Ladder Resets
#1
Without the inclusion of the "ladder" there is no way to periodically reset the economy. Additionally there is limited reason to ever restart a character given the respec native in the game. I think they should add some "season" type of functionality when they add the PVP patch.
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#2
Yea, I suggested it in my recent thread about loot. But the ladder system can't just exist by itself, as we still would care about the nonladder economy.

I suggested a way to able to purchase ladder items (which will be on its own AH) with nonladder gold. However, any gold that enters from nonladder to ladder only goes one way. Items and characters will be transferred back to nonladder at the end of the season, but gold will NOT. This means, sure people can dump gold into the ladder to get ahead, but that gold better be used wisely or the investment will fail. Add special ladder exclusives (level to 63 at a slow rate, ladder items)

My suggestion was only based on trying to clear out the regular economy though. A traditional ladder would work too and be more "pure" me thinks.
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#3
If you're just trying to reset the economy, one partial way to do it is to simply release new better items. Then, suddenly, everyone's in the same boat in that they don't have those items and there's the rush to go find them.
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#4
They seem intent to tie into some of the things built in WoW. So 'PvP' seasons, with recognition for the best in each season could be tied easily to the ladder. They have a PvP season system in WoW. I kind of expect to see it recycled into Diablo.
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#5
(07-18-2012, 12:07 PM)Yricyn Wrote: They seem intent to tie into some of the things built in WoW. So 'PvP' seasons, with recognition for the best in each season could be tied easily to the ladder. They have a PvP season system in WoW. I kind of expect to see it recycled into Diablo.

One thing Jay's been pretty clear he *doesn't* want from WoW is PvP that tries to be competitive. He doesn't want their team to even try to balance it, and are therefore avoiding competitive metrics (e.g. elo/ladder/tournament) that you could use to gauge skill of players.
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#6
(07-18-2012, 01:36 PM)FoxBat Wrote: One thing Jay's been pretty clear he *doesn't* want from WoW is PvP that tries to be competitive. He doesn't want their team to even try to balance it, and are therefore avoiding competitive metrics (e.g. elo/ladder/tournament) that you could use to gauge skill of players.

I think they want to balance it as well as they can, and I expect several skill adjustment patches to come out specifically due to PvP balance. However, what they've said is that they don't want to go through what the WoW people did where they tried (and mostly failed) to have it become an official ESport. They want to keep PvP as a mostly "fun" thing. However, people will earn PvP ratings and will be matched up with people around their rating bracket as a way to balance out the skill and gear diversity. So, if you're good and have poor gear, you might find yourself matched with someone with great gear but who's lousy (or vice versa, but of course everyone is fantastic at PvP -- just as 90% of drivers are better than average drivers--, so the vice versa case would never happen).
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#7
It's understandable that they aren't balancing the game for pvp, however regardless of how competitively you define pvp, people will naturally have a pecking order and bragging rights. It's the nature of the thing.

Though I guess the fear of BM is particularly high in the pvp circle. PvE has actually had a lot of cordial players in public, and actually the social experience for D3 is great when you get a game going but the nature of pvp tends to lead to more tempers.
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#8
(07-19-2012, 08:19 AM)Archon_Wing Wrote: It's understandable that they aren't balancing the game for pvp, however regardless of how competitively you define pvp, people will naturally have a pecking order and bragging rights. It's the nature of the thing.

I'm sure they will try to establish it, but my point is that Jay is not going to help them. There will be this rating used to match people, but it will not be made public. There will be no ranking beyond looking at # of wins, which given their rating system will stick most players around 50%, isn't going to indicate much more than time spent PvPing. No real public way to compare the skill of players, no official tournaments for them to fight in either. Whatever else this means, it surely rules out PvP seasons. This video goes into pretty good detail on related PvP topics if you have the interest:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_E452S_fJwA

8:20 until the end has some pretty interesting stuff on how they will handle skill balance. The short of it is that they do have seperate data values for PvP versions of skills and are tweaking them, but are adamant that PvE *always* comes first, so we should not be expecting PvP-oriented nerfs to hit PvE much. Jay also mentions that they don't particularly want to tweak damages I.E. they are not that mindful of there being some obviously "best" skills, and are mostly tweaking to control CC and invuln cooldowns from breaking everything.
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#9
Echoing what others have said, Blizzard learned from World of Warcraft. Rob Pardo, Blizzard VP of Game Design, admitted in 2009 that arenas were the largest mistake Blizzard ever made with WoW; the highly competitive rated nature of arena PvP in WoW completely changed the game and their approach to balance, which they felt hurt PvE and annoyed players endlessly. Once it was established in the game, they couldn't take it away.

Consider the neutering of class skills and abilities that has to result when you try to balance a game that features 25-man raiding alongside 3v3 competitive player vs. player. It's insane, really. For those who were around in the beginning of WoW, remember how radically different the classes were from each other? Balanced, no; but you have to admit they were extremely unique.

In short, don't make MMO (or pseudo-MMO games like D3) a PvP e-sport; they'll leave that to things like Starcraft in the future. I think this is a case of "be careful what you wish for," because actually putting in a serious e-sport level PvP element into Diablo III would, in the long run, completely wreck the PvE side of the game.
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#10
(07-19-2012, 05:58 PM)Bolty Wrote: ... Once it was established in the game, they couldn't take it away.
True. But they could isolate it from PVE with an Arena specific area, complete with locker rooms where you store your arena PVP gear. The character code play rules in the arena could be different from outside the arena. It may be a bit disconcerting for those that play in both places in that your highly ranked arena gladiator may be much weaker in a raid, or in world PvP.

Frankly. I'd do it in the MOP release. Much is changing in skills anyway.
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#11
(07-19-2012, 05:58 PM)Bolty Wrote: I think this is a case of "be careful what you wish for," because actually putting in a serious e-sport level PvP element into Diablo III would, in the long run, completely wreck the PvE side of the game.

To clarify I am not advocating for an e-sport mentality to D3 PvP. I am saying I see a potential to hang a "ladder reset/economy reset" type of event on the due to arrive PvP patch.
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#12
I can't see why we can't have PvP arbitrary balance. That is, some balance changes only effect PvP.

How to accomplish that? That's easy, make abilities have modified effects on human players! Certain skills could just have a penalty against human players only, etc.

That way they can almost be separate issues.
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#13
(07-19-2012, 08:38 PM)Archon_Wing Wrote: I can't see why we can't have PvP arbitrary balance. That is, some balance changes only effect PvP.

How to accomplish that? That's easy, make abilities have modified effects on human players! Certain skills could just have a penalty against human players only, etc.

That way they can almost be separate issues.

Not really. The skills that tend to be the most problematic aren't ones that have effects on other players, it's cooldown stuff, which means you aren't just changing what it does to people you have to limit what it can do based on location, which is whole new layer to the coding because there is no mechanic in place for that now. The could likely kludge something in with the difficulty system, but my guess is for code efficiency that is only a way to do multiplicative changes across the board. You need a finer tool than that for skills.

I don't know the classes and skills well enough to come up with a pertinent example, but I would imagine that something like serenity for the monk would be a problem. 4 seconds of invulnerability to everything. How do you fix it? Do you start tacking things into the code base so that it doesn't work vs this player skill or isn't full invulnerability?

The real issue is that balanced PvP is akin to security, you have to build from the ground up for it. It's actually easier to add on PvE to a PvP game than the other way around. Sure you can also tack security onto an existing system but it's much more vulnerable (think windows or the old IPX/SPX protocols if we are staying in the code base world ) as opposed to something that has security at it's core (think *nix/MacOS or TCP/IP protocol). It doesn't eliminate the issues, but it makes them simpler to deal with, and can eliminate a large swath of problems that trying to add on after the fact can't.
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#14
Well, they are taking their time on the pvp thing, so perhaps they could use it to institute different rules in the arena. It doesn't need to be balanced totally; I mean Diablo 2 PvP did not have balance in mind at all yet it was fairly popular with leagues popping up everywhere that came up with their own restrictions.

And they really should, because this game needs a purpose for endgame gear.

I guess this is one of the things they should have foreseen by looking at D2. Like I've said many times before, the majority of players lean towards endgame things, and the main reason why min/max godly gear was desired was for pvp! And thus we now have the current state of the game where high end loots exists for the sake of farming high end loot.
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#15
(07-19-2012, 08:49 PM)Gnollguy Wrote:
(07-19-2012, 08:38 PM)Archon_Wing Wrote: I can't see why we can't have PvP arbitrary balance. That is, some balance changes only effect PvP.

How to accomplish that? That's easy, make abilities have modified effects on human players! Certain skills could just have a penalty against human players only, etc.

That way they can almost be separate issues.

Not really. The skills that tend to be the most problematic aren't ones that have effects on other players, it's cooldown stuff, which means you aren't just changing what it does to people you have to limit what it can do based on location, which is whole new layer to the coding because there is no mechanic in place for that now. The could likely kludge something in with the difficulty system, but my guess is for code efficiency that is only a way to do multiplicative changes across the board. You need a finer tool than that for skills.

I don't know the classes and skills well enough to come up with a pertinent example, but I would imagine that something like serenity for the monk would be a problem. 4 seconds of invulnerability to everything. How do you fix it? Do you start tacking things into the code base so that it doesn't work vs this player skill or isn't full invulnerability?

The real issue is that balanced PvP is akin to security, you have to build from the ground up for it. It's actually easier to add on PvE to a PvP game than the other way around. Sure you can also tack security onto an existing system but it's much more vulnerable (think windows or the old IPX/SPX protocols if we are staying in the code base world ) as opposed to something that has security at it's core (think *nix/MacOS or TCP/IP protocol). It doesn't eliminate the issues, but it makes them simpler to deal with, and can eliminate a large swath of problems that trying to add on after the fact can't.

Certain skills will most likely be made entirely null in PvP, I would imagine Serenity would be one of them, as would Giant Toad for WD. Much like how in D1 PvP you couldn't stone curse people - that would be way too cheezy and abused by everyone. Very powerful skills, like Wrath of the Berserk or Archon will probably be cut in half, based on either their duration, actual damage or even both.

There are plenty of easy ways to balance skills in PvP, but then again it is Blizz, and they can't even balance Inferno properly so I don't have too much confidence in them being able to balance PvP, even if it really shouldn't be that difficult.
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#16
(07-20-2012, 12:21 AM)RedRadical Wrote: Certain skills will most likely be made entirely null in PvP, I would imagine Serenity would be one of them, as would Giant Toad for WD. Much like how in D1 PvP you couldn't stone curse people - that would be way too cheezy and abused by everyone. Very powerful skills, like Wrath of the Berserk or Archon will probably be cut in half, based on either their duration, actual damage or even both.

There are plenty of easy ways to balance skills in PvP, but then again it is Blizz, and they can't even balance Inferno properly so I don't have too much confidence in them being able to balance PvP, even if it really shouldn't be that difficult.

Have you written a line of code in your life? Easy concepts are not always easy to translate to code and depending on design your base set-up may not be designed to handle it. This whole "it's easy" is not always easy and we have years of examples from WoW, Rift, Warhammer online, Guild Wars, and many other games that had RPG style classes and PvP how balance is not nearly as simple as people like to think and how changing skills to work with PvP, if the game wasn't designed for PvP from the ground up, can be a pain or affect the PvE game and some of those games were designed with PvP in mind from the ground up.

Let's take your example of monks can't use serenity at all, but can a demon hunter still use vault? So now the monk has no PvP escape skill but the demon hunter does? So that is balanced how? If you take a skill away from one class you have to take a skill away from ALL classes or you now have a class that has fewer PvP skills they can use.

In D1 since every class had access to all the skills every other class had (though yes because of how attributes worked the classed played differently but a warrior could still cast a fireball just like a sorc could) balance was A LOT simpler and doing things like making players take half damage from other player skills was simple from a coding stand point because it wasn't actually changing the skills it was changing something on the classes since it applied to everything not just certain unique skills.

There is a reason why most of the successful and popular PvP games don't have a lot of real variation in the "classes" at least in the shooter world. The difference in damage output of attacks are minor compared to the variety of damage and effects that are available in something like WoW.

As I said depending on how the engine and code base was designed changing something that seems small could require rewriting a lot of the code.
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#17
(07-20-2012, 01:12 AM)Gnollguy Wrote:
(07-20-2012, 12:21 AM)RedRadical Wrote: Certain skills will most likely be made entirely null in PvP, I would imagine Serenity would be one of them, as would Giant Toad for WD. Much like how in D1 PvP you couldn't stone curse people - that would be way too cheezy and abused by everyone. Very powerful skills, like Wrath of the Berserk or Archon will probably be cut in half, based on either their duration, actual damage or even both.

There are plenty of easy ways to balance skills in PvP, but then again it is Blizz, and they can't even balance Inferno properly so I don't have too much confidence in them being able to balance PvP, even if it really shouldn't be that difficult.

Have you written a line of code in your life? Easy concepts are not always easy to translate to code and depending on design your base set-up may not be designed to handle it. This whole "it's easy" is not always easy and we have years of examples from WoW, Rift, Warhammer online, Guild Wars, and many other games that had RPG style classes and PvP how balance is not nearly as simple as people like to think and how changing skills to work with PvP, if the game wasn't designed for PvP from the ground up, can be a pain or affect the PvE game and some of those games were designed with PvP in mind from the ground up.

Let's take your example of monks can't use serenity at all, but can a demon hunter still use vault? So now the monk has no PvP escape skill but the demon hunter does? So that is balanced how? If you take a skill away from one class you have to take a skill away from ALL classes or you now have a class that has fewer PvP skills they can use.

In D1 since every class had access to all the skills every other class had (though yes because of how attributes worked the classed played differently but a warrior could still cast a fireball just like a sorc could) balance was A LOT simpler and doing things like making players take half damage from other player skills was simple from a coding stand point because it wasn't actually changing the skills it was changing something on the classes since it applied to everything not just certain unique skills.

There is a reason why most of the successful and popular PvP games don't have a lot of real variation in the "classes" at least in the shooter world. The difference in damage output of attacks are minor compared to the variety of damage and effects that are available in something like WoW.

As I said depending on how the engine and code base was designed changing something that seems small could require rewriting a lot of the code.

Serenity is probably much more OP than Vault, since one grants complete immunity to attacks and the other doesnt. You are comparing a damage mitigation skill to a damage avoidance skill that involves mobility. Apples and oranges. Monk has Dashing Strike or even Tempest Rush for mobilty (as well as Cyclone Strike to pull people in sort of like Vortex), just like Barb has Leap/Charge and Wiz has teleport and Illusionist passive.

D3's PvP may be more complicated to balance because of the different dynamics in skills, but with some extensive testing it is completely within the realm of possibility - and regardless of that, it should not be affecting PvM in any sort of way. No, I don't code, but it isn't rocket science either. The people saying that it can't be balanced without disrupting PvM only say that because a few anti-PvP people started this myth and now they are running with it. It is pretty ridiculous.
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#18
(07-19-2012, 08:49 PM)Gnollguy Wrote: Not really. The skills that tend to be the most problematic aren't ones that have effects on other players, it's cooldown stuff, which means you aren't just changing what it does to people you have to limit what it can do based on location, which is whole new layer to the coding because there is no mechanic in place for that now. The could likely kludge something in with the difficulty system, but my guess is for code efficiency that is only a way to do multiplicative changes across the board. You need a finer tool than that for skills.

Jay Wilson said in the video Foxbat linked to that they actually have PvP tables that would enable them to alter cooldowns as well as the length of time effects have on players. I guess the game code knows to use the PvP tables if you're in a PvP arena.
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#19
(07-19-2012, 05:58 PM)Bolty Wrote: Consider the neutering of class skills and abilities that has to result when you try to balance a game that features 25-man raiding alongside 3v3 competitive player vs. player. It's insane, really. For those who were around in the beginning of WoW, remember how radically different the classes were from each other? Balanced, no; but you have to admit they were extremely unique.

Thank-you for saying this, Bolty. This is one of the things that really bothered me when I came back to WoW in February. I remember coming up to a big AOE situation while running a dungeon in a pug group. Since we didn't have a mage or warlock in the party, I made a comment like, "This might be tough without an AOE dps class in the party." I could feel the confusion in my party at my comment when I was told, "What do you mean? We have a paladin and a death knight."

Similarly, when I got Divine Hymn, I thought, "People must love to have priests in their raids to right them out of bad situations." Then I found out that *every* healing class had a raid-wide super healing ability. It was then I realized that truly all dps were interchangeable, all healing classes were interchangeable, and all tanks were interchangeable. Maybe at the bleeding edge of hardcore raiding, where 1% differences are important, some distinctions could be made about which classes are preferable. But pretty much I kept thinking, "What's the point of having so many different classes if they can all effectively do the same thing?"
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#20
(07-20-2012, 09:56 AM)MongoJerry Wrote: Jay Wilson said in the video Foxbat linked to that they actually have PvP tables that would enable them to alter cooldowns as well as the length of time effects have on players. I guess the game code knows to use the PvP tables if you're in a PvP arena.

Good to know. They did build the base engine with PvP in mind and give it a way to more subtle tweaking for balancing in the arenas. Of course this isn't going to stop the whinging for "world PvP" that can't be balanced for in the same way because cooldown and duration changes would then affect PvM as well.

My other points about similar class based type games changing things for PvP affecting PvM still holds, as does my point that most successful PvP game tend to have classes that are very similar or essentially the same (which you and Bolty also covered).

Unless Blizzard makes arena have NO connection to PvE, that means you don't use the PvE stash or gear or skills (and with separate tables you won't be using PvE skills even if they have the same name and graphics) then trying to balance PvP will have some effect on PvE. Sure those could be positive. Things like making better gear more readily available in Hell difficulty so that you don't have to play inferno if you want to be better at PvP would actually be good because that would be a step in the direction of truly making inferno a bonus difficulty and not the next difficulty in the progression. But it is a PvP change that affects PvM. Yes they could go the WoW model and introduce PvP gear vendors and create a few stats that only give benefit in PvP, but that didn't really work all that well in WoW (it also didn't work all that well in Rift which had better distinction because you had the same issue that in some cases the best PvE gear was from PvP and the best PvP gear was still from PvE).

Again the idea that balancing it is easy is not true. Ripple effects can reach very deeply and I've yet to see a game that was designed to be primarily PvE get PvP properly balanced or never have a PvP change affect PvE. So I too was happy to hear everything about PvP being a minor concern. I also stand behind the idea that if you want PvP you design and balance for that, then add the PvE on after because it's will be much easier to balance both. Guild Wars took this approach and while it had it's issues and ripple effect problems, it offered the better experience.
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