PvP, Honor, Faction and BGs

[Hedon]

Those of you, who have chosen a PvP server: do you still remember why you did so? Would you chose PvP again today?

Though I never was an avid PvP player and usally seek out my challenges in MMORPGs on the PvE field, I chose PvP for the extra thrill it promised when roaming through the world. Choosing PvP came with a price: not being able to have Alliance alts on the same server my Horde main is on, and therby forgoing the pleasure of being able to interact ingame with the "the other side" of the server community I am a part of.


Let's see how PvP developed since February 2005, the European WoW release date:


Pre Honor, pre BG:
PvP rarely occured. Horde and Alliance were mostly at peace, as there was no motiviation to PvP apart from just doing it for fun.
At the same time in the Nothamerican community, were due to a earlier release date (Nov 2004) large parts of the server populations were hitting lvl 60, complaints began to be voiced about the lack of progression outside of raid instances like MC and Onyxia.


Post Honor, pre BG:
PvP activitiy becomes suddenly frantic from on day to the other after the introduction of the honor system (see critique on honor system below). People have suddenly a strong motivation to engage in PvP as they hope for the epic rewards they weren't able to obtain from PvE, because they are not part of a large raiding guild. Only very few people, those who know what "distribution" in the context of "contributed points" and "limited ranks" really means, realize that this is going to be a rather fruitless exercise for most players.


Post Honor, post BG:
Once again a sudden turn of tides. The world becomes a serene place again, as PvP is being fought out in BGs, where one cannot only gain more and easier honor then from going out hunting players in the wilds, but also gain faction rewards.
While faction might be very well achievable if one only hangs out long enough in the BGs, on the honor front the mother of all grinds begins...


Situation Today:
The PvP situation "out in the wilds" is only slightly more exciting than before the introduction of the honor system. A few scattered encounters here and there, but mostly there is a truce between Horde and Alliance.

Warsong is dead and buried. Faction rewards are not good enough there, and most people realized that the probability to sucessfully solo MC is higher than gain epics through PvP ranking; honor was the main reward for Warsong.

Alterac Valley lives up from time, when enough people come together to grind for faction. Once they reach exalted with the Frostwolf Clan they usally do not come back.

Arathi Basin: As it is new everbody who wants the faction rewards is grinding out there, together with the the few people who have aspirations on a high PvP rank (as they cannot find Warsong matches anymore, they have to mingle with the faction hunters). Basically it is the same as AV: once people have reached exalted with the Defilers they will drop out, and AB will begin dieing slowly much like AV today.




So here we are at the source of the whole blizzardic PvP-Problem: The whole honor and BG system was never designed with PvP as a social game in mind, but as an alternative way to acquire epic items for those who can't or don't want to PvE raid for them.
But the fun part of PvP is really the social aspect of it. Not being able to chose when to engange or not engange in PvP leads to social interaction, whether it is coalition building or simply trashtalking on realm forums about "oh so unfair gankers". Entering a Battleground where you are exepcted to kill and be killed, takes away this social element, and makes it mere sport or even worse "work".


Ok lets accept that Blizzard does not want open PvP, and rather simply seeks a competitive mode of play for item acquistion versus the cooperative one of PvE raiding.
People who don't do PvE Raids are often labled as casual players due to the fact, that they don't have or simply don't want to contribute large timeblocks for raid content. The honor system should be the way for those people to gain access to epic equipment.
The truth is, that to advance past rank 11 you have to contribute much more time than you would have to for mastering Onyxia, MC and BWL together. Basically it requires 24/7 gaming, simply because of the fact that you compete against other players who want to achieve the same thing, as opposed to competing vs. a set threshold of difficulty presented by the raid instances. In PvP there will always be someone more dedicated than you. If raid content is for the hardcore, then honor is for the maniacs ;)

In conclusion one has to credit Blizzard that they tried to tackle PvP in a way no other MMO has done before, but it is time to ackonowledge they have failed in this.
This not withstanding the BGs can be incredible fun in itself, wouldn't they be corrupted by the "curse of grind" to a degree that pales the PvE instances in comparison, or as the author of the craftingworlds.com movies said: "BGs have become the slums of Azeroth".

[Watto44]

on the honor front the mother of all grinds begins...

This pretty much sums up my "honor" experiences to a "T".

I am not a casual gamer, I play Wow a lot. However, I'm not in a big guild. (Which is a whole other story. Quite boring, no drama.) When honor was released I thought of it as a way to progress my lvl 60 character(s) without having to join a raiding guild. It was a great boon in my eyes: I could progress and remain competetive against the epic clad opposition by doing something that I was really interested in.

And then reality hit. I hit the wall and the wall hit back. Hard. A variety of issues (work, family, timezone) keep me away from the computer for much of the day. I could not compete with the people in my own faction to gain the required standing to progress past rank 7. Frustraition has set in, and I've spent the last few weeks relaxing and assessing the situation. Here's what I've come up with.

Blizzard is essential the author of their own demize. They billed this as a game that catered to the needs of both the hardcore and casual player. Unfortunately, because of the way they designed character progression at level 60, balancing these two needs is extremely difficult.

Imagine a scenarion where a casual gamer could spend thirty hours spred out over several weeks to significantly progress their character at level 60 by grinding for faction to get themselves some nice new gear. Sounds great, but then try and balance that with the hardcore gamer who can probable knock that 30 hours over in 4 days. The situation you end up in is one in which the "hardcore" aspect is so cheapened that you may as well remove Ony/MC/BWL from the game entirely. Why bother spending hours and hours of time keying 40 characters for Ony when you can spend that time getting comparable gear through a simple level grind?

So how do you resolve this situation? The solution that I see blizzard taking is to make the casual grind hellishly long. So long in fact that it becomes both unfeasable and unenjoyable for casual gamers to progress their characters at level 60 in a manner that is comparable to a hardcore gamer in a raiding guild. (For a good example of this, try and imagine how long it would take someone who only plays 10 hours a week to get a Hide of the Wild. Doable, yes. Enjoyable...)

Now apply this same logic to the honor system. Admittedly bliz made a mistake with the rank percentages - which is being rectified in the next content patch - but the same logic is still applied. To balance the progression of the hardcore and casual player you either cheapen the efforts of the hardcore player to the point where there is no reason to chase harcore content, or you set the casual gamer up with a hellish grind.

That, in itself, is not so bad, but the real problem for the casual gamer isn't so much the hellish grind, it's the fact that the highest level of pvp is unattainable for them. The grind I wouldn't mind, it's the fact that I have to compete with players who have far more time than I do just to get a set of blue gear. It's not a contest I can ever win so my character stagnates.

As for solutions, as I said, it's a tough bind that blizzard has found themselves in. How do you let casual players progress in a meaningful way without cheapening the achievements of the hardcore? But step one would be to make the tier 1 pvp set an achievable goal for casual players. Removing the need to chase standing to get to rank 10 might work, making it more like grinding for experience than a frustraiting and unwinnable contest for a lot of people.

Hehe, sorry to hijack your thread with a bit of a personal rant, but I'll get a little more on topic from here on in. :P

The loss of "world" pvp that happened with the introduction of BGs was a direct result of the flaws in the honor system grind. Why engage in world PvP when the return is meaningless in comparison to the return from BGs? (The fact that it's an absolute ton of fun aside. B) ) For anyone who wanted to get that pvp set, all thoughts of grinding honor outside of BGs went out the window the first time they won a BG and saw that big, juicy honor bonus.

The solution here seems a lot simpler, but it would still be a stop-gap. Remove or greatly reduce the honor bonus for winning battleground. There is still incentive to play in them as the rep rewards are nice, but there is no [b]need[/p] to play in them if you wish to progress in ranks.

Another - more hair brained and definately not well thought out :) - solution would be to scrap the honor system as it stands and replace it with a similar system to the reputation hand-ins in AV. Want those pvp boots? Bring me 50 tufts on gnome hair. Then tie the epic rewards into suitably epic pvp acomplishments.

Unfortunately we aren't left with any simple answers at the end of the day. In their most recent battleplan bliz mentioned that they are thinking of introducing world pvp events. Perhaps this will help to return world pvp to the servers, but it won't address the basic flaws inherent in the honor system, just as Dire Maul and Zul Gurub haven't addressed the basic flaws in PvE progression.

(Wow, sorry about this. I didn't realise it was so long. Congratulations if you actually made it through the whole thing.)

[oldmandennis]

Ehh... I guess I'll go ahead and play devils advocate here.

First off, I for one don't miss the large scale "world pvp". With no way to even up sides, no way to "win", no objectives to take, it just seemed kindof silly to me. It doesn't help that my server is fairly tilted against the horde, so we never had a chance. There are a lot of neat quests in Hillsbrad that I'm just now getting around to with my alt because the place was such a cluster while leveling my main.

At least on my server there is still a lot of small scale PVP, if thats your game. Head to any of the notorious farming spots like Tyr's hand or Hearthglen if you are looking for action.

It seems like you guys want to grind honor the same way you grind XP. Well, they are different. There is already XP, factions like TB, TMF, AD, and probably heros will involve more of an XP grind. One aspect of the game is not the conventional, kill 30,000 of X and collect 3,000 of Y grind. It is a good thing.

As far as character advancement goes, I'm not sure if I ever saw where the honor system was supposed to be a widespread alternate means of advancement. Even if they said it, things change. Right now it seems more like a Starcraft/Warcraft ladder. I played hundreds of games of Starcraft and Warcraft, but spread out over a long time, and never made it far up the ladder. Play it because you enjoy it, and at the end of the day you will find your level.

If you do need to advance, BG faction rewards are pretty reasonable in terms of time/epic. If you are going to be casual, it's going to take you a long time to get epic no matter what your route (raid/BG/farm enough gold to buy at AH). WAI.

[oldmandennis]

Slow news day, so I'll link and quote a few things from the Blizz site that support my previous argument "You are not supposed to be able to grind honor the same way you grind XP"

Linky

It (was) decided to implement a ranking system [in World of Warcraft] that is similar to the Warcraft III ladders on Battle.net

It ensures that the honor system rewards are very meaningful without running the risk of the PvP rewards drastically devaluing PvE loot (i.e. if it took less total playtime to get the PvP rewards in comparison to the player-vs-environment (PvE loot).

Finally, one of the major benefits is that a ladder system helps ensure that over time, the game world does not become inflated with "Generals" and "Warlords".

[Roland]

Here's an odd idea that may very well help the situation, though it might not seem obvious at first: make CRAFTING worthwhile.

Think about it - theoretically, crafting can be done just as easily by the casual player as by the hardcore player (it just takes longer; no different than leveling). By making very good gear available from player-made sources, you essentially alleviate the need to grind PvE content for that oh-so-rare drop, and likewise make PvP grinding not so necessary (doubly so if you're sole PvP goal is to get gear without having to PvE grind). How to balance this? Doing exactly what they have done thus far: rare item reagents required to make the best gear. Although, they shouldn't make all the best gear require RAID rare drops - not even half, I'd say, or not much more than half. 5-man instances can be made well-difficult enough to make soloing impossible, but still worthy of a strong reward. And let's not forget: even if you DO get the reagents, you still have to know someone (or be someone) with a crafting level high enough to make the items for you. This in itself helps balance the whole process, too, by adding another layer to it.

It's not a perfect solution, not by far, but it would help. It would also solve a grievance that has been plaguing players since day one: worthless crafting. I'm confident Blizzard COULD pull this off. I'm not confident they will, espeically since it doesn't seem that they even want crafting to be worth anything. Sad, really... makes you wonder why they even bother implementing it at all.

[TheLuminaire]

Here's an odd idea that may very well help the situation, though it might not seem obvious at first: make CRAFTING worthwhile.

Think about it - theoretically, crafting can be done just as easily by the casual player as by the hardcore player (it just takes longer; no different than leveling). By making very good gear available from player-made sources, you essentially alleviate the need to grind PvE content for that oh-so-rare drop, and likewise make PvP grinding not so necessary (doubly so if you're sole PvP goal is to get gear without having to PvE grind). How to balance this? Doing exactly what they have done thus far: rare item reagents required to make the best gear. Although, they shouldn't make all the best gear require RAID rare drops - not even half, I'd say, or not much more than half. 5-man instances can be made well-difficult enough to make soloing impossible, but still worthy of a strong reward. And let's not forget: even if you DO get the reagents, you still have to know someone (or be someone) with a crafting level high enough to make the items for you. This in itself helps balance the whole process, too, by adding another layer to it.

It's not a perfect solution, not by far, but it would help. It would also solve a grievance that has been plaguing players since day one: worthless crafting. I'm confident Blizzard COULD pull this off. I'm not confident they will, espeically since it doesn't seem that they even want crafting to be worth anything. Sad, really... makes you wonder why they even bother implementing it at all.
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I dunno, that's pretty much unrelated to the problems that plauge the PvP landscape. While a group of people do PvP strictly for the honor/faction rewards, that's not always the case. I'll agree that there need to be some crafting changes, but as it stands now, some/many of the best weapons and armor in the game are made, not found.

Take Sulfuras for instance. That's arguably one of, if not THE most powerful weapon in the game. It takes such a huge amount of high-level regents, both from inside MC, and from regular reagent paths, like Thorium>Arcanite. The last thing I want is powerful epic/legendary items that are easy enough to get in 5-man, or solo content. It completely defeats the purpose of having a weapon that rare.

I fail to see how adding some new recipies, with reagents that are easier to find outside of a raid instance makes PvP, Honor, and the Battlegrounds any better.

[Hedon]

Hehe, you asked for quotewars, oldmandennis, you can have it ;)

From the Blizzard PvP Flash Site http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/pvp/flash-rewards/

What's the Honor System -> Gain Honor Points -> 6. What can be done for casual players?

We expect many players will be surprised how viable they will be in the Honor System

As one poster on the official WoW forums put it:
"Still makes me giggle" :P



I agree very much with Roland on the crafting issues. Crafting should be much harder to level up, yet be able to yield better results itemwise, without the necessity of using raid dropped recipes and ingredients. Raiding for recipes and ingredients is basically the same as raiding for the items itself. That's why examples like the Sulfaras Hammer doesn't falsify Rolands points about the lacking possibilites of item acquisition through crafting.

[Roland]

I fail to see how adding some new recipies, with reagents that are easier to find outside of a raid instance makes PvP, Honor, and the Battlegrounds any better.

I didn't say it would. I said it could alleviate SOME of the problems inherent to the PvP Battleground / Honor system. I also explicitly stated it would NOT solve all of them. It was just a quick thought that could help, with ADDITIONAL changes, alleviate some of the problems with PvP / BGs / Honor, while also solving the problem of very poor crafting choices.

By no means do I think that the PvP system in its entirety is going to be fixed by any small changes; the thought is ludicrous. I just had a small thought on one possible way to help change some parts of the problem, that's all.

Your comments as a whole are duly noted. I would not want the best items made craftable by 5-man teams or solo adventurers, either, although it would hurt to give us more varied choices.

[oldmandennis]

./agree with Roland.

By my count there are 8 purple items that can be crafted without core mats, my favorite being Hide of the Wild. It certainly involves an epic amount of work, but you can imagine a casual player chipping away at it for a while.

There's probably room for a dozen or two more similar items.

As far as your quote goes, Hedon, pffftttt

1) Well, you sure were suprised, right?
2) The site is in flash, which makes any info on it highly suspect.
3) IIRC, the site is European. Reading through it, it seems some things were lost in translation.

[savaughn]

While faction might be very well achievable if one only hangs out long enough in the BGs, on the honor front the mother of all grinds begins...
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I keep hearing this complaint over and over. Generally followed by "Hey, Blizz, you said you were going to make this game viable for the casual gamer!".

I find myself confounded by the concept. People want to be able to get the exact same benefits through solo play that you can get through the focused and concentrated effort of 40 people working together. :blink: That doesn't even make sense.

Can you slowly but surely grind your way in the post 60 game? Sure. You can slowly accumulate honor points, you can go mine the 48000 dark iron ore required for that faction, you can pick a battle ground and play when you can and slowly grind your way through those factions. You will likely find it slow, monotonous and boring. You have two choices at that point: quit, or find a different way to enjoy the game. I don't think Blizz really cares that much which one you choose.

Let's compare the end game for WoW with the end game for Diablo 2. 48000 dark iron? No problem compared to the 150,000 Pindleskin runs people were doing. And grinding for honor in the battlegrounds is a joy compared to grinding out that last final level before capping in D2. Assuming you ever got there.

My take on it is this: there are two parts to every game. The first part is the provided content. In Diablo, you could get through this in a day and a half at which point you'd seen all there was to see. In WoW, I've been playing since December and I still find new stuff. There's a lot more out there. But even once you're done, once you've seen all there is to see, explored all that provided content... there's more.

Talk to MJ about a certain little lady who punched her way through the first part of Diablo2. Once you've exhausted the provided content, what you are left with is a toy. And it's up to you to make a fun game with it at that point. Blizz will add content now and again and it will be great. We'll get a whole EXPANSION of content - probably at the rate of once a year - as things move forward. Every couple months we'll get some changes that will give you something else new to explore or whatever.

But if you feel like you've been there and you've done that and it's lost it's magic... if you don't make the decision to enjoy the toy that is WoW - it's time to move on. If you aren't in a supporting guild, you are probably never going to get a full set of purples. If that's the only criteria you have to say if WoW is a success for you or not, it's probably time to move on.

Personally, I haven't done all the quests on the Horde side, I haven't capped a Warlock or a Shaman, and I haven't seen nearly enough end game raid content for my tastes. I'm gonna keep playing with this toy until then. But then, I was one of those idiots who was actually trying for a complete set of Uniques in D2, too.

[TheWesson]

I keep hearing this complaint over and over.  Generally followed by "Hey, Blizz, you said you were going to make this game viable for the casual gamer!".

I find myself confounded by the concept.  People want to be able to get the exact same benefits through solo play that you can get through the focused and concentrated effort of 40 people working together.  :blink:  That doesn't even make sense.

Can you slowly but surely grind your way in the post 60 game?  Sure.  You can slowly accumulate honor points, you can go mine the 48000 dark iron ore required for that faction, you can pick a battle ground and play when you can and slowly grind your way through those factions.  You will likely find it slow, monotonous and boring.  You have two choices at that point:  quit, or find a different way to enjoy the game.  I don't think Blizz really cares that much which one you choose.

Let's compare the end game for WoW with the end game for Diablo 2.  48000 dark iron?  No problem compared to the 150,000 Pindleskin runs people were doing.  And grinding for honor in the battlegrounds is a joy compared to grinding out that last final level before capping in D2.  Assuming you ever got there.

My take on it is this:  there are two parts to every game.  The first part is the provided content.  In Diablo, you could get through this in a day and a half at which point you'd seen all there was to see.  In WoW, I've been playing since December and I still find new stuff.  There's a lot more out there.  But even once you're done, once you've seen all there is to see, explored all that provided content... there's more.

Talk to MJ about a certain little lady who punched her way through the first part of Diablo2.  Once you've exhausted the provided content, what you are left with is a toy.  And it's up to you to make a fun game with it at that point.  Blizz will add content now and again and it will be great.  We'll get a whole EXPANSION of content - probably at the rate of once a year - as things move forward.  Every couple months we'll get some changes that will give you something else new to explore or whatever.

But if you feel like you've been there and you've done that and it's lost it's magic... if you don't make the decision to enjoy the toy that is WoW - it's time to move on.  If you aren't in a supporting guild, you are probably never going to get a full set of purples.  If that's the only criteria you have to say if WoW is a success for you or not, it's probably time to move on.

Personally, I haven't done all the quests on the Horde side, I haven't capped a Warlock or a Shaman, and I haven't seen nearly enough end game raid content for my tastes.  I'm gonna keep playing with this toy until then.  But then, I was one of those idiots who was actually trying for a complete set of Uniques in D2, too.
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Gee I dunno, it's not that much of a toy
A ) inasmuch as it doesn't reward skill
B ) inasmuch as you can't do new things with it.

A yo-yo you can learn to "walk the dog" (or whatever) if you have sufficient skill.

The WoW equivalent might be yo'ing the yo 10,000 times by grinding honor in BG.

Or, in the case of raiding instances, learning to put a puzzle together.

Lego's you can build something new. What can you build in WoW besides your own character?

Some suggestions for rewarding skill and getting to do new things:

Make PvP zero-sum. Everybody is born with a little honor. If you're killed you or your party or your raid lose a small proportion of your honor, which is awarded to whatever unit killed you.

You and your guild share honor (if so desired.) Big guilds can make guild camps. Guilds lose honor when their camps are raided and gain honor by raiding camps, as well as by the kill-or-be-killed mechanic above.

Random dungeons. If you don't know what to expect, then skill and adaptability are truly rewarded.

Casual single-player instances. Get faction or honor by killing a boss solo, who's very difficult to kill solo. Randomize the boss and his minions to some extent. Thus, the "hard-core" gamer is rewarded for his/her hours spent by becoming extremely skilled and able to do what the casual gamer just cannot. Nonetheless a casual player could be smart or skilled or lucky and have a 0.01% chance of killing the boss - or at least *feel* that they could've ... if only they hadn't done so and so ...

Now I'm not saying WoW is totally a non-toy or totally unskilled. But the toy factor could be greatly enhanced by (1) a changing world that could be changed by you, and (2) having more skill in the equation.

A real "toy" game is like SimCity, in which you can just do things and watch their effects. In this sense, WoW isn't much of a toy world.

anyhow that's my slight, meager opinion.

not saying I'm not addicted to WC and lovin' it. I do my own "toy" things, like trying different classes and professions and character builds ...

PS over-levelled characters should not be allowed in instances. It's not about going in and grabbing the loot, people! <annoyed>

[Chesspiece_face]

Gee I dunno, it's not that much of a toy
A ) inasmuch as it doesn't reward skill
B ) inasmuch as you can't do new things with it.

A yo-yo you can learn to "walk the dog" (or whatever) if you have sufficient skill.

The WoW equivalent might be yo'ing the yo 10,000 times by grinding honor in BG.

Or, in the case of raiding instances, learning to put a puzzle together.

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And this is Savaughn's point. If you chose to view the game as a constant non stop grind, that's all it's gonna be and you need to decide to leave or stay. If you are playing the BG's just to grind out faction you probably aren't going to get much enjoyment out of it. If you are playing the BG's so that you can learn to play your character better or for the thrill of highly comptetitive interplayer interaction you will be able to find enjoyment out of practically every match you enter.

[TheWesson]

And this is Savaughn's point.&nbsp; If you chose to view the game as a constant non stop grind, that's all it's gonna be and you need to decide to leave or stay.&nbsp; If you are playing the BG's just to grind out faction you probably aren't going to get much enjoyment out of it.&nbsp; If you are playing the BG's so that you can learn to play your character better or for the thrill of highly comptetitive interplayer interaction you will be able to find enjoyment out of practically every match you enter.
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I've thought about this topic many times. I'l put it this way - it would be nice if compulsive min/maxers (somewhat like myself) could have fun and maximize reward (or come close to it) at the same time.

It would be nice if you could build a viable warrior-priest, or get ahead (fairly quickly) by having deathmatches with creatures well above your level.

I don't think it's unjust to complain that fun and reward should be aligned.

Admittedly there is a deep underlying problem - the min/maxer will almost always find a way to make work out of play.

(I understand that going on a raid is much like joining the Army - everybody has one job, follow orders or else...)

Work is the inevitable end state of play. The kitten with a ball of yarn is preparing to one day catch his dinner ...

but even the cat has fun catching his dinner. or seems to.

[Jester]

Either maximize your character, or maximize your fun.

To ask that these be the same thing is to ask for a perfect game, like chess. I don't see a game that good coming around any time soon, but you're welcome to wait for it.

Jester

[Watto44]

Hmm, looks like we've run off on a bit of a tangent. Sorry about that. In response to the pvp stuff:

First off, I for one don't miss the large scale "world pvp".

I certainly don't miss the TM/SS lagfest, but there are things I miss about world pvp. Some of my fondest memories of WoW are world PvP stuff. Holding the tower in Southshore against hideous odds. Our server's first raid into Ironforge where the entire 40 man raid wiped before the city had finished loading. Trying to take down Jania Proudmore (spelling?) and wiping because we didn't notice a civilian that spawned a ton of guards. (Hehe, if you're ever looking for a laugh, run 40 odd people past a civilian. Funny stuff.) Three man guild raids on Astranaar or Duskwood. (Suicide but great fun.) What was great about this was there was no motive behind it except to have some fun. This was very much the "toy" aspec that savaughn talked about: a way to create your own fun in the game.

Battlegrounds are great, don't get me wrong, and I do have fond memories of some battleground moments. I think they're well done and a lot of fun, but they are static in terms of goals. What was fun about world pvp was that the goals were fluid and you could create your own.

As for the honor system itself - as it relates to pvp as opposed to character progression - my gripe is that it introduced the grind into an element of play that was previously purely about the fun. Despite my best intentions to keep pvping for the pure joy of it, it has become difficult to seperate the honor grind and fun aspects of pvp. It is very difficult for me to play something where I can progress my character and not get frustraited when I hit the wall, particularly when that wall falls well short of - what I thought to be - realistic goals. (In my case, the blue pvp set.)

Which brings us to the difficulties of the casual gamer. Why do I hit the wall? It doesn't seem to be because I'm lacking in skills. While I'm far from the best pvper on my server, and far from being the best druid, I do alright and hold my own with some of the big dogs. No, it's nothing to do with skill level, I hit the wall because of time issues. In a sense character progression through pvp is closed to me. I've gone as far as I can go. While this has been something of a relief - I no longer feel I have to grind for honor - it's also very, very disappointing as I've fallen well short of the goals I had set and there's nothing I can do to change that.

As for the casual dilemma in general, the real problem is one of progression. In order for someone to enjoy the game they have to feel empowered to progress their character. For a casual gamer, there is also a wall that they hit, generally around the time that they've finished collecting their tier 0 set. At that point, there is little they can do to progress their character further, and they become disempowered to act in the game world. It is a very frustraiting feeling.

So the problem is how do you give casual gamers those two things, empowerment (geez, is that even a word?) and progress? I feel that there are templates already in the game that would let the designers do this. One that's already been mentioned is crafting. Hide of the Wild is a good example. It gives casual gamers the opportunity to go out and farm for things that will progress their character, it makes you feel as if your actions matter within the game world, as they're going to progress your character.

Another is quests. While this was mentioned already, I thought I'd throw in a couple of examples. The first one is Battle of Darrowshire. This is a great quest line for a casual gamer. They can go out and complete the long chain pretty much solo. Each step in the chain doesn't take that long, but each step has meaning because you are working towards a goal. While you still need to find a group to complete the quest, it gives casual gamers an opportunity to progress on their own. Another example of the quest template is the hunter epic quest for lok'thingy. While this requires a drop from a 40 man instance, the quest itself is suitably epic and, interestingly, has to be done solo. I don't feel that either of these quests, nor their rewards, "cheapen" the accomplishments of players who are grinding in various instances, and would love to see more of this sort of stuff. A suitably epic quest chain for a suitably epic reward. (Note: I know that the quest rewards from Battle for Darrowshire aren't epic, but apply the logic to the tier 0 sets. Does this quest reward cheapen the efforts of people who grind in scholo/strat/et al.?)

At the end of the day, there's nothing that says an "epic" equates with "40 man raid", as I'm sure any hunter will tell you. :)

(Woo, sorry for another long post. Arts Degree for the loss. :blush: )

[Roland]

It just dawned on me what PvP, and specifically BGs, need: persistent world effects.

Planetside has them. DAoC has them. Lots of other games have them, and they WORK.

Let me give you one example. Alterac Valley, like any BG, has outposts that need to be fought for and controlled (if I understand BGs right - I've never been). Doing so in the BG itself is virtually meaningless, in the "big picture". But, let's say that "capturing" and holding all of Alterac Valley caused, say, a 10% increase in experience gain for your ENTIRE FACTION while you held it. NOW you have real reason to go to battlegrounds, and not just for some fun PvP action - for REAL rewards that EVERYONE can benefit from WITHOUT the need for grinding, and instead the need for skill.

Planetside has this in ABUNDANCE, and it works BEAUTIFULLY. Capturing bases not only creates spawn points for your faction, which in turn creates a base of operations to organize attacks, gear up, and move on to the next objective from a closer location (just like in real life wars), but each base has a certain "installation" benefit, so to speak. Some, when you capture and hold them, offer vehicle repairs to all your "controlled and linked" bases. Others create a shield wall in the main gate to each "controlled and linked" (linked = controlled, but controlled =|= linked necessarily) base, keeping enemy ground vehicles from entering but still allowing enemy troops to flow through if unguarded. Battles very often wage in, on, and around these bases, sometimes for hours on end, and your skill and determination (along with that of your teammates) can ultimately determine whether you hold your ground, crumble, or push them right back all the way into their "home base". This creates a very tense PvP environment while still creating a huge amount of fun for those seeking PvP. Of course, it's not ALL about huge battles - plenty of 1v1 or small group battles occur constantly, as well. Just that the 100+ per-faction battles tend to be the most memorable. ;)

Doing something like this for WoW will accomplish many things:
1) Allow everyone to gain a benefit from your factions PvP efforts. This in turn -
2) Drives everyone to participate in PvP in BGs, because your efforts are needed to sway the battle in your faction's favor. This in turn -
3) Keeps BGs full of players throughout the day, eliminating the "battle until I've gained all I can then move on" mentality of BGs currently seen, while allowing casual players to still do their own thing wherever (either in or out of BGs, be it PvP or PvE).

Of course, this would require 100% constant BG servers, without any of this queue crap they have now. That is an issue I don't think Blizzard is even remotely ready to tackle, but hopefully they can in the future. And again, it would give a STATIC, attainable-by-everyone benefit / goal to PvPing in BGs. Your skill, along with the rest of your factionmates, would determine the outcome of battles, and thus who got the rewards. Constant fluxes in playerbases would allow natural Darwinistic variance of who got the benefit(s) without it falling prey to the current problem of hardcore gamers and min/maxers. Casual players would be just as essential as hardcore players, single individuals just as important as large-scale guilds, because it would be a constant goal, with a constant benefit.

It doesn't even have to be that huge of a benefit either, and by NOT making rewards item-based, you in effect avoid most any issue of "balance" becoming a problem.

The only real problem, or problems I should say, I see with this idea are thus:
1) Large differences in faction population on servers. This can be alleviated by using the same system both DAoC and Planetside have been using since day one. That is, if you are on the faction with the lower population, you gain very small, incremental (scaled, depending on just how big the difference is) bonuses to your entire faction in the form of HP, damage, etc. AFAIK, there are no penalties for having the higher population, only bonuses for having the lower one, thus keeping the playing field level at all times (relatively speaking).
2) Very solid server architecture and software. Blizzard has, unfortunately, been very weak in the past here. They failed to meet the requirements for WoW at release, likewise with Diablo II, although unlike Diablo II the turnaround for the problem was MUCH more rapid (inside of a month, with problems being almost completely fixed within the first few months). Still, persistent servers dedicated to hosting the PvP BGs may be an obstacle for Blizzard. I can't say for sure, only speculate based on what they've shown us, and what they've stated (IIRC, persistent BGs as has been wished for before around here have gotten a less-than-stellar response from Blizzard; i.e. "don't hold your breath").

Thoughts anyone? Personally, I think it's the almost-perfect fix to a huge part of the problem. And, it's been tested throughout multiple MMOs (even multiple GENRES!), and proven to be a very effective, viable means of PvP. Personally, I think it's an incredible idea and is EXACTLY the direction WoW should go in with their BGs, but I may be biased due to my previous PvP experience. What does everyone else think?

[TheWesson]

It just dawned on me what PvP, and specifically BGs, need: persistent world effects.

Planetside has them. DAoC has them. Lots of other games have them, and they WORK.

Let me give you one example. Alterac Valley, like any BG, has outposts that need to be fought for and controlled (if I understand BGs right - I've never been). Doing so in the BG itself is virtually meaningless, in the "big picture". But, let's say that "capturing" and holding all of Alterac Valley caused, say, a 10% increase in experience gain for your ENTIRE FACTION while you held it. NOW you have real reason to go to battlegrounds, and not just for some fun PvP action - for REAL rewards that EVERYONE can benefit from WITHOUT the need for grinding, and instead the need for skill.

Planetside has this in ABUNDANCE, and it works BEAUTIFULLY. Capturing bases not only creates spawn points for your faction, which in turn creates a base of operations to organize attacks, gear up, and move on to the next objective from a closer location (just like in real life wars), but each base has a certain "installation" benefit, so to speak. Some, when you capture and hold them, offer vehicle repairs to all your "controlled and linked" bases. Others create a shield wall in the main gate to each "controlled and linked" (linked = controlled, but controlled =|= linked necessarily) base, keeping enemy ground vehicles from entering but still allowing enemy troops to flow through if unguarded. Battles very often wage in, on, and around these bases, sometimes for hours on end, and your skill and determination (along with that of your teammates) can ultimately determine whether you hold your ground, crumble, or push them right back all the way into their "home base". This creates a very tense PvP environment while still creating a huge amount of fun for those seeking PvP. Of course, it's not ALL about huge battles - plenty of 1v1 or small group battles occur constantly, as well. Just that the 100+ per-faction battles tend to be the most memorable. ;)

Doing something like this for WoW will accomplish many things:
1) Allow everyone to gain a benefit from your factions PvP efforts. This in turn -
2) Drives everyone to participate in PvP in BGs, because your efforts are needed to sway the battle in your faction's favor. This in turn -
3) Keeps BGs full of players throughout the day, eliminating the "battle until I've gained all I can then move on" mentality of BGs currently seen, while allowing casual players to still do their own thing wherever (either in or out of BGs, be it PvP or PvE).

Of course, this would require 100% constant BG servers, without any of this queue crap they have now. That is an issue I don't think Blizzard is even remotely ready to tackle, but hopefully they can in the future. And again, it would give a STATIC, attainable-by-everyone benefit / goal to PvPing in BGs. Your skill, along with the rest of your factionmates, would determine the outcome of battles, and thus who got the rewards. Constant fluxes in playerbases would allow natural Darwinistic variance of who got the benefit(s) without it falling prey to the current problem of hardcore gamers and min/maxers. Casual players would be just as essential as hardcore players, single individuals just as important as large-scale guilds, because it would be a constant goal, with a constant benefit.

It doesn't even have to be that huge of a benefit either, and by NOT making rewards item-based, you in effect avoid most any issue of "balance" becoming a problem.

The only real problem, or problems I should say, I see with this idea are thus:
1) Large differences in faction population on servers. This can be alleviated by using the same system both DAoC and Planetside have been using since day one. That is, if you are on the faction with the lower population, you gain very small, incremental (scaled, depending on just how big the difference is) bonuses to your entire faction in the form of HP, damage, etc. AFAIK, there are no penalties for having the higher population, only bonuses for having the lower one, thus keeping the playing field level at all times (relatively speaking).
2) Very solid server architecture and software. Blizzard has, unfortunately, been very weak in the past here. They failed to meet the requirements for WoW at release, likewise with Diablo II, although unlike Diablo II the turnaround for the problem was MUCH more rapid (inside of a month, with problems being almost completely fixed within the first few months). Still, persistent servers dedicated to hosting the PvP BGs may be an obstacle for Blizzard. I can't say for sure, only speculate based on what they've shown us, and what they've stated (IIRC, persistent BGs as has been wished for before around here have gotten a less-than-stellar response from Blizzard; i.e. "don't hold your breath").

Thoughts anyone? Personally, I think it's the almost-perfect fix to a huge part of the problem. And, it's been tested throughout multiple MMOs (even multiple GENRES!), and proven to be a very effective, viable means of PvP. Personally, I think it's an incredible idea and is EXACTLY the direction WoW should go in with their BGs, but I may be biased due to my previous PvP experience. What does everyone else think?
[right][snapback]91385[/snapback][/right]

Yep totally into that. And I'm not even into PvP as a rule, I'm really PvE-leaning.

I suppose you do need to limit the positive feedback effect. If one faction can start taking bases and then gain momentum and completely roll over the opposing faction leaving them in a corner (forever) that's not so good.

Hence some negative feedback effect - for example, the deeper that Alliance is in Horde territory, the more Horde NPCs spawn. Or something, I'm sure such mechanisms have been explored in great depth.

Blizzard's getting soo much money every month from this game ... one would think they could assemble the resources to do a lot of very interesting work.

[oldmandennis]

Roland -

My impression of Planetside is that it was very (maybe completly) PvP oriented. Those ideas sound like fun, but it also sounds like a different game then this one. There are a whole lot of WoW players who wouldn't take kindly to Orgrimmar being under constant siege.

I think I've heard of a game with some of those ideas coming out soon based on a Roman theme, I can't recall the name.

Watto -

I'm just not sure what part of casual progression through pvp is not addressed by BG faction rewards. I can't find anywhere it says casual players should be able to progress themselves through honor. If you don't like BG's then you have a problem with the basic design of the pvp aspect of the game, I don't know what to say other then give guild wars a shot maybe? Granted BG's need a couple of tweaks like going cross server so anyone can get into any map in a reasonable amount of time, and maybe some sort of ranking system to stop pugs from getting repeatedly annhilated by pro teams. I'm actually interested in your response.

As far as "not being casual".... well, I guess its relative. My server just got it's first high warlord. I had him on my friends list, cause if I could sneak into his AB group I learned alot. The guy was always on. That's what it takes to be the best. As in most MMO's, the best is mainly determined by time spent. To race to the top of a Diablo ladder you had to make it your life, to hit lvl 30 on a WC3 ladder you had to make it your life. Top Counterstrike teams spend hours and hours training togeather..... compared to all that everyone is casual. I would love some blues for my rank 3, 3-4 games a week lifestyle, but I'm not blaming blizz for not making it happen.

Heh, went a bit long.... thats beer for ya :)

[Watto44]

I'm just not sure what part of casual progression through pvp is not addressed by BG faction rewards.&nbsp; I can't find anywhere it says casual players should be able to progress themselves through honor.&nbsp; If you don't like BG's then you have a problem with the basic design of the pvp aspect of the game, I don't know what to say other then give guild wars a shot maybe?&nbsp; Granted BG's need a couple of tweaks like going cross server so anyone can get into any map in a reasonable amount of time, and maybe some sort of ranking system to stop pugs from getting repeatedly annhilated by pro teams.&nbsp; I'm actually interested in your response.
[right][snapback]91414[/snapback][/right]

Hehe Dennis, I'll admit that my discontent with the honor system is probably my fault. I had quite high expectations for the honor system and set my goals accordingly, and it's just unfortunate that those goals were a little unrealistic. My bitterness (and I am bitter, but it's getting better - this has been quite cathartic :D ) stems from the fact that I couldn't reach my goals.

As for not liking BGs. Well, that's not entirely true. I do like them. I like the team work, and the friends that I've met playing in them. I've certainly had some great times in them. (There's definately something very satisfying about making a really good flag run, and being a part of the horde's first AV win on my server was a huge buzz.) But there are somethings that I miss from world PvP. (Mentioned them in my second post.) I understand that I'm being a little nostalgic: world pvp was very, very rarely as good as I remember it. But there was definately a joy to it at times that I don't really see in BGs, maybe because it's hidden under all the testosterone and aggro. ;) (Hehe, I remember one time an unnamed warlock screaming over vent at people "Don't PvP!!!!!!!!" But that was one out of the box, I've met a lot of really relaxed, chilled people who are great fun to play with.)

In regards to reputation rewards: thank God for Arathi Basin. :D For a druid the rep rewards from WSG are pretty crappy, and certainly not really worth shooting for. There's some pretty nice AV stuff, but mostly if you're going pretty hard at feral. Unfortunately, AV's a pretty rare beast on my server, but getting that rep up is still something I want to do. Luckily the rep rewards from AB are definately a goal worth shooting for. They're very nice indeed.

At the end of the day, I'm just bitter that I can't achieve the goals I set myself, and it's going to take a while to turn that around and accept more realistic goals in terms of character progression. I still think, however, that having a system where a player can just hit a glass ceiling is inviting a loss of business. Fair enough to have a ladder system, but it's something of a shock when you suddenly, and almost inexplicably, stop progressing from one week to the next. (In my case I managed to get almost a full "bar" to get to Blood Guard one week - thank you irregular work hours :D - and the next week played a comparable amount and made no progress what-so-ever. :( ) Perhaps a system where you don't stop progressing, you just starting going really, really, really slowly. The wall is still effectively in place, but the shock value of hitting it isn't as great. :)

PS. I think that the pro-group vs PuG issue is very real and going to become more and more of a problem in BGs as more raid content is released. I seriously hope that blizzard is trying to think of some solution to this. Perhaps a split ladder system like you suggested would work, but there seem to be a lot of design problems in something like that. I can't think of anything else that might work off the top of my head though. :D

[oldmandennis]

Well... I guess I'm glad to be part of your venting process? :wacko:

Guild is having a hard time gettin its act togeather tonight, so a lot of posts :P

As far as glass celing... did you play WC3( which the honor system was explictly based on)? When I did, I slammed into at level 12-13 or so. If I had a good streak (usually by consistantly playing to make my skills better) I could bump up to 14 or 15, but with the amount I generally played I usually regressed back to 12 shortly.

So I think the problems will hopefully be solved with 1-2 maps, cross faction matchmaking, and hopefully something that weights the average rank of the team into the sides.

:) A good time will be had by all.