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Why PVP in MMOs is - most of the time - pointless

SystemSystem Member, NoReporting Posts: 178,019 Arc User
Here is my thesis why PVP in MMOs is - most of the time or for most players - pointless:

MMO combat engines are not built for PVP. They have to handle much more than a dedicated PVP game engine and therefore will never handle PVP as well as a dedicated PVP game.

To satisfy hard core gamers, there must be stuff that is much more powerful than the stuff available to the casual gamer. Since hard core gamers play the game more often, they also have more player skill. This increases the gap between casual and hard core gamers even more than in a dedicated PVP game where basically everybody has access to the same characters/gear.

When you go into a match in a PVP game you usually know against whom you're going, and you can pick someone who is aproximately in your league (or the really cool games like - say - Star Craft (II) - take care of this). In MMOs you are sent against random people who may be much better (or much worse) than yourself. The dreaded laws of statistics make it highly probable that the battle is totally unbalanced.


What IMO could help would be to implement some kind of ladder system (independend of your rank) that just tracks how good you are and tries to create match ups with players/groups who are in your league.

That would make PVP more interesting for everybody.

Until then, I think, PVP is more KVV (Killer vs Victim) than - well PVP.
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