Tobold's Blog
Wednesday, December 08, 2010
 
Thought for the day: Does PvP make sense while questing?

I did some dungeons and quests in the new zones yesterday, and hit level 81 with my priest. I noticed that the new zones are rather crowded around the quest giver NPCs, and that Horde and Alliance often cross paths. That doesn't affect me, as I am playing on a PvE server. But from what I read in various blogs, and hear from friends, this does cause problems on PvP servers: Everybody is concentrated around the same few quest givers, and then the ganking starts.

Now, while not a fan myself, I completely support PvP that has some sort of objective: Be it some battleground, keep warfare, territorial control, that all makes perfect sense to me. But why would a game first force people to congregate around the same few spots to get and hand in quests, and then enable them to slaughter each other there without any purpose?
Comments:
Random violence is not the problem, it's the solution. It's a great way to fan the flames of inter-faction hatred. If the Other kills without any apparent reason, it's much easier to hate them. And that in fosters intra-faction camadaderie, drives people to the many forms of PvP to get even, and sells a whole lot of faction-themed merchandise.
 
It affects us on PvE servers also, but to a much lesser degree. There are very often players of the other factions standing around the quest giver or around the quest mob about to spawn flagged. It's easy to attack them by accident and that's in many cases exactly what they want. Because then they can attack you, most often with the help of their friends standing there too. I managed to get killed that way last evening and had to wait for the PvP flag to reset before resurrecting.

I personally like PvP, but not while I'm questing.
 
I actually agree. The game WoW has become does not allow reasonable world PvP during questing. It is 99% ganking whereever it occurs.
 
Actually my PvP server (Daggerspine) has been fairly peaceful. I've only been ganked twice, and both times by a roving group of level 85s. Even though I'm alliance and we are hugely outnumbered by horde, they have all left me alone and quested beside me.
 
Depends on the game. In DCUO, for example, you could hardly expect Superheroes and Supervillains to politely defer to each other. Moreover, since the missions they are on have diametrically opposed objectives but use the same NPCs, conflict is built in.

That, however, is on a PvP server. Even in a setting with such clear definition between the sides PvP doesn't make sense if the server is advertised as "PvE".
 
Well, in WoW Horde and Alliance often do exactly the same quest. One of the more crowded points for example is a cave which you get to by saving a group of humans, which then become quest givers. The humans are clearly Alliance, but saving them and getting quests from them is the same for Horde.
 
That same argument goes way back to the Shattering Sun dailies. If you remember, the realm progression on the dailies opened up more levels of quests. At the time, PvE realms clearly opened the new quests significantly faster than PvP realms, for this very reason.

I guess that's just part of the game if you choose a PvP server.
 
It's really not a new trend. I first noticed it when I was in the beta for Burning Crusade. I have nothing against PVP but I realized that I would just be annoyed beyond belief trying to level to 70 under those circumstances. So I took advantage of the then-new server transfer feature to move my Horde characters on their PVP server to my Alliance PVE one.

Different folks have different tolerance levels for that kind of thing. You just need to recognize what yours is before it impacts your enjoyment of the game.
 
In my opinion. Fighting over the objective of a quest (spawn, item, whatever) is the most sensible/meaningful PvP you will ever experience.

Fighting for some artificial goal in a mini game (battle ground) is nowhere near it.

It is ok if you do not to like or understand this form of PvP, but then you should probably be asking yourself if a PvE server is a better home for your toon.

Plus, my guild needs 10K honorable kills, so we might as well get started :)
 
If you're on a PvP server, the fight is going on always, everywhere. You could see the entire world as one huge BG. So it's not that strange in my eyes, even if it's not a game I'd like to play myself. There was a forum poster that complained about the hardships of levelling on a PvP realm, and I think the blue answer explained it pretty well. http://blue.mmo-champion.com/topic/141299/this-is-not-fair
 
I guess it depends on the server. I quested fine on my Troll Rogue last night even though I was surrounded by Alliance.

One of the deterrents to ganking so close to the quest givers is the fact your opponent will wait until you have 4 mobs on you and will return the favor. If you get caught in a circle of ganking then you can't level up very well.

Also if you attack an opposing faction member near neutral quest givers the guards will sometimes kill you.

One favorite trick is to stand on the quest giver with your mount so instead of the quest giver being clicked you get accidentally attacked and the guards kill the other player. That's always a chuckle. Everyone was trying that trick last night.

I did get ganked once last night, but it was after taking that stupid Drill to Blackrock Caverns, there was a mage there ganking Hordies as they came in from the drill. That's an isolated case though. It's a perfect ambush spot as people come in and are disoriented and in an enclosed space.
 
Sure it makes sense, from a design standpoint of steering players into the same region so that things can happen. Seen it in Aion, and seen it in WAR too.

The question is, does the thing that proceeds to happen equate to fun?

Personally, I find balanced pvp fun, or at least some back and forth where both sides have a chance of winning. A sort of RvR, realm pride affair.

Ganking where one side has excessively good equipment or higher levels (that affects their PvP performance) is not in my fun book. Imo, WoW's game mechanics and community make the latter much more probable than the former in open world pvp.

It was a lot more interesting in Aion when characters hadn't hit max level or decked themselves out in gold gear yet.

Rifters would come in, beat up some individuals, and get away with that for a while until a retaliatory horde descended on them. Often questing in a group scared them away because 6 outnumbered 2 guys, or they'd try and hit you while the group was fighting elites. Had times where we wiped, had times where we managed to handle the elites AND kill the gankers, and had instances of terribly funny moments where the elites turned on the gankers.

The point is the erstwhile victims should have a decent chance of fighting back, be it in a group or using friendly NPCs or the scenery and map design to their advantage. If it boils down to repeated kills with no real risk for the gankers, then it's just stupid.
 
the one big stopper i met in AION was that very thing : getting one shotted by a lvl+x opponent while peacefully killing your foozles isn't my idea of fun. Instant Unsubbing :D

On topic, given you can actually fight back in wow, it kinda makes sense, yes. Different playstyle is what makes PvP servers a different experience.
 
On my PvP server, I was pleasantly surprised to see that there was a sort of unofficial truce declared. We've got queues, and the quest zones are packed; however, there is very little ganking going on.

A boomkin tried to kill me once when we were both going for the same quest item, but he was clearly noob because he was dispatched very easily.

I think most people realize that for now, much more progress can be made by all if we refrain from stupidity.
 
I'm on a PvP server and most people don't want trouble. We quest near each other without anyone attacking the other. No one needs time lost on corpsecamping (you lose it if you are the camper too).

Only easily killable morons start PvP "for lawls"
 
Two quests came to mind immediately after reading this post. In Hyjal there is a quest chain which eventually leads you to part of the firelands through a portal. In the you have to kill this named mob that can only be summoned once every few minutes....Naturally this quest was a huge pain to do on a high population pvp server.

The brilliant thing about it though? Right after you complete that the very next step in the chain is to do the same thing with ANOTHER named mob, albiet a tougher one, 20 feet away from the last one... /cry
 
Wow , not saying that I am surprised, but this is sad. Majority of people expect questing "in peace" on pvp servers. Well originally they were made for PvP, and originally some zones in Vanilla wow such as stranglethorn vale were specifically made to have conflict

PvP servers means you kill other side . Whenver , whatever. Quests are sidedish, the bait to go to x. PvP is the main food. On server I played at every high level dungeon was cluttered with corpses , it was never ending kill fest. Tarren mills was slaugheterzone way before any warlord rp grinds were introduced

That is in fact the only thing which was different between pve and pvp servers. But I guess wow population today is so anemic that even on pvp servers there are "truces"
 
Ideally this happens, then people get pissed and bring out the high levels or get 30+ people and camp the gankers. In reality though you just drive the true newbies to PvE servers or out of the game as in Aion, and the high levels get tired of needing to guard quest givers.

If it's centered around necessary things, it's supposed to force PvP.
 
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