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General: MMOWTF: Infamy in MMOs
Stradden
Managing EditorMember CommonPosts: 6,696
This week in his MMOWTF column Dan Fortier uses a piece of fiction to punctuate his views on playing an infamous outlaw character in an MMORPG.
There are many different ways to enjoy yourself in an MMO. Some players find entertainment and profit in becoming master crafters whose wares are widely sought. Others find fulfilment by systematically defeating every challenge in the game till nothing left remains except to train for the next expansion. Others however revel in the joy of being the villain much like Rainz, Serenity Now, and Cynewulf. These players don't just want the joy of being hated but also long for a life outside of 'normal' society and truly wish to suffer the consequences of their actions. For them it's not good enough to kill weaker players if there is no penalty and enjoy the thrill of leading a virtual life 'on the lam' so to speak.
This week I wanted to muse briefly on the topic of playing an Outlaw in an MMO and the systems that make it rewarding. Grab your bifocals gramps and read along with the grandkids about their newfangled video games!
Read the whole column here.
Cheers,
Jon Wood
Managing Editor
MMORPG.com
Comments
Interesting topic, one which interests me. MMOs need to explore fame and infamy more, providing more options. I guess any good sandbox game would have these features, so now we just need to see a good sandbox game.
Of course, one of the sad things involved in this kind of impulse is that people take it to games such as Second Life, where the "game" isn't that kind of anagonism, and the hacker/griefer impulses can hurt people in their pocketbooks. What is the impetus for a person to take up the griefer role in a social game? Anonymity? Lack of consequences? Lack of power in the person's real life causing them to act out in their second life? Neurochemistry?
I can appreciate someone who is a villain and scoundrel within the setting (sad about the bank in Eve Online, even sadder about Ginko, where we probably had some combination of ethical falling-short and simple incompetence including lack of clue in people who used the banks).
But when people come into a social game just to f* things up, one really has to wonder if they were weaned too young, or something. Then again, gosh, I question that in real life too...
Yrs,
Shava
Fabulous article! I think you've touched on one of those intangible desires that MMO fans are itching to get out of their online play. I was originally hoping that Huxley would be able to capture this to an extent, but they seem to walking the beaten path rather than pushing for something new and exciting.
Take WoW and make it a PvP between all players, not just Horde vs. Alliance, and I think you might be getting somewhere. Perhaps make it so that you have both Horde and Alliance faction, and this faction is adjusted based on your PvP activities. In addition, if you kill a friendly, you'll have agg to the guards of that faction for a set time depending on your faction level. If this was the case, then making raids on major cities would be fruitful in harvesting faction, not just because it sounds fun. Perhaps as a bounty system, players will get 3x or 4x more faction if they kill a "traitor." I might actually start playing again if they implemented that!
Ok perhaps I read it wrong but it seems he is advocating griefing, ninja-looting and kill-stealing as long as there is some kind of ingame "penalty"?
Doing that would only encourage those people to do it even more. It would be like the company saying "ok we used to forbid this but now it's A-Ok as long as you don't mind a 10 min Outlaw Debuff". The problem he fails to understand, as usual, is that the people that want FFA PvP or PK PvP are in the minority. Look at WoW there are less PvP servers than normal servers. In DAoC, they used to have 2 PvP servers but due to low population they were merged. Now the PvP server has around the same population as the non-pvp Coop server. In EQ1 when the subs began to decline the 1st servers merged were the PvP servers. These are only 3 examples but I hope I've made my point.
There are games that have PvP systems closer to what Dan wants. They are the "asian games" such as Lineage 2. However as the name states it is typically only asian gamers that enjoy the more hardcore pvp where as the american/european gamers prefer pve with some optional pvp mixed in. Now I'm not saying that all asian gamers like hardcore pvp or that all american/european gamers are all "carebears", this is just how their respective majorities average out.
I have no problem if a game wants to make a server that allows more pvp freedom. That way those that want the more risk can go there and those that don't can go to another server. Understand that if you make an entire game like that you will be alienating a large percentage of potential customers. Even if the possibility of being Pk'ed, Podded, etc is very small there are some people that simply will not want to risk losing days, if not weeks, worth of advancement. No amount of "debuff pk penalities" will change their minds on that either.
Only one question comes to mind when I think about this topic, will I be too old to care when such a game comes?
No one ever seems to remember Meridian 59 at its heyday when it comes to villains or PVP in general. The consequences were...well...interesting to say the least. That game developed revenants that made PKing something to think long and hard about before one even considered whether or not primaries or alts might be aligned with duke or princess for faction, not to even mention bounty status..
Well...I played a relatively well known villain dating back to beta in that title, and while it sucked mightily to get ganked by Vicky, she did get a lot of appreciation across the servers for making people think...and with Qor being damn hard to max at the time, i had to actually play the game at its fullest to get where I wanted to be in the capacity Vicky needed to be at for mazimum effectiveness...
The massive flaw in an idea of FFA PvP for all servers is this:
Player A spends two weeks getting Item1. Player B comes along and kills Player A easily, stealing Item1. Player A asks himself, "Why am I paying $15 a month for this?" The End.
I don't need to say anything more than that.
Well, lack of imagination is the biggest problem, and then the balls...
YES YES YES to perma-DEATH
A western themed mmorpg would cater for this style of gaming and yet there is only one potential candidate on the market - wat da...! We are awash with wishy washy fantasy.
A bounty system and a game build round a law system - jeeez where are the Native Americans...colt 45....heck...shootin irons...????
Dog gone it...I am not even from the U.S. and I want some one to sphagetti western me NOOOWWWW
Is this ranting? AND if so, my apologies.
PERMA-DEATH will remove the bane of mmorpg - grinding....and as the short story clearly states a knife in the neck kills...not 300 chops with a double handed +5 battle axe followed by 20 fireballs!
And any one who disputes that perma-death
cannot work better start reading all my blogs. Life is cheap on the Wild Frontier but a simple family tree system where by death actually benefits you resolves all the key issues. i.e. kill yourself 100 times (and not some rats!!!) and you unlock stuff till the ultimate unlock REZ! Any one who knows Project Entropia knows what kind of game it would be.
This is proably why I can't be bothered with mmorpg any more. I blame every one including myself for the utter crappy standard of mmorpg.
Well, I agree with the sentiments here, but I think that a game would have to go the next step, and make the punishment something that causes the majority of players to not do the "crime" in the first place. Otherwise, you are back to square one, and many players will leave due to the perception of not only losing the game to other players, but worse, feeding their wins.
What has to be done is give the "criminal" characters a harsh penalty that does not apply to the "innocent" characters. More importantly, the "innocent, law abiding" characters have to have a way to win the battle against crime. These games are not real life, where you fight back or lose with no other choices. Players can leave these games (or avoid them in the first place), as they have in the past. So they must have a way to win the battle, to stop the "crimes", at least to a degree that they feel they are able to control the situation.
Making life difficult for the criminal characters doesn't work. The players have alts and they have guild mates.
Perma-death for all doesn't work. Then the game ends up with a bunch of kings of the hills, and many others will leave.
It has to be a one sided outcome, in favor of the "law abiding citizens". At least if you want the game to be diverse and full of varying interests and players.
However, if a game can accomplish this, it does open up a much wider range of game play. We could finally get away from the static feel of being herded through the game in some grind for constant pats-on-the-backs. We could finally have more freedom! But with consequences, which would be good too.
Once upon a time....
Everyone assumes that there would be no way to regulate the amount of player killing a "outlaw" would do. I figure that a system with a perma death would work to everyones advantage because if the "outlaw" killed the player he could never go back and get money/items from that player again. Make it so that it is more rewarding to hold a player up and make him give you X items or you kill him rather then making it more rewarding to kill him and take everything.
Also a bank system goes a long way here make it so that all a persons characters can access each others bank. If a item is in the bank its safe from being taken. Though this whole system wouldn't work in the current loot based system. Make loot less valuable and make money more. So the only reason the "outlaw" would terrorize people is for their money and maybe to sell the goods they take to someone. As mentioned in earlier posts a whole outlaw economy would have to form.
Also for those who arn't outlaws they could hire other players to be bodyguards if they happen to be a crafter which creates another way to make money for players. Though these ideas would work best n a wild west mmo I guess.
The biggest problem here is levels and loot. If your game is about that, then this could never work in my opinion. Its also why alot of people instantly think they wouldnt like it. They dont wanna get ganked and lose there loot. Maybe if you couldnt see the levels..or, heaven forbid there are no levels just skills. That way you dont instantly know the power and everything your prey can do. What if stats on items where hidden, and you couldnt just put a full set of armor, a halbered, and a shield in your backpack. If you wanted the sword, you'd have to swap yours...then go use it to see if it was better.
Same with everthing you loot..and only money could really be taken for sure. Add a bounty system, either a player or npc i think could try and revenge your death..if successful the villian would lose all items or all items were given to the person placing the bounty. So you might kill a day one player with nothing and end up losing everything for it..only those who really want to play a villian would try. I think these players need a place in the game too, or they will just find a way grief without punishment. Give griefers a role, and people tools to punish and rewards for punishing that are great in terms of the items taken from the bounty. Give the bounty hunter or marshall fame or something for them to get new skills specifically for bounty hunting not a cash payment unless it was agreed upon and done through person to person trade or mail so there is no system to exploit.
No one wants a game without levels and loot it seems..and developers cant seem to come up with anything else for us to do. As a poster above said, we'll be dead and gone before someone who is creative gets 30 mil to take a chance, Darkfall maybe...meh. Id love any game that was different atm.
See you in the dream..
The Fires from heaven, now as cold as ice. A rapid ascension tolls a heavy price.
what if a game wasnt about spending weeks getting one items? IS that all there is?
See you in the dream..
The Fires from heaven, now as cold as ice. A rapid ascension tolls a heavy price.
Fansy of Everquest came to mind, and many lesser creeps who suffered banishment from the community. Fansy had his own guild "Flowers of Happiness" check it out and Fansy's adventures for a belly laugh!
If you have any questions please ask. I have moved on to WoW from eq and no longer have any desire to play a dead game. Thank you. (posted by another selling his account in EQ1)
That is a a flaw in item based games not FFA PvP. In classic UO you used player crafted items for PvP and PvM. There were some magic items you could get from PvM but they were no über sword of teh wtfpwnzor that you had to have to be able to PvP or really do anything. Infact you used player crafted armor and weapon in PvP... Unless you were a mage then you just bought regs from a store for cheap.
This is a selfish approach at best.
As you disregard the pleasure of the majority, only for the pleasure of the minority. This lead eventually to having only the minority playing the game, and when they are left alone, without the majority, they dwindle and miss the majority.
Enforcing a gameplay on another player is bad design at best. <Mod edit> But from supposedly free-willed and supposedly intelligent devs, enforcing these gameplays on CUSTOMERS who are looking for another gameplay (be it PvE crafting, soloing or grouping), this is ridiculous.
I have nothing against the idea of a FFA server, or a PD server...but honestly, never do it for the whole game, at the expanse of the remaining of the game.
- "If I understand you well, you are telling me until next time. " - Ren
All i can say is pray for Darkfall. Everything else looks pretty carebear complete with exclamation points above npc heads.
"Go forth 1337d00d and kill 10 wolves." <decline>
Are you a Pavlovian Fish Biscuit Addict? Get Help Now!
I will play no more MMORPGs until somethign good comes out!
Arg, this question of having players-as-villains in mmogs has been explored to DEATH for the last 10 YEARS and already been resolved. (and the author knows this)
Time and again the resulting consensus is invariably the same: it simply Does. Not. Work. in a general population setting, where the activity is recognized for what it is: Griefing.
It only works in a controlled and specialized environment where A) you go into the game knowing it is unlimited unregulated PvP, or
you have something like Monster Play or PvP Zones where again, it's regulated and restricted and you know going in that you will be ganked.
Players-as-villains cannot work in general-population mmogs.
(lazy but...) /agree
Currently playing: Planetside, Americas Army.
Praying to Zeus for: Darkfall.
The words 'It cannot work' shouldn't be in any mmorpg developer's vocabulary. There are lots of ways to encourage play outside the boundaries in mmo society, and the idea that everyone would want to play the 'outlaw' is flawed. Most people I encounter in mmorpg's are pve'rs primarily, concerned with progression and crafting.
The TEF system in pre-cu swg was a great way to regulate this. You couldn't just walk into a city and gank a noob, but if that noob came out into the world and tried their hand at killing faction aligned npc's there were pvp consequences. Of course, like everything else that was fun about swg it is now ancient history.
While I haven't played EVE at the higher levels, everything I've read about the high end pvp is intriguing. The security clearance in certain zones is not a new idea, and a very workable one that has been tried and tested. If you want to go around ganking that is fine, but be prepared for a life of isolation. On the run, as it were.
This is one of the areas in mmorpgs that I have alot of interest in. The zerg based pvp that seems to be proliferating the genre at the moment doesn't do much for me. However, being out in the wilderness, on the run, chasing down hidden treasure only to come across a player controlled posse looking to end your reign of terror, that is something I'd like to see.
The original Neocron had this structure. You could start as a either a citizen of Neocron in the (relative) safety of the city or you could start in an anti-Neocron faction which meant you couldn't go near the city really and had to use outposts in the wastelands to hide out and buy/sell. If unsuspecting city dwellers came by, you could blast them and hack their containers to nick their stuff.
Only problem was that there was a lot of griefing in it because away from the Copbots and Stormbots there was no-one to stop aggressors in the sewers or wastelands and you had to go out there to do missions.
Still, I liked the game but it never really took off probably because it was a poor German company running it.
Raymondo
Just an idea, but perma-death could work as both a deterrent to PvP and (for players like myself who enjoy PvP) an added attraction to PvP.
For example, have a system a bit like Lineage II whereby if a player attacks and kills another player, he gets tagged as an 'outaw' and can be hunted without penalty. Then make it so that the player who was killed simply respawns, but the 'outlaw' player is now subject tp perma-death. This would make players think long and hard before 'going to the dark side' (go PvP and lose everything if you die!) and at the same time give PvP players that thrill of danger they seek.
I like PvP - have played on the Darktide server on AC1, the PvP servers on EQ1, the frontiers of DAoC, Lineage II and a few free PvP geared mmo's. I don't PvP to cause other players any real grief and am happy for them to respawn with all their stuff intact, losing no xp - I fight other players because they are far more challenging than stupid NPC's you can predict. I'm happy for those I kill in PvP to suffer no loss other than a little time respawning perhaps, and would be happy to risk perma-death for the freedom to do it .
People always seem to be either rabidly 'carebare' or blindly pro-PvP. I say there must be a way to balance both, and am just wating for the MMO that achieves it
Kes
*edited for spelling and to add - ANOFAYLE; your comment about handicapped people was possibly the singularly most stupid thing I have ever read on these forums. I suggest that in future you might want to switch on your brain and think about what your saying before commenting.
----------------------------
Hundreds of years from now, it will not matter what size my bank account was, the sort of house I lived in, or the kind of car I drove... But the world may be different because I did something so bafflingly crazy that my ruins become a tourist attraction.
UO was pretty much FFA for some time. My friends and I certainly had a blast hunting the griefers, but there were a lot of constraints that the griefers used to their advantage, like hiding in houses, invisibility, etc.
The problem with this system, there is always some idiot that preys on the weak because they cannot hack it when faced with a competitive environment. The system needs to come down hard on those type players. None of the games so far provide any benefit for players to protect those that are weak. So far there is not one game that comes close to providing an enviroment that will let this kind of play succeed, but a lot of us would play one, if someone would design it.