PvP endgame - Better models are possible, always

Come on, you have to suffer these topics, I don’t post these as frequently as before. This one is spawned by the discussion in the other thread about the PvP endgame between WoW, DAoC and other games.

We gave a glance to the advantage/disadvantages of them. I said that better models are possible and this thread is to suggest a solution to explain my point of view and demonstrate concretely what I consider a “better model”. So you can see directly what I mean and agree/disagree.

To build it I borrowed the best parts of WoW, DAoC and Planetside. Adding my own ideas to the general shape.


The idea I suggested a year ago was built on this principle:
“Designing a game which allows players not to HAVE to play regularly”.

  • At the base the system works like DAoC. You gain points and progressively unblock ranks. The relevant difference is that these points are only gained by achieving PvP goals and never by killing players directly. The enemies are considered simply as “obstacles” that step in your way and that you need to get rid of in order to reach your goal.

  • As you gain points you unblock ranks in a similar way to what happens in both WoW and DAoC but as a “flat treadmill”.

  • Ranks unblock new skills but you do not gain them automatically. You do not fill a rank as you unblock it. You unblock only the possibility to fill it.

  • The skills and spells a rank offers aren’t cumulative. So you can use exclusively the skills/spells that are tied directly to the single rank you fill at that precise moment.

  • Ranks get assigned to groups and raids through a voting system (also based on ranks). So, for example, every group of “normal players” will have just one commander assigned and each raid will have a finite number of officers and just one leader (to simplify, the actual system offers many different ranks/“roles”).

  • These ranks will be assigned through the voting system and to the players that were able to unblock them by gaining the appropriate amount of points.

  • When a character is within a specific rank he gets access to specific new skills that are tied to his particular role. These skills are for the most part area-based effects that affect his squadron, the enemies or the environment. So, generally, not just more powerful versions of the same skills/spells he uses normally. This to give each rank a different role in the battlefield and not just making the character directly more powerful. Ranks are meant to unblock specific purposes and possibilities, not to make the single player more powerful.

This system allows to appoint players that are considered “naturally” leaders by giving them a recognized role in the game and specific skills that are appropriate for the situation. It also differentiates the gameplay so that different ranks behave in different ways on the battlefield.

The system can then be extended to PvE to create more dynamic situations instead of the repetitive models in the endgame content in games like WoW.

Plus, the bigger goal, it brings together the casual players and the catasses. It allows them to join their forces and rely on each other. Since the ranks are unblocked and assigned in groups and raids, not everyone will just become more powerful. A group of five players will always have just one commander. Even if ALL the players in that group have the “commander” rank already unblocked, only one of them will fill that role after being voted by the group.

So if you want to be a leader you don’t just have to catass but also build your own reputation with the community so that after you unblocked a rank you are also voted to fill and use it.

The system is called “Flat Power Treadmill” since it doesn’t define direct advancement paths like in other games. You don’t gain directly more power between the ranks. Instead you gain a different roles, different goals and differemt responsibilities, making the gameplay more interactive and dynamic. At the same time you always need “normal players” in your group in order for someone to fill an higher rank, so you’ll NEVER see in the game a full group of commanders or higher ranks. It isn’t an endless race to be more “leet”. The higher ranks will always have to rely on the “casual players” to have access to their powers.

This offers an incentive to go on and unblock new interesting roles in the battlefield (for example in a game with vehicles only higher ranks could get access to them or some specific weaponry). So this is an incentive to play and enjoy the game in the long term (retention of subscriptions). At the same time it doesn’t creates GAPS between casual players and catasses that ultimately breaks the game when the groups progressively outdistance each other. Instead it helps them to play together. The catasses will help the casual players to get involved and understand the game and the casual players will help the catasses to gain access to what they want.

[ul][li]This is a model that works on the long term (because it provides always incentives to unblock new gameplay and not just more powerful version of “the same”).
[/li]
[li]It is always accessible for both the catasses and the casual players and throughout the whole life span of the game.
[/li]
[li]It adds dynamism to the battlefield by giving the players different roles and purposes.
[/li]
[*]It finally brings together catasses and casual players. Producing an heathly community that doesn’t shatter in pieces, progressively damaging the accessibility for new players as they join.[/ul]

What does this have to do with Shadowbane?

So your solution for ‘end game’ is to add a little more ‘end game’ that has such a steep advancement curve that anyone who isn’t a hard-core catasser has no hope of getting very far in?

Asside from that your solution contradicts the premis.

Premis:You are at the ‘end game’, you have done it all. How do you keep people intrested.

Contradictory solution: Add a new system that gives players something to do.

Problem: If you add ‘more’ then you are not at the end game anymore, hence you are not solving the end game problem.

What the real solition will look like: Enganging and Fun that does not include gaining more wealth or power. AKA there is no advancement of any sort, but people are still motivated to play.

Impress me, solve that problem.

The system I imagined is more complex but I have simplified it to just explain the essential. In its complete version it starts to work in a similar way to the talents in WoW.

You do not unblock just progressive ranks but completely different roles that you have to choose. Like a new PvP class system. So you build your own path through this advancement system.

The skills/spells aren’t usable if you are alone. Firstly because you cannot fill a specific rank without being in a group and voted for it. Secondly because these skills are not supposed to affect the single character, in general.

You AREN’T catassing for your power because those skills and powers have basically no effect on your own power. So you cannot catass it and you aren’t going to be excluded from the gameplay.

There is no requirement to “catass”, that’s the main goal of the system so it just demonstrates that you didn’t read what I wrote. You can advance at your own pace and this will never affect your performance or viability in the battlefield. It doesn’t prevent you to have fun or being invited in a group if you aren’t at the appropriate level. ON THE CONTRARY, the lower ranks will be always considered PRECIOUS because without them noone will be able to get assigned at the higher ranks.

In the practice the more you play the more possibilities and “content” gets unlocked. If you play for a month you’ll just have access to a basic level. But a basic level that is always REQUIRED in the game. The higher ranks aren’t supposed to be directly “more fun”. But just to offer new patterns and new types of interactions. As you move up you can use them.

Premis:You are at the ‘end game’, you have done it all. How do you keep people intrested.

Contradictory solution: Add a new system that gives players something to do.

Problem: If you add ‘more’ then you are not at the end game anymore, hence you are not solving the end game problem.

This system I suggested is solely about the advancement path. Because they are fun and because they are needed for retention. Without being able to build something the subscriptions are going to hurt and noone will ever produce such a game that shoots on its feet.

My goal is to retain the fun in the advancement but without damaging the fabric of the game. Instead using it to bring catass and casual together and progressively unblock different gameplay and more dynamism in the PvP.

This isn’t “content”. The topic of this thread isn’t about the content at the endgame.

For example in DAoC there’s the ranking system and the Realm Skills. And then there’s the content in the form of RvR zones, conquerable keeps, sieges and so on.

What I’m discussing here it’s NOT about the content but about the other aspect of the advancement.

What the real solition will look like: Enganging and Fun that does not include gaining more wealth or power. AKA there is no advancement of any sort, but people are still motivated to play.

Impress me, solve that problem.

No, because that would completely derail the thread.

I discussed the “content” of the PvP elsewhere and it’s pointless to keep derailing the threads toward other directions as an excuse to invalidate what I write about different arguments.

If you want games without advancement of any sort, go play Unreal Tournament. Mmorpgs ARE about advancement, without it they aren’t mmorpgs. If you think it’s okay to remove from the game an important system like this one you are just removing one of the strongest qualities this genre offers.

To address even more the core concept:

Catassing a system is about progressing through it in order to play along with your friends. In other games you are forced to catass or you are excluded from the game. This because you have to keep up with your friends or you’ll lag out and you will get outcast.

That’s what is wrong in the advancement systems we have in the games now. Not the advancement itself but the OBLIGATION TO KEEP UP AND MATCH THE RESULTS OF OTHER PLAYERS.

“Advancing” is always fun if it’s kept accessible and if you aren’t forced to maintain an exact pace set by others.

My system address this problem directly. New ranks do not make you more powerful but just give you access to different gameplay. A player can choose that a specific role is extremely fun and REFUSE to progress further because he has no interest in doing so.

The system never forces you to “keep up”. You just go where you want to go. From a side you have an incentive because you can get bored after playing the same role for months. So you could have an interest to get access to something else (and this happens naturally as you play). From the other side this process is NEVER REQUIRED and always optional.

The point is that there are no gaps between catasses and normal players. The catasses will fill naturally their role as leaders while other players will explore other possibilities.

I believe not everyone plays to lead raids. I offer specific roles to those players that want such positions, I offer then a bunch of different roles for the players that are interested to play with other mechanics.

It’s NEVER a race to the end. All the roles you unblock are essential to the system and they are the OPPOSITE of a ladder you have to endlessly climb.

This series of posts almost makes me wish I hadn’t used the smashy-face animated gif on Koontz.

Almost.

If it ain’t Open PvP, it ain’t PvP.

Oh yea…go make a game.

Sorry Hrose, but I will not buy into a semantical argument here. If there is a way to advance, its not end game.

End game is cleary when you have done it all. You have the phat loot, you have the leet skills, etc… How do you keep people involved in your game. What you are suggesting is not an end-game fix. You are, again simply suggesting something else to do as users approach the end game, to push the end-game goal away, just a bit farther.

You do not need any magic to put it slightly farther away. You can simply add a slightly more uber dungeon, just a little more phat loot, or somethign meaningless like a quest to get “The grand Poohbah” added infront of your name.

Perhaps you should re-title this thread, to something like “Things for high level PvP players to do”.

Finally I object to any idea that involves really cool stuff to do, like capturing cities or makes PvP meaningful because this should be available at all levels, not just for the level 60’s with purple gear.

Sounds an awful lot like Planetside to me.

Level 23 with Mini Chaingun and Reinforced Amor versus Level 6 with Mini Chaingun and Reinforced Armor is down to who has more skill. The Level 23 has no advantages except maybe implants, but there’s only one that really helps your in combat itself, and the Level 6 has access to that as well.

One commander/squad leader for each group.

Time spend leading gives perks that only help leading, not in minute-to-minute killing. Except the once every 2 (?) hours Orbital Strike.

Most experience coming from capturing bases and working with your team, rather than just killing the enemy.

Decent experience earned just by healing/repairing your empire’s soldiers and vehicles.

The only problem with Planetside is there’s no sense of being able to affect long term change. The base you capture tonight will probably change hands two or three times while you’re at work tomorrow. I haven’t seen a good proposal to fix that though.

You lost me here. You are describing something like keep/relic raids in DAOC or AV in WoW. In both of these you end up fighting NPCs mainly, which is not PvP.

Endgame from my perspective is where players reuse the same content over and over, yet are still interested in playing and willing to pay. DAOC did this by providing RvR frontiers, and letting the enemies players be the “content.” Seems like a great business decision. WoW is doing it with PvE instance dungeons and battlegrounds. I think DAOC implementation of endgame progression was close to optimal - RvR participation gained you ranks, and new abilities, but was steep enough to keep even the most hardcore players engaged for years.

Well, noone will believe me but I was discussing the idea the first time one year ago on Mud-Dev and only tried Planetside for a month in October again of the last year.

Of course I knew some parts of it even without playing it but not the details.

There are considerable differences in the skills themselves. In Planetside there is no “character”. The PvP advancement is the only one in the game so you BECOME a normal soldier or a tank or an helicopter and so on. You never retain your “character”. Instead in my idea there’s still the persistence of “yourself”. If you are a mage you aren’t going to change what you can do through the PvP system. So you gain new possibilities and roles but still “as yourself”.

The skills and spells I have in mind are the opposite of those in Planetside. In that game you change completely your way of shooting and moving. In my idea the skills are mostly situational and useful because they affect a large number of players (so not effective in a single group or alone). They are dynamic in the battlefield while I didn’t notice situational and reactional events in Planetside.

For example one of the skills I have on mind that can be used by a commander is the possibility to cast a force field (radius of 10 meters) that lasts 30 seconds, prevents enemy players to go in and mitigates their magic effects up to 90% (50% for “outgoing” magic). This is an example of a situational skills that affect the situation and a large group of players. It’s a direct effect on the environment that requires you to react.

This idea of the force field is supposed to add dynamism. For example to be used during a siege where all the players take cover under it to resist and heal themselves before it falls again. Or to set a retreat point that is easily recognizeable and allows the players to reorganize together during a chaotic battle.

Has Planetside something along these lines? As I said you still play your own class, in different roles and with different competencies. The class system isn’t affected. While in Planetside you switch directly the class and you never seem to gain specific new skills that add dynamism to the action and that affect a large number of players.

Planetside also differs (I think, I’m not sure how it works) on the main mechanic. I think in Planetside you can fill every role if you have enough experience. In my idea you can fill a role ONLY if there are enough players to support it. In order to unblock more ranks there must be enough normal players already in the battlefield. This to support the gameplay between new players and catasses, which is the main part of what I planned.

The only problem with Planetside is there’s no sense of being able to affect long term change. The base you capture tonight will probably change hands two or three times while you’re at work tomorrow. I haven’t seen a good proposal to fix that though.

I have written my ideas in the link I posted above in the answer to DeepT.

In my plan the world is divided into regions in a similar way to a Paradox game. You can conquer only adiacent regions. Everyone lives in this world because the gameplay is supposed to be based only partially just on “combat”. In fact I strongly criticize the current mmorpgs because they are limited to being just “combat simulations” when they can be so much more.

In Planetside there’s no long term change because the battle is everything. In my idea the battle is only a part of the game and in those zones other activities go on.

I was also planning for a resource system similar to RTS games. So you do not just conquer hotspots, but you also manage them, gather resources, upgrade structures and create caravans to move these resources between the regions and build an inner market that is required to keep the control of your zones.

In Planetside there’s no breadth and depth because it was conceived as an evolved FPS (and the rank system isn’t anything new, it wasn’t invented by this game). My point of view isn’t about Planetside, but about what mmorpgs can be. So I borrow from Planetside the mechanic of the ranks as “roles” because I think it can provide a good mechanic and improve on the current situation.

Has Planetside something along these lines? As I said you still play your own class, in different roles and with different competencies. The class system isn’t affected. While in Planetside you switch directly the class system and you never seem to gain specific new skills that add dynamism to the action and that affect a large number of players.

The AMS, a vehicle that is a spawn point for everyone in your empire. You decide where it goes, and in doing so you dramatically affect the lines of battle. Also the Router, a teleporter type vehicle. And combat engineers who place mines/turrets around a base for defense. And hackers who can give their empire temporary access to vehicle or equipment terminals. And Galaxy pilots who can offer rapid transport of up to 13 people at a time. And ANT drivers who refill a base’s energy level, letting the defense hold out longer.

Planetside also differs (I think, I’m not sure how it works) on the main mechanic. I think in Planetside you can fill every role if you have enough experience. In my idea you can fill a role ONLY if there are enough players to support it. In order to unblock more ranks there must be enough normal players already in the battlefield. This to support the gameplay between new players and catasses, which is the main part of what I planned.

You certainly can’t have every certification at once, so you can’t fill every role with enough experience. It isn’t tied to number of players at all, but that mechanic would really piss me off if I logged in one day to find out I can’t drive my AMS because there aren’t enough people logged in.

In my plan the world is divided into regions in a similar way to a Paradox game. You can conquer only adiacent regions.

Planetside works like that.

I was also planning for a resource system similar to RTS games. So you do not just conquer hotspots, but you also manage them, gather resources, upgrade structures and create caravans to move these resources between the regions and build an inner market that is required to keep the control of your zones.

How do keep team A in check when they start dominating team B and team C and building up their inner market?

I just want to say that I think it is great that Lum has coined a phrase which has just become such a part of everday vernacular when speaking about MMORPGs that no one even blinks anymore. (Even more so because he can see the fruits of his labor here and on other boards)

Catass - verb

Catasser - noun

I just snicker with glee everytime I see that phrase thrown around and not an eyebrow is lifted in protest anymore.

In my idea you NEVER retain abilities between different ranks. I believe Plaetside works in the same way? Or there are some abilitiles you retain between the roles?

Anyway, the reason why you wouldn’t like to have ranks dependent on other players is again because in Planetside you ARE your rank. So not being able to fill a rank means not being able to play the class you want to.

This doesn’t apply to my idea because the class is a part and the rank is another. If you are a mage you still keep using your skills, no matter of the rank. The rank just unblocks different possibilites you can use and that have an effect on a number of players instead of just yourself.

Again, in Planetside a rank determines the way you shoot and move. So it affects mainly yourself. In my idea the skills have an use only when organized and used for other players. So you are intersted in filling a rank only if there are other players that can benefit from it.

How do keep team A in check when they start dominating team B and team C and building up their inner market?

Well, it’s written here.

Delving into it would produce endless discussions because it’s a complex system tied with many other parts of the game. So the discussion can derail everywhere.

Mainly there are (to the point I planned, it’s about “ongoing design” ideas) three systems to assure a balance and keep the game fun:

1- Some of the resources to maintain the regions you conquer are fixed and you need to distribute them between the various points. The more you expand your realm the more you need to spread those fixed points, so you become more vulnerable to aimed attacks coming from the other faction. This while the losing faction can concentrate more resources in a single point and obtaining a greater defence.

2- Some of the resources that aren’t fixed are produced solely by the opposite faction. So you can retain a “complete control” only temporary (may be a few days in borderline situations, for example). The philosophical idea is that one side needs the other to survive. The game also contemplates “agreements” and “peace”. Because as I said I do not want just a combat simulation.

3- A faction can conquer the whole world but not the capital of the other realm. The capital can get pillaged and destroyed but never controlled directly. The third system is about underground galleries that from the capital bring the players “behind the enemy lines”. So even in the most desperate situation the players can organize strike forces to cut the supply lines of the enemy realm.

There are three classes of resources:

  • The first class is about the fixed pool. These resources cannot be increased, destroyed or stolen. You can think of them as energy spheres. If one of them is kept in a tower and the tower falls to the enemy, the sphere ports itself back to the capital of the reign and waits to get allocated again by someone.

  • The second class is about resources that a faction doesn’t know how to produce and so needs to “buy” from the other realm (transitioning through a neutral realm that has the role to balance the two and regulate the market). If the other realm isn’t able to produce thse resources in the first place even the opposite realm will suffer after the escorts are exhausted. (these resources can be stolen or destroyed)

  • The third class is about resources that you can produce yourself. Here you spawn NPCs and give them tasks as in the most popular RTS. So you heap and use progressively what you are producing. (these resources can be stolen or destroyed)

I’m not sure how you could port these design ideas to Planetside but I believe in their value. I believe they can produce an interesting PvP environment.

One of the basic ideas is an heresy: unbalanced PvP is FUN.

I believe that it can be FUN to play the underdog. Single players games often rely on this to obtain a strong emotional impact and I believe this mechanic can be carried over to a multiplayer environment. Playing the underdog hasn’t been fun in the games we know because the design doesn’t support it properly. So I tried to develop ideas that offered specific gameplay only accessible when you are losing. The galleries and the fixed pool of points open new possibilities and dynamics. The players that are losing a battle have always something to do and gain access to new conditions.

So you do not sit on your ass and keep dying, respawning, dying, respawning, knowing that you are losing and still without being able to do anything about it. Instead you organize and play the different strategies that open up in different situations.

I’m currently playing “God of War”. If there’s an evidence of its success it’s about the ability to put you constantly in new situations and offer new dynamics. PvP in mmorpgs becomes boring exactly when there’s one pattern that can only be reiterated endlessly.

My ideas (successful or not, I believe they can be valid) are aimed to offer more dynamism on the battlefield and change the way you play over time. This is why being the underdog CAN be fun. You have access to new patterns and plan different strategies.

I believe the duty of a designer is about supporting those possibilities and offer the players the tools to do so.