Just found out about this game, looks super great, but if there is forced PvP I won't play it. Until I have confirmation of a toggle or garunteed PvE only server, I cannot support the game. I'm all for players having fun however they want, and that includes myself, I just want options for not engaging with the system at all, ever.
I find PvP enjoyable when I'm allowed to decide how and when I engage with it, but if I'm just trying to relax and do some grinding and someone decides I get to have a bad day because they want have fun griefing it just ruins my enjoyment and causes me to quit the game.
One bad experience can lose a customer forever, and people asking for constant open world full loot PvP and spouting their no risk no reward mentality aren't thinking ahead for the long term survivabilty of the game. Player experience is everything, especially for an MMO which needs an actual playerbase to survive, which means it needs to cater to casual and PvE only players like myself (who make up the majority of players IMO).
Looking forward to seeing the rest of development and supporting once I hear good news about the state of PvP! :)
For me its a big NO!
there is nothing more frustrating than being on a quest, collecting resources or just some mindless grinding and then get killed by another player, that is a big quit moment for many non pvp players. and world pvp also promotes a certain level of toxicity between players in the community.
For me pve and pvp should be a seperate thing so you as a player has a choice of taking part in pvp or not. a good example is ESO where there is a massive part of the map dedicated for pvp (wich is also faction wars) and non pvp players can play the pve content without the "fear" of getting killed for seemingly no reason just minding their own and also look at games like new world how much pvp do you actually see in the world?? almost none... even a game like Albion online has focused a lot more the last years on pve content because the vast majority of mmo players is not pvp players and there needs to be a place for both pve and pvp without forcing one or the other upon players
and lastly for those who read this sorry for my bad grammar.
Hello there!
New to the game and I absolutely love everything I've seen so far. When it comes to PvP I believe there can be a balance emplaced to serve both the pvp crowd and the people who don't like pvp.
I've seen a good few comments where people claim there is a need for risky gameplay and areas to make things exciting, I've also seen comments people have on how pvp can be turned to a lame experience due to gear or power imbalances. There is a way to fix this that actually can be done without much of a hassle if it's able to be implemented well.
I personally fall in the camp of 'no enforced pvp'. I am an MMO player that avoids pvp-centric games (like Albion, BDO or ArcheAge) simply because for me it's not enjoyable content. I know I'm bad at pvp and unable to really even defend myself in world pvp, and too often did I see in other games people more willing to ridicule you than help if you ask for help in general chat (as some of the pvp players here suggested is an option). Enforcing pvp in the world just makes the game niche past just 'conflict to make the game keep going'.
So, what do I believe a good fix is? A toggle, but not like a Warmode from WoW. The toggle would come with phasing pve-only players into a shard that has pvp disabled. This way, the overworld and some areas can be pvp-enabled as a default, but the pve-only zones will be an option that pve-players will be in and not worry about getting suddenly ganked for 2 hours because someone doesn't have anything better to do at max level. These phased areas can have less resource nodes for crafting and drops, to make the pvp areas more lucrative to risk (hence appeasing the 'risk more for more gains' people) but still be an enjoyable enough an experience for people who want to enjoy the story, play with friends and not stress that there's some high level ganker just around the corner ready to turn your session into a grief fest and (likely) leave a fully negative impression of the game to those affected.
I hope there can be a good compromise in this regard, I love pvp that is not as reliant on someone just overpowering you with their cumulated months/years of equipment and trinkets and theorycrafted sets and relies more on your skill as a player and team cohesion (like Crystalline Conflict is in FF).
Hello there!
New to the game and I absolutely love everything I've seen so far. When it comes to PvP I believe there can be a balance emplaced to serve both the pvp crowd and the people who don't like pvp.
I've seen a good few comments where people claim there is a need for risky gameplay and areas to make things exciting, I've also seen comments people have on how pvp can be turned to a lame experience due to gear or power imbalances. There is a way to fix this that actually can be done without much of a hassle if it's able to be implemented well.
I personally fall in the camp of 'no enforced pvp'. I am an MMO player that avoids pvp-centric games (like Albion, BDO or ArcheAge) simply because for me it's not enjoyable content. I know I'm bad at pvp and unable to really even defend myself in world pvp, and too often did I see in other games people more willing to ridicule you than help if you ask for help in general chat (as some of the pvp players here suggested is an option). Enforcing pvp in the world just makes the game niche past just 'conflict to make the game keep going'.
So, what do I believe a good fix is? A toggle, but not like a Warmode from WoW. The toggle would come with phasing pve-only players into a shard that has pvp disabled. This way, the overworld and some areas can be pvp-enabled as a default, but the pve-only zones will be an option that pve-players will be in and not worry about getting suddenly ganked for 2 hours because someone doesn't have anything better to do at max level. These phased areas can have less resource nodes for crafting and drops, to make the pvp areas more lucrative to risk (hence appeasing the 'risk more for more gains' people) but still be an enjoyable enough an experience for people who want to enjoy the story, play with friends and not stress that there's some high level ganker just around the corner ready to turn your session into a grief fest and (likely) leave a fully negative impression of the game to those affected.
I hope there can be a good compromise in this regard, I love pvp that is not as reliant on someone just overpowering you with their cumulated months/years of equipment and trinkets and theorycrafted sets and relies more on your skill as a player and team cohesion (like Crystalline Conflict is in FF).
Another way to do it is to make a level difference cap.
Level 40 vs level 45 okay you can win with skills. If you have a bigger difference, you can't attack.
That will prevent the high-level players to go to the starting zones and mass murder everyone they see, or gank you later on.
Another way to do it is to make a level difference cap.
Level 40 vs level 45 okay you can win with skills. If you have a bigger difference, you can't attack.
That will prevent the high-level players to go to the starting zones and mass murder everyone they see, or gank you later on.
Any level cap on PvP handicaps many of the social dynamics that make an MMO an MMO. Scars of Honor claims to be an "Old-School" MMO. Level capping or Toggling will kill that claim. If you want to protect low level players do it through GAME-PLAY and not arbitrary systems that prevent players from playing. Place guards in lowbie areas, have an alert system that notifies when enemies may be in the area, make it easy for lowbies to ask for help from fellow faction members, use terrain and world design to make it difficult for factions to invade each others cities or corpse camp, etc...
If you take away the danger, player friction and fear of loss you haven't created an MMO...you've created a boring "Safe-Space" that people will soon leave.
Any level cap on PvP handicaps many of the social dynamics that make an MMO an MMO. Scars of Honor claims to be an "Old-School" MMO. Level capping or Toggling will kill that claim. If you want to protect low level players do it through GAME-PLAY and not arbitrary systems that prevent players from playing. Place guards in lowbie areas, have an alert system that notifies when enemies may be in the area, make it easy for lowbies to ask for help from fellow faction members, use terrain and world design to make it difficult for factions to invade each others cities or corpse camp, etc...
If you take away the danger, player friction and fear of loss you haven't created an MMO...you've created a boring "Safe-Space" that people will soon leave.
Hey man, we are all brainstorming here. Our Game Designers are roaming the forums and Discord to gather your ideas, likes, dislikes, and etc.
So don't worry we never "pull the trigger" without making a research before that ^^
I am a fan of limiting ganking cause some claim it should be part of open world pvp... I say the only people who think ganking is fun are those who gank lowbies for sport. I'd rather not be harassed and camped by someone who thinks ruining another's time is fun, if im trying to get into the game. It's also very very poor sportsmanship and shows cowardice that someone would rather kill lowbies then fight someone of equal or better skill.
A level 50 say killing level 15's just makes those players frustrated and have a negative time with the game which can lead to them leaving and also telling others not to play if you dont wanna be harassed by someone. Players at level cap duking it out is fine, but most people I'd bet my life on do not like being ganked in mmo's the only people that like it are the gankers and campers.
World PvP is an absolute yes for me, however I know too well that it can go badly as well. So let's think of a solution to make it the least abusable.
1) I think what Puffy said about limiting PvP activity to levels around you is a good mitigating tool. Another thing to think about is gear. Few patches down the line, a max lvl character will be significantly more powerful than a max level character at launch. So a lvl 49 character in leveling gear wouldn't stand a chance against a fully geared lvl 50 character after few raids/pvp seasons have rolled out even though they only differ by 1 level. So setting item level ranges might be something to think about as well.
2) You could simply disable pvp in the starting zones as well, that's where the potential for pvp abuse is the highest. For later zones, if you want a more organic pvp ecosystem, you can set up bounties for players that killed you, as you said in one of your early YT videos. As long as that bounty rewards a good amount of pvp currency/valuable reward, there will be players waiting for them to appear to farm said currency/item. I think this, maybe coupled with lvl ranges is the solution we may want.
3) Another, much more difficult solution would be level scaling. This of course changes the game fundamentally, but it alleviates the problem of level difference altogether.
The PVP system of Warhammer Online would work very well in Scars of Honor:
From the starting area on, you can run without loading time into PVP zones, which could also be the place of quests and there meet players of the other faction.
This would reinforce the feeling of a lively and dangerous world and greatly increase the excitement of all quests there.
The PVP system of Warhammer Online would work very well in Scars of Honor:
From the starting area on, you can run without loading time into PVP zones, which could also be the place of quests and there meet players of the other faction.
This would reinforce the feeling of a lively and dangerous world and greatly increase the excitement of all quests there.
Warhammer Online (WAR) had the best implememntation of WPvP in any MMO I've played.
1. Keeps and Areas to control with meaningful and MASSIVE battles. Watch the Zerg potential...as I've seen it FIRST HAND and it destroyed WAR. I was in the guild that overran and destroyed 3 servers and was moving to a 4th when I quit. Nobody could compete with our numbers and organization....even when we tried to help them. Find a way to minimize the Zerg that doesn't look forced and you'll have a winner/
World of Warcraft Vanilla did some great things as well.
1. Quest NPC's that could be killed and needed defended if people wanted to complete quests in an area. Vanilla WoW was designed from the ground up to be a WPvP game. Even the Faction leaders are killable. This kind of friction between factions brought players together to defend areas and NPC's and helped forge lifetime Friends...and enemies on many servers. This friction is what modern MMO's are missing and what needs to come back to revive the genre.
2. DO NOT CENSOR CHAT! Player friction creates amazing WPvP. I've seen people leave a faction and completely restart a game just to hunt down @sshole players on their previous faction. This is wonderful, exciting game play. Good drama and keeps people playing. We've had BLOCK and MUTE buttons since the beginning of the interwebs and we don't need companies to choose what we see or read for us. A good argument with name calling in chat is good player friction. Most men have a story of how they met a good friend by getting in a fight with them...later they were laughing and having a beer together (women...not so much).
3. Please stop with "No killing lowbies." talk. Again...this creates player friction and interaction. Instead of whining about being killed by a high level player in Vanilla WoW...we just called for some help from a high level player and/or grouped up. It's an MMO. You're supposed to interact with other players. Negative and Positive player interaction forms bonds which create better game play. When I got camped by a higher level player I just wrote down their name, called for some help, and pushed harder to level so I could hunt them down and do the same to them.
STORY TIME: I was playing a Private WoW Vanilla server the other day when I decided to go hunt for a rare spawn pet. The pet wasn't there and the area was camped already, and my Hearthstone was on a 45 minute cooldown, so I decided to head over to Westfall. I proceeded to killed the Defias Messenger NPC, and a couple farmer quest NPC's by the bridge. Boy did I piss off the players in the area. I had four players chasing me around for 45 minutes while I killed players and NPC's all over Westfall and Elwyn Forest. I had more fun in that 45 minutes (and I bet the four players did too) than I had the entire time playing to my level. It was fun chase and they got me 3x before my Hearthstone was off cooldown. THAT IS WORLD PVP!
WPvP...the good and the bad, create memories and promote player retention in ways many people have forgotten. WPvP isn't just players hunting down players. It should be an integral part of the game. It should include Areas, NPC's, Players (of all levels), and the environment.
Find a good balance between these two (WoW and WAR) excellent examples and you'll create some fun and exciting WPvP for players to enjoy.