that pvpers will never be able to beat the proper hardcore pve. Because if we do have instances that have no limits on them - only the pvers will benefit from them.
It could be argued that Noaani's idea of post-pve caravans could balance it out, but to me it feels like it would instead just hold the pendulum on the pvp side, because now pvpers would have no benefit in working together with the pvers and they will instead just always attack them and rob them. At which point we come back to the "everyone leaves because hunters drive out the prey".
And in the classic circular argument, if those pvers want to work with pvpers to get defense for their post-pve caravans - why can't they do that for pre-pve defense?
I feel like all this cumbersome thought process is exactly why Steven keeps saying that instances are story-based and that the game is about "not everyone winning". Cause that's a much easier approach to the situation, than trying to find the perfect middle-of-the-road design for the game.
I don't think you are understanding much at all of what I am saying.
Some of that is no doubt due to me not explaining it well enough, but some of it is without a doubt due to you not being able to distance yourself from how things were in L2.
Basically, if I don't talk about something, you should probably assume I am talking about it being the opposite of L2, not what L2 did.
A recent example of this is timers. Talking about those smaller bosses, you couldn't get your head around what timer they would have, and had quite a lot of thoughts on the matter.
Thing is, anyone that has played a game with this kind of content would know straight away that it is a random spawn mechanic - because that is what is needed to make this content work. You preseumably haven't seen such a system, and so thought the whole thing couldn't work because you couldn't work out a spawn timer that would work. I didn't bother mentioning it at the start because to me this is just an inherent aspect of this kind of content and doesn't actually warrent mentioning.
Back to your post;
If players feel they need to be eased in to the content, they can sit at the door for a few spawn cycles.
If they feel they are ready to go, they shouldn't be required to do so.
This is a pointless, monotonous requirement that detracts from the actual content, rather than adds to it.
Stop people being able to kill the encounter - via what ever means are available to me.
If I can stop you from having access to an encounter, you will never have access to that encounter.
Even for a PvX game, this is only good game design if it applies to some content of each type. If it applies to all content of each type, then this is horrid game design. With the content you are talking about (cages), I would expect a competent PvE guild to be able to kill it either first or second pull.
As a content type, this is not suitable for actual hard content, for reasons I mentioned a few posts above.
Basically, if the goal is good PvE, this is something that can be used sparingly, on some encounters.
My expectation is about 10 wipes, at which point you would need to head back to a node with services of some form (repairing, if nothing else), and you can then head back down if you like.
Where the respawn point is located is something that I don't care too much about at this stage.
Yeah, you shouldn't fight over them.
Fight over the drops, for sure. FIght because you don't like the other people even, if that is what you want. However, you shouldn't fight against other people for the right to play the game you are paying a subscription to play.
That is stupid.
You're almost there, no sarc, no insult.
Which PvP group should these theoretical PvEMainly Raiders who want a shot at the boss, work with?
The reason is simple - I don't want to fight you for the right to play the game I am paying for.
This is what it comes down to - don't fuck with a PvE'ers access to content. If PvE'ers don't have access to content, they instead play a game in which they do. This isn't up for debate, and you do not get to use your definition of content when talking about other people.
This seems to be the biggset thing you aren't understanding.
Keep in mind, the idea of this discussion is to talk about what would get PvE players - specifically top end ones - interested in Ashes. Do you think any of your ideas would achieve that? Because it seems fairly obvious to me that they would guarantee that such players remain in other games.
Of course I won't understand what you mean when you explicitly avoid explaining the basis of your position. Not everything is obvious to everyone, so it seems at least somewhat logical to help someone explain the thing they don't know, if you're trying to make them understand your point (especially when it's based on the thing that person doesn't understand).
And more on the point of "timer". I still don't understand what exactly does the word "timer" implies in this context. Or how does a respawn timer relates to random spawn mechanics. Is it "you can kill 10 mobs until the boss spawns or you can kill 1000 and it still won't"? Or is it "if the boss died at some point in the last hour and his respawn timer is an hour - it's pointless to kill any mobs until the timer is up, because the boss won't spawn"?
Yes, which is why I said that if people can physically prevent someone from ever accessing smth - Intrepid should resolve that. PvPing someone to prevent them from access is not a physical prevention that can't be overcome. Get more people to kill the ones who're trying to stop you; use stealth to move past them; use defensive abilities to not die while you run past; etc etc.
As long as there's a way to overcome the blockade - imo it's not a horrid design.
I don't see why you think this.
I got these 2 sentences together, because I think they relate. You want to reattempt the boss immediately on the spot, which is why you think cages are not suitable.
Is that assumption incorrect? Because, as I said, I see no reason why a caged fight can't be as difficult as a n instanced one. Yes, it'll take longer for you to reattempt it, but is that your only point for why it's bad design?
And this is mostly the main reason why Mag keeps aggroing onto you. You want pure pve in a pvx game (I know you'll say that it's a pvp game if you gotta do pvp).
A person will pay for the game because they want to do both. Of course there's gonna be people who pay because they don't realize that they need to do both, but I blame that on poor research into their expenditures.
So far I haven't seen any indications that Steven's lying to pvers, telling them that they can enjoy the game to the fullest while completely avoiding pvp. If I missed/forgot an example - do point it out.
I definitely understand that you completely disagree with his position and think that it'll drastically change before the release, but we'll obviously only know whether it does or not on release. So far I don't really see why it would.
Of course Steven might be so absolutely stupid so as to not see the thing that's been pointed out by any WoW passerby on any social media, or by numerous forum posts/threads from you or several other posters who say that having an L2-like design in 2020s will kill the game.
If he is that stupid - well shit, aren't we even more stupid to have spent years of time investment into a game where he's the Creative Director.
Did you mention that before? Cause if you did, I either missed it or forgot about it.
Yeah, I did kinda forget that this is the main goal of this thread with my response above
So, for Vaknar - there isn't a way, because you're not building a game like that. There's my main feedback for Intrepid
You maybe missed the point again.
What incentive does a PvEMainly Raider guild have, to ally with or care about anyone other than the strongest PvP guild?
If four guilds, two PvEMainly and 2 PvPMainly, want to fight a boss (the reason for the alliances between the PvE and PvP groups doesn't matter), only the PvEMainly group that is allied with the stronger PvPMainly group gets to fight the boss.
Why does the losing PvEMainly group do anything other than 'also try to Ally with the stronger PvPMainly group'?
This is what I was referencing when talking about my naivete when it comes to believing in people's desire to fight against strong opponents.
Imagine a group of PvPMainly players who want to go into a dungeon to 'help prevent someone from fighting a boss'. (They don't know anything about the mechanics of this weird dungeon).
They reach the targets and try to flag up and get the message:
"You cannot flag for combat on this floor, you do not have the Title/Status 'Fourth Floor Challenger'." The targets get prepped, flag first, and beat them down, since they have the status required.
They go back, irritated, and find out that you get this Title/Status from beating a specific difficult boss on the third floor. This sounds good to them, since even if some group that has the '3rd Floor Challenger' status comes along, they're a great PvP group, they can handle it.
Then they find that they don't have the skills to beat the 3rd floor boss required to get the status that will let them initiate PvP on the 4th floor. Not only that, they barely have the skills to beat the 2nd floor boss required to make sure that they can initiate combat against PvEMainly people who come to steal that same 3rd floor boss and protect their farm.
You know the meme, right? Is this... "PvX"?
But more importantly, I would expect those PvPMainly players, if the game was set up like this a lot, to complain, stop, or 'try to get the strongest PvE players to help them get to PvP'. Imagine a game where this is the only PvP method. You can't flag without the 'status' for flagging in an area, and you must PvE for the status, while competing with PvE players that you can't always PvP.
That's the reflection.
In a respawn like this, there is no timer other than the reqular respawn timer of the base population.
When the mob in question respawns, there is a percentage chance that it may spawn as the boss for that room instead. No other variables involved.
This means the boss may not spawn for a week, or may spawn twice in a row. And if there isn't?
Again, I have yet to play a game where this has not been possible. I see no reason to assume Ashes would be any different.
To most MMO developers, the entire point of open world content is so that players can block each other from it. This is actually great design - but ONLY when it is a portion of the content. If it takes my guild 4 months of 100+ pulls three nights a week to get a world first kill, how long would it take to get that many pulls using this cage mechanic?
Developers tend to only develop reasonable content - or at least attempt to do so. They won't put something in the game that would take you years to kill - in an MMORPG that content should be obsolite by then anyway.
Thus, in order to make sure that an encounter that has a limited number of pulls available on it, and where those pulls need to be fought for, the encounter itself needs to be easier.
This is a factor with instanced content in Ashes as well - but I have long said that there is no hope of getting the actual top end of PvE in Ashes, and the 10 pull at a time comment from above would make all but the actual hardest content perfectly viable. Again, if PvP arenas exist, there is no argument in regards to Ashes being a PvX game that detracts from the existance of repeatable PvE instances.
You should note though, every actual suggestion I have made has been based on access to content being unfettered, but the rewards always having a PvP component associated with it.
No one here is asking to be able to fully avoid PvP any more than people wanting PvP arenas are asking to be able to avoid PvE. As long as arenas (and sieges) exist, this isn't a valid argument to make against PvE instances existing.
Saying that what I am asking for is pure PvE and so shouldn't exist in Ashes, but not saying the same about PvP arenas is pure hypocracy.
No, the correct statement here should be that if you want to create a game like this, all the information is in this thread to be able to do so (or, more specifically, all the information is in the minds of the develoeprs you have on staff).
From there, there is no question as to whether you can (adding PvE instances with a portion of the reward then being subject to the caravan system 100% fits in with what Ashes is as a game). It is purely a case of whether Intrepid/Steven want to do it or not.
If the answer is that they do not want to do it, any comments that this game will appeal to people that accept PvP but prefer PvE is misleading.
Hell, I'd fucking want that for Ashes. Another piece of feedback for Vaknar
Great, I knew you would. So here's the really important part to frame the rest of the conversation.
What is a reasonable respawn time for the 3rd Floor Boss that gives the '4th Floor Challenger' status?
Like, if some guild got a shitton of alts/members to just stand around in one place in several layers of people, not moving for a certain amount of time, and the amount of those layers prevents anyone from pushing through - imo that's a bannable action. Just as hardcore harassment will be one. The "certain time" part should be explicitly stated by Intrepid and known to all players.
Also, this is still pushthroughable, because other people can bring their own alts and PK through the crowd.
So I supposed right and it is all about time. You already know my position on progression pace, so it's gonna be up to Intrepid to decide how they wanna approach this.
Arenas don't give gear. PvPers won't be able to progress in pvp w/o pve.
Of course there's the money option, but then they would need to ally themselves with pvers who farmed that money (or gear directly), so that they can use it to pvp better.
PvErs can do the same, by paying pvpers for protection.
But outside of that point, I quite literally said that I agree that Ashes should have instances and that they should have the hardest pve in the game. I disagree with the whole "10 wipes per entrance" thing, but I also like to grind games (took me 270h to finish Starfield cause I grinded lvls through a super mundane action), so, as always, it's gonna be up to Intrepid to choose how they wanna design this.
If they allow us to endlessly wipe in an instance until we win - better for me. But I'm completely fine with reentering after each wipe.
If it's a group boss - twice a week. If it's a raid-size encounter - once. I'd probably prefer if there was a lockout on its farm for anyone who already has the status, but I feel like that might be a bit too much for a lot of people.
That preference is probably hypocritical in the context of this boss dropping mats that are valuable even for people on the 4th floor, so ideally the boss would be an entirely separate thing that's just required to flag up on the upper floor, w/o any loot. And with that change I'd be totally fine if it was the hardest boss on its floor.
Thanks, that's good framing. This says 'I am ok with the idea that players who want to flag up on the 4th floor of this dungeon can only do so once a week'.
It also says "I am ok with players that don't manage to be the ones to kill the boss that week, being unable to PvP on floor 4 at all for that week'.
It also sorta blends into 'I am ok with some group of players killing the boss themselves to guard the status so that no one else can initiate PvP on floor 4 that week'. Though you didn't directly say this, it would almost certainly be what would happen.
The 'strongest guild' would do their best to lock down the 3rd floor 'Title Giver', and anyone who wanted to PvP on Floor 4 (idk, maybe they care about challenging the strongest guild who has set up camp down there) just can never experience 'PvP content' in that dungeon.
I believe that you'd not only accept, but encourage all of these outcomes, just as you accept the various 'PvE open world only' outcomes. I'm just rambling to maybe illustrate, just in case you've ever maybe met some PvPMainly players who would leave a game because of this setup, and could therefore parallel their reactions or 'expected responses'.
Just the 'Gatekeeping of Content' situation, from the other side.
There are many and varied ways of doing this.
In Archeage, for example, you were able to push players out of the way, but you weren't able to push vehicles. People used this one fact to grind the economy on some servers to a literal halt. In EQ2 there were specific points you could stand that would prevent bosses spawning.
I have no doubt Ashes won't have either of these two, but I also have no doubt it will have something. If you say to a PvE player that the expectation is that they will be attempting to kill this same mob a year from now, they will leave.
Hell, if you told them they would be successfully killing a mob for a year they would leave. No one wants a game experience that is this repeatitive.
Remember, as far as these people are concerned, you are trying to compete with other PvE games and their content. Hell, you are competing with non-MMO games, you are competing with watching TV, with going to see a movie or with going bowling. Ashes is wanting to be a form of entertainment - it should be entertaining.
This is not strictly true.
Arenas don't give arena points that can be used to buy gear. However, they count towards PvP seasons, and they reward gear - or gear based progression at least. I have spent 11 hours in Starfield.
I gave up because there are more enjoyable games I could spend my time on.
The rapid dropoff in concurrent and daily players that Steam reported suggests I am in the majority here - if a game isn't good, people will just play a different game. I assume I don't need to point out how much worse this is for a subscription game over a game like Starfield.
Quite honestly, the fact that you put so much time in to Starfield when so many other people were leaving with under 20 hours played should tell you that your opinions here are very much the minority.
Assuming each floor is more valuable than the previous, if my guild wants to keep people away from the 4th floor, we aren't doing it by blocking the third. We are blocking as far away from the 4th floor as we can get.
So my thought process was "as long as you manage to kill this boss once - you can pvp on the upper floor in the future". And at that point - yes, I'd be fine if guilds from higher floors tried to fight people at lower floors, because that would be exactly same as people from F3 coming up to F4 to try and farm stuff there.
I think I'm the gatekeepiest person on this forum. I want player funnels and I want everyone to git fucking good, if they want any semblance of a reward.
My L2 bias simply reinforces that position. Only the strongest and most resilient people deserve the spot at the top. Everyone else should be fine with farming stuff at a stage below their progress or find ways to fight upwards with what they have (be it skill or numbers, or alternative methods of power acquisition).
And, as this thinking applies to both pvers and pvpers - I wouldn't care if those pvpers complained that they have to pve in a pvx game. Cause, once again, I'm used to grinding mobs for weeks just to get a slightly better piece of gear, so that I have a slightly better chance of winning pvp. If that grind came in the form of fighting the same boss over and over again - that's fine, cause I'm used to doing that against dull mobs. Hard bosses are at least fun (or so yall pvers say
I've also thought a bit more about the lockout related to the flagging status and I change my mind. Fuck the lockout. People who've already fought the boss can go fight it again, cause it's gonna be up to those who want to kill it for the first time to prevent the upper floor dudes from doing so.
That thinking might've led me to a better understanding of what yall are talking about. I initially thought about the lockout because I thought it'd be unfair to the lower floor people if dudes from a floor above (who already have the knowledge about the fight) could clear the boss again, cause the chances of pve success of these groups are uneven due to difference in experience.
And I assume this is what pvers find unfair in the premise of "you gotta pvp to pve", right? The difference in experience of default pvpers who'd be fighting these newbie pvpers. But, as I said above, my position is "git good". Fight amongst each other, find training partner parties (if you're not in a guild), fight weaker pvpers, etc.
So I think I finally understand where the pvers are coming from, but, just as I would say to a pvper who complains that pve is difficult
Because what follows on from that first part, is the thing I was talking about before with the exclusivity. There does come a point where no amount of 'working harder' will get you what you want, in a competitive game, if the thing you want isn't directly competition.
And even when the thing you want is competition, if your opponent has a way to prevent you from ever becoming competitive, there is a meaningful set of people with the skills or dedication to do that.
So, at that point, that's what 'gatekeeping' is. Those who bend the knee are rewarded (until the top consider them a threat) and those who refuse are stagnated. The difference is that you will press on basically forever, and other people won't.
If Ashes were to implement this, I have no doubt that not only would you try every week without fail, if you were in 7th place and never really got to do anything, but you would accept when guild members give up, leave, betray you for the chance to get stuff from the top guild, etc.
You'd just keep pushing on forever, rebuilding your guild as many times as it took until it was literally not possible any more, or until it was full of likeminded people.
You also apparently have 5x more time in StarField than the average person, though.
It is inherent in the nature of a top end raiding guild to always want to be improving and progressing. That is just a part of the deal.
As such, that really isn't an issue at all.
The issue, as I have said many times, is access to content. It isn't that I am not happy getting better at PvP in order to fight you, it is that I refuse to have to fight you in order to have access to the content that is the reason I play the game.
If we are to fight, it happens after the fact.
Which is why it's a pvx game. I know you consider pvp repeatable too, so this particular point might be moot for you, but L2's grind was still fun because pvp would happen during it.
But you gotta win to get points. And only people in gear (and usually better gear) will win points. Iirc there's been no talk about equalized arenas, so it's not like someone can just power through with sheer skill.
I know full well that my opinion is in the minority and relates to niche interests. Which aligns perfectly with Steven's knowledge that his ideal game is niche.
My L2 examples are based on years of playing with people who're same as me, who grinded mobs while pvping and who then kept playing grindy games too. Of course there's not as many of us as someone like WoW players, but I'd imagine that there's only not that many hardcore pvers who'd leave the game if they don't get the amount/quality of content you desire.
If anything, we currently have the biggest example of "majority's quality standards" in the form of Palworld. Obviously the game itself is fun (or so I've heard), but killing mobs can be fun as well, as long as the combat itself is fun. BDO exists, and afaik that shit is GRIIIIIINDY. But it retains people through combat and a shitton of sunk cost (be it time or money). So if Ashes manages to have fun combat - I'd imagine quite a lot of people won't really care that they're killing the same mobs day in day out, because the process itself is fun.
Fuck, EVE exists, and that shit is a spreadsheet with time dilation. But people directly create their own fun through all kinds of means.
So, if anything, I feel like your super high standards for this stuff is the thing that's in the minority.
The enemy had a higher tier of gear? Enhance your lower tier to be closer to theirs. Or get more people with your gear to roughly equate the powers. Or try another farming spots for that higher tier (this was a much rarer possibility in the game).
My application of that example to your floors was the stuff I mentioned (the ways of training pvp) and, obviously, the "take more people to fight them" for the pvp part of the equation. Of course you can't take all those people into the raid itself, but we're talking about the keepers at the gate, so the raid is not even in the equation at this point.
And yeah, exactly as you said - I always understand the position of those who can't keep on fighting. Mostly cause I've played with quite a few people like that in the past. This was also the reason why all my guilds from later on in my L2 career were purely casual. I knew that pushing my preferences onto people rarely worked.
But you know what happened quite a lot? THOSE FUCKERS ASKED ME TO TRY HARDER
This is why I keep saying that it's up to them to ultimately decide what they'll do. I've said it before, I kinda agree with Noaani's "doomerism" that majority of AoC's hardcoreness won't survive release (hell, probably even A2). And I've also said that if it doesn't - I'll know for sure that these types of mmos are not for me. I might play ff14 for the story or Riot's one for the casual experience of existing in a big world with a ton of people - but I'll definitely give up on waiting for "that one next mmo that's gonna save me".
The context of that particular discussion doesn't really apply to your preferences. You're just as crazy as I am, just in a different way
None of us are "normal" here.