The attitude of PvE players towards PvP

[gh0un]

I agree with you, I’m just explaining the current situation. This is actually never ending story, PvP needs to be entertaining for the newcomer, otherwise he will leave.

Let’s say I’m new to the game and I don’t speak Polish, so I cannot join BBS. So I have basically two choices, to join TTTLA/C88 or to join Hawks+friends. If I join Hawks, nobody will really care that I can’t play properly, since half of people there play for lulz, they don’t care about competition that much. Great. But the problem is, if I don’t get any victory after some fights, I might get frustrated, you need to be a really hardcore player to survive in that faction. Possible threat of quitting the game for good is 85%.

Ok, now, let’s assume I joined C88. Great faction, helpful people everywhere, but as far as I am concerned, you need to follow many rules (which, I don’t say is anything bad) and it happens quite often that people don’t fit in for some reason. Basically you can’t rob bases, you can’t act like dick and many people find that too restrictive (these are btw probably the future recruits of hawks, again, that’s my theory and my opinion) and they are kicked or leave for not having any “fun”. Possible threat of quitting the game for good is 60%.

So as a conclusion if a newcomer wants to have some PvP, it’s very hard to join TC fights for him, because the background (joining some faction etc.) is too complicated. He can enjoy some Hinkley, some miners pwning in mines and maybe some TB action near SF. That’s it. I don’t really know how to fix this, but to me it seems that the whole faction concept is actually too restrictive - you can officially be in only one faction, so if there is a fight and you would love to join, you simply can’t because your faction isn’t ready for the fight. You have to wait till you gather some players, even organizing such event is a hard work. So we have 200 players online and only 20 fighting because 40 other guys who would love to fight can’t because they are not members of neither of fighting factions.

This is exactly the problem. The faction-TC mechanic is too restrictive.
Im sure there are plenty of people that would love to fight in TC combat, but cannot due to having such small factions.
Me and my friends would like to participate, but we cant.

[Neuromancer]

If I were new player who actually wants to join TC (skipping total newb players,  I presume player knows mechanics, is self sufficient and is after 'exploring the world' part of the game)
1. Make PVP build
2. Sit in hinkley, looking for as much free pvp as I can, getting buttraped ( in order to get pvp skills, find out that this build I made was complete crap )
3. Make another build ( trying to spot enemies stats from awarness( str, hp),dmg done,dmg received, occurence of critical hits etc., or simply asking someone from there if they would help in making new build )
4. Sit moar in hinkly, try rambo fights in north or new reno, try clearing militia from opposing gangs, then pking ( possibly getting better, less buttraped )
5. Meet people ( other players without gangs, players from other factions, possibly If im doing fine there, either I'm getting invitation to some better organised group, or I'll try to spot players that I find worthy and trying to make my own group )
6. Finally I'm in some (more or less) pvp oriented group
7. Prepare lots of stuff ( for other experienced/skilled/bigger groups )
8. Get into tc, and get raped again ( ur stuff drops here )
9. Repeat rambo,militia clearing, hinkly, tc, craft, make ur gang bigger, get experience, search for recruits or look for an alliance ( possibly with other groups like yours if this guide would be successfull )
10. Finally u're into pvp/tc oriented group with 8+ active players ready for TC.

As for idea for npc driven factions in tc:
- u still have problem with communication ( ts,mumble is rly a must in every competitive game )
- let's say I join your npc driven faction, we all agree to participate in TC, we go there then i'm shooting your back and taking your stuff, if will notice that u got trolled, u start complain/whine in game and on forums, my alt eventually gets kicked out, or u won't go with this alt again,  chance of other mechanics abusing players is 100%, if not me someone else would do this 

[Nice_Boat]

2238 had a GM-driven PvP faction (NCR army), it didn't work and they ended up just getting their asses kicked and feeding everyone with loot despite having tweaked stats and free gear. You have to learn how to PvP and it takes some time, unfortunately for now there's no way around losing a lot before you actually start winning (aside from Hinkley).

What I'd like to see is PvP battles with full loot and some player-sponsored rewards (no free-spawning stuff to avoid abuse) with a limit on the size of each team. I think that the best options would include 3v3, 5v5 and 10v10 (if you have more people, you're TC-enabled anyway). However, this stuff would require taking up some of the dev time, so for now it's impossible I think.

I'm not sure if organizing something like that on our own would be possible right now - I mean we could have PvP tournaments with good organization in faction bases, but they wouldn't be running around the clock without a fair bit of scripting and some additional NPCs/terminals to automate sign-ups, entrance fees, reward payouts etc.

[serath]

TL;DR alert.

I played FO on few servers since very beginning. I'm mostly PvE player, but had some experience with PvP. I was in a gang on 2238, I was part of bigger alliance (first with The Guardians, then some ppl may remember PolFinGer thing, then times with VSB, the Hawks and the rest against Rouges/BBS) and I played some TC. I can't say i was a great PvP killing machine nor my gang was (hmm, maybe was, before some players ot bored and went to BBS for moar action), but had a a shitload of fun and was getting better (hejmr from Hawks can confirm, I killed him once. As his allay ). But still, now for me PvP is secondary thing. I'm not afraid of losing my stuff, I'm not afraid of dying many times (it happened countless times on 2238), and I plan go deeply into PvP later, but it sucks that there is to many restrictions with TC.

Let's skip the gang thing, it's obvious. But I can't use my main character because i got pwned really fast it RT combat against BG builds or Snipers, since I'm PvE build. It's not about experience and skill, since I've killed many ppl on the desert or in Glow or V15. It's about the game mechanic and i get that. I know it's hard to make everyone happy, but I play energy or melee chars only, and only one char at the time. I have 52 lvl energy char with 190HP, fast shot, 12AP, -1AP plasma rifle and i pwn solo almost everything in TB. When it comes with players it depends, but i assume that I've changed more players in a pile of goo than i died. But when comes to RT it's very hard. I play RT often too, since i like visiting Glow but i only can kill nabz without skills who thinks that because of their bursts they already are a winners. Skilled players with BG or XL70 are deadly. I don't say they are killing me only because of guns they use, but in most cases that's the truth. And I don't say it's a bad thing, but it's the thing that makes me useless in TC. I know You will say, make a pvp char and play. But it's not my style I always played with one Character (with one eception, but it was for trolling/RP thing*). Besides there is many things to do, I can spend all day hunting DeathClaws in caves, looking for good shit in lockers, wandering with friends on the desert without cleared purpose, just to spend some good time and shot few things. With no rush, and no competition, just for pure relax. So, about your question about attitude... PvP against similar players (not pure pvp builds) is good and i enjoy it (yes, even when i die), about TC and such since i don't have a crew and right build I must pass. Unfortunately.



*the trolling thing was to pretend a friend of myself from america fooling all my friends and gang members, that i want to learn polish language. I was fooling them about 2 moths or something like that, and it created a massive amount of funny situations. I doubt that someone remember my char named "Harry Keogh", since it was something about 2 or 3 years ago but hell, that shit was funny...

[AlbertStarski]

Hello,

Guys. I have a good supply background. I would be more then happy to do TC as well as, kill some annyoing players (especially prancing ones). If we have similar attitude, maybe we can unite our forces ? My fraction base has been called "The black cats" This name might give some impression about how the idea may function.

Iam waiting for your messages. I can give you more insight about this - "the black cats" project - vision.

PS.

Vote for my FANTASTIC ideas placed on the suggestions board : P

[Esteban W.]

PvE players are typical, run of the mill individuals. We are here to get as far as we possibly can, and have as much fun as possible. When we encounter two people who can shoot 15 times in a row with rifles; It doesn't make us want to PvP at all. Also, RT is horrid for anyone who actually wants to play the game. If you don't use a 'standard' build and level it, which is ungodly boring and, who wants to be like everyone else? Nobody. That's why I chose the slaver build, ten charisma does shit all for anything, but it gives me the ability to all sorts of awesome and cool things. I will never participate in TC on that character simply because I can't. I don't do enough damage to be efficient, and I can't take more than two turns of hits. Sure, my first aid and doctor are both pretty high, I'm a good support guy. But that's it. I'd much rather hang out with friends and take on huge groups of SM's and such, challenges that include risk and death is staring you in the face. But you can avoid it, you can fight it. When I think TC, I think of an ant getting stomped on by an elephant. You can't stop it, simply because we don't follow the crowd and use the 'correct' build. That's just my view on the whole thing; in short, we can't participate in TC because we don't follow everyone else's build, because we want to be different and find new ways to play the game.

[xargas]

Esteban is completely right. People who are focused more on roleplaying and immersion, usually have no chances when they encounter anyone with a PvP build. For example, if I like to play an SG hunter, with some decent outdoorsman, a bit of this and that, I will get stomped by any min-maxer, by simple maths. The sole SPECIAL distribution puts me a light year behind any guy with a "viable" PvP build. I think there should be sth like 2 servers, for example, one for PvE, and other for hardcore PvP. I don't mind getting sniped, or anything  like that, I played too much DayZ to bother, but being instagibbed by miniguns in every possible location is just getting tiresome, and it just makes you want to quit. I love the changes made, the amount of new content is great, and as a Fallout fan since, well, always I want to dig through it. I hope there can be a solution that would satisfy both sides.

[lightbulp]

This part is a reply to Nice Boat post:
From what I saw in GM videos and while sneaking during TC for some time now every gang even thinking about some serious TC need to have:
- 2-3 heavy battle sneaks (not just a bluesuit scout)
- about 12 real PvP chars (it's usualy range from 8 - 16)
- lately it's also 2-4 BG companions

Tell me which PvE group willing to try TC can afford that?

Another thing is that PvE players usualy would like to play on their favourite laser spammer or other good or bad PvE char. That's the thing only they can change because if they are not willing to level new char then there is no place for them in PvP because they would be eaten alive by first PvP char they encounter.

Ok, lets say they got PvP char and wanna try something small, so New Reno is their choice. Fine, but they enter and find nobody or get raped by bluesuit HtH trolls, invisible heroes on sneak or just a group twice their size spawn on them.

Also TC fights slowly turn into who got more people and patience to wait on WM or in building longer. It's mostly because of sneaks. Durring TC fights I go out, check WM and there are some nick, but not much, suddenly 10+ people spawn, soon after fight begin and surprise, surprise another 10+ people spawn. Before that happen you need to get past insane ammount of sneakeres running everywhere, so my ques is that for 15 min. you wait in tents/bases with 10+ people while 2-3 are running all over the town (same for all teams) and just wait for oportunity go get in ass of two fighting groups and fights seams to be about 1 min long.
Very apealing for new players to start doing TC if in 1h window you spend most of the time on WM because if you enter first you will be just serving yourself on plate for those who had more patience to wait on WM.

This part is mostly general PvP talk:
What I see is seriously wrong with this PvP and will soon turn Reloaded into 2238 mkII version is:
- PvP builds on sneak, you should call it like that, it's no longer a sneaker, it's a regular fighter with ability to become invisible and all they sacrifice is 1 perk at lvl 6...
- sneakers with companions, also great Reloaded invention
- AC + Jinxed + Sneak chars - real combobreaker, just add companions and avenger/gatling into that
- bluesuit AC + HtH +/- HH trolls - 2238 all over again (from what I saw on videos from Reno on Reloaded Youtube channel trolls are already here and still naked bluesuit is doing amazingly good vs well armed chars)
- NPC in PvP all over again but this time it's not merc leaders spawning from WM, now it's sneakers or regular fighers with companions (free and respawning npc), with no lvl cap, easy leveling you get PP for 2 of those without a problem

What can be done:
- heavy nerf to sneakers, they are ment to be scouts, not invisible regular PvP chars. I would love to see them disabled and scouting left for snipers and other high pe chars. Imagine three groups in town looking for each other, more tactical gameplay I would say, not simply had a magic eye in town that will say, ok spawn rigth, go up, left then down and rape all that are left from two groups that had balls for enter town first
- make HtH chars worth something but only when well equiped, right now AC is working best on bluesuit, you got in your face, sneak and you just need to be lucky, score some crit, ko/kd but you can do it for free on bluesuit, you die, you respawn and come back on blue to troll some more
- sneaking should work like loging off for NPC followers, right now good sneaker can use them for example to initiate corner rush, companions are free, will respawn, got reaction time better then players, so well used can break every rapetrain for free
- change of TC zones in town (maybe exclude buildings?), from many movies you can see that durring TC most of the time is not used and it's n-th time same moves, over and over again, I don't know but it seams to be a bit borring. There are also too many open spaces where you simply don't want to go in towns becuase you can be ambushed easily with no cover on open space, so people stick to old buildings and streets that at least give them some cover

[Kilgore]

First is to follow the Guild Wars route of offering an entirely separate PvP character creation option. I don't have to work my way up to max level, I can tweak my character exactly the way I want, and I get to jump into PvP right away without worrying about messing up. It's a consequence-free way to offer the full PvP experience of competing via player skill, tactics, reflexes, and other non-mechanical traits. After all, that's the core of PvP, right? You're fully satisfied - even if you lose - when you know you and your enemy were fighting on equal terms, and that if you mess up, it was because of a mistake you had full control over. Not because of some stupid thing like your gun jamming in the middle of the fight, or your opponent's armor having +1 more AC than yours.

I've played Guild Wars for few years, mostly pvp-only chars and sure, it was a great idea. Recently I was thinking about something like that - an arena that can be joined by everyone and also it would be possible to create arena-only characters, with free exp till 24 lvl, but these characters would not be able to leave the arena.

Still, there are other things to do, like some alternatives to town control, maybe with limited number of participants on both sides..

[Kirkor]

Very apealing for new players to start doing TC if in 1h window you spend most of the time on WM because if you enter first you will be just serving yourself on plate for those who had more patience to wait on WM.

Yep, I'm really getting tired of TC. 90% of the time it's just standing on WM/tent and waiting. I don't mind waiting - I'm patient man, but for god's sake! 40minutes of waiting, just so we can enter and fight for 5 minutes...

In most of the games there are"sneaker" characters - rogues/thieves/scouts, you name it. Yes, they are "invisible", but at the same time alot weaker than tank/dps or whatever. They can't use heavy armors, big weapons etc. Their advantage is "invisibility" and surprising the enemy, not a friggin gatling in your face...
Here they can sneak with friggin' minigun or gatling - that's damn stupid. They shouldn't be able to sneak with heavy weaponry (all big guns, gatling etc.) and should have big minus for sneaking with weapon bigger than pistols/SMGs. They also shouldn't be able to sneak with anything heavier than Combat Leather Jacket.

[Kelin]

I agree that sneaking in best armors is just ridiculous, sneakers are hard to kill and are very powerful. Previous sneak system was pretty balanced, every kilogram was a small penalty for sneaking, that way it was harder to sneak with heavy weapons like avengers or gatlings, sneaking in a CA was almost impossible. The fights are long and mostly about WM camping because there are teams that don’t even take a shit without proper scouting. During this time there are a few sneakers inside the town having some fun but most of the players are waiting on WM and that’s tiring.

I have myself a 281 hp sneaker and I remember in one TC in Den I switched to rocket launcher and joined our main forces in fighting, that is in my opinion something that a sneaker shouldn’t be capable of.

[Garrett]

basically what reasons you listed and what everyone else already has said. pvp players generally are just really poor sports and horde you with numbers, or just randomly dying on a town map, why has it become habit for me to always check a town out naked if im not ABSOLUTELY sure its safe, cant count how many times ive been blown in half for just going into a town and not knowing that it was some PVP BS. im lookin to trade and find quests instead i find a minigun DPS whore in my face just waiting there not even being fair, just waiting with perfect LOS to burst you. its just poor sportsmanship, i don't play this game because I WANT to play with 5 year olds..........

so honestly i just don't want to play its not fun there is no teamwork outside of the big gangs and the game itself does not leave room for small pools of players that just want to play with 3-5 freinds. we will never compete with gangs of 50+, we know it and we dont WANT TO, we just want to have fun playing fallout as a team and maybe pit our characters against each-other because at least there is a sense of fairness in 1v1.

[b__B]

I'm afraid you play wrong game. You probably want some meaningful "Fallout experience" with
towns being actual towns with some roleplay not arenas filled with maniacs, but this game
IS NOTHING like the original Fallout games. The sooner you realize it, the better for you. Sorry.

[Ryvaeus]

First is to follow the Guild Wars route of offering an entirely separate PvP character creation option. I don't have to work my way up to max level, I can tweak my character exactly the way I want, and I get to jump into PvP right away without worrying about messing up. It's a consequence-free way to offer the full PvP experience of competing via player skill, tactics, reflexes, and other non-mechanical traits. After all, that's the core of PvP, right? You're fully satisfied - even if you lose - when you know you and your enemy were fighting on equal terms, and that if you mess up, it was because of a mistake you had full control over. Not because of some stupid thing like your gun jamming in the middle of the fight, or your opponent's armor having +1 more AC than yours.

I've played Guild Wars for few years, mostly pvp-only chars and sure, it was a great idea. Recently I was thinking about something like that - an arena that can be joined by everyone and also it would be possible to create arena-only characters, with free exp till 24 lvl, but these characters would not be able to leave the arena.

Still, there are other things to do, like some alternatives to town control, maybe with limited number of participants on both sides..

I want to clarify something about my original, very long reply here.

I equate PvP with everything that involves hostile player interaction with other players. That is, not just TC, which is ideally a fair matchup between factions and where the most important factor for winning is lots of planning and sound tactics (I think?). I also assume the term "PvP" includes world map encounters, town griefers, suicide bombers, etc.

My opinions and observations about PvP therefore are not specific to Town Control.

[Sperber]

The biggest problem I have with PvP is that I don't like real-time combat.
I'm just a casual gamer and suck at it big time.

Another thing is that I don't want to play min/maxed PvP builds since I like balanced characters.
Playing PvP with a build that's not powergamed for it and that doesn't use drugs seems pointless.
Although I've been able too kill some PvPers at Hinkley with my less than 70HP crafter/sniper.

I prefer playing WITH other players over playing AGAINST them,
but still think PvP (yes even PKing to some extent) is an important part of the charm of Fonline.
Wasteland gotta be a dangerous place.

But if I just wanted action I could simply go to Hinkley. Nothing to lose there.

Maybe factions could recruit other players as mercenaries for TC and give em gear and caps in return?

I'm afraid you play wrong game. You probably want some meaningful "Fallout experience" with
towns being actual towns with some roleplay not arenas filled with maniacs, but this game
IS NOTHING like the original Fallout games. The sooner you realize it, the better for you. Sorry.

It could be though. It doesn't depend on the game but the players.