Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
Alpha Two Realms are now unlocked for Phase II testing!
For our initial launch, testing will begin on Friday, December 20, 2024, at 10 AM Pacific and continue uninterrupted until Monday, January 6, 2025, at 10 AM Pacific. After January 6th, we’ll transition to a schedule of five-day-per-week access for the remainder of Phase II.
You can download the game launcher here and we encourage you to join us on our for the most up to date testing news.
Alpha Two Realms are now unlocked for Phase II testing!
For our initial launch, testing will begin on Friday, December 20, 2024, at 10 AM Pacific and continue uninterrupted until Monday, January 6, 2025, at 10 AM Pacific. After January 6th, we’ll transition to a schedule of five-day-per-week access for the remainder of Phase II.
You can download the game launcher here and we encourage you to join us on our for the most up to date testing news.
Comments
As a PvE first player, I agree with your general point here - I hate doing content everyone can do.
That's why I play at the top end. When you are killing mobs that only 1% of a games population will even see (and only 25% of those that see it will ever kill it), the above issues simply aren't factors.
While I understand many players enjoy PvE at lower tiers - tiers where everyone is able to participate - that has never appealed to me at all.
Yeah, but the actual fighting is all the same. PvP fighting on a large scale is boring as fuck.
PvE content (good PvE) is FAR more varied than PvP could ever be in terms of the actual fight. Sure, every time you fight the same encounter it may go roughly the same, but the next encounter along is totally different, and the one after that is different again.
In PvP - especially mass PvP - every fight is basically just the same.
It doesn't really even matter what game you are playing, mass PvP is still basically the same. It's the same in EQ2 as it is in Rift, or Archeage, or BDO, or ESO, or EVE.
There is more variation in how you actually play within one EQ2 raid zone than there is within the PvP of every game I have listed above.
Acting in Broadway plays is also riskless.
If I want risk, I will play a Survivial game or an FPS.
If I want Cooperative Storytelling, I will play and RPG.
I don't raid, either.
The foundation of RPGs is cooperative PvE storytelling.
Competitive PvP is really the purview of other genres of video games. It's like trying to make all video games e-sports.
PvP friction is uninteresting. I am not at all interested in player v player friction.
Just as I am uninterested in actor v actor friction when I watch or participate in a play.
I am very interested in the stories of the characters - and I really don't want actor-friction or player-friction interfering with the cooperative story-telling of the actors and players portraying the progression of their characters.
We agree that Lineage 2 was probably garbage. Ashes is heavily inspired by Lineage 2.
I have 0 interest in player drama and player fights and backstabbing and spying while playing an RPG.
I don't want MMORPGs to give me any of that.
When I want something like that, I will play a PvP genre, like a Survival game or an FPS.
PvE is fun, memorable and rewarding enough for me. Sometimes, there is some nailbiting from mobs and NPCs. (Especially the first time I was hit with Blind and my screen went black.)
If I want PvP, I will play a different genre of game.
What I'm hearing is that gamers find the RP aspects to be boring so they have to add in competitive PvP to make RPGs interesting.
I’m shocked. 😆
People can say whatever they like,
PvP will follow them even when they try to avoid it. This doesn't make Ashes a pure PvP-Game. It just forces People to be more aware of their Environment and to possibly, just "possibly" - search for Allies who can help oneself out.
✓ Occasional Roleplayer
✓ Currently no guild !! (o_o)
Sir Steven will balance the game based on what he sees on Alpha 2 servers.
I don't know if those players are a representative sample of those who are expected to join after release.
And he said everything is subject to change.
For the life of me I cannot understand what kind of mental gymnastics you did to get to that conclusion. Everytime you PvP, the scene is different, the terrain is different and it often favours different classes depending on the location, the enemies may change, the strategy is different, randoms may join the fight or not, hell, even the time of the day changes things, too. Depending on what you did ingame yesterday, some other people might like you and help you, or even dislike you and fight you, too. You may end up fighting outnumbered, you may end up having to run away while being chased by 20 people. That's because players are unpredictable.
You're saying that somehow hitting the same NPC that's coded to work the exact same way until the end of time in PvE 100 times is more varied than that?... I have no idea how you can claim that, sorry. Hard disagree and I think you're a bit on copium there.
Dygz, for the record, I don't dislike you or anything, I'm just completely confused as to why you're here. AoC will be exactly the opposite of what you're looking for, and it has been like that since the day I frst saw Steven talk about the game. You seem the type of player who would enjoy FF XIV. Why are you in an open world PVP MMO forum? It's very clearly something you don't or won't enjoy. The game won't change either, this has been the vision from the start.
Everyone have a little Dygz inside and he takes care of them to grow happy.
Even in PvE, we search for Allies who can help.
I've been here since the Kickstarter.
The game design has changed significantly - especially with the addition of The Open Seas in 2022.
(Which was also several months after the original Lead Game Designer left and Steven took over as Acting Lead Game Designer for 18+ months, before hiring Bill Trost.)
While Jeffrey Bard was Lead Game Designer, the spin seemed to appeal to a broader set of playstyles.
So... no. The current vision is not the same vision it has been from the start.
And has changed in a manner that I'm no longer interested in playing.
I am still very interested in testing several of the systems.
So... I will be testing the Alphas and Betas.
(Steven will tell you that Ashes is not a PvP MMO; rather it is a PvX MMO.)
In practice, however, this couldn't be further from the truth.
In my years of playing Archeage (5 years in total, including time on NA/EU, RU, KR and private servers), mass PvP only ever happened in 5 locations (Halcy, Red Dragon, Mistmerrow, Diamond Shores, open ocean). Didnt matter what server or region, if PvP started somewhere else and started to get big, it moved to Diamond Shores anyway.
While in theory it could happen anywhere, in practice it only happens in a handful of locations.
Small scale PvP happened in a few more locations, but realistically still only a dozen or so for most people. Different locations for different people, bur still only a handful of locations in total. Small scale PvP generally only happened around resources or content you wanted, and so would basically always be in the same area. If I was farming archeum or braziers, the only small scale PvP I would see was people attacking me while going through a choke point on my farm vehicle. For literally months in a row, those choke points would be the only small scale PvP I would see, even though in theory I could be attacked anywhere, or attack others anywhere.
This was even the case for the year or so I was the only pirate on my server - meaning I was red to literally every other player.
Contrast this to the time I spent in EQ2. In that time, if we include both group and raid bosses (but exclude solo), there were around 2,200 bosses, all of which were different in some way, many of which were vastly different.
I mean, there was one boss that the raid had to use musical instruments to play a song to in order to kill. Like or loathe that idea, you can't deny that this kind of thing existing means that PvP has literally nothing on PvE in terms of variation in actual practice.
I'm amazed and kind've impressed anyone would even attempt to make this argument.
It's common for this to be opposed, but in nearly every case it turns out that the person only played the old PvP MMORPGs and not the PvE ones.
It's an interesting type of specific frustration when it comes to trying to have forum discussions, for certain.
What, that PvE has more variation than PvP?
I've yet to meet anyone that has played a decent amount of a decent PvE game that has disagreed with this statement.
I've met plenty of PvP players that have only played shit PvE that disagree with it.
If someone's PvE experience was L2, Archeage, BDO and/or Albion (or other similar games), I would fully expect them to disagree with the statement, and be sure of themselves right down to the core.
I mean, I agree that the game changed A BIT with the addition of open seas.. but the game since its inception was entirely PvP focused. The moment they told you L2 and AA was the inspiration... it was obvious. Flagging system being exactly like L2 was a dead giveaway this is a PVP game. Steven can say 5000 more times that it's a PvX game, but that just means you get to PvE and PvP at the same time. As in, I'm farming in a good spot, someone tries to fight me for it, one of us dies, I keep or lose the spot. That's what PvX means, it doesn't mean you can safely PvE as if you're running an instanced dungeon. It means both are combined and obviously when PvE and PvP are combined, PvP is the force that rules the open world whether you like it or not. And this has been AoC since day 1 of kickstarter. If you had asked any L2 player they would've told you so 5 years ago.
Yah, that's cause AA PvP just wasn't very good. In L2 you PvPed all over the map. Literally. You had sieges and people chased you from the castle to a town. There were at least 25+ high level Open World Bosses relevant in the late game that could give you juicy drops, and all of them were contested. That's without counting Epic Raids like Valakas, Antharas, Core, Frintezza, Zaken, Queen Ant, Baium, etc. You had to contest every single one of them. That alone already gave you like 30+ different fighting zones. Then there were also castles (Gludio, Dion, Giran, Innadril, Oren, Schuttgart, Goddard, Rune, Aden), then mass PvP popping randomly, etc. Add different times of the day, different enemies, and it literally was never the same. The stakes are also different depending on what you're contesting.
I just want to remind you that saying PvE is more varied than PvP when PvE by nature, is literally doing the exact same thing in the exact same place, over and over and over is probably one of the dumbest things I've ever read. I understand you like PvE. That's fine, you can prefer PvE over PvP all you want, but stating it's more varied just makes you look delusional.
And for the record, I thoroughly enjoyed PvE in L2, cause even killing the same Ketra mobs had a chance for a jackpot drop and there was always PvP popping up everywhere. It was a blast. But what made PvE good was the thrill of knowing something could go down any minute. Killing some random guy who tried to take my spot many times ended up in crazy mass PvP with 100+ people. If that chance didn't exist, I would've died of boredom.
Do you have any opinion on the Ashes of Creation design goal to have highly dynamic PvE encounters with random ability use, timers, and possibly configurations of adds/skills on different appearances of the same mob?
I'll bet money these encounters will be on the easy side, because every single one of those encounters will be in the Open World (except for Story Bosses that will be instanced and absolutely irrelevant for high level players in terms of loot/gear) and everyone will be able to contest them. So if they try to make a super hard dynamic PvE encounter, then literally nobody will be able to kill the boss cause they'll have 2-4 parties contesting the boss while trying to PK your healer, if the boss has any good loot. It's just a terrible idea overall. Or maybe it's not and they want us to fight 10 hours for each boss, in which case, I'm also down for it (but I doubt it).
The incentive is to fight when there is something to fight over, and to not fight when there isn't. Cool, so you are about 15% of the way there. Sure, from an L2 players perspective. As I said earlier; You think PvE is repetitive because you played a game where the developers expected people to want to kill the same encounter for 5, 6 years or more.
I am talking about games where you are expected to kill any given encounter perhaps a dozen times in total, ever. I'm talking about games where your server may only ever see a given unique encounter one time ever - and in some cases not even that.
So yeah, to you, PvE would be repetitive and shit, because PvE in L2 is repetitive and shit.
Apparently you can't read, try reading my post again. L2's PvE was super fun, precisely because of the existance of PvP. Because before we got to the raid arena, we had 2 hours of PvP and we WON the access to the arena. It already felt fucking amazing. Everything was EARNED. Not something you just tried 500 times until you got it like in the little instances you love so much. A lot of times we also had to fight the boss + other parties at the same time. So when you get that juicy drop, it was better than anything in the world. Nothing comes close that feeling, other than capturing a castle.
PvE was a blast in Lineage 2. But if it had been only a PvE game, it would've been dogshit. Those two systems combining PvE and PvP (this is what Steven calls PvX) is what made the game shine and what made PvE fun. Something that you'll never understand unless you played Lineage 2.
If Ashes somehow manages to capture the incredible L2 pvp and something like 40-50% of EQ2 - the game will be incredible. I'd love if they could go up to 80% of EQ, but I think that would take too much devtime and would potentially require best AI in gaming, except somehow adapted to an owmmo.
I read your post and understood it. All of that shit applied to Archeage. Hundreds of people spending hours of fighting over the Red Dragon to get the kill. Or the Kraken, or Leviathan, what ever.
This isn't what we are talking about though. If you want to stop trying to argue against my point that PvE is inherently more varied than PvP, we can move on to talking about this if you like - your call.
So was your original point actually that PvE in PvP/PvX games cannot be that difficult/varied and therefore, since that is the only game type you're discussing at this point, that PvP will always be more varied than PvE in those games?
Some people might have read it as if you were referring to PvE in games that intended to offer a dynamic PvE experience, just like they read Intrepid's design goal and think that they're talking about dynamic PvE experience.
Absolutely. PvE by itself was trash but clearly it was designed so that everything PvE was to be contested via PvP. From farming spots, bosses, everything. That's made what made PvE fun, that's what PvX means. Farming in L2 for 6 hours would've been the most painful experience ever if there wasn't a good chance to get a great drop or a chance that an enemy party would show up out of nowhere ready to murder everyone in your party. You had to keep all your buffs up all the time, manage your mana properly, carry different gear, switch it up just to be more efficient, be on the lookout, etc. Without the risk of PvP, it just becomes a grind with 0 risk, boring, etc.
That's the game some of us want (mostly me)
I mean, L2 social systems were fine, they allowed for a lot of fun, but they were also extremely primitive and AoC is trying for a lot more than L2 did. You also didn't have sea combat in L2, nor caravans, or node sieges, or even 1/10th of the systems AoC is going to introduce. Even professions were super boring and limited in L2, they're going to be a LOT more fun in AoC.
I'm totally down for a very much improved version of L2+AA combined.
The only difference between the 2 games would be water, but even that part of the design remains to be seen. Will it be "characters on ships fighting each" other or "characters as ships fighting each other". Cause the first one is just standard pvp, while the second one is kinda something new, but I'd simply see it as transformation pvp in L2.
And considering that pve will be the majority of gameplay (unless you're a hardcore artisan) - I'd prefer if the pve part of the game was great not only on its own, but as part of pvx as well - with both of those sides complimenting each other.
I've been here since Kickstarter and I have had several interviews with Steven.
Steven will tell you even today that Ashes is not entirely PvP-focused. Steven will tell you that Ashes is not a PvP-centric game. Steven will tell you that Ashes is a PvX.
In our very first interview for the Ashen Forge with Steven in Feb 2018, my very first question asked Steven to compare Ashes PvP with the PvP in ArcheAge and EvE - two games that are too PvP-centric for me.
Specifically because they have areas similar to The Open Seas in Ashes (The Open Seas were added to the design in 2022).
Steven said that the PvP in Ashes is significantly different because, unlike ArcheAge and EvE, Corruption is in play everywhere across the map. Ashes has no permanent zone that are Corruption-free PvP.
Steven stated that Lineage 2 could sometimes be a murderbox, but he believes that Corruption is just enough harsher than L2 Corruption to make playing Ashes comfortable for MMORPG fans, except those who 100% hate PvP combat.
I like to flag for PvP sometimes. Especially to defend objectives, like Towns and Caravans.
So... I'm completely up for Castle Sieges, Node Sieges and Caravans. That's the kind of PvP I can enjoy.
I'm skeptical about whether Corruption would be enough of a deterrent for non-consensual PvP that I would be comfortable playing - but at least I can punish people who force me to PvP when I'm not in the mood by giving them Corruption. Which should make them less likely to repeatedly accost me.
Gamers like CROWE3 and NiKr, who have played Lineage II have faith that Corruption will works as intended - and we all agree that I should test Corruption during the Alphas and Betas to see it works as hoped.
I abhor MMORPGs that have large permanent auto-flag, free-for-all PvP combat. I don't play MMORPGs on servers that have that ruleset. Which means I have no interest in playing EvE or ArcheAge. And now no interest in playing Ashes.
I also am not all motivated by Risk v Reward. In the last two years, the original 2nd Design Pillar - Meaningful Conflict (Castle Sieges, Node Sieges, Caravans) - has been replaced with Stevens obsession with ubiquitous Risk v Reward.
1: I haven't played Lineage II, so I have no reference.
2: Steven says that the Ashes flagging system is not exactly like L2. STeven says that Corruption is harsher than Karma and designed to make Ashes less of a murderbox than L2.
3: Gamers who have played L2 (including Steven, CROW3 and NiKr), have told me that I should test the Alphas and see if Corruption makes Ashes a comfortable fit for my playstyle. I agree.
4: After the addition of The Open Seas and witnessing Steven's growing obsession with Risk v Reward at the end of 2022, I was finally able to see past Steven's snow job. And understand that Ashes is a PvP-centric game and that "PvX" is meaningless hype. We agree.
No. L2 gamers did not say that 5 years ago. They did not say that 2 years ago.
NiKr and Linniker began saying that as we discussed the meaning of PvP v PvX within the past year - starting in 2023.
You are talking about PvX here and saying it was great. You are also talking about the PvE itself being shit.
You are not talking about (and likely have no experience at all of) good PvE.
I know what made L2 shine - the same thing that made Archeage the most popular PvP MMORPG on the planet for a few years (when all regions were combined). Yes, fighting a boss while also fighting other players is fun - but there isn't much variation to it.
Not in comparison to PvE.
When I talk variation, I'm talking about encounters like the one above where you are playing a song as a raid. Or encounters that swallow raid members and require them to find explosives and blow the mob up with them. Or encounters that require you to keep your mana level between 60 and 35% at all times or wipe the raid. Or encounters that require all members to take a step at least once every 2 seconds (fondly referred to as the DDR mechanic). Or encounters that would remove the tanks pants. Or encounters that require two entities to remain within 1% HP of each other the entire time. Or encounters that spawn adds the healers need to kill. Or encounters that are on platforms being lowered in to lava (cliche, but still). Or encounters with any mix of hundreds of other mechanics.
By variation in PvP, you are talking about how sometimes in L2 there might be a hill or a tree. That isn't variation.
Again, you don't know PvE.
A Grind because it was the longest and most tedious form of progression.
15 years later, the term had drifted to mean any form of progression before Endgame.
Because "Endgame is the real game" and Leveling is just a tedious time sink (Grind) to prolong gamers from reaching the real fun of the game: Endgame.
Now, Grind seems to mean anything that is not the real fun of the game: PvP.
So, again, what I'm hearing is that RPG aspects of MMORPGs are not fun, so PvP combat has to be added in order to make MMORPGs fun.
And... I want to play RPGs for the RPG aspects cooperative PvE vs mobs - not for the PvP combat.
When I want to experience PvP combat, I will play some other genre of video game.
@Dygz
you're a G for being here from the start but jesus christ.. I don't care if Steven keeps saying until the end of time that AoC isn't a PvP game, they literally have already included in the game, the EXACT flagging system from L2. It's been there for years, it was there in Alpha 1.The moment they added that to the Open World, it became a PvP game. When Steven says PvX he just means the PvE + PvP combined into one. That's it. Nothing more than that. They might add more complex PvE encounters but they will most likely all be Open World content and therefore contested. Maybe they'll add instanced content, but that'd be just like WoW/FF and completely against Steven's vision so I doubt it. The instanced content will most likely be Story driven and will have 0 loot/gear as reward. I REALLY don't think PvX is meaningless hype, it's literally what it says it is. A combination of PvE and PvP. What does that get you? Killing mobs or raids while you fight other players. It's that simple. Steven didn't lie. That's PvX. Lineage 2 was PvX, so was AA. I'm a bit sorry that you're unable to enjoy these kind of games because nothing will give you bigger highs than them.
@Noaani
As for you, talking about me not knowing PvE... I'm a fucking boomer and I played a ton of MMOs. I played WoW for years, I just never mention it because the game is fucking dogshit and has been dogshit for a LONG time and it actually embarasses me that I played a Blizzard game for so long. Fuck everything about that company. I raided a lot and it was just boring as fuck and tedious even. In WoW, the moment they added the PVP toggle (warmode iirc) the game died for me.
I played Dragon's Nest. I also played Tera Online and that game had some cool raids and also PvP was fun fucking tastic IMO. I also played Blade & Soul. I played Air Rivals/Ace Online for many years (top 1-2 player there by the way in SA official server). I played GW2 for about 2 years.
You know what all those games had in common? The PvE in every single one of them was doing the exact same shit over and over. You know why? Because that's PvE. PvE is literally entering an instance or space created by the Devs where THE SAME SHIT HAPPENS EVERY SINGLE TIME. All those little things you explained? Yeah, that's what you'll be doing 400 times if you decide to enter that instance 400 times. Because that's how they're coded. They're coded so that if X happens then Y, and if Y ends then Z appears. That's PvE. Every single time and in every single MMO. 98% of MMOs out there have been/are PvE MMOs. We've ALL played PvE. You don't need to be a quantum physics engineer to understand it.
If you enjoy doing that 100 times, that's perfectly fine and I'm happy for you but don't come here and type with a straight face "PvE is more varied than PvP" because it literally makes you look like you're trolling because nobody is that dumb to try making that argument. Just the human factor by itself in PvP is enough to make it 100 times more varied than your little PvE instances.
And I'm not trying to hate on PvE, I think its needed and important, but not by itself.