PvP: Challenge Other Players! -> New features in Module 9

Sarr · March 2009

That's what Turbine Community Officer Tolero revealed to players:

PvP can be a lot of fun with friends and guildies, but sometimes you just want to pick a fight with a complete stranger one-on-one, without interference. We're pleased to introduce in Mod 9: the challenge system!

Rather than convincing your foe to run all the way to a PvP tavern to duke it out, you can now just select the player directly, and on your inspect orb, click the "challenge" symbol. This will allow you and your enemy to be transported to a PvP arena of your choice from anywhere in the game!

To begin your duel, you must specify the terms of your battle. Select from:

* Game type (death match, capture the flag)

* The Arena (select an arena or chose random)

* Time limit (a range of minutes up to a full hour, or random)

Similar to a trade window, both parties must agree for the match to begin, and you can see the status of whether or not the other person has accepted yet or not. Your opponent is presented your terms, and given the chance to negotiate any changes they'd want to make to the duel. A text field is also available for you to privately chat/negotiate in the Challenge window with your opponent prior to the start of the match. Once you and your opponent agree to the terms, you will be transported automatically into the arena after a 5 second count down.

Remember that in Mod 9, general chat spans across any instance, so if you were standing in the Marketplace when you entered the arena, your general chat will still be seen in the Market. If you have something to say to your PvP opponents that you don't want everyone to hear, you're best to use /say or /tell.

You don’t have to just duel though, you can challenge in groups as well! You can fight in combinations of 1 vs 6, 3 vs 3, or any other group configuration you want. Gather your forces together into a group, and your opponents must do likewise. So if your group of 3 would like to fight those two guys in a group by the mailbox, set up your challenge and it will present it to them! You can see the status of who all of the two teams has accepted the challenge, and who's acceptance is still pending. Remember that you need to be in separate parties to use the challenge system. If you need to communicate between the two rival teams prior to the match, you can use the text field in the challenge window before everyone is transported into the match.

If you'd like to have a match up with other random players, Jackson Laws is still available in the PvP taverns, and the open-brawl Tavern pits are still available at the Phoenix, Hammersmith, Wayward Lobster, and Open Palm.

In addition to the normal death-match arena, a new Shavarath themed death-match arena has been added! Filled with traps and things to avoid bumping into, it can really add a whole new level of difficulty for your duel as you try not to be done in by your enemy AND your environment!

If you're not in the mood to accept Challenges, you can turn on/off challenge acceptances in your options panel at any time! Otherwise, you can leave it on and see who picks a fight as you're making your way around the various public spaces!

So the next time you're milling around the Harbor or Meridia, and you have a hankering for some PvP, challenge a friend or a stranger to PvP on the spot using the Challenge system!

Direct link to source: forums.ddo.com/showthread.php

She added, that it didn't took much time to implement, and was actually very easy work. It didn't interefere with quest developing team too, that's what she wrote to date.

Personally, I can't wait to use it : ). Great new feature, and while I know many existing DDO players will complain about it, many others will use it. Including me. If someone doesn't want to be bothered with PvP, you'll be able to disable incoming challenges until you change your mind or forever ; ).

So, who's up to the challenge?

Papadam · March 2009

Sounds like a great feature! I have never done PvP in DDO but seem s like some fun since the combat system is so great. But I guess theire is alot of balance whinning

Rokurgepta · March 2009

Actually DDO has little PVP balance whining because almost no one PVPs and the last thing the game needs is Dev attention paid to the PVP side of DDO.

That being said this tidbit from the devs shows that while they have built a great and fun game they are very disconnected from their players. DDO is not about PVP, DDO skills and feats do not lend themselves well to PVP and balancing for PVP would be the end of DDO. Turbine is asking fans to vote and each win giving more Mod9 information. Well this bit of info they should have saved. The PVP population of DDO is tiny and not exactly something they should have used a hook like vote for us for information on. As an addition to the game that is fine, but they once again screwed the pooch when it comes to communication with their players.

This will be turned off by almost every player in DDO by the end of the first week. If you need proof of this go to any bar and peek into the PvP pit, empty almost all the time. PvP is used more to test parts of builds or out of boredom rather than any real part of DDO. Just not a game that lends itself very well to what PVP should be.

Dr.Rock · March 2009

It does seem an odd choice to focus on, compared to more obvious things people have been asking for like more content.

Bennyblyfot · March 2009

If the mod 9 is focused on PvP wich it seem t be i for one will turn my back on DDO, with mod8 came nothing good (except mabye herilings) and it was wastly delayed for The eu community. SO as usual turbine has turned it´s back on their costumers and made what seems a hughe misstake. Nothing good can come from this.

DDO was niched in as a great game for instanced based playing with frinds puggs or guilds, seems turbine wants it to be something else, imo not worth paying money for.

Seems like turbine has been looking at what SOE did to SWG and their population......... FAILURE

Papadam · March 2009

Originally posted by Bennyblyfot

If the mod 9 is focused on PvP wich it seem t be i for one will turn my back on DDO, with mod8 came nothing good (except mabye herilings) and it was wastly delayed for The eu community. SO as usual turbine has turned it´s back on their costumers and made what seems a hughe misstake. Nothing good can come from this.
DDO was niched in as a great game for instanced based playing with frinds puggs or guilds, seems turbine wants it to be something else, imo not worth paying money for.
Seems like turbine has been looking at what SOE did to SWG and their population......... FAILURE

heh this seems like a very small feature so I doubt it will be the focus of mod 9 and probably didnt take much time to implement... just a little something for thoose who enjoy PvP. What DDO lacks most is stuff to do between questing and making PvP more accesible will give the players something to do. Isnt mod 9 gonna raise the level cap to 20 and add alot of new quests areas?

(I havent played the game alot so dont really no much about it )

mindspat · March 2009

Some misconceptions in this thread.

Tavern Brawls are *NOT* PvP! it is a stale experiance where people auto attack with absolutely no skill involved. These people would fall apart in real PvP situations that don't focus on builds.

The closest thing DDO has to PvP is the Capture the Flag and Deathmatches. If you have never done any of the CTF scenarios you are missing out. They have great potential for occassional fun.

The real trick is balance, which DDO and D&D is not supposed to be in a PvP sense. One way to address the imbalance is by limiting classes to a CTF group or opting in for round robin Off Limit spells/abilities; ie, one match Team A choses No Greater Commanb and Team B choses No Facinate.

If you think this is making DDO PvP centric you're a little misguided. For what ever it's worth, get your guild members together into a Raid group, chose half to be Blue Team and other to be Read Team and give Capture the Flag a go. Chances are you'll hear people getting excited who've said they despise all forms of PvP.

The addition of this only makes it more accessible and I know there's many people who currently play DDO but have never seen the interiors of a Capture the Flag match, have you?

Rokurgepta · March 2009

Originally posted by mindspat

Some misconceptions in this thread.
Tavern Brawls are *NOT* PvP! it is a stale experiance where people auto attack with absolutely no skill involved. These people would fall apart in real PvP situations that don't focus on builds.
The closest thing DDO has to PvP is the Capture the Flag and Deathmatches. If you have never done any of the CTF scenarios you are missing out. They have great potential for occassional fun.
The real trick is balance, which DDO and D&D is not supposed to be in a PvP sense. One way to address the imbalance is by limiting classes to a CTF group or opting in for round robin Off Limit spells/abilities; ie, one match Team A choses No Greater Commanb and Team B choses No Facinate.
If you think this is making DDO PvP centric you're a little misguided. For what ever it's worth, get your guild members together into a Raid group, chose half to be Blue Team and other to be Read Team and give Capture the Flag a go. Chances are you'll hear people getting excited who've said they despise all forms of PvP.
The addition of this only makes it more accessible and I know there's many people who currently play DDO but have never seen the interiors of a Capture the Flag match, have you?

Yes I have. When it first came out my guild at the time spent plenty of time in there and after that I can say DDO has very little use for PVP. DDO needs more non quest things to do, but really PVP is not the answer in a game where balance is not really practical. The reason people have not seen the inside of the CTF is because they do not want to.

I do not think DDO is becoming PVP centric at all, I am annoyed that this is the tidbit they throw after using the hook of vote for Turbine and get mod9 info. As far as Mod9 goes this should be a footnote at the end and not something they hype for winning round 2 of that magazine tournament.

DDO is not real PVP. DDO was never meant for PVP and generally when added late PVP never gets balanced well and DDO really does not need it.

Sarr · March 2009

Originally posted by Papadam

Originally posted by Bennyblyfot

If the mod 9 is focused on PvP wich it seem t be i for one will turn my back on DDO, with mod8 came nothing good (except mabye herilings) and it was wastly delayed for The eu community. SO as usual turbine has turned it´s back on their costumers and made what seems a hughe misstake. Nothing good can come from this.
DDO was niched in as a great game for instanced based playing with frinds puggs or guilds, seems turbine wants it to be something else, imo not worth paying money for.
Seems like turbine has been looking at what SOE did to SWG and their population......... FAILURE

heh this seems like a very small feature so I doubt it will be the focus of mod 9 and probably didnt take much time to implement... just a little something for thoose who enjoy PvP. What DDO lacks most is stuff to do between questing and making PvP more accesible will give the players something to do. Isnt mod 9 gonna raise the level cap to 20 and add alot of new quests areas?

(I havent played the game alot so dont really no much about it )

Yes, I think so . And personally, I'm very happy with this PvP system improvement, but I think Devs should create more fixes & features to PvP play. I really like PvP in DDO. I was great to win wizard vs. warrior on 5th level both, using smart spell selection and some movement skill.

But still, this "PvP focus" is largely overhyped. Those most vocal people playing DDO are mostly traditionalists, and they fear each and every change to the game. There are many people which literally panic when something in development isn't like they imagined. Some even try to harass Turbine that they'll unsub - mostly those feeling like they're important elites, and that they'll do great harm to the game when they'll leave (pretty unrealistic, rather egocentric).

Concluding, I don't see any PvP focus here. I see Turbine trying to put already existing PvP arenas to better use. Accessibility is the key here. And they added new arena, which is a natural thing, knowing that Shavarath (Mod 9 environment) is called the "Plane of Battle".

I think Turbine will assess the PvP popularity again. There's no reasons to panic. Turbine has stat numbers for every instance players enter, so they can check PvP popularity. No Developer like to waste his time on anything (time=money), so I'm sure they know what they do.

Another scenario might be, that Turbine has statistics that most DDO players didn't even try PvP ever, so they want to let them know it's here and easily accessible. Then, there will be a room for better stats etc. Wasting money based on pure whim isn't possible in Turbine, in my opinion. They can make wrong choices, but they're much more knowledgabe about the game than we are.

Raithe-Nor · March 2009

I have to add a few comments to this thread if only to make it clear that PvP functionality and focus has been repeatedly requested... by me. My comments:

1) DDO is already 90% PvP focus. PvP simply stands for Player vs. Player competition, and it doesn't necessarily have to involve Player Killing (PKing). The PvP game in DDO is a horrid game of grinding determination comparisons. Who has the best stats, who has the best gear, who gets the most kills in a quest, these are the measuring sticks used to practice this ridiculous form of PvP. Yet if this form of PvP didn't exist, people would quit the game after only a few months of exploration and story reading.

2) Dungeons & Dragons has always been focused on PvP. Computers do not determine the actions of monsters in the tabletop game, it is a human called the DM. The DM is a player of the game in the general sense of the word, as he is required to roleplay on a regular basis. The game is therefore human player vs. human player. I'll admit it is usually a less competitive version of PvP, but there is nothing stopping anyone from taking PvP in DDO just as lightly.

3) Dungeons & Dragons PvP is group-based. There is no need for individual class balancing, as the unit of competition is the group. Furthermore, many PvP-based MMOs such as Warhammer Online actually have greater imbalance between classes than DDO does. Lastly, class balancing is already an issue in PvE play, as rangers and certain multi-classed combinations of them (ranger/monk/rogue) have become absurdly overpowered and need nerfing regardless of PvP considerations.

4) In the early days of DDO, the playerbase was actually divided fairly evenly against or for additional PvP functionality. That doesn't include those who simply didn't buy the game to begin with, because of the developer-mentioned lack of PvP. Stating that "most players" have no interest in PvP is a gross overestimation. Even among those left playing, I'd wager that more than 10% are highly interested in PvP mechanics. As I inferred, however, it isn't the playerbase that is left that would be the primary consideration.

5) PvP is a necessary component of roleplaying, which is what the game should really be focused on. If nothing anyone ever says or does can be acted upon, then the words and motivations of characters become meaningless.

Sarr · March 2009

Originally posted by Raithe-Nor

I have to add a few comments to this thread if only to make it clear that PvP functionality and focus has been repeatedly requested... by me. My comments:
1) DDO is already 90% PvP focus. PvP simply stands for Player vs. Player competition, and it doesn't necessarily have to involve Player Killing (PKing). The PvP game in DDO is a horrid game of grinding determination comparisons. Who has the best stats, who has the best gear, who gets the most kills in a quest, these are the measuring sticks used to practice this ridiculous form of PvP. Yet if this form of PvP didn't exist, people would quit the game after only a few months of exploration and story reading.
2) Dungeons & Dragons has always been focused on PvP. Computers do not determine the actions of monsters in the tabletop game, it is a human called the DM. The DM is a player of the game in the general sense of the word, as he is required to roleplay on a regular basis. The game is therefore human player vs. human player. I'll admit it is usually a less competitive version of PvP, but there is nothing stopping anyone from taking PvP in DDO just as lightly.
3) Dungeons & Dragons PvP is group-based. There is no need for individual class balancing, as the unit of competition is the group. Furthermore, many PvP-based MMOs such as Warhammer Online actually have greater imbalance between classes than DDO does. Lastly, class balancing is already an issue in PvE play, as rangers and certain multi-classed combinations of them (ranger/monk/rogue) have become absurdly overpowered and need nerfing regardless of PvP considerations.
4) In the early days of DDO, the playerbase was actually divided fairly evenly against or for additional PvP functionality. That doesn't include those who simply didn't buy the game to begin with, because of the developer-mentioned lack of PvP. Stating that "most players" have no interest in PvP is a gross overestimation. Even among those left playing, I'd wager that more than 10% are highly interested in PvP mechanics. As I inferred, however, it isn't the playerbase that is left that would be the primary consideration.
5) PvP is a necessary component of roleplaying, which is what the game should really be focused on. If nothing anyone ever says or does can be acted upon, then the words and motivations of characters become meaningless.

This is great post and very interesting point of view. After reading it, I have to say I learned something about why I do like PvP, but not in style of Warhammer Online.

So I completely agree and I'm with you with these requests. People on DDO EU almost treated me like a witch and burned at the stake for only making a thread about this new feature and liking it! So it's really good to see some indirect support to what I think. DDO won't be anything like WoW ever, calm down people. That's even technically impossible.

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PvP: Challenge Other Players! -> New features in Module 9

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