Games are entertainment - they are supposed to be fun. They can be war-themed, many are, but at the end of the day, they are games. War is not fun. It is everything but. And they are not started because someone got bored (vast majority at least weren't).
Non-consentual PvP is not war. It is not even close. The same people who claim that are the ones who think grinding signatures and anomalies in Eve is "exploration". Or spawn camping "baddies" in Fall of Mankind is "keeping the peace". Don't be that guy.
The idea that the metagame in Eve is war or simulates war is a joke. At the end of the day it is just a game, and that makes all the difference.
Real war is not fun, true.
Playing a game or indulging in other fiction that - in some ways - simulates some aspects of war, however, can be incredibly fun to many, many people. Otherwise, why would we play strategy games and table tops, and shooters like CoD and BF? Why is the market full of countless books, TV series and movies about WW2 and other historical wars?
War is fascinating and a lot of people like their entertainment to put them in the role of a mighty general or a brave soldier. Of course this does not mean that they would like to be a real general or a real soldier, or that the fiction has to simulate a truly warlike experience to be influenced by the popular image of war (after all, most of us has not experienced real life warfare).
People simply compare MMO FFA PvP with warfare because it's more akin to that type of conflict than to sports, which is what a lot of people actually want when they talk about "real" PvP.
I've played Eve for 2 years, nearly all of that in nullsec, flown with some of the best FCs in the game, I have always look for a conflict and content and I have had less than a dozen "good fights" in that game.
Sov warfare is dull grind, rest of it is ganking to a varying degree. Eve is the quintessential game for gank warfare. For example, goons do not engage if they do not have at least 2:1 odds. They don't do even fights and they have the numbers to pull it off. They don't need to be good, they just need to bring more people.
Its not fun for goons and its not fun for their opponents either. Then I hear this drivel "this simulates real war" ... no it doesn't. Its a game! Wars, in games, are started by people who are bored. It can never simulate real war, and falling short of real war, what it devolves into is not fun for great many people.
Your post seems to be an expression of a very common misconception, or better: a very common but IMO too restricted way of looking at PvP.
The actual fighting is only a very small part of PvP. It is merely the culmination of all the other aspects. Just like the actual shot is only a very small part of hunting and comes only after all the preparations, the tracking, the luring, the choice of time and spot, the exploit of the surroundings, landscape, weather, the training and use of dogs etc.
And still most people reduce PvP to the actual fight and complain about it being "unfair". Well if you want fair fights there is no way around an Arena like GW2 sPvP.
But for me that isn't enough. It is a boring and dull grind.
And now EvE. The art of PvP shows not in the actual fights alone, but in the preparation. All the fun is in the metagame which gives you nearly limitless possibilities. There are quite some ways to avoid the gank scenario and also it can be exploited for more fun when you get some friends and bumrush them.
Chess players don't complain about the rules and try to impose their own idea of how a game should be played on the pieces, but if chess was an MMO players would probably complain about white having an unfair advantage and whine on the game forums that the movement of the Knights is totally OP and the Queen should be taken out (only for the opponent of course) and some would probably also complain that their King got ganked by some no life basement dweller.
But FFA games and chess have one thing in common: Preparation is much more important than a single match or fight which is only an expression of your understanding of the game at a certain point in time.
Btw. regarding the argument that FFA games are not financially feasible because of being elitist... Not true. EvE and even UO tell otherwise. PvP games do not tank because of the FFA PvP but because thery are just bad games. FFA PVP alone without a sandbox, deep economy etc. doesn't cut it. You need the whole package to have a good game, otherwise there is no emergent gameplay and the self fufilling prophecy of gank and destroy happens.
In less deep games or themeparks non consensual PvP is at least a bit of flavour. I am quite happy when it is restricted to PvP servers in such games since then there is less complaining, but even then there is usually a vocal minority starting to hardcore whine instead of just choosing a PvE server. Tera was a disgusting example of that.
That was also the lesson I took from EVE though my preferences are different so I came to a different conclusion. PvP in EVE is part of the Big Picture and if you do not like or want to be part of it, you are better off not playing the game. I find the metagame of EVE to be pointless and boring so all the effort I would put into the PvP side would not give me a meaningful result. Frankly, I find the preparation part to be way more fun then the PvP itself and there is only so many times you can go through the process if there is no payoff in the end.
No amount of rewards, no amount of shinies...no amount of strings with something attached to it is going to bring meaning to PvP to me. PvP is either about challenge or it may as well be PvE. I could care less about capturing a castle to give my faction a "bonus"...I want players that freaking know how to play.
Non-Consensual PvP does NOT bring that, in fact in brings the opposite. It causes people to stay in packs and creates high level ganking...the two types of PvPing that makes a players skills weaken.
And sorry to break it to you, but I am from early UO back when it was ALL ABOUT PVP yet I can still say full open world PvP doesn't match up to games like Asherons Call where it was all consensual.
I hope we shall crush...in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country." ~Thomes Jefferson
to me, the pvp being "meaningful" is FAR more important than it being "consensual".
meaningful, again to me, meaning that something is at stake over the outcome rather than just one person won and one person lost. (i know, that alone is a motivator for some people but not me)
EX: in eve where a pvp battle might determine ownership of a system (a zone in eve)
this is the essence of pvp in an mmo to me; this is even though in eve the pvp is in a grey area between non consensual and consensual (there are areas in eve where you get punished for PK to the point where it rarely happens).
thanks for reading.
The meaningfulness of an engagement is entirely subjective and a separate matter. You can decide the fate of a fortress, a town, a mine, a province, a star system or a space station through either non-consensual or consensual way.
And how do you do that? Just out of curiosity. If you need consense from the player ownign the mine, city.. he will always say no if someone want to attack him,, overtake it.
Or another example. If you need consense every miner will turn off his pvp flag to mine ore from that certain mine and you can do shit against it. So it becomes rather usesless to "own" a mine. The economic affect turns to zero.
The only way is that you restrict pvp to certain areas, like in EvE, where pvp areas, or areas with more risk have better or more resources to farm, where it would be more valuable to have a city or own a mine. PvP flag is in that scenario just a way to exploit the game and make it entirely useless.
Point is, and a lot of player don't understand that. That a lot of player want to have PvP absent of the figthing. A game where trading, crafting and resource gathering is part of the pvp game. And you can't have that with a pvp flag.
The meaningfulness of an engagement is entirely subjective and a separate matter. You can decide the fate of a fortress, a town, a mine, a province, a star system or a space station through either non-consensual or consensual way.
yeah. And "meaningful" is subjective. For example, a story mission in STO is meaningful to trekkies, but may appearing as just "kill x quests" to others.
No.. It is not. Meaningful means it will have effect in the game world. A story mission is a story mission, and as long as nothing changes in the world there is absolut no effect to the game world.. and with that it is not meaningful.
One aspect I hate about consensual pvp is gathering and the economy. If you have a gathering person who can go in to end game zones and farm the high end mats with the only obstacle being spawned mobs, the rarity of those items and value decreases. If the person can get ganked the risk/reward may not be worth those items making them hold their value better and be more rare. I am an auction house player and gatherer. When I get to a node to gather and someone has beat me to it, I want to fight them for the material.
- none -- there needs to be zones where players are safe, to craft, AFK, chat, whatever
- consensual -- the players agree to PvP
- non-consensual -- the players can "jump" each other
For me, the best model is non-consensual in a zone. In other words, go into this zone and you might get jumped. In DAOC, I used to go PvE in the PvP zones, knowing all the while that I could get jumped. Put valuable stuff in that zone: mats, keeps, etc.
Any game that forces PvP on people who don't want it, is doomed to be a niche game with few players. There is only one popular game with that kind of PvP, all the rest are not.
I think best is non-consensual but with chance to run-away/disengage.
Eve mechanisms like stargate, web, point , bubles make games a huge stall- nobody dares to explore as next 2 gates you will die.
EDIT:
now put 20 gates in a system, remove bubles, make points chance based, webs causing damage on both sides , make belts in random position, scanable only and not in overview and yea pvp is fair
pvp is ONLY good if there is variety in weapon choice,the map is laid out to support good pvp and both players are READY.
If there is no variety in choice,then it favors the player that suits best to that choice.
if the map is not laid out for pvp,then to be straight forward,it is a joke and nothing else matters anymore.
If both players are not thinking pvp and ready for it,the one who is ready will have a huge advantage.Being that all pvp is a race to get opponents hp down first,getting off two strikes before your opponent decides to fight back is pretty much a guarantee win.
i know there are man y who would cheat or prefer an advantage,i don't consider that good pvp,i like to have it on a even keel,both fighters completely prepared and ready for it.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
Comments
Real war is not fun, true.
Playing a game or indulging in other fiction that - in some ways - simulates some aspects of war, however, can be incredibly fun to many, many people. Otherwise, why would we play strategy games and table tops, and shooters like CoD and BF? Why is the market full of countless books, TV series and movies about WW2 and other historical wars?
War is fascinating and a lot of people like their entertainment to put them in the role of a mighty general or a brave soldier. Of course this does not mean that they would like to be a real general or a real soldier, or that the fiction has to simulate a truly warlike experience to be influenced by the popular image of war (after all, most of us has not experienced real life warfare).
People simply compare MMO FFA PvP with warfare because it's more akin to that type of conflict than to sports, which is what a lot of people actually want when they talk about "real" PvP.
That was also the lesson I took from EVE though my preferences are different so I came to a different conclusion. PvP in EVE is part of the Big Picture and if you do not like or want to be part of it, you are better off not playing the game. I find the metagame of EVE to be pointless and boring so all the effort I would put into the PvP side would not give me a meaningful result. Frankly, I find the preparation part to be way more fun then the PvP itself and there is only so many times you can go through the process if there is no payoff in the end.
No amount of rewards, no amount of shinies...no amount of strings with something attached to it is going to bring meaning to PvP to me. PvP is either about challenge or it may as well be PvE. I could care less about capturing a castle to give my faction a "bonus"...I want players that freaking know how to play.
Non-Consensual PvP does NOT bring that, in fact in brings the opposite. It causes people to stay in packs and creates high level ganking...the two types of PvPing that makes a players skills weaken.
And sorry to break it to you, but I am from early UO back when it was ALL ABOUT PVP yet I can still say full open world PvP doesn't match up to games like Asherons Call where it was all consensual.
I hope we shall crush...in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country." ~Thomes Jefferson
And how do you do that? Just out of curiosity. If you need consense from the player ownign the mine, city.. he will always say no if someone want to attack him,, overtake it.
Or another example. If you need consense every miner will turn off his pvp flag to mine ore from that certain mine and you can do shit against it. So it becomes rather usesless to "own" a mine. The economic affect turns to zero.
The only way is that you restrict pvp to certain areas, like in EvE, where pvp areas, or areas with more risk have better or more resources to farm, where it would be more valuable to have a city or own a mine. PvP flag is in that scenario just a way to exploit the game and make it entirely useless.
Point is, and a lot of player don't understand that. That a lot of player want to have PvP absent of the figthing. A game where trading, crafting and resource gathering is part of the pvp game. And you can't have that with a pvp flag.
No.. It is not. Meaningful means it will have effect in the game world. A story mission is a story mission, and as long as nothing changes in the world there is absolut no effect to the game world.. and with that it is not meaningful.
I see three types of PvP:
- none -- there needs to be zones where players are safe, to craft, AFK, chat, whatever
- consensual -- the players agree to PvP
- non-consensual -- the players can "jump" each other
For me, the best model is non-consensual in a zone. In other words, go into this zone and you might get jumped. In DAOC, I used to go PvE in the PvP zones, knowing all the while that I could get jumped. Put valuable stuff in that zone: mats, keeps, etc.
Any game that forces PvP on people who don't want it, is doomed to be a niche game with few players. There is only one popular game with that kind of PvP, all the rest are not.
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2024: 47 years on the Net.
I think best is non-consensual but with chance to run-away/disengage.
Eve mechanisms like stargate, web, point , bubles make games a huge stall- nobody dares to explore as next 2 gates you will die.
EDIT:
now put 20 gates in a system, remove bubles, make points chance based, webs causing damage on both sides , make belts in random position, scanable only and not in overview and yea pvp is fair
pvp is ONLY good if there is variety in weapon choice,the map is laid out to support good pvp and both players are READY.
If there is no variety in choice,then it favors the player that suits best to that choice.
if the map is not laid out for pvp,then to be straight forward,it is a joke and nothing else matters anymore.
If both players are not thinking pvp and ready for it,the one who is ready will have a huge advantage.Being that all pvp is a race to get opponents hp down first,getting off two strikes before your opponent decides to fight back is pretty much a guarantee win.
i know there are man y who would cheat or prefer an advantage,i don't consider that good pvp,i like to have it on a even keel,both fighters completely prepared and ready for it.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.