Can we please kindly keep on the subject? Again a TL;DR for those unwilling to read:
- PvP (PvE as well) needs constant influx of fresh blood to work and develop, or it slowly withers and dies - just as it does now
- new players need to be helped acquiring the gear needed to compete at the top. Gear takes a year to get as F2P, or a few thousand USD with money. This is a horrific price to pay to enjoy a game, because yes, you NEED the BiS gear to compete, or you get stomped. So mechanics such as Seasonal Gear, PvP-only enchants that drop in PvP at a decent rate need to be introduced.
- the new blood mentioned above is dissuaded by PvPing more seriously because of humiliating, repeated PUGSTOMPS. From 35 games or so this Module, only 4 were premades, and I was in premade teams with 17k-22k GS players with Perfects that do daily PvP for MONTHS.
The rest of 31 games were all against a hodge-podge mix of unfortunate souls with 6k-15k gear layouts not thought or optimized for PvP, dying in one rotation. Even worse were the cases where our full premades met semi-premades of decent players, with 3 newbies on their team.
The situation was slightly better in Mod 3, where I played a combined 1000-ish games on 2 chars.
So PUGSTOMPING needs to disappear. Better MATCHMAKING, bracketed, should be introduced
It should be essential for a business offering a product to make things fair for ALL users. At this time, things are extremely unfair and very frustrating for almost everybody PvPing, including the top players with a smidgen of conscience.
The purpose of this topic is to help Cryptic develop things FAIRLY for their playerbase through suggestions and discussion.
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adernathMember, Neverwinter Knight of the Feywild UsersPosts: 0Arc User
edited September 2014
I find all suggestions good...
BUT
no way I'd like seasons in this game... no no no.. it was already horrible in WoW, always being forced grind after the next gear.
I want to get geared and enjoy pvp, gear grind shounld be taken out of pvp completely IMO. With your seasons you have the same problem as before: people who have time/money to grind fast have the advantage. IMO only skill must matter in the end.
Suggestions to improve NW:
- Dualspec
- Better rewarding foundry and foundry pvp maps
- Custom PvP leagues with leaderboards instead of the current 'matchmaking'.
- Armory
- make jumping cost stamina (to reduce hopping in pvp)
no way I'd like seasons in this game... no no no.. it was already horrible in WoW, always being forced grind after the next gear.
I want to get geared and enjoy pvp, gear grind shounld be taken out of pvp completely IMO. With your seasons you have the same problem as before: people who have time/money to grind fast have the advantage. IMO only skill must matter in the end.
We need to find a compromise between MMO PvP and FPS (no gear) PvP.
Take out all gear, all customization, and many are unhappy.
Take out all progression and goals, and again, many are unhappy.
We need to keep in mind people came here expecting an MMO. Gearing up and customization of build are essential parts of MMOs.
So we need to retain them both, in the most fair way possible.
I think Seasons are just that. They allow for :
- periodic resets of the Ladders
- new goals to be set each few months
In a Season PvP model, all you have to do is PLAY PvP. The model is design to let you have all gear in a tier in a few weeks of normal play.
Will time investment play a role? Yes, it still do.
As Kripparian put it once, something needs to make a difference between players in an MMO.
A combination of Dedication and Skill is the best way to separate players IMO.
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ironzerg79Member, Neverwinter Moderator, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 4,942Arc User
edited October 2014
I agree that one of the biggest issues is the lack of population.
If I was handed the reins, the first thing I would do is eliminate levels from PvP. Everyone, from level 4-60 fights in the same bracket.
Everyone is bolstered up to level 60, and given a flat set of stats. Basically, a level 4 and a level 60 have exactly the same stats. The only difference is a level 60 has all their feats, skills and powers, putting them at a distinct advantage. Obviously this gap closes the closer a toon gets to 60. But it shouldn't be so great that a lower level can't at least compete.
Then you take the gear. Make it all PvP specific. Remove tenacity. In theory, by normalizing stats across all players, you can induce the baseline effects of tenacity, without having tenacity. Then the only way to increase your stats above the baseline is to use PvP gear. And normalize the stats on the PvP gear so that they're much lower than PvE gear, but they're effective in PvP. A high end PvE piece might have 600 crit. A high end PvP piece might only have 200. However, that 200 crit is extremely valuable in PvP, because outside of PvP pieces, there's no way to get more stats.
Do the same with enchantments, armor enchants and weapon enchants. And make these only attainable through PvP, dropped in matches, rewards or through glory. Perfect Vorpals have no effect in PvP. Make something like a Perfect Sinister Vorpal, that only affects your crit severity versus other players. Add Sinister Barkshields, Sinister Soulforge, Sinister Bloodtheft, etc...
Artifacts as well. We have four PvP artifacts to chose from. I would add a fifth that's attainable at a lower level via a PvP-centric quest, that's relatively easy to do, at level 20 when you get your choice of a PvE artifact. But it's a totally separate thing, and the PvP artifact does nothing outside of PvP, and the PvE artifact does nothing in PvP.
And on top of this, you do match making based on gear levels. And you don't mix gear levels. If someone has a PvP gearscore of 15k (high end, but lower because of overall lower stats in PvP) and their queue is too long, they can take off gear to drop their gearscore and make up for lower stats with more skill. Or they can wait for a high gearscore match. Once they're in a match, their gear is locked so they can't change it. But competing against higher gearscore players earns you more Glory, so you have to weigh whether or not it's better (or more fun) for you to wait for a higher match, or jump into a lower one. Another option would be for the queue to automatically drop the stats of a higher gearscored player if no match can be found, and inject them into a lower gearscore match, but normalize their stats accordingly.
The net effect should still be that higher geared, PvP-centric toons always do have an advantage against a non-geared, PvE-centric toon, but the gap isn't so great as to be completely uncompetitive.
So you have a system where:
a) The entire playerbase is able to fill the same queue
b) Gear still matters, but has a smaller effect
c) Skill trumps gear
d) People who earn more gear in PvP by playing more PvP have an advantage over PvE players
e) PvE items never become BiS and required for people who want to PvP, and vice versa. PvP items are never BiS for PvE players.
lack of participates is because of the gap and AD requirement to become competitive. Theres not enough people to fill the queues if brackets were introduced. PvPers are turned off from the need to grind, pay money, or wait for months upon months before being able to "play the game" the only people left who pvp are generally the twinks.
Twinks always pay obscene amounts of cash to get ahead of the game, these people need places like PvP to flaunt and slap people around with their newly earned power. Sure there are some who want to fight on even ground (pvpers) but these people are outshadowed by the twinks, and cryptic would lose alot of money if they took away their ability to show their power and feel dominant.
So nope, i dont think realistically PvP will ever be "fixed" not with foundation this game is built on (gear progression etc).
However it doesn't mean they couldnt release new maps or game modes to make things more interesting.
lack of participates is because of the gap and AD requirement to become competitive. Theres not enough people to fill the queues if brackets were introduced. PvPers are turned off from the need to grind, pay money, or wait for months upon months before being able to "play the game" the only people left who pvp are generally the twinks.
Overall this is a realistic approach. considering the foundations of the game, they will probably never bother to improve it to the point where PvP is a great experience.
However, if we are to seriously solve the situation (as PvP is in a serious crisis, and looks to get worse in Mod 5), you NEED to make it a fair experience.
Will it be painful at the start because of lower playerbase?
Yes.
Will the experience improve, resulting in attracting more and more people to PvP?
Yes again.
There's really no other chance to fix PvP once and for all, and make this game relevant in this department. You see, thing is the game mechanics are awesome and pretty unique, and this foundation should be built on and exploited by the devs.
Balanced, fair PvP =easier to develop than intricate raids with lots of mechanics. At least we would have some type of REAL endgame, instead of daily grind.
Overall this is a realistic approach. considering the foundations of the game, they will probably never bother to improve it to the point where PvP is a great experience.
However, if we are to seriously solve the situation (as PvP is in a serious crisis, and looks to get worse in Mod 5), you NEED to make it a fair experience.
Will it be painful at the start because of lower playerbase?
Yes.
Will the experience improve, resulting in attracting more and more people to PvP?
Yes again.
There's really no other chance to fix PvP once and for all, and make this game relevant in this department. You see, thing is the game mechanics are awesome and pretty unique, and this foundation should be built on and exploited by the devs.
Balanced, fair PvP =easier to develop than intricate raids with lots of mechanics. At least we would have some type of REAL endgame, instead of daily grind.
For me, it's not about the PVP mechanics. It's about the players. For the most part, in my experience, PVPers are jerks. No amount of GS brackets or gear equalization can fix that.
I am trying here to make PvP fair for everybody, especially for newcomers. They are the lifeblood for any MMO. At this point, PvP is driving them away. I suggested a way to improve this situation considerably and make PvP an awesome activity in Neverwinter.
Don't derail this for personal vendettas.
You have ways to improve my suggestions? Read the first post here, and then post your own suggestions. I have already edited my OP because people's opinions.
- create brackets based on rating. Each bracket contains, as rewards, better gear, so there is something to work for in PvP
I'd be ok with cosmetics. That's about it. If you have to earn the better gear in the new bracket you probably rubber band down to your lower bracket. Even if its a slight difference it matters. The baseline supposition in balancing a thing should be that opposing players are equally competent so the outcome of any match should be essentially random. Slight advantages that turn 50/50 into 60/40 for no reason, nah.
- make specific PvP enchants obtainable SOLELY by PvPing. NO SHORTCUTS. Alternative: take out all enchants, create slotless PvP gear.
I like slotless gear a lot more. You shouldn't start a match with an advantage over people. Its totally absurd in anything that wants to look remotely competitive.
- make gear relatively easy to obtain. It shouldn't take months to get what you want
That would be nice.
- REMOVE REFINING FROM PvP!!!
- Make PvP SEASONS, up to 3 months or so in length
- Reset Leadeboard(s) and statistics each season
- Introduce new tiers of PvP gear each new season, making last season's gear obsolete. All obtainable SOLELY BY PvPing.
Why? And how is this better than what we have?
Seasons are a nice idea. Having a new map each season would be cool. Considering how complicated and intricate the current two maps are giving them 3 months to make another one would be a stretch. I would like to see ice rivenscar with slightly higher walkways for example.
I think they should just give you the pvp gear in a pvp inventory and the stuff you get from pvping is still hats or whatever.
I think limiting the gear is the most important thing. With 7k to 21k differences and a continually expanding soup of different artifacts having any idea of what actual class balance looks like gets increasingly impossible. Leave it all in pve where no one gets locked into spawn
I addressed the need to have gear upgrades in a few past responses. Lemme reiterate why it's kinda necessary.
- there needs to be a sense of purpose.
- there needs to be some character improvement
- there needs to be a sense of progression
Why? Because, it is an RPG. Character development is essential. We cannot have gear-less models as in a FPS game.
So we need to have nice, BALANCED rewards. Of course, such a model needs extensive testing to make sure we avoid negative sides.
As for enchants, and why they are necessary: they open up min-maxing and customizing builds. So I think they should stay, as long as you can get them from PvP alone.
Think about this as a means to get enchants:
- DPS class? Triple Kill will net you a random Rank 7 (max rank already), tradeable to PvP vendor (not sellable for Ad).
- Healing/pure support? Triple clutch-save (for example) and you get a R7.
Now, let's say you got an Azure R7 and you don't want it. You can trade it for a radiant or w/e at some vendor in a 4 to 1 ratio for another type of enchant of your choosing. So get 4 random enchants that you don't need, go to vendor, exchange for what you want.
Farming and gearing up need to remain in one form or another. It's an MMO game and we NEED (and want) progression.
But they need to be done in a satisfactory way for the playerbase.
If its about min maxing I don't see why don't just throw 10 of each into a pvp inventory to let you pick your loadout. Like why even start with an imbalance if the end state is to have it erased.
As for progression I dunno. I think getting into and maintaining your position in a higher bracket is important. This is what progression looks like to me.
This is from a vastly more popular game which I won't mention
A nova 4 is a guy who can aim his weapon a decent amount of the time but has little awareness or ability to play as part of a team or to create opportunities. A Legendary Eagle is an agile monster who will take your head off and who should be feared. A global elite is probably cheating or might be a guy who plays matches for significant quantities of money.
Because you can see the rankings the nova 4 wants desperately to be good enough to get higher. To me that's progression. You get better or you stay with people at your level. Or as so many dmgs have been told if you play like a badge you stay a badge.
Put a load of displayable badges into the game that are neverwinter specific and its the same thing. Though if they let us keep the weapon of the revolution, the ak47 i would like that even if it doesn't fit the lore.
It would be nice for the dcs to have achievable goals though. That I agree with wholeheartedly.
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nezraalMember, Neverwinter Knight of the Feywild UsersPosts: 0Arc User
edited October 2014
Rating-based BRACKETS, with GEAR per BRACKET - yes
GEAR AVAILABILITY - no, pve should have value
GEAR is made OBSOLETE next SEASON - no, time given to farm gears should not be taken away
Why SEASONS? - yes, but I think it's already there with release of each mod
Additionally:
a) Make a PvP type which is not Capture the flag, i.e. it involves killing opponents as score.
b) Make GG more available and do not count win / loss as Leaderboard rating
c) Another interesting new PVP Type system could be:
- EVERYONE START WITH A LOW TIER GEAR.
- with EACH KILL get CURRENCY to purchase your OWN gear.
Something like what they have in LOL (League of Legends)
GEAR AVAILABILITY - no, pve should have value
GEAR is made OBSOLETE next SEASON - no, time given to farm gears should not be taken away
PvE should have value, of course, but... for PvE.
If you follow closely on my first post, you see that I describe how gear would come and go - and be way easier to get.
Why do I want to make gear come and go? So people have constant GOALS to achieve.
Nobody wants to farm forever. We want to do FUN stuff - PvP, or kill PvE Bosses.
As for Seasons, they aren't structured enough to be called that yet. Seasonal winners (maybe top 1%?) should receive some prize, such as some awesome unique mount, that would make them stand out of the crowd.
PvP, i would love to be able to play it more, im a player thats been arround since just after beta release and tbh have never really been good at PvP, sadly that gap has only gotten bigger and bigger as relative gear levels have widened.
I think in all my time here across 10 char at level 60 ive played less than 20 pvp matches, why because its not fun doing the spawn, step out, get killed, wait for timer, spawn and repeat thing ... Only once or twice have i been "lucky" and dropped into a good team, yes they carried me probably but i really enjoyed it when i lasted in combat more than 3-5 seconds !!!
If there was a beginner catogory for pug only where there was no enchants, no atrifacts, no boons, no anything, only standard 1st level PvP gear maybe people like me could actually compete a bit, at least enough for me to learn, improve and actually enjoy the PvP aspect of the game enough to actually want to do it more.
Picture the setting :-
Lord Neverember has decided to host a series of gladiatoral games to determine the best warriors in NW, on entry to the arena we who are going to amuse the plebs (not insulting btw just refering to the masses as the Romans once did) get to pick a set of T1 armour that Lord Neverember is laying on for us to borrow for this match up. No additional stuff, just the city's ruler wanting am ammusing match up where only skill and not gear determines the winner
The easy solution is to filter by class and paragon. SW is OP and wins hands down because he's 2v1? No problem when the whole match is 5 SW vs 5 SW. That is, 5 SW temptation vs 5 SW temptation. Or 5 SW fury against 5 SW fury.
The easy solution is to filter by class and paragon. SW is OP and wins hands down because he's 2v1? No problem when the whole match is 5 SW vs 5 SW. That is, 5 SW temptation vs 5 SW temptation. Or 5 SW fury against 5 SW fury.
LOL imagine 5 perma stealth vs 5 perma stealth .... it literally would never end as no one could find each other
The easy solution is to filter by class and paragon. SW is OP and wins hands down because he's 2v1? No problem when the whole match is 5 SW vs 5 SW. That is, 5 SW temptation vs 5 SW temptation. Or 5 SW fury against 5 SW fury.
This thread is about Matchmaking, Rewards and PvP overall. SW is NOT OP at all and one of the weakest PvP classes with the DC.
Making changes like this which are obviously just meant to point out something that you consider an "issue" (i.e. you died to SW and cannot make a "SW is OP topic cause it gets deleted) would just destroy the game.
If there was a beginner catogory for pug only where there was no enchants, no atrifacts, no boons, no anything, only standard 1st level PvP gear maybe people like me could actually compete a bit, at least enough for me to learn, improve and actually enjoy the PvP aspect of the game enough to actually want to do it more.
Yeah this would be what would happen if there would be properly set up PvP brackets. You would play with other beginners for a good while, then as you get better, ascend to another bracket with people with better gear and skills.
Any kind of bracket will fail, not enough people pvp-ing. Same goes for seasons, specific gear and so on. Oh and pvp is not player vs player, it's team vs team. OP, take the time to read all the constructive suggetions by community about pvp.
Any kind of bracket will fail, not enough people pvp-ing. Same goes for seasons, specific gear and so on. Oh and pvp is not player vs player, it's team vs team. OP, take the time to read all the constructive suggetions by community about pvp.
I ain't even sure how to categorize this post.
Make PvP fair and rewarding will result on attracting more PvPers. The system that I propose WORKS 100%.
Also please stop with the "constructive" stuff, makes you sound like a... you know. I came to profoundly hate this word.
Such changes just will fully destroying the pvp,
Look at "GW2" how the pvp there works and how they failed absolute,
and the same things you want it here, NO thanks!
because everyone got the same BORING stuffs.
we just need more PvP rooms or an options to create personal room,
Just a "Second specific PvP Queue options",
for Abvanced Players!
I work hard to get my Enchantments,
and it is good to use it on PvP also,
this don't need to change!
<::::::[]==0 GwF 0==[]::::::> ● Still waiting for the promised Improvement ●
Such changes just will fully destroying the pvp,
Look at "GW2" how the pvp there works and how they failed absolute,
and the same things you want it here, NO thanks!
because everyone got the same BORING stuffs.
we just need more PvP rooms or an options to create personal room,
Just a "Second specific PvP Queue options",
for Abvanced Players!
I work hard to get my Enchantments,
and it is good to use it on PvP also,
this don't need to change!
You will still have to work hard for your gear here as well, but newcomers will have a MUCH better chance to catch up.
I dont think, that adding another grindfest to the artefact grind will get more players to PVP.
Guys, read the OP lol.
I specifically say the items will be easier to obtain by JUST PLAYING. You won't need to grind RP or whatever for anything.
Some details:
- you PvP, you accumulate currency (Glory)
- you buy ALL the gear that you need with Glory alone. No RP needed anywhere.
- there's better gear/bracket, and new gear each season. This is needed, as people have to play for something, and have goals, as this is an MMO, and an RPG, where character development and customization is important.
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luxarkMember, Neverwinter Beta UsersPosts: 1Arc User
- there's better gear/bracket, and new gear each season. This is needed, as people have to play for something, and have goals, as this is an MMO, and an RPG, where character development and customization is important.
I just want to emphasis this point. It's why WoW started doing PvP seasons. They realized that if the gap between the top and the bottom got too big, it would kill the PvP aspect of the game.
They also realized they needed to segregate PvE and PvP gear. Early on in Vanilla WoW you had a great PvP scene. However, what started happening is top PvE players from the best raiding guilds would get super-rare raid drops or legendary weapons (only doable in PvE), and the dominate PvP simply because the gear they had was unobtainable via PvP. If you only liked to PvP, you had to accept you were going to eat dirt if you met a hardcore PvEer who casually liked to roflstomp people with their epics and legendaries in PvP.
The exact same thing is happening here, and it's strangling PvP to death.
I agree that gear is an important carrot to chase, but it can provide a lifetime advantage. Nor is PvP sustainable if people who love to PvP are forced to grind out an incessant amount of PvE to be able to "compete" in PvP.
I wish Cryptic would take a harder look at some of these ideas Magiquepurse put out there, as they're essential to the longterm health of PvP in Neverwinter. And while PvP may be a smaller community than PvE, having a healthy PvP community is still an important piece of having a healthy MMO overall.
"Meanwhile in the moderator's lounge..."
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gabrieldourdenMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,212Arc User
I like your proposals but fail to see how they will push people to spend money. It may work in a subscription game but not in NWO at this time.
It will work for a few reasons.
- the game has unique combat mechanics that can attract the hardcore PvP players that now are playing WoW, DOTA, LoL etc., if there is a proper implementation of PvP and fairness to the playerbase
- you can make money by FRUSTRATION (current model - you frustrate players and hope they will use credit card to make the most of the game), or...
- you can make money by HAPPINESS (desired model - you make players happy with you, and wanting to throw money at you)
Needless to say which model is the proper F2P one and the moral path to walk.
To make players HAPPY, you need to be FAIR to them and offer them ways to fully enjoy the content by playing itself.
Then, you capitalize financially by putting up for sale a range of COSMETICS and slight BOOSTERS (think about an XP booster so one can get to 60 faster, it is not imbalancing the game in any way), none of them offering power for sale to the players.
Happy and satisfied players
>PURCHASES
>financial heaven.
The model I described works already in other F2P titles. I have witnessed people in the other game forums ASKING devs to put up more stuff on thr cash shop so they can buy it. Yes, people did that, as they were extremely pleased with the fair model chosen by the company.
I just want to emphasis this point. It's why WoW started doing PvP seasons. They realized that if the gap between the top and the bottom got too big, it would kill the PvP aspect of the game.
They also realized they needed to segregate PvE and PvP gear. Early on in Vanilla WoW you had a great PvP scene. However, what started happening is top PvE players from the best raiding guilds would get super-rare raid drops or legendary weapons (only doable in PvE), and the dominate PvP simply because the gear they had was unobtainable via PvP. If you only liked to PvP, you had to accept you were going to eat dirt if you met a hardcore PvEer who casually liked to roflstomp people with their epics and legendaries in PvP.
The exact same thing is happening here, and it's strangling PvP to death.
I agree that gear is an important carrot to chase, but it can provide a lifetime advantage. Nor is PvP sustainable if people who love to PvP are forced to grind out an incessant amount of PvE to be able to "compete" in PvP.
I wish Cryptic would take a harder look at some of these ideas Magiquepurse put out there, as they're essential to the longterm health of PvP in Neverwinter. And while PvP may be a smaller community than PvE, having a healthy PvP community is still an important piece of having a healthy MMO overall.
Thanks for the support and for detailing up how things went in that other MMO, which was definitely my inspiration for writing up the long OP.
You are correct on every point you made and echoed my thoughts exactly.
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ironzerg79Member, Neverwinter Moderator, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 4,942Arc User
- you can make money by HAPPINESS (desired model - you make players happy with you, and wanting to throw money at you)
Exactly.
Happy players play your game more consistently. They become more open to buying stuff in the cash shop, or throwing money at a special or two. Plus, happier players are your best marketing resource towards attracting new players. And new players keep the game fresh and exciting for everyone.
You don't have to monetize PvP in order to squeeze every dime out of it. By having a healthy PvP community, you can create a positive halo effect that encourages activity (and thus spending) on other aspects.
And even then, if glory is a more important currency, you can monetize glory boosters. Or you could monetize "tier boosters" for people who are happy to skip past certain tiers, and jump right into higher tier combat without having to work their way up (and assume they're ready for the challenge).
You can do what GW2 does and sell "fancy finishers". Sure, any scrub can do a basic stomp, but only the best humiliate their fallen opponent by dropping a cow on them, or getting a llama to dance around their fallen corpse. Sell people "battle flags" that work like the PvP Banners, but are cosmetic only. Nothing says, "I own this point" like planting your own flag to taunt the enemy.
Things like that. Again, just like PvE, there's plenty of ways to monetize PvP without players feeling like
they need to grind PvE or shortcut with cash to stay competitive.
EDIT: Since pets can't be used in PvP, make cosmetic only pets. Give people a bard pet that follows them around, and every time you kill a player, he sings a song about how awesome you are. Bonus points if the player is forced to listen to the entire song while he waits to to respawn.
Another FPS MOBA type game (Super Monday Night Combat) I played a while ago sold "taunts". You could taunt whenever you wanted, but if you killed a player, and you "taunted" as they died, they had to watch a brief 4-5 second cut scene of the taunt. And you got bonus points on the kill. The bad thing was you were totally vulnerable for those 4-5 seconds where you taunting.
Comments
- PvP (PvE as well) needs constant influx of fresh blood to work and develop, or it slowly withers and dies - just as it does now
- new players need to be helped acquiring the gear needed to compete at the top. Gear takes a year to get as F2P, or a few thousand USD with money. This is a horrific price to pay to enjoy a game, because yes, you NEED the BiS gear to compete, or you get stomped. So mechanics such as Seasonal Gear, PvP-only enchants that drop in PvP at a decent rate need to be introduced.
- the new blood mentioned above is dissuaded by PvPing more seriously because of humiliating, repeated PUGSTOMPS. From 35 games or so this Module, only 4 were premades, and I was in premade teams with 17k-22k GS players with Perfects that do daily PvP for MONTHS.
The rest of 31 games were all against a hodge-podge mix of unfortunate souls with 6k-15k gear layouts not thought or optimized for PvP, dying in one rotation. Even worse were the cases where our full premades met semi-premades of decent players, with 3 newbies on their team.
The situation was slightly better in Mod 3, where I played a combined 1000-ish games on 2 chars.
So PUGSTOMPING needs to disappear. Better MATCHMAKING, bracketed, should be introduced
It should be essential for a business offering a product to make things fair for ALL users. At this time, things are extremely unfair and very frustrating for almost everybody PvPing, including the top players with a smidgen of conscience.
The purpose of this topic is to help Cryptic develop things FAIRLY for their playerbase through suggestions and discussion.
BUT
no way I'd like seasons in this game... no no no.. it was already horrible in WoW, always being forced grind after the next gear.
I want to get geared and enjoy pvp, gear grind shounld be taken out of pvp completely IMO. With your seasons you have the same problem as before: people who have time/money to grind fast have the advantage. IMO only skill must matter in the end.
- Dualspec
- Better rewarding foundry and foundry pvp maps
- Custom PvP leagues with leaderboards instead of the current 'matchmaking'.
- Armory
- make jumping cost stamina (to reduce hopping in pvp)
We need to find a compromise between MMO PvP and FPS (no gear) PvP.
Take out all gear, all customization, and many are unhappy.
Take out all progression and goals, and again, many are unhappy.
We need to keep in mind people came here expecting an MMO. Gearing up and customization of build are essential parts of MMOs.
So we need to retain them both, in the most fair way possible.
I think Seasons are just that. They allow for :
- periodic resets of the Ladders
- new goals to be set each few months
In a Season PvP model, all you have to do is PLAY PvP. The model is design to let you have all gear in a tier in a few weeks of normal play.
Will time investment play a role? Yes, it still do.
As Kripparian put it once, something needs to make a difference between players in an MMO.
A combination of Dedication and Skill is the best way to separate players IMO.
If I was handed the reins, the first thing I would do is eliminate levels from PvP. Everyone, from level 4-60 fights in the same bracket.
Everyone is bolstered up to level 60, and given a flat set of stats. Basically, a level 4 and a level 60 have exactly the same stats. The only difference is a level 60 has all their feats, skills and powers, putting them at a distinct advantage. Obviously this gap closes the closer a toon gets to 60. But it shouldn't be so great that a lower level can't at least compete.
Then you take the gear. Make it all PvP specific. Remove tenacity. In theory, by normalizing stats across all players, you can induce the baseline effects of tenacity, without having tenacity. Then the only way to increase your stats above the baseline is to use PvP gear. And normalize the stats on the PvP gear so that they're much lower than PvE gear, but they're effective in PvP. A high end PvE piece might have 600 crit. A high end PvP piece might only have 200. However, that 200 crit is extremely valuable in PvP, because outside of PvP pieces, there's no way to get more stats.
Do the same with enchantments, armor enchants and weapon enchants. And make these only attainable through PvP, dropped in matches, rewards or through glory. Perfect Vorpals have no effect in PvP. Make something like a Perfect Sinister Vorpal, that only affects your crit severity versus other players. Add Sinister Barkshields, Sinister Soulforge, Sinister Bloodtheft, etc...
Artifacts as well. We have four PvP artifacts to chose from. I would add a fifth that's attainable at a lower level via a PvP-centric quest, that's relatively easy to do, at level 20 when you get your choice of a PvE artifact. But it's a totally separate thing, and the PvP artifact does nothing outside of PvP, and the PvE artifact does nothing in PvP.
And on top of this, you do match making based on gear levels. And you don't mix gear levels. If someone has a PvP gearscore of 15k (high end, but lower because of overall lower stats in PvP) and their queue is too long, they can take off gear to drop their gearscore and make up for lower stats with more skill. Or they can wait for a high gearscore match. Once they're in a match, their gear is locked so they can't change it. But competing against higher gearscore players earns you more Glory, so you have to weigh whether or not it's better (or more fun) for you to wait for a higher match, or jump into a lower one. Another option would be for the queue to automatically drop the stats of a higher gearscored player if no match can be found, and inject them into a lower gearscore match, but normalize their stats accordingly.
The net effect should still be that higher geared, PvP-centric toons always do have an advantage against a non-geared, PvE-centric toon, but the gap isn't so great as to be completely uncompetitive.
So you have a system where:
a) The entire playerbase is able to fill the same queue
b) Gear still matters, but has a smaller effect
c) Skill trumps gear
d) People who earn more gear in PvP by playing more PvP have an advantage over PvE players
e) PvE items never become BiS and required for people who want to PvP, and vice versa. PvP items are never BiS for PvE players.
Twinks always pay obscene amounts of cash to get ahead of the game, these people need places like PvP to flaunt and slap people around with their newly earned power. Sure there are some who want to fight on even ground (pvpers) but these people are outshadowed by the twinks, and cryptic would lose alot of money if they took away their ability to show their power and feel dominant.
So nope, i dont think realistically PvP will ever be "fixed" not with foundation this game is built on (gear progression etc).
However it doesn't mean they couldnt release new maps or game modes to make things more interesting.
and also the featured satirical comedic adventure "A Call for Heroes".
Overall this is a realistic approach. considering the foundations of the game, they will probably never bother to improve it to the point where PvP is a great experience.
However, if we are to seriously solve the situation (as PvP is in a serious crisis, and looks to get worse in Mod 5), you NEED to make it a fair experience.
Will it be painful at the start because of lower playerbase?
Yes.
Will the experience improve, resulting in attracting more and more people to PvP?
Yes again.
There's really no other chance to fix PvP once and for all, and make this game relevant in this department. You see, thing is the game mechanics are awesome and pretty unique, and this foundation should be built on and exploited by the devs.
Balanced, fair PvP =easier to develop than intricate raids with lots of mechanics. At least we would have some type of REAL endgame, instead of daily grind.
For me, it's not about the PVP mechanics. It's about the players. For the most part, in my experience, PVPers are jerks. No amount of GS brackets or gear equalization can fix that.
I am trying here to make PvP fair for everybody, especially for newcomers. They are the lifeblood for any MMO. At this point, PvP is driving them away. I suggested a way to improve this situation considerably and make PvP an awesome activity in Neverwinter.
Don't derail this for personal vendettas.
You have ways to improve my suggestions? Read the first post here, and then post your own suggestions. I have already edited my OP because people's opinions.
- create brackets based on rating. Each bracket contains, as rewards, better gear, so there is something to work for in PvP
I'd be ok with cosmetics. That's about it. If you have to earn the better gear in the new bracket you probably rubber band down to your lower bracket. Even if its a slight difference it matters. The baseline supposition in balancing a thing should be that opposing players are equally competent so the outcome of any match should be essentially random. Slight advantages that turn 50/50 into 60/40 for no reason, nah.
- make specific PvP enchants obtainable SOLELY by PvPing. NO SHORTCUTS. Alternative: take out all enchants, create slotless PvP gear.
I like slotless gear a lot more. You shouldn't start a match with an advantage over people. Its totally absurd in anything that wants to look remotely competitive.
- make gear relatively easy to obtain. It shouldn't take months to get what you want
That would be nice.
- REMOVE REFINING FROM PvP!!!
- Make PvP SEASONS, up to 3 months or so in length
- Reset Leadeboard(s) and statistics each season
- Introduce new tiers of PvP gear each new season, making last season's gear obsolete. All obtainable SOLELY BY PvPing.
Why? And how is this better than what we have?
Seasons are a nice idea. Having a new map each season would be cool. Considering how complicated and intricate the current two maps are giving them 3 months to make another one would be a stretch. I would like to see ice rivenscar with slightly higher walkways for example.
I think they should just give you the pvp gear in a pvp inventory and the stuff you get from pvping is still hats or whatever.
I think limiting the gear is the most important thing. With 7k to 21k differences and a continually expanding soup of different artifacts having any idea of what actual class balance looks like gets increasingly impossible. Leave it all in pve where no one gets locked into spawn
I addressed the need to have gear upgrades in a few past responses. Lemme reiterate why it's kinda necessary.
- there needs to be a sense of purpose.
- there needs to be some character improvement
- there needs to be a sense of progression
Why? Because, it is an RPG. Character development is essential. We cannot have gear-less models as in a FPS game.
So we need to have nice, BALANCED rewards. Of course, such a model needs extensive testing to make sure we avoid negative sides.
As for enchants, and why they are necessary: they open up min-maxing and customizing builds. So I think they should stay, as long as you can get them from PvP alone.
Think about this as a means to get enchants:
- DPS class? Triple Kill will net you a random Rank 7 (max rank already), tradeable to PvP vendor (not sellable for Ad).
- Healing/pure support? Triple clutch-save (for example) and you get a R7.
Now, let's say you got an Azure R7 and you don't want it. You can trade it for a radiant or w/e at some vendor in a 4 to 1 ratio for another type of enchant of your choosing. So get 4 random enchants that you don't need, go to vendor, exchange for what you want.
Farming and gearing up need to remain in one form or another. It's an MMO game and we NEED (and want) progression.
But they need to be done in a satisfactory way for the playerbase.
As for progression I dunno. I think getting into and maintaining your position in a higher bracket is important. This is what progression looks like to me.
This is from a vastly more popular game which I won't mention
A nova 4 is a guy who can aim his weapon a decent amount of the time but has little awareness or ability to play as part of a team or to create opportunities. A Legendary Eagle is an agile monster who will take your head off and who should be feared. A global elite is probably cheating or might be a guy who plays matches for significant quantities of money.
Because you can see the rankings the nova 4 wants desperately to be good enough to get higher. To me that's progression. You get better or you stay with people at your level. Or as so many dmgs have been told if you play like a badge you stay a badge.
Put a load of displayable badges into the game that are neverwinter specific and its the same thing. Though if they let us keep the weapon of the revolution, the ak47 i would like that even if it doesn't fit the lore.
It would be nice for the dcs to have achievable goals though. That I agree with wholeheartedly.
GEAR AVAILABILITY - no, pve should have value
GEAR is made OBSOLETE next SEASON - no, time given to farm gears should not be taken away
Why SEASONS? - yes, but I think it's already there with release of each mod
Additionally:
a) Make a PvP type which is not Capture the flag, i.e. it involves killing opponents as score.
b) Make GG more available and do not count win / loss as Leaderboard rating
c) Another interesting new PVP Type system could be:
- EVERYONE START WITH A LOW TIER GEAR.
- with EACH KILL get CURRENCY to purchase your OWN gear.
Something like what they have in LOL (League of Legends)
+ CAGI Calcultator
+ Liquid Tear Website
PvE should have value, of course, but... for PvE.
If you follow closely on my first post, you see that I describe how gear would come and go - and be way easier to get.
Why do I want to make gear come and go? So people have constant GOALS to achieve.
Nobody wants to farm forever. We want to do FUN stuff - PvP, or kill PvE Bosses.
As for Seasons, they aren't structured enough to be called that yet. Seasonal winners (maybe top 1%?) should receive some prize, such as some awesome unique mount, that would make them stand out of the crowd.
I think in all my time here across 10 char at level 60 ive played less than 20 pvp matches, why because its not fun doing the spawn, step out, get killed, wait for timer, spawn and repeat thing ...
If there was a beginner catogory for pug only where there was no enchants, no atrifacts, no boons, no anything, only standard 1st level PvP gear maybe people like me could actually compete a bit, at least enough for me to learn, improve and actually enjoy the PvP aspect of the game enough to actually want to do it more.
Picture the setting :-
Lord Neverember has decided to host a series of gladiatoral games to determine the best warriors in NW, on entry to the arena we who are going to amuse the plebs (not insulting btw just refering to the masses as the Romans once did) get to pick a set of T1 armour that Lord Neverember is laying on for us to borrow for this match up. No additional stuff, just the city's ruler wanting am ammusing match up where only skill and not gear determines the winner
Pick your gear ....
Pray to your god ....
Stand by the door ....
Go and fight, win or die trying
LOL imagine 5 perma stealth vs 5 perma stealth .... it literally would never end as no one could find each other
Making changes like this which are obviously just meant to point out something that you consider an "issue" (i.e. you died to SW and cannot make a "SW is OP topic cause it gets deleted) would just destroy the game. Yeah this would be what would happen if there would be properly set up PvP brackets. You would play with other beginners for a good while, then as you get better, ascend to another bracket with people with better gear and skills.
I ain't even sure how to categorize this post.
Make PvP fair and rewarding will result on attracting more PvPers. The system that I propose WORKS 100%.
Also please stop with the "constructive" stuff, makes you sound like a... you know. I came to profoundly hate this word.
Look at "GW2" how the pvp there works and how they failed absolute,
and the same things you want it here, NO thanks!
because everyone got the same BORING stuffs.
we just need more PvP rooms or an options to create personal room,
Just a "Second specific PvP Queue options",
for Abvanced Players!
I work hard to get my Enchantments,
and it is good to use it on PvP also,
this don't need to change!
You will still have to work hard for your gear here as well, but newcomers will have a MUCH better chance to catch up.
That is all.
Guys, read the OP lol.
I specifically say the items will be easier to obtain by JUST PLAYING. You won't need to grind RP or whatever for anything.
Some details:
- you PvP, you accumulate currency (Glory)
- you buy ALL the gear that you need with Glory alone. No RP needed anywhere.
- there's better gear/bracket, and new gear each season. This is needed, as people have to play for something, and have goals, as this is an MMO, and an RPG, where character development and customization is important.
They like upgrades. Not getting their gear made useless.
I just want to emphasis this point. It's why WoW started doing PvP seasons. They realized that if the gap between the top and the bottom got too big, it would kill the PvP aspect of the game.
They also realized they needed to segregate PvE and PvP gear. Early on in Vanilla WoW you had a great PvP scene. However, what started happening is top PvE players from the best raiding guilds would get super-rare raid drops or legendary weapons (only doable in PvE), and the dominate PvP simply because the gear they had was unobtainable via PvP. If you only liked to PvP, you had to accept you were going to eat dirt if you met a hardcore PvEer who casually liked to roflstomp people with their epics and legendaries in PvP.
The exact same thing is happening here, and it's strangling PvP to death.
I agree that gear is an important carrot to chase, but it can provide a lifetime advantage. Nor is PvP sustainable if people who love to PvP are forced to grind out an incessant amount of PvE to be able to "compete" in PvP.
I wish Cryptic would take a harder look at some of these ideas Magiquepurse put out there, as they're essential to the longterm health of PvP in Neverwinter. And while PvP may be a smaller community than PvE, having a healthy PvP community is still an important piece of having a healthy MMO overall.
I like your proposals but fail to see how they will push people to spend money. It may work in a subscription game but not in NWO at this time.
Born of Black Wind: SW Level 80
It will work for a few reasons.
- the game has unique combat mechanics that can attract the hardcore PvP players that now are playing WoW, DOTA, LoL etc., if there is a proper implementation of PvP and fairness to the playerbase
- you can make money by FRUSTRATION (current model - you frustrate players and hope they will use credit card to make the most of the game), or...
- you can make money by HAPPINESS (desired model - you make players happy with you, and wanting to throw money at you)
Needless to say which model is the proper F2P one and the moral path to walk.
To make players HAPPY, you need to be FAIR to them and offer them ways to fully enjoy the content by playing itself.
Then, you capitalize financially by putting up for sale a range of COSMETICS and slight BOOSTERS (think about an XP booster so one can get to 60 faster, it is not imbalancing the game in any way), none of them offering power for sale to the players.
Happy and satisfied players
>PURCHASES
>financial heaven.
The model I described works already in other F2P titles. I have witnessed people in the other game forums ASKING devs to put up more stuff on thr cash shop so they can buy it. Yes, people did that, as they were extremely pleased with the fair model chosen by the company.
Thanks for the support and for detailing up how things went in that other MMO, which was definitely my inspiration for writing up the long OP.
You are correct on every point you made and echoed my thoughts exactly.
Exactly.
Happy players play your game more consistently. They become more open to buying stuff in the cash shop, or throwing money at a special or two. Plus, happier players are your best marketing resource towards attracting new players. And new players keep the game fresh and exciting for everyone.
You don't have to monetize PvP in order to squeeze every dime out of it. By having a healthy PvP community, you can create a positive halo effect that encourages activity (and thus spending) on other aspects.
And even then, if glory is a more important currency, you can monetize glory boosters. Or you could monetize "tier boosters" for people who are happy to skip past certain tiers, and jump right into higher tier combat without having to work their way up (and assume they're ready for the challenge).
You can do what GW2 does and sell "fancy finishers". Sure, any scrub can do a basic stomp, but only the best humiliate their fallen opponent by dropping a cow on them, or getting a llama to dance around their fallen corpse. Sell people "battle flags" that work like the PvP Banners, but are cosmetic only. Nothing says, "I own this point" like planting your own flag to taunt the enemy.
Things like that. Again, just like PvE, there's plenty of ways to monetize PvP without players feeling like
they need to grind PvE or shortcut with cash to stay competitive.
EDIT: Since pets can't be used in PvP, make cosmetic only pets. Give people a bard pet that follows them around, and every time you kill a player, he sings a song about how awesome you are. Bonus points if the player is forced to listen to the entire song while he waits to to respawn.
Another FPS MOBA type game (Super Monday Night Combat) I played a while ago sold "taunts". You could taunt whenever you wanted, but if you killed a player, and you "taunted" as they died, they had to watch a brief 4-5 second cut scene of the taunt. And you got bonus points on the kill. The bad thing was you were totally vulnerable for those 4-5 seconds where you taunting.
Here's an example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CTEKqVkiz0I
The "time for tea" and "cool guys don't look at explosions" were some of my favorites.