Splinter Topic: Micro-Competition vs Macro-Competition

People misunderstand forced-PvP-averse vs owPvP-enjoyer in MMORPGs because of some stuff. Here's some of that stuff. If you poke me, I'll add more stuff or expand on this stuff.

1. A PvE-enjoyer (let's use a fisher), enters the game with the idea of getting good at fishing, building up knowledge, skill level, understanding of systems (plz donot assume they 'don't care about PvP'). That person is in micro-competition with every other fisher. When another person shows up at their fishing spot in a game with no forced PvP, their 'competition' is in 'who understands the fishing mechanics better and who honed their skills more'. In a game with forced PvP, their 'competition' can instantly become 'who is better at PvP'.

2. A PvP-enjoyer (let's say me, a 'fishing rights enforcer') enters the game with the idea of getting good at controlling an economic space. That person is in micro-competition with the PvP skill or the organizational ability (or zerg factor) of anyone who wants control of that economic space. But there's one catch to consider. In this case, the PvP-enjoyer has a vastly diminished incentive to cooperate compared to even a Survival game (but let's look at games where some attempt at simulating a world is happening, instead).

The 'flaw' in forced-PvP MMOs is contained in those two things above and all the fundamental issues relative to them that these games nearly never address, or cannot address because it would drastically warp gameplay. The result is, that all the 'real world equivalent' outcomes that 'would need to happen in the game, for it to make sense as a proper macro-competition', end up happening in terms of 'players existing in the world'. Basically, characters 'die' when their players leave the game due to the 'flaws', which are really just 'the equivalent of what would happen irl if too many immortal people with low incentives for cooperation entered an area'.

For a game to be enjoyable for most PvE-focused players, something must enforce the micro-competition within their skillsets. Otherwise, the only micro-competition they can be assured of getting to experience is PvP. This was the original failpoint of New World.

If I can 'help my friend win a fishing contest' by killing you, it is no longer a fishing contest. If you take nothing else from this post, let it be that. No matter how much someone likes PvP competition, if they also want to have 'fishing skill competitions' and the game allows another player to 'win the fishing skill competition by using PvP skill', it is a 'PvP game'.

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Ace1234

@Azherae

While I can see that having the effect of 'more total players, playing Ashes', what happens on the Elite side, is that people who might be okay with playing in 'Open' get pulled into Private Groups to be with their friends who are less okay with it.

This probably wouldn't be as big an issue in Ashes, but I feel like anything that risks segregation of the playerbase is ... suboptimal. Personal sense, though.

Ah, I didn't really think about that. My first reaction though is whether or not the firends could be pulled the opposite direction if that instwnced content didn't exist. If not, then they would just play something else anyway so it eould be better for the game to offer something for the whole group, even if some of the particpants would rather do something else.

Well, subtracting the PvP aspect for the moment, despite how obviously important it is, most of what Ashes offers is some combination of Elite Dangerous and FF11.

Freeholds and Node Reliquaries are good, if you can experience anything related to them, so definitely a plus there. And ofc, FF11 is old, and Elite Dangerous isn't a fantasy game. BDO has some bits too, ofc, but it's just 'bits'.

Throne and Liberty doesn't have any housing yet (but you can see that the design allows for it). I don't know if it is fair to say overall, but I think that unless Ashes goes beyond what I can even begin to imagine, I've mostly had the experiences it intends to offer already. As I always say to Intrepid Team though...

"If y'all can manage to put those into the same game with L2 or better tier PvP, you have automatically won."

Which sounds a lot like I'm saying 'build the game I want' but technically it's largely the game they say they're going to build and I'm just waiting for them to do it properly (my only point here is that if they don't knock it out of the park, they won't surpass the upcoming mentioned below)

Remember that I haven't played any mmos to really have a frame of reference when you say "like lineage 2 or better tier pvp" or that kind if thing. I'm curious what this market differentiator is that you are saying Ashes should utilize. It sounds like it might be something the expands on the idea of:

"So it comes down to 'how much do I really want to see a different node in this spot?' (larger content changes are apparently not a thing that technically appeal to a very large number of players? But I definitely care about it)."

But if thats what you are referring to then what aren't they doing now in this regard?

And what you are referring to by this exactly: "I don't know if it is fair to say overall, but I think that unless Ashes goes beyond what I can even begin to imagine, I've mostly had the experiences it intends to offer already."?

Because by the sound of what you are saying if they took it in that direction it would end up more like an "Archage 2 or Throne and Liberty mash up".

Regarding my perspective of differentiators, combat is the main one for me. I can extrapolate a good idea of what the combat might look like between Ashes and Throne and Liberty, but depending on how things go that might be a big draw for Ashes if it manages to differentiate itself in that regard. I have my doubts, but its hard to say for sure either way at this point regarding that, so we will have to wait and see. (At least for Ashes, since I believe the revamped combat of Throne and liberty has already been played by some people)

Azherae

I don't actually think Ashes has another market differentiator available to it at all.

Lineage 2 players often perceive Ashes as a return to that game's glory days. I ended up here because it sounded like someone was going to 'make FF11 style gaming great again'.

But, fortunately, I do have examples of playloops.

In Ashes, I would like to see a situation where:
1. Because many more people than usual have visited a node, from outside that node, a small outbreak of a not-terrible disease has occurred (Can happen in Elite, something slightly like it can happen in FFXI)
2. Players are requested or expected to import medicines from another nearby node with good Alchemy facilities, or make them, themselves (obv can happen in both games)
3. Players can vote on or influence a decision from the Node Government about secondary approaches to dealing with the problem (can happen in a particular subsection of FFXI, only partially in Elite Dangerous)
4. Players fulfilling or ignoring the decision and synchronizing with the relief effort can lead to a quicker resolution, or a loss of confidence due to 'incompetence' (can happen in both games)
5. NPC behaviour both in-node and external conditions such as battle and enemy spawns, change because of this shift in activity, such as gathering more herbs for medicine, or bandits taking advantage of imports (definitely happens in Elite, happens slightly in FFXI)
6. Disruption of relief efforts by rival player groups having control of specific territories/areas can affect all of the above (happens in FFXI slightly more than Elite, but not really anymore due to additional fast travel options)
7. Complete failure to respond to the situation results in economic downturn due to weakening of defenses of the Node, etc (happens in both games, in a very roundabout way also happens in BDO)
8. Strong coordinated success in response to the situation results in reputation benefits for involved players (happens in both games, and during BDO events of certain kinds)
9. Changing control of some territory during this, to improve supply lines, can automatically have some positive effect through things such as NPC actions in the open world (happens in both games, and in TL, though TL lacks most of the above currently).
10. The overall price of medicine or related items rises or falls due to the situation.

To me, this sounds like what Intrepid is already planning as a standard for their game (most of the above would be handled with the World Manager and a good economy design), and 'the thing that would be driving most of our play loops', since things like Node Sieges would be less frequent than 'node status changes' or 'world status changes'.

Elite's changes are more visible, and less 'abstract'. FFXI requires a bit more 'careful attention' to easily see differences in the world-state, but you often get more benefit out of paying attention. Elite's overall simulation state changes once per day on average, and FFXI has some systems that change 'in real time' and others that go through bigger changes once per week.

Therefore, in terms of 'what Ashes offers to me', I can experience it all already, with the main difference being that the complete destruction of a Node and therefore some absolute loss of related content, is more possible than it is in standard play of Elite Dangerous or FFXI (it is, actually, also possible in both those games as well, but it's just 'a change of control in an area that is considered more important than most others')

I can imagine more specific and granular forms of this, but it's hard to go very far beyond where Elite already is.

"An outbreak in this system has changed the missions in the Passenger Lounge so that rather than seeing sightseers who are going on joyrides, quarantines have led to requests from Medical Officers needing to go to different high tech systems with Pharmaceutical facilities, and long-haul explorers who intend to get out of the area until the situation is resolved."

The above is just 'normal' for that game. That, if anything, is my entire point. I'm not really asking for Intrepid to do much, if anything, beyond 'my normal'. But 'my normal' is relatively complicated with a lot of balance levers and non-obvious pitfalls, and I can't always tell when they are 'choosing to do something differently because they have a different, detailed plan', and when it's that they don't have experience doing a specific thing properly, which leaves me in the unfortunate position of 'having to express that I think they might be messing something up' without knowing the details.

The last thing I want is to be giving useless feedback to a developer with a really clear plan, because I 'think they forgot to consider something'. But the second-last thing I want is to not point out something they overlooked.

I think Ashes can just count on the fact that WoW players are far more numerous and generally less likely to know what is available in other MMOs, and that FF14 is actually also a type of WoW-clone, itself. They just have to do what they say they are going to do, but do it better than all the other upcoming games, many of which will also be made/influenced by people who, like me, are familiar with 'a game that had almost all of this implemented by 2007'.

A good, solid execution of their core goals, using the reference games that already do it, with the correct MMO sociology adaptations to make it all fit Ashes.

unknown

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JustVine

Vaempy wrote: »

If people don't want to engage in the PVP and competition that Ashes has they're welcome to play other games.

why is walking away from this game a bad thing if it's not for them?

Steven knows this isn't going to be a game for everybody it's just upto people this game isn't for to recognize that this isn't their cup of tea and move on on their gaming journey.

I do think that there'll be alot of things in Ashes that will interest alot of people and because of that they may be able to overlook some things that they don't enjoy (which in a way is good as they'll likely be trying some new things) But eventually they'll realize at a fundamental level they don't like the game and will play elsewhere.

All I want is for AoC to expand its player base as much as is reasonable within their own goals. They want crafting and have put a lot of thought to making both the economic side of crafting and the social side of crafting feel right. I think we can all agree that more people feeding Ashes economy will make any server more interesting and fun. So it's important we keep the ones that can actually like the game with some nudges from the game designers in rather than 'elsewhere' yeah?

Ace1234

@Azherae

The last thing I want is to be giving useless feedback to a developer with a really clear plan, because I 'think they forgot to consider something'. But the second-last thing I want is to not point out something they overlooked.

Ah, mine is flipped, thats why my posts probably come acrossed to them as some dork who thinks he's teaching them something they already know, but I do it anyways just in case theres that off chance they havn't thought about it in a certain way.

Therefore, in terms of 'what Ashes offers to me', I can experience it all already, with the main difference being that the complete destruction of a Node and therefore some absolute loss of related content, is more possible than it is in standard play of Elite Dangerous or FFXI (it is, actually, also possible in both those games as well, but it's just 'a change of control in an area that is considered more important than most others')

I can imagine more specific and granular forms of this, but it's hard to go very far beyond where Elite already is.

"An outbreak in this system has changed the missions in the Passenger Lounge so that rather than seeing sightseers who are going on joyrides, quarantines have led to requests from Medical Officers needing to go to different high tech systems with Pharmaceutical facilities, and long-haul explorers who intend to get out of the area until the situation is resolved."

Ah okay I think I understand, basically that the main draw to Ashes is that macro-competition which at this point isn't really any more fleshed out than other similar games.

From my perspective, even though I am interested in the macro-competition, the main draw for me is both how good the individual experiences are that make up the macro-competitions, and how that improves the overall macro-competition experience. I think thats where the differentiation can occur, but I haven't played Elite to know for sure. But, I can't imagine the combat being that similar in a sci-fi themed game (if I remember right its sci-fi fps gameplay I think), so for example, if Ashes were to imrove upon these types of individual systems you don't feel like that would be a meaningful differentiator with the cascading effects that could have in the macro-competition experience and set Ashes apart even if the macro-competitions weren't as granular?

Azherae

Ace1234 wrote: »

@Azherae

The last thing I want is to be giving useless feedback to a developer with a really clear plan, because I 'think they forgot to consider something'. But the second-last thing I want is to not point out something they overlooked.

Ah, mine is flipped, thats why my posts probably come acrossed to them as some dork who thinks he's teaching them something they already know, but I do it anyways just in case theres that off chance they havn't thought about it in a certain way.

Therefore, in terms of 'what Ashes offers to me', I can experience it all already, with the main difference being that the complete destruction of a Node and therefore some absolute loss of related content, is more possible than it is in standard play of Elite Dangerous or FFXI (it is, actually, also possible in both those games as well, but it's just 'a change of control in an area that is considered more important than most others')

I can imagine more specific and granular forms of this, but it's hard to go very far beyond where Elite already is.

"An outbreak in this system has changed the missions in the Passenger Lounge so that rather than seeing sightseers who are going on joyrides, quarantines have led to requests from Medical Officers needing to go to different high tech systems with Pharmaceutical facilities, and long-haul explorers who intend to get out of the area until the situation is resolved."

Ah okay I think I understand, basically that the main draw to Ashes is that macro-competition which at this point isn't really any more fleshed out than other similar games.

From my perspective, even though I am interested in the macro-competition, the main draw for me is both how good the individual experiences are that make up the macro-competitions, and how that improves the overall macro-competition experience. I think thats where the differentiation can occur, but I haven't played Elite to know for sure. But, I can't imagine the combat being that similar in a sci-fi themed game (if I remember right its sci-fi fps gameplay I think), so for example, if Ashes were to imrove upon these types of individual systems you don't feel like that would be a meaningful differentiator with the cascading effects that could have in the macro-competition experience and set Ashes apart even if the macro-competitions weren't as granular?

I do.

The moment I see that Ashes has meaningfully improved on FFXI's individual systems, I'll consider it 'set apart' due to the PvP aspects (assuming those don't, in turn, become a detriment, and by that, I mean to PvX players who might otherwise stick to TL or AA2).

Hence why I say I just want the first 'FFXI+L2' game to come out (I didn't like ArcheAge 1 much for some reasons). If it's Ashes instead of 'full featured TL', or if they're 'equal' in quality, and Ashes 'wins' by having no Fast Travel and Nodes, great. (Despite liking TL combat better, I don't want TL to 'win' since that would imply Ashes falling short of the proposed vision).

Ace1234

@Azherae

I do.

The moment I see that Ashes has meaningfully improved on FFXI's individual systems, I'll consider it 'set apart' due to the PvP aspects (assuming those don't, in turn, become a detriment, and by that, I mean to PvX players who might otherwise stick to TL or AA2).

Hence why I say I just want the first 'FFXI+L2' game to come out (I didn't like ArcheAge 1 much for some reasons). If it's Ashes instead of 'full featured TL', or if they're 'equal' in quality, and Ashes 'wins' by having no Fast Travel and Nodes, great. (Despite liking TL combat better, I don't want TL to 'win' since that would imply Ashes falling short of the proposed vision).

Okay, im assuming the main system of concern is the economy? Other than that, what individual systems are of concern to you that is "not looking good by comparison to similar games", because from my perspective a lot of systems are sounding pretty solid by comparison, (at least in concept.) Which if that is the case then things would be going as you hope, if I understand correctly.

And I haven't seen enough of TLs combat to know if it will be better or not, what have you seen that implies this?

Ludullu

Over 70 comments while I was asleep

Azherae, what's your party's opinion would be on smth like this setup?

The game tracks account-wide PK Count History (i.e. even if your current count is 0, the game would know that you have 10 PKs overall; and the count itself is not account-wide)
Military nodes have access to the PKCH of players that have PKd people in the vicinity of allied nodes
Other nodes can request the full PKCH list by sending a Mayoral caravan to get it (requires a full back&forth track to do)
PKCH info needs to be retaken every month (could be more often)
Guards in nodes operate according to the available PKCH
Guard power exists on a sliding scale of "can kill a weak mob" to "literally immortal and hits like a truck" (controlled by the mayor choices)
Guards are positioned across the node in predetermined places, with a predetermined patrol route
Guards aggro onto mobs that enter a certain radius and onto PKers who enter x2 of that radius
Guard-killed targets don't drop loot ("killed" here means "Guard did any dmg to the target") and Guards don't aggro onto bosses
After a certain PKCH value Guards aggro onto a flagged player with that value
If there's been a PK, Guards over a certain lvl (let's say 3/5 minimum) will go to that location and stay there for a certain amount of time
Amount of Guards and the duration of their presence in that location is set by the Mayor (debatable)
All of the above don't apply to military nodes themselves

As I see it, this would be a player-controlled TL-like system. There'll be nodes that are very good for pvers, but the system itself doesn't remove the possibility of being killed at least once. The economic macro-competition is still present in the form of mayoral actions (and any influence on them by other players), node wars/sieges (wars could have a goal of "destroy the guard post in the node", which disables it for several days) and caravan attacks to prevent the Guards from knowing the latest info about PKCH.

And this would also enforce pve-based micro-competition on the spots themselves, while not removing a casual PKing as the last resort. In other words, your enforcer might not be able to PK as much as yall might need, but a random person can still use the system for their benefit. Obviously this doesn't prevent your entire party going corrupt one after the other, but this too would only be doable up to a certain extent.

I feel like this system would be a nice way to have a not-as-gamey application of TL's events.

Dygz

Azherae wrote: »

People misunderstand forced-PvP-averse vs owPvP-enjoyer in MMORPGs because of some stuff. Here's some of that stuff. If you poke me, I'll add more stuff or expand on this stuff.

1. A PvE-enjoyer (let's use a fisher), enters the game with the idea of getting good at fishing, building up knowledge, skill level, understanding of systems (plz donot assume they 'don't care about PvP'). That person is in micro-competition with every other fisher. When another person shows up at their fishing spot in a game with no forced PvP, their 'competition' is in 'who understands the fishing mechanics better and who honed their skills more'. In a game with forced PvP, their 'competition' can instantly become 'who is better at PvP'.

2. A PvP-enjoyer (let's say me, a 'fishing rights enforcer') enters the game with the idea of getting good at controlling an economic space. That person is in micro-competition with the PvP skill or the organizational ability (or zerg factor) of anyone who wants control of that economic space. But there's one catch to consider. In this case, the PvP-enjoyer has a vastly diminished incentive to cooperate compared to even a Survival game (but let's look at games where some attempt at simulating a world is happening, instead).

The 'flaw' in forced-PvP MMOs is contained in those two things above and all the fundamental issues relative to them that these games nearly never address, or cannot address because it would drastically warp gameplay. The result is, that all the 'real world equivalent' outcomes that 'would need to happen in the game, for it to make sense as a proper macro-competition', end up happening in terms of 'players existing in the world'. Basically, characters 'die' when their players leave the game due to the 'flaws', which are really just 'the equivalent of what would happen irl if too many immortal people with low incentives for cooperation entered an area'.

Mmmmn. So... I will say that this does not address my concern with non-consensual PvP.
I am non-competitive, so I would not feel any competition with other fisherman.
I would probably have some goal of gathering xx fish within the time frame allotted for that play session.
In this example, let's say I have an hour left in my play session so I should be able to gather 50 fish.
It's possible that another fisherman could appear and we'd have to split the available resources in that spot, but typically that should just mean once there are no more fish in the first spot, I would move to a different spot.

If a PvPer arrives and kills me and it takes me five minutes for me to return and continue fishing for the remaining 55 minutes, I'm OK with that.

If I were confident there would be just one 5 minute battle and then I could continue fishing for the next 55 minutes... I might even choose to flag Purple.

If it means that I'm going to remain flagged purple for 10 minutes - thereby indicating that I'm still in the mood for PvP when I actually just want to fish - I'm not going to flag and will just let my attacker kill me as quickly as possible so I can return to fishing for the next 55 minutes.

It's often said that if I don't want to fight, I could just try to run.
Which is a viable stratgy with mobs since mobs typically have tethers. It's typically easy enough to escape.
In PvP - gamers don't have tethers, so there is no guarantee that the attempt to escape will only last 5 or 10 minutes. Or that the entire encounter will only last 5 or 10 minutes.

It's fairly common that the PvPer who does not ackowledge the concept of non-consensual PvP will attempt some form of corpse camping because it's easier to hunt for prey when you know they are likely to return to the same spot to retrieve their loot drop(s). Or could be a reasonably good guess the victim will want to return that spot or a nearby spot to continue fishing.

How much time is that player "stealing" from my play session goals? Especially if I've dropped some fish.
I may have lost that first 5 minutes worht of fish. Then I'd have to spend another 5 minutes re-gathering that amount of fish. Plus the 5 or 10 minutes it took to resolve the PvP encounter. That's easily a third of my play session that has stolen by some other player.
And I'm going likely to be enraged by that.

And I'm not necessarily going to feel much better if I win the PvP battle, but my attacker returns 2 or 3 times because they love dueling with other players even if they lose a couple times. Again... that could be a quarter to a third of my play session time stolen.
And I'm going to be pissed.
Because I'd rather play an MMORPG where I can't be attacked when I'm not in the mood for PvP and could just conintue to pursue my game session goals - which is, in this case fishing.
And then, when I am in the mood for PvP, I could go sign up for a Siege or a Caravan raid/defense.

I don't play multiplayer RPGs to be competitive. I play multiplayer RPGs to be cooperative with other players.
And, yeah, while I would probably tolerate PvP during Sieges and Caravans (even while mostly ignoring direct PvP combat as much as possible), I'd prefer to be teamed with other players v NPCs and mobs during those encounters. Similar to D&D.

Dygz

blat wrote: »

It's an MMO, a big dynamic world. It's back to the point I tried to make earlier:
It's like everyone wants to jump into a massively multiplayer online world... and then play mini-games in instances.

Here you say MMO. I'm not really talking about MMOs in general.
If I want to engage in PvP in an MMO, I would play an MMO FPS.
I've played D&D for 40 years and only encountered PvP once - at the 15 year mark.
I don't play multiplayer RPGs to PvP. I play multiplayer RPGs to team with other players vs NPCs, mobs and the Environment. Because that is the very foundation of RPG gameplay.
Instances really have nothing to do with this topic.

blat wrote: »

There are plenty of people on all sides here, I just get the impression that the PvEers are mad fussy about it all, whereas it's actually the PvPers who are generally more forced into PvE content than the other way around. IMO.

Who has been mad fussy?
It's a pretty pleasant discussion as far as I've seen.
We're just sharing our different perspectives of how we like to play MMORPGs. And our perspectives of rulesets we don't like to play.

Of course "PvPers" are going to generally be forced to PvE in RPGs because PvE is the very foundation of the RPG genre.
PvEers are not suggesting that PvE be added to Fighting games or FPS games or other genres that are fundamentally PvP. Or to Sports games.

That being said. I think the veterans of these Forums for the most part understand that there are not a lot of MMORPGs that adequately support those who love to PvP in MMORPGs. Again, even the devs of L2, ArcheAge and EvE have chosen to lessen the focus on PvP in the current MMORPGs they're developing compared to their previous games.
So, yeah.. it's great for Ashes to cater to the PvP playstyle. It's just clear that Ashes does not adequately support my playstyle so I will primarily be playing other games that do. I expect to play more Pax Dei than Ashes because Pax Dei has large zones with PvP turned off.
I will likely spend more time helping Fantmx tend his farmstead in Pax Dei than I will on his Freehold in Ashes because I won't need to be concerned about PvP at all while I do that in Pax Dei, though I could be attacked on the Freehold in Ashes.

Dygz

Azherae wrote: »

Also, the reason why Survival games work is related to their sociology being better (less fiat protections, immortality, ability to just logout, etc) and the reason why people like PvP competitive games that aren't MMOs better is because they're more streamlined.

Hmmn. Typically, I don't like Survival games much because they tend to be very Sandboxy and refquently are more real-world mundane than High Fantasy.

But, I'm loving Nightingale.
I play it like it's an RPG.
I love the High Fantasy, Gaslamp setting (a close sibling to my favorite genre: Steampunk)
Sound design is immersive. UE5 visuals are , of course, stunning.
And it's a Themebox, rather than a Sandbox.

I don't know that I've noticed a difference in the immortality and ability to log out in both MMORPGs and Survival Games. I'd say I'm not as much of a fan of full Inventory drop that tends to be a staple in Survival games.

Ludullu

Dygz wrote: »

It's often said that if I don't want to fight, I could just try to run.
Which is a viable stratgy with mobs since mobs typically have tethers. It's typically easy enough to escape.
In PvP - gamers don't have tethers, so there is no guarantee that the attempt to escape will only last 5 or 10 minutes. Or that the entire encounter will only last 5 or 10 minutes.

It's fairly common that the PvPer who does not ackowledge the concept of non-consensual PvP will attempt some form of corpse camping because it's easier to hunt for prey when you know they are likely to return to the same spot to retrieve their loot drop(s). Or could be a reasonably good guess the victim will want to return that spot or a nearby spot to continue fishing.

I don't remember if I asked this before. What game did you experience the "chase" in before? Cause I'm mostly used to the more campy side of things, though it's usually not camping and simply "this is now my spot, so pick another".

Or are you mostly talking about the sheer possibility of the rare griefer choosing you as his next target and hunting you until you leave the game?

Dygz

Azherae wrote: »

I'm personally saying that people don't care 'that there is no content designed around them'. Technically there is a lot of content designed around 'them'. They just lose access to that content sometimes to anyone who likes that content and is also better at them in PvP. If by 'content designed around them' you mean 'content that others can't interrupt', that's a whole different way of looking at it, from what I'm trying to address, hence the shift to splinter topic.

Mmmmn. Yeah. For me.. It doesn't really matter who is better at PvP. It's still a lose/lose scenario even if I win the PvP battle. Especially since I have 0 motivation from "Risk v Reward". The dropped loot I might pick up would not actually be perceived as a consolation for the stolen time.

Typically, the point at which I'm driven off of PvP-Optional servers is after I've already spent an hour in PvP and had my fill of an activity that I consider to be more hardcore than I usually want to play.
I want to do just about anything else for the rest of my play session except PvP. But, I'm stalked by someone who recognizes me from that PvP battle or someone stumbles upon me while I'm waiting for the PvP flag to cool down.
The PvPer attacks me. I tell them, "Hey. You know, I've had my fill of PvP for the day. I just want to pick some flower right now. If you want to PvP, we can do that for an hour tomorrow."
And, of course, they respond, "Why are you flagged for PvP if you don't want PvP!??! Why are you in this PvP enabled zone if you don't want to PvP!??!"

I experience that as if I'm a photographer or referee in a boxing ring and a boxer punches me in the face.
I'm all, "WTF. I'm not here to fight you. I'm just taking pictures (adjudicating the fight)!"
The boxer screams, "Brah! Why are you in the ring if you don't want to get PUNCHED in THE FACE??? I'm gonna PUNCH you in the FACE!! Step in the ring - I'm gonna PUNCH you... in the FACE!! RAHR!"
Even if I'm able to knock the fucker out, I'm still going to be pissed off that that encounter happened.
I might like taking pictures of boxing or refereeing boxing, but if the rule is going to be if you step in the ring you auto-consent to getting punched in the face, I will take photos or referee for some other sport where there is no chance of me getting punched in the face.

Noaani

NiKr wrote: »

What game did you experience the "chase" in before?

This was fairly common in Archeage.

One example (by no means the only from that game) would be if you were harvsting logs or water for Archeum or regrading. If you saw someone else going after the same thing as you, you didn't jusg chase them off - you hunted them and killed them.

If all you do is chase them off, then they will go to one of the other spawns for that same resource. Since these resources spawn in clumps of 8 and have a 75 minute respawn timer, you didn't want that person going after the resource you were going after next.

If the player in question was pesky enough, it was fairly normal for players to hinder their activities in those zones to the point where the player moves.

The closest thing I can think of that Archeave would have similar to the concept of a single camp spot that you are talking about is in the form of game fishing.

Game fishing location would move around the map, and when you find one (assuming you are looking for one), you would park up and, well, go fishing.

Depending on how many people you had with you, and how far away you were from somewhere you could drop your fish off, it could take you a few hours to clear that fishing location. You would potentially defend that spawn location like you would an L2 camp spot - but even then you had to go back to a storage location to drop your fish off fairly often, so you would want to kill any other players nearby that may take your spot while you have to stow your fish.

Dygz

Ace1234 wrote: »

If there was a ton of instanced fishing competitions/content for example, I don't think you should be able to go into the open world and sell your fish or anything like that. I think there could be fun instanced fishing content, and its just that, its own experience using the design philosophies of Ashes, with rewards only relevant to that particular system (even if it takes place visibly within the open world within some in-game structure or something).

*meh*
I have 0 interest in instanced fishing.
I enjoy fishing in the Open World in New World. Especially with PvP toggled off.
So, I expect to play more NW than Ashes - if NW is still available to play when Ashes finally releases.

Ace1234 wrote: »

Whereas, fisherman in the open world, would choose to participate in the open world for the added layers and complexity that it provides, and can sell fish in the open world because they earned those fish in the open world. Two separate experience options for different types of players, that is more the reasoning behind what I was saying. Maaaaybe allow for fish earned in the open world to be used in the instanced content, or better yet another "mode" where your open world rewards are relevant in that instanced content. You can see how scope creep could start to become a problem, though the conflict bwtween the different types of players within the playerbase could also be appeased to a higher degree, on the other hand.

Why would there be more more "complexity" to the Fishing in the Open World?
And why would I desire more complexity? Other than an obsession with PvP combat?
I think this, again, is a key difference between the original 2nd Pillar of Meaningful Conflict and what it's been replaced with; the obsession for Risk v Reward.

I consider fighting over fish to be petty and meaningless. I have no desire for Fishing to be "more complex" due to "Risk v Reward".
Again, here, "Risk v Reward" just means, "If you want to acquire (highly valued) Fish, you have to be willing to engage in PvP combat." Which, of course, does not suit my playstyle.
But that can be great fun for gamers with Steven's playstyle.

Ludullu

Noaani wrote: »

One example (by no means the only from that game) would be if you were harvsting logs or water for Archeum or regrading. If you saw someone else going after the same thing as you, you didn't jusg chase them off - you hunted them and killed them.

If all you do is chase them off, then they will go to one of the other spawns for that same resource. Since these resources spawn in clumps of 8 and have a 75 minute respawn timer, you didn't want that person going after the resource you were going after next.

I mean, to me this is just the same as spot defending in L2. It's just a bigger spot, due to the respawn timer (same was true for several locations in L2 as well).

If that's what Dygz is talking about - ok. But it seems like it's not? And considering Dygz' non-competitiveness, I'd imagine he wouldn't care much about that specific type of the material, as long as he can get the material in some other way or in some other place.

Also, did people in AA control all respawn spots at all times or was player respawn locations so damn far away from the resource that killing a competitor would stop them from coming back in time? Or was it more about "if I move/act in just the right way, I can gather all the resources right at the time of them spawning, but if there's even a single competitor - the timing is off"? Cause I definitely had those kinds of situations in L2 and killing the competitor over and over until he was made sure that he can't win was definitely the answer (though this was still in one general location, so I wouldn't call this "the chase").

Dygz

JustVine wrote: »

All I want is for AoC to expand its player base as much as is reasonable within their own goals. They want crafting and have put a lot of thought to making both the economic side of crafting and the social side of crafting feel right. I think we can all agree that more people feeding Ashes economy will make any server more interesting and fun. So it's important we keep the ones that can actually like the game with some nudges from the game designers in rather than 'elsewhere' yeah?

Nighitngale has the best and most immersive Crafting I've ever experienced.
I would love for Ashes to have the same depth to their Crafting, but...
Nightingale is a co-op Survival Game. I don't think its Crafting system would be good for Player Economy in an MMORPG.
(I'm a commie/hippie and not a fan of Player Economy because gamers are too greedy, but... lots of people love Player Economy, so...)

Ace1234

@Dygz

Why would there be more more "complexity" to the Fishing in the Open World?
And why would I desire more complexity? Other than an obsession with PvP combat?
I think this, again, is a key difference between the original 2nd Pillar of Meaningful Conflict and what it's been replaced with; the obsession for Risk v Reward.

I consider fighting over fish to be petty and meaningless. I have no desire for Fishing to be "more complex" due to "Risk v Reward".
Again, here, "Risk v Reward" just means, "If you want to acquire (highly valued) Fish, you have to be willing to engage in PvP combat." Which, of course, does not suit my playstyle.
But that can be great fun for gamers with Steven's playstyle.

Correct, the idea behind that would not be aimed at your playstyle.

*meh*
I have 0 interest in instanced fishing.
I enjoy fishing in the Open World in New World. Especially with PvP toggled off.
So, I expect to play more NW than Ashes - if NW is still available to play when Ashes finally releases.

"Instanced" in the way I meant it could still take place in the open world, I intended for it to be more of a catch all term that includes "safe zone" where you can be in the open world and have your experience uniterupted from things like non-consensual pvp, within the context/point I was making in that post. So basically "fishing in the open world with the pvp toggled off" was an included potential option, within my statement there.

Noaani

NiKr wrote: »

Noaani wrote: »

One example (by no means the only from that game) would be if you were harvsting logs or water for Archeum or regrading. If you saw someone else going after the same thing as you, you didn't jusg chase them off - you hunted them and killed them.

If all you do is chase them off, then they will go to one of the other spawns for that same resource. Since these resources spawn in clumps of 8 and have a 75 minute respawn timer, you didn't want that person going after the resource you were going after next.

I mean, to me this is just the same as spot defending in L2. It's just a bigger spot, due to the respawn timer (same was true for several locations in L2 as well).

Spot defending when the spot takes 10 minutes to cross on foot?

Spot defending where there are literally player houses in the middle of that spot that you don't care about at all?

Spot defending when there are multiple rival castles in that spot? (not that castles meant much in Archeage, but still).

Helic

JustVine wrote: »

All I want is for AoC to expand its player base as much as is reasonable within their own goals. They want crafting and have put a lot of thought to making both the economic side of crafting and the social side of crafting feel right. I think we can all agree that more people feeding Ashes economy will make any server more interesting and fun. So it's important we keep the ones that can actually like the game with some nudges from the game designers in rather than 'elsewhere' yeah?

I think you're overestimating the value of raw numbers. 10,000 players in one instance of an open world is MASSIVE. You don't need it to grow arbitrarily. If you played with 4 friends, and you guys did some kind of epic 5v5 for some open world resources for an hour every day, you could fight a new group of 5 players every day and not run into the same person twice in 5 and a half years.

Arbitrarily growing population just means there will be other players playing on other servers that you will never interact with anyway. Similarly, as is obvious to everyone, casual players are the largest market in the world. Every profit driven corporation is going to dumb down its games to make them "fun and accessible" to the largest possible audience. I kind of thought the whole point of Steven & his attitude was to make a game that wasn't just seeking the most players and the most profit.

I don't mean this to be callous; when I played FFXIV, the game kind of felt like it was designed in such a way that a 5 or 6 year old could successfully play it. It wasn't mechanically challenging, it didn't take planning, there was no economic challenge, there was no intellectual challenge, no social challenge. I spammed MSQ alongside my duo and doing all the dungeons/raids at each expansion, and I think we may have died one time total. In literally hundreds of hours of gameplay. More of my focus was on my second monitor watching YouTube videos than was on the actual game.

The questing "system" felt downright insulting, just navigating to circles and question marks on the map. Anyway, this isn't a post just to crap on FFXIV, it's mostly just some frustration seeing masses of people taking a game that explicitly markets itself as NOT wanting to cater to them, where people funded millions of dollars on the original vision, the owner puts up millions of his own dollars to fund his vision of an MMORPG, and the internet is just flooded with people who want FFXIV v2 or WoW v2.

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