Player collision needs removed.

Wanted to bring up player collision in Ashes of Creation and make a case for removing it. I know it adds some realism, but the downsides seem to outweigh the benefits, especially in a game that emphasizes open-world PvP.

To start, the potential for abuse with collision is huge. Imagine this: You’re exploring a node, minding your own business, and you find yourself in a tight spot—a corner or a narrow hallway. Suddenly, a group of players moves in, surrounding you on all sides. There’s no way to get past them without flagging for PvP, and the second you do, they’re on you, using your desperation to escape as an easy excuse to gang up and take you down. In an open-world PvP game, sure, conflicts like these are going to happen, but being physically trapped with no way out, just because of collision, feels unfair and leaves players with no options.

On top of that, collision is causing noticeable performance issues in high-density areas, especially around the spawn point where new players are all loading in at once. *Cough* LIONHOLD SPAWN *cough*. Hundreds of characters spawning into the same tiny area forces the game to juggle where everyone is positioned to avoid overlap. The sheer number of calculations is slowing down the engine. This isn’t just immersion-breaking; it’s creating massive lag spikes that impact everyone around the area, and it’s clear the game struggles to keep up with the load.

Given the game’s focus on events and node wars, removing player collision would smooth out performance and make movement much more manageable in crowded areas. I get that PvP is central to Ashes of Creation, but being able to move around freely without physical blocking would improve the experience for both new and seasoned players. Maybe if collision is here to stay, it could be limited to specific situations or zones where it adds more than it takes away. Just my take, but I’d love to hear what everyone else thinks.

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Trikki

Imagine this: You’re exploring a node, minding your own business, and you find yourself in a tight spot—a corner or a narrow hallway. Suddenly, a group of players moves in, surrounding you on all sides.

Sounds like the greatest reason to leave collision in. Thanks for inspiring my imagination and reminding me to be aware of my surrounding at all times..

Citing performance reasons at this stage is a weak argument. If on launch it's a gamebreaking problem, then I'll agree with you. Until then, the potential for amazing and tactical gameplay with collision is too good to ever consider removing.

itsemji

Trikki wrote: »

Sounds like the greatest reason to leave collision in. Thanks for inspiring my imagination and reminding me to be aware of my surrounding at all times..

This isn’t just my opinion—Albion Online had this exact problem with player collision in open-world PvP. Groups would trap players and force PvP interactions, creating so much negative feedback that developers had to adjust collision rules in certain areas. The issue is that griefing causes player drop-off. Fewer players mean fewer PvP interactions and, ultimately, less tactical fun for everyone, including the griefers.

Trikki wrote: »

Citing performance reasons at this stage is a weak argument. If on launch it's a gamebreaking problem, then I'll agree with you. Until then, the potential for amazing and tactical gameplay with collision is too good to ever consider removing.

It’s happened in other games. It doesn’t matter what stage of the game it is—alpha or not—there is a reason Albion, ESO, and WoW removed collision from the game in certain aspects, if not entirely. (Look into the O(n^2) complexity)

WoW saw severe lag in crowded events before removing player collision for the sake of performance in major cities and events. ESO also initially had NPC collision and found that the calculations overwhelmed servers, so they left it out entirely for players to improve response times during events. Removing player collision reduces these calculations significantly, allowing the server to handle high numbers of players more efficiently.

Tahiti02

Wow can barely handle 50 people on the screen at one point, not exactly the best comparison.

I like the collision, it adds depth to the game-play and honestly its been barely 3 days. Lets give if a few more months before we start sayings its a bad idea.

triageuk

Surely, the tactical advantage of a guild or alliance stopping people from entering an area is a good thing?

itsemji

triageuk wrote: »

Surely, the tactical advantage of a guild or alliance stopping people from entering an area is a good thing?

I wouldn't mind collision on in node wars or battle events, things like that. But not in cities. People are already unintentionally trapping people at the commission board or at crafting stations. People will undoubtedly use it to grief people. When people get griefed, they stop playing. Just trying to keep the longevity of the game in mind.

nanfoodle

Collision is turned off where you spawn for the first time. Ashes has the ability to turn it off if or where its needed. The game has live GMs that will take care of people exploiting systems outside of there intended use, unlike most of the MMOs out there.

BaSkA_9x2

Collision has its pros and cons. If the cons outweigh the pros, then hopefully they will remove it.

itsemji wrote: »

I wouldn't mind collision on in node wars or battle events, things like that. But not in cities. People are already unintentionally trapping people at the commission board or at crafting stations. People will undoubtedly use it to grief people. When people get griefed, they stop playing. Just trying to keep the longevity of the game in mind.

This sounds like a good idea. Collision off in nodes plus a 50 meter radius, but on everywhere else.

proky

Uncommon Sense

Collision is about the only thing preventing zerg trains. I understand why you might dislike it.

But when you get used to it or have played games then utilize this feature you will come to respect why its required in a mass PVP game.

The benefits far outweigh the cons

Crotchless

it feels good having it. only issue is see is the same as what happened in archeage... people using hitboxes to block off bridges on caravans, then your stuck and cant pass, while they kill you off and destroy the caravan.

So as long as this is addressed were fine

Verus

We can have the benefits without the cons. While it is valuable to be able to bar people from a certain spot, or for more to not be able to joint the front line when it is full, there are opportunities for over-abuse. If a cornered player could use their dodge charges to roll through players, this is the most obvious solution.

Human walls remain as a strategic tool and consequence of population, and an injection of player agency is introduced.

Daave

I remember in Archeage there being multiple situations where you couldn't even enter/exit a building to do a quest because there was more than a couple people near the doorway. Stuff like that is just annoying and should be mitigated somehow if collision is kept everywhere.

Rym

I heavily disagree with player collision removal.

When I first saw that my character has actual physical collision with other players, I thought to myself finally, a game that does it right.

Dreoh

proky wrote: »

No

My sentiments exactly

Uncommon Sense

Crotchless wrote: »

it feels good having it. only issue is see is the same as what happened in archeage... people using hitboxes to block off bridges on caravans, then your stuck and cant pass, while they kill you off and destroy the caravan.

So as long as this is addressed were fine

This 'issue' Sounds like intended game play to me...

I'f players want to be jerks and body block doors/quests/npcs...they will get a reputation and other players will kill them. Otherwise GMs will soon know about it and the problem I expect will get dealt with...

Choke points like chasms and bridges are exactly why collision is needed as it performs a focus point where smaller numbers can take larger/zerg groups that bottle neck...

If you don't have collision these points are less relevant as numbers can just faceroll...

Collision also make group formation relevant...Tanks can front line and defend while ranged can apply pressure from the back lines. This makes class roles actually matter and have purpose identity

When you take away collision you just create Clusterfudgery

Garrtok

Player collision is super important for pvp.

Winterfang

itsemji wrote: »

triageuk wrote: »

Surely, the tactical advantage of a guild or alliance stopping people from entering an area is a good thing?

I wouldn't mind collision on in node wars or battle events, things like that. But not in cities. People are already unintentionally trapping people at the commission board or at crafting stations. People will undoubtedly use it to grief people. When people get griefed, they stop playing. Just trying to keep the longevity of the game in mind.

You can jump over them or use one of the abilities in your toolkit.

Barab

Non issue from my experience and pvp in the open field will absolutely suck with it.

ilt

i think the collision is great as is

Uncommon Sense

if you had a chance to play Warhammer Online AOR or the current private server RoR and compare it to say GW2 WvW the open world PVP is night and day different.

with player collision making the conflict feal real compared to 2 blobs dry humping...

If it wasn't for the 2 faction imbalance and lack of server optimization Warhammer online would have held more ground as the RVR was fantastic for what it was...

I am feeling confident the group pvp combat/ node wars will be the glue that keeps players engaged.

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