good ol dayz of world PVP.

[vindicatorx]

not really to be honest I hardly ever took part in other than being trusting and getting jacked after I had plenty of chances to be a jerk to them.

[birdfly]

I think flying mounts, and the Looking for random mechanic broke world PvP.

Back then, you had to get a group for wailing caverns, and spam trade, and general, and wo /who

Also crossroads would always get attacked by 60s, and there was tons of level 10s, 25s, 45s, and 60s in crossroad, it was always fun.

Now and days you can fly over areas with out worrying about getting ganked, or just teleport with Have Group will travel or Instant portal from LFR

[Asatru]

Back in the day Guards didn't 2 shot you when you got within 40 yards away.

[Natrii]

Only world pvp I really miss are Terran Mill and Quel Danas. QD was soo much fun...only took 3 hours to do daylies, but you enjoyed them because of the constant pvp to distract you from them.

[Stanton Biston]

That's not an insoluble problem. Just put all the NPCs like Transmog, Reforging etc. in the other capitals as well for a start. Players clog up SW/Org because they aren't given any incentive to go elsewhere. Ironically, decent World PvP would be such an incentive.

You miss my point.

If the faction leader dropped 10 conquest epics on a 6 hour spawn with a 4 hour variance, do you think the cities would be stable? If world PvP has enough incentive for people to do it, the volume of people would make the servers unstable. There's a reason Guild Wars is capping the total number of players that can participate in their scaled down RvR combat to 128 per faction TO START.

Data transmission increases exponentially the more players are present.

Actually there was quite a lot of 8v8 still going on until maybe half a year ago. The reason it got quiet is mainly because the game is very old; and everyone is running the same group setup by now. There aren't many capable opponents left, either. If I were to assemble a group again we'd just never die and probably keep switching realms and group setups due to boredom.

A.) Sounds real balanced there.

B.) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FileAOCSubchart.PNG


If the PvP was half as good as you claim, it would have a more loyal following. CounterStrike is still played by more than that many people.

[Feranor]

You miss my point.

If the faction leader dropped 10 conquest epics on a 6 hour spawn with a 4 hour variance, do you think the cities would be stable? If world PvP has enough incentive for people to do it, the volume of people would make the servers unstable. There's a reason Guild Wars is capping the total number of players that can participate in their scaled down RvR combat to 128 per faction TO START.

Data transmission increases exponentially the more players are present.

Who said that the only possible incentive would be to kill faction leaders? There could be stuff like captureable towns all over Azeroth and randomized events to direct the flow of players if necessary. World PvP isn't just "Let's raid Orgrimmar!" or the infamous TM<->SS zergfest.

A.) Sounds real balanced there.

I hope that's not too off topic (it's very relevant as to why PvP sucks in WoW ), but it's a bit more complicated than that. The basic group setup works like this:

2 Interrupters (Merc + Minstrel for Albion, Bonedancer + Berserker for Midgard, Champion + Blademaster for Hibernia)
1 Main CC (Sorceress for Albion, Pacification Healer for Midgard, Bard for Hibernia)
1 Main Assist/Debuffer (Cabalist for Albion, Spiritmaster for Midgard, Enchanter for Hibernia)
1 Assist Nuke/Utility Slot (Heretic for Albion, Runemaster for Midgard, Eldritch for Hibernia)
1 Main Healer (Friar for Albion, Augmentation Healer for Midgard, Druid/Warden for Hibernia)
1 Main Buffer + Buff Shearer (Cleric for Albion, Shaman for Midgard, Druid for Hibernia)

That's 7 out of 8. Now Albion adds a Theurgist (a caster that can spam temporary pets for insane interrupt), Midgard adds a second Spiritmaster for another permanent pet, nukes and stat debuffs and Hibernia either adds another caster or another healer.

Now, Hibernia is weaker for mainly two reasons:

1) Their main healer (Druid) is also their main buffer and buff shearer. But the important resistance buffs (body vs. Albion and spirit vs. Midgard) are on the Warden. So you can either run 2 Druids and take more damage from casters and melees (worse resistances and no Bladeturn), 1 Druid 1 Warden (the Druid won't have enough time to heal, rebuff and buff shear) or go for 3 healers (-> less damage output).

2) Hibernia doesn't have as many pets. Albion has 3 permanent pets (Minstrel, Sorceress, Cabalist) and the Theurgist can spam temporary ones, Midgard has 3 permanents (Bonedancer, Spiritmaster, Spiritmaster) and the Bonedancer's pet also has 3 pets of his own, so in an optimal situation they have 6. Hibernia has 1 pet per Enchanter and 1 very low level pet (i.e. it's a onehit) per Druid. Pets are extremely important because getting hit by anything that does damage or CC (even when immune) in DAoC is like a Strangulate in WoW.

There's also a difference between ToA (an expansion) servers and "classic" servers. On classic servers, casters aren't nearly as strong, which makes for a better balance. Unfortunately the classic servers died with the release of WAR (the players returning from WAR after its failure started playing on ToA servers again).

Before us Europeans switched to the US servers, everyone there was running pure tank groups for some obscure reason. Since there were two separate rush hours (19:00-24:00 Euro time and then again 01:00-06:00) it took a few years for them to adapt as they didn't meet us that often.

B.) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FileAOCSubchart.PNG


If the PvP was half as good as you claim, it would have a more loyal following. CounterStrike is still played by more than that many people.

- DAoC is old and worn out
- DAoC's PvP is skill-based, which means that if there are a couple of very strong groups running everyone else will just keep dying all night, which is quite deterrent.
- DAoC's PvE is ridiculous in many ways. Most players are PvE players, and WoW etc. are much more enjoyable if you only want PvE.

[Stanton Biston]

Who said that the only possible incentive would be to kill faction leaders? There could be stuff like captureable towns all over Azeroth and randomized events to direct the flow of players if necessary. World PvP isn't just "Let's raid Orgrimmar!" or the infamous TM<->SS zergfest.

You miss my point. It isn't about faction leaders. It's about the only current form of 40+ on 40+ PvP (excluding TB, I think). It's about the technical limitations in the form of excessive lag that occurs when such battles happen and that there is still a tremendous data bottleneck. I would be out of my element to talk exhaustively about TCP/IP stacks and network architecture, but the point is that WoW has never, ever been able to handle massive amounts of concurrent players without lag.

All the information above is factual. My data so to speak.

My claim is that there is no way for Blizzard to have a world PvP scenario that is any more satisfying than what we have, outside game mechanic innovation within the instanced scenarios. Essentially, the best we can hope for is a bigger; and, from a tactical and game mechanic point of view, more complex; Alterac Valley with potentially more players.

My warrant is that the system GW2 uses (excepting for network and hardware setups) could be used to solve population balance issues with a Halaa like zone, but as we've seen time and time again, any time there is anything 'worth doing', the player base does it en masse until it is no longer 'worth doing.' Like the World Bosses, Molten Front or the IQD. If there was an event such that it was possible to participate solo and such that it's rewards had a high and constant level of desirability, then plainly put, servers would always be crashing, thus making the event a 'failure'.

Unless there was instanced gating, like Tol Barad, but no one for 'true' World PvP likes that idea.

Which returns to my claim that sustainable World PvP is an impossibility given hardware constraints.

I hope that's not too off topic (it's very relevant as to why PvP sucks in WoW ), but it's a bit more complicated than that. The basic group setup works like this:

2 Interrupters (Merc + Minstrel for Albion, Bonedancer + Berserker for Midgard, Champion + Blademaster for Hibernia)
1 Main CC (Sorceress for Albion, Pacification Healer for Midgard, Bard for Hibernia)
1 Main Assist/Debuffer (Cabalist for Albion, Spiritmaster for Midgard, Enchanter for Hibernia)
1 Assist Nuke/Utility Slot (Heretic for Albion, Runemaster for Midgard, Eldritch for Hibernia)
1 Main Healer (Friar for Albion, Augmentation Healer for Midgard, Druid/Warden for Hibernia)
1 Main Buffer + Buff Shearer (Cleric for Albion, Shaman for Midgard, Druid for Hibernia)

That's 7 out of 8. Now Albion adds a Theurgist (a caster that can spam temporary pets for insane interrupt), Midgard adds a second Spiritmaster for another permanent pet, nukes and stat debuffs and Hibernia either adds another caster or another healer.

Now, Hibernia is weaker for mainly two reasons:

Now, I read the rest of this but I want to stop you here.

You've criticized WoW for being unbalanced, but your assertions is that there is 1 rather specific comp and that DAoC is also balanced is kinda silly. If there's only 1 real comp to run, then WoW must be especially balanced since RLS, RMP, (x(!W))LS, PHD are all valid, rank 1 comps.

1 comp, 1 way to play, 1 faction isn't even remotely balanced. It isn't even in the same field as balanced.

DAoC is old and worn out

People still play Zork.

- DAoC's PvP is skill-based, which means that if there are a couple of very strong groups running everyone else will just keep dying all night, which is quite deterrent.

Your descriptions make it seem formulaic and social skill and not play skill based. If you don't fit or can't fit into the mold, then you don't have the same opportunity. That's not skill. Being 'skill based' isn't a deterrent. If it was, no one would play actual skill based games online. And there wouldn't be a massive community for those skill based games.

- DAoC's PvE is ridiculous in many ways. Most players are PvE players, and WoW etc. are much more enjoyable if you only want PvE.

Even WAR gained people. Outside 1 patch, DAoC was in a state of perpetual decline.

Honestly, there's tons of reason why DAoC crumbled, and I wanted to see which you would pick to refute. Your omission of the big one and your narrow focus on gameplay show that in addition to being myopic, you lack a broad objective understanding of things. But if the game was as great as you claim, it wouldn't be in the state that it's in, or, at the very least other games would have come along to replace it, excepting for cases that otherwise validate my claim.

[Feranor]

You miss my point. It isn't about faction leaders. It's about the only current form of 40+ on 40+ PvP (excluding TB, I think). It's about the technical limitations in the form of excessive lag that occurs when such battles happen and that there is still a tremendous data bottleneck. I would be out of my element to talk exhaustively about TCP/IP stacks and network architecture, but the point is that WoW has never, ever been able to handle massive amounts of concurrent players without lag.

All the information above is factual. My data so to speak.

My claim is that there is no way for Blizzard to have a world PvP scenario that is any more satisfying than what we have, outside game mechanic innovation within the instanced scenarios. Essentially, the best we can hope for is a bigger; and, from a tactical and game mechanic point of view, more complex; Alterac Valley with potentially more players.

My warrant is that the system GW2 uses (excepting for network and hardware setups) could be used to solve population balance issues with a Halaa like zone, but as we've seen time and time again, any time there is anything 'worth doing', the player base does it en masse until it is no longer 'worth doing.' Like the World Bosses, Molten Front or the IQD. If there was an event such that it was possible to participate solo and such that it's rewards had a high and constant level of desirability, then plainly put, servers would always be crashing, thus making the event a 'failure'.

Unless there was instanced gating, like Tol Barad, but no one for 'true' World PvP likes that idea.

Which returns to my claim that sustainable World PvP is an impossibility given hardware constraints.

Well, I agree that one of the reasons why Blizz killed World PvP is that their servers/netcode cannot handle it (assuming it presents itself as a zergfest, which it only does if the game either rewards players for seeking them or if certain mechanics direct players towards them).

Then again, 'World PvP' does not equal 'zerg', DAoC's 8v8 was World PvP and it often involved no more than 40 players in one zone. And Vanilla WoW did have World PvP without those problems as long as you didn't go to Hillsbrad. I spent most of the time patrolling Felwood, Winterspring, STV, Plaguelands etc.

In any case, it's a stupid idea to try and offer just one PvP event like Halaa, because, as you said, everyone will farm the hell out of it until it's broken. The only comparable entity in DAoC would be a Relic raid, which often involved enough players to crash a PvP zone (in Old Frontiers, at least). But they don't happen that often.

Now, I read the rest of this but I want to stop you here.

You've criticized WoW for being unbalanced, but your assertions is that there is 1 rather specific comp and that DAoC is also balanced is kinda silly. If there's only 1 real comp to run, then WoW must be especially balanced since RLS, RMP, (x(!W))LS, PHD are all valid, rank 1 comps.

1 comp, 1 way to play, 1 faction isn't even remotely balanced. It isn't even in the same field as balanced.

Well, you could just as well say that all WoW comps are the same because they all feature 1 healer and 2 (CC heavy) DPS.

There are still a couple more fundamental differences between WoW and DAoC in that regard:

In DAoC, it takes about 1-2 days to get a char from creation to fully equipped for RvR. In WoW, every patch can spell doom for your class/spec because of some PvE contingency or because Ghostcrawler was killed by a Feral Druid once too often. Often a class/spec will remain broken for the rest of the expansion. This doesn't happen in DAoC. Buffs/Nerfs are done quite carefully and except for the occasional bug (which really only affected EU servers because they were lagging a few months behind in patches) there aren't any spikes or drops in terms of class/spec performance.

Thus, you know in advance which classes perform a certain role well and you can pick accordingly. And you won't have to reroll. For instance, a Matter Sorceress is complete and utter garbage. Always has been. Nobody plays it. Not even for shits'n'giggles. I don't see this as a balance problem because, for all intents and purposes, this spec doesn't exist. But that's just specs. There isn't a single class that doesn't perform well in 8v8 (with the exception of those classes designed for solo play, like archers, assassins and the Mauler). I just explained the basic group setup, as I said. You can just as well play Hibernia with a Vampiir or a Valewalker, or have an Animist as your third caster; and the same is true for the other realms.

The only thing that doesn't work (aside from using solo classes or building bogus setups that can't fulfil every necessary role) is to combine casters that don't use the same resistances (e.g. a Wizard does Heat or Cold damage, but a Cabalist can only debuff Spirit, Body and Energy resistances, so it's generally not a good idea to combine them).

People still play Zork.

And people still play DAoC. But the average "casual" player finds better content in other games. Aside from nostalgia and the likes, DAoC only has the best (potential) PvP to offer among MMOs. PvPers, however, are a very small minority. The most 8vs8 groups at one time on the same server were on Logres (around the year 2006 IIRC), maybe 15 groups total. If half of them were playing at the same time, that was ~60 players out of ~1500. And that's the most extreme example. The bigger servers had ~3000-3500 players online during rush hours, with maybe half a dozen 8vs8 groups. The rest was zerging keeps or doing PvE.

Your descriptions make it seem formulaic and social skill and not play skill based. If you don't fit or can't fit into the mold, then you don't have the same opportunity. That's not skill. Being 'skill based' isn't a deterrent. If it was, no one would play actual skill based games online. And there wouldn't be a massive community for those skill based games.

How so? I simply explained what roles need to be fulfilled in a group. Besides, unlike in WoW, in DAoC, players generally aren't bound to any specific class. In WoW, I'm a Feral. In DAoC, I'm Feranor. I've played Necromancer, Cleric, Reaver, Druid, Savage, Berserker, Warrior, Theurgist, Cabalist, Friar, Warden, Valewalker, Runemaster and Spiritmaster. So if the particular setup my group wants to play happens to favour a Thane over my Zerker; guess what, I'll make a Thane, no big deal.

What exactly do you mean by "play skill"? If I've given the impression that you just need to roll the cookie cutter setup I mentioned to win; that's not how it is. But DAoC does require a more diverse set of skills; it involves far more coordination and communication than, say, WoW.

Also, those games with "massive communities" are those that allow for spectators. One of the reasons why WoW failed as an eSport is that people who haven't played it themselves just see flashy effects and random numbers. Case in point, do you find this enjoyable to watch?

Even WAR gained people. Outside 1 patch, DAoC was in a state of perpetual decline.

True, but how is it relevant? The PvP community has never been a substantial part of the player base.

Honestly, there's tons of reason why DAoC crumbled, and I wanted to see which you would pick to refute. Your omission of the big one and your narrow focus on gameplay show that in addition to being myopic, you lack a broad objective understanding of things. But if the game was as great as you claim, it wouldn't be in the state that it's in, or, at the very least other games would have come along to replace it, excepting for cases that otherwise validate my claim.

I explained why people like me stopped playing it. That might've been beside the point in response to the graph you posted, which in turn is irrelevant to PvP. The reasons why the player base got smaller have little to do with the reasons why the amount of PvPers declined; and vice versa.

[Stanton Biston]

Well, you could just as well say that all WoW comps are the same because they all feature 1 healer and 2 (CC heavy) DPS.

There are still a couple more fundamental differences between WoW and DAoC in that regard:

In DAoC, it takes about 1-2 days to get a char from creation to fully equipped for RvR. In WoW, every patch can spell doom for your class/spec because of some PvE contingency or because Ghostcrawler was killed by a Feral Druid once too often. Often a class/spec will remain broken for the rest of the expansion. This doesn't happen in DAoC. Buffs/Nerfs are done quite carefully and except for the occasional bug (which really only affected EU servers because they were lagging a few months behind in patches) there aren't any spikes or drops in terms of class/spec performance.
[...]
How so? I simply explained what roles need to be fulfilled in a group. Besides, unlike in WoW, in DAoC, players generally aren't bound to any specific class. In WoW, I'm a Feral. In DAoC, I'm Feranor. I've played Necromancer, Cleric, Reaver, Druid, Savage, Berserker, Warrior, Theurgist, Cabalist, Friar, Warden, Valewalker, Runemaster and Spiritmaster. So if the particular setup my group wants to play happens to favour a Thane over my Zerker; guess what, I'll make a Thane, no big deal.

That's true. As far as I'm concerned the biggest concern WoW has to address is the ever widening gap between starting a character and 'playing' the game at 85. But that's a widely held notion, and one Blizzard has acknowledged.

What exactly do you mean by "play skill"? If I've given the impression that you just need to roll the cookie cutter setup I mentioned to win; that's not how it is. But DAoC does require a more diverse set of skills; it involves far more coordination and communication than, say, WoW.

Skill at the game itself as opposed to social skills and having a group of people etc. My point was the success at DAoC was less about being good at 'pressing your buttons' than it is about not being a dick to everyone you meet.

Also, those games with "massive communities" are those that allow for spectators. One of the reasons why WoW failed as an eSport is that people who haven't played it themselves just see flashy effects and random numbers. Case in point, do you find this enjoyable to watch?

Other than the center focuses UI, it wasn't so bad. But I'm conditioned to like PvP videos, but I get your point.

True, but how is it relevant? The PvP community has never been a substantial part of the player base.

I explained why people like me stopped playing it. That might've been beside the point in response to the graph you posted, which in turn is irrelevant to PvP. The reasons why the player base got smaller have little to do with the reasons why the amount of PvPers declined; and vice versa.

Then I have to return to my question in the other thread: Why would anyone want to make a skill based game that's balanced that no one wants to play?

[Lenno598]

I agree with the above post

[Feranor]

Skill at the game itself as opposed to social skills and having a group of people etc. My point was the success at DAoC was less about being good at 'pressing your buttons' than it is about not being a dick to everyone you meet.
Other than the center focuses UI, it wasn't so bad. But I'm conditioned to like PvP videos, but I get your point.

DAoC is less of a "twitch" game than WoW, if that's what you mean by "pressing your buttons". DAoC is more about foresight, tactics and making sure that 7 other players are informed about what you're going to do so they can plan accordingly. The level of communication that happens in WoW's RBGs is roughly equal to the level of communication between just the two offensive interrupters in DAoC.

Then I have to return to my question in the other thread: Why would anyone want to make a skill based game that's balanced that no one wants to play?

Well, who's saying that anyone would? Though here's hoping that GW2 will. I think the problem is designing a good PvP system that isn't too elitist. Part of the issue, however, is the size of the player base. If there are only 5 other groups running and you cannot beat 3 or 4 of them, that's not very enjoyable. To use DAoC as an example again, when playing US prime time we would sometimes run with just 5 or 6 people because the total amount of groups that were up was large enough for us to find 8mans that we could beat that way. That wouldn't have been feasible during EU prime time.

Maybe GW2 could actually manage this because they basically have DAoC RvR, but they match servers based on how well they do (although the amount of strong 5v5 groups doesn't necessarily correlate with a server's success in taking keeps) and they have an Arena/Battleground hybrid; plus, it doesn't seem like PvE damage meters will influence how strong a class is in PvP.

[Woodgela]

Well, Blizz already tried to revive World PvP quite a few times:

- Tower ruins in EPL
- LOLSand in Silithus
- Halaa etc.
- Wintergrasp
- Tol Barad

Seriously n00bs like you add to the problem. Those arent fixes for World PvP, u miss the point completely. World PvP at its best occurs when people dont want to be ganked ie. forced daily quest zones for all alts (like hodir when shoulder enchants weren't BoA), or instance summoning stones in the old days... these areas dont exist anymore and you can forget about stirring up trouble in an opposing base with overpowered gaurds in the way.
Towers and all that BS are just timed, predetermined outdoor BG's... Any real ganker/world PvPer knows that the most enjoyable ganks and PvP occur when u start trouble with people who arent there to PvP. People get angrier and form groups and go looking for revenge. Everyone is sick of all this control the towers/nodes and fk around nonsense....if ppl wanna cap towers and hold nodes intead of actually PvPing they can que for a BG. If they want free flowing PvP against differering numbers and groups of players then they should be able to do that at forced daily hubs and other areas. Bring back shoulder and head enchant rep grinds for all chars (non BoA). That would be a great start.

[kemdog]

yes..i miss them way too much. flying mounts killed world pvp! : (

[phirx]

i miss the pvp at cross roads.

[poorkilla]

heres what i think will

nerf guards and flightmasters
make quest givers killable
convert pve servers into pvp servers(its the world of WARcraft)
no flags even in horde or alliance terrority
nerf guards at starting zones

[Sinraye]

Guild Wars 2 XD

[Deleted]

Nerfing guards and flightmasters is something I can get behind, but some of your other suggestions are laughable. Why turn pve servers into pvp servers? People rolled on those because they didn't want world pvp, why force it upon them? And what use is nerfing guards at starting zones? There is no real pvp to be had there, and if you really just like ganking low levels, roll on a pvp server and scour the questing zones for low levels. No reason to negatively impact players from level 1 to 15.

[digger66]

This is dumb, if you want world pvp play on a pvp server and if its red its dead.

[poorkilla]

Nerfing guards and flightmasters is something I can get behind, but some of your other suggestions are laughable. Why turn pve servers into pvp servers? People rolled on those because they didn't want world pvp, why force it upon them? And what use is nerfing guards at starting zones? There is no real pvp to be had there, and if you really just like ganking low levels, roll on a pvp server and scour the questing zones for low levels. No reason to negatively impact players from level 1 to 15.

its the world of WARcraft thats why pve servers shouldnt exist. so what if i kill someone below level 15 the below level 15 is still a player hence pvp in the open world.

[digger66]

its the world of WARcraft thats why pve servers shouldnt exist. so what if i kill someone below level 15 the below level 15 is still a player hence pvp in the open world.

Again something you can do on a pvp server, do you eat paint chips?