Are Dev's Bad, or do MMO PVP Games Not Work?

[slog]

One good idea that Fury had is that, at the end of the match, both winners and losers received loot for playing and got to roll on a chance to get other loot. Winners did get slightly better loot than losers, but everybody got something.

Which is wrong. You shouldn't get rewarded for losing. Only someone who never wins could be happy about that.

I was in some club during high school. Every year the club would attend a national competition. I was competing in some lame technology challenge event. I was given instructions, rules, and a list of materials. Using those I had to create a device that could accomplish a task. In the end mine was the only working device at the competition. The others completely failed. They decided that the rules had been too tough, or they hadn't given everyone adequate time to complete the task. So they decided to keep my fucking winners trophy, and give everyone a participation certificate instead. When my turn came up I told them to shove the certificate up their asses, and to give me my first place trophy. I told them it wasn't my fault the other participants were retards. I was booted out of that club, and not allowed to rejoin the next year. I might not have gotten my trophy, but at least I didn't feel like one of the losers as I was escorted out.

Now, lets take that experience (not yours, but the losers), and repeat it 1000 times.  On the 1001st time, do you really  think losers will not only want to participate, but pay a monthly fee?

Hell no.  They will just play some other game.  This is the fundamental problem with PvP in persitant worlds:

Slog's PvP basic rules:
-20% of the players will always beat the other 80% for a majority of the time.   
-This ratio is fixed
-Players will not pay a monthly fee to keep losing


WoW solved this by making PvP meaningless.  Shadowbane solved this by watching their players leave.  UO solved this making PvP optional. Fury never solved it.  Planetside made winning and losing meaningless.  And so on.

[UnSub]

I was booted out of that club, and not allowed to rejoin the next year. I might not have gotten my trophy, but at least I didn't feel like one of the losers as I was escorted out.

I'm actually trying to work out exactly who PK'd who here.

It was right to give everyone a certificate of participation. It wasn't right to penalise the winner in that scenario.

[Venkman]

It wasn't right to penalise the winner in that scenario.

Unless the winner told them to shove the certificate up their asses, and to give [them their] first place trophy and then proceeded to them say it wasn't [their] fault the other participants were retards.

That might have skewed their opinion of the one who actually had anything at all that function 

[Valmorian]

I was booted out of that club, and not allowed to rejoin the next year. I might not have gotten my trophy, but at least I didn't feel like one of the losers as I was escorted out.

Ironically, I imagine the "losers" were thinking the same thing about you.  Rewarding for participation isn't an evil, you know.  The goal of PvP in a game isn't to determine who is the best player of all time and immortalize it, it's to provide an entertaining experience for your consumers. 

[tmp]

Unless the winner told them to shove the certificate up their asses, and to give [them their] first place trophy and then proceeded to them say it wasn't [their] fault the other participants were retards.

That might have skewed their opinion of the one who actually had anything at all that function 

Probably, but i cannot help but sympathize with the sentiment. After all, maybe minus the window dressing he was pretty much spot on

[UnSub]

It wasn't right to penalise the winner in that scenario.

Unless the winner told them to shove the certificate up their asses, and to give [them their] first place trophy and then proceeded to them say it wasn't [their] fault the other participants were retards.

That might have skewed their opinion of the one who actually had anything at all that function 

If the story went as LC indicated, if he completed the set task, he deserved the reward. That was the 'penalising the winner' situation I was talking about.

But yeah, the rest of it probably didn't help his case to get that trophy.

[slog]

It wasn't right to penalise the winner in that scenario.

Unless the winner told them to shove the certificate up their asses, and to give [them their] first place trophy and then proceeded to them say it wasn't [their] fault the other participants were retards.

That might have skewed their opinion of the one who actually had anything at all that function 

If the story went as LC indicated, if he completed the set task, he deserved the reward. That was the 'penalising the winner' situation I was talking about.

But yeah, the rest of it probably didn't help his case to get that trophy.

I think LC's story is a great metaphor.  The organizers were afraid of the long term consequences if they didn't reward everyone involved.  There might not have been any future events if they didn't encourage participation.

[Venkman]

Not enough details and those we have come from an biased source. Did he create two cans on the end of a wire while others were trying cold fusion? Was it the local competition to send a single competitor to Nationals (which given what he said he had said at the time, I could easily see the school not thinking him the best representative  )? Being a sore winner can hold ya back as much as being a sore loser.

However, there is definitely something to be said for people not feeling challenged when they see everyone getting an award. That part concerns me even in nowadays kids sports. Everyone gets a trophy no matter how could anyone on the team did. I definitely agree with the idea of everyone getting something. But if we don't recognize nor reward individual achievement, then that doesn't compel people to try their own thing.

[Slayerik]

Part of what's wrong in the world today. I'd be fuckin' livid if I were LC, too.

Don't compete if you are afraid to lose. Just like field day for kids these days...I hear everyone gets ribbons. Sure, it's nice for fat Bobby but in the end it's teaching bad precedents to kids. You see, in the real world noone gives a fuck and you don't get points for trying and failing. Why teach bullshit? Why celebrate mediocrity?

I was never particularly special at any sport, wasn't overly good at school. I never applied myself to either though, but I never had any illusions. I knew that the guys that kicked ass in sports and got 4.0s would have an advantage in the next phase in my life. Competition is not a bad thing. I chose to smoke weed, drink, get laid, and play MMOs instead.

Back to MMOs, I'm not big on rewarding losers. But I'm a realist dick so whatever.

[UnsGub]

PvP can be done in MMOs just like sports are currently.

People participate in basketball and win NPA championships along with everything in-between (pickup, YMCA, HS, college, D-Level, Euro, NPA) for example.  People find their level of competing, even if it just against themselves\nature and not other people, and make a system for it.  MMOs have just not gone that deep yet and provided that structure.  They current seem to cover participation and the top winners but nothing in-between.

I am still waiting for a MMO to build a fantasy system or betting system based on players within the game played by players of that game to help with this issue.

[Nebu]

PvP can be done in MMOs just like sports are currently.

People participate in basketball and win NPA championships along with everything in-between (pickup, YMCA, HS, college, D-Level, Euro, NPA) for example.  People find their level of competing, even if it just against themselves\nature and not other people, and make a system for it.  MMOs have just not gone that deep yet and provided that structure.  They current seem to cover participation and the top winners but nothing in-between.

I am still waiting for a MMO to build a fantasy system or betting system based on players within the game played by players of that game to help with this issue.

I thought WoW implemented arena battles this way.  What they found is exactly the same thing we see in competitive sport; people gaming the system and installing ringers. 

If you want to stratify your playerbase for better competition, you need to make a very solid and transparent means of stratification. 

[slog]

PvP can be done in MMOs just like sports are currently.

People participate in basketball and win NPA championships along with everything in-between (pickup, YMCA, HS, college, D-Level, Euro, NPA) for example.  People find their level of competing, even if it just against themselves\nature and not other people, and make a system for it.  MMOs have just not gone that deep yet and provided that structure.  They current seem to cover participation and the top winners but nothing in-between.

I am still waiting for a MMO to build a fantasy system or betting system based on players within the game played by players of that game to help with this issue.

Every sport has a big old reset button:  Someone scores the most runs after a time limit, crossed the finish line after so many miles, blah blah blah.

Reset buttons break immersion in MMORPGs. 

[UnsGub]

Every sport has a big old reset button:

Is it a reset button?

Past compeditions\events turn into traditions and history.  That is adding content to the game.

The upcoming ones turn into new opportunities.  Seem the "reset button" works just fine for humans since sports were created and it would work in MMO.  Olympics\World Cup resets every four years and that is more or less a would wide event.  No reason to not copy it.  It works.  Not much difference between a digitial and physical court as you still need people to show up and compete in a given time frame.  It is good to see scheduling tools start to show up in MMOs as it is a step in the right direction of control teh "reset button".

[LC]

Not enough details and those we have come from an biased source. Did he create two cans on the end of a wire while others were trying cold fusion? Was it the local competition to send a single competitor to Nationals (which given what he said he had said at the time, I could easily see the school not thinking him the best representative  )? Being a sore winner can hold ya back as much as being a sore loser.

However, there is definitely something to be said for people not feeling challenged when they see everyone getting an award. That part concerns me even in nowadays kids sports. Everyone gets a trophy no matter how could anyone on the team did. I definitely agree with the idea of everyone getting something. But if we don't recognize nor reward individual achievement, then that doesn't compel people to try their own thing.

Everyone had to build their device to do the same task. I believe 2 competitors from each school were allowed. I was the only person from my school. The next year (and year after that) nobody from my school participated.

They never told me beforehand that I wouldn't be getting anything for winning. They just sprung it on me during the award ceremony. They never even mentioned that I had created the only working device. The altercation came after that as they were wrapping up the event. They told me that I didn't really deserve anything since I hadn't actually competed with anyone else.

[tmp]

They told me that I didn't really deserve anything since I hadn't actually competed with anyone else.

[slog]

Every sport has a big old reset button:

Is it a reset button?

Past compeditions\events turn into traditions and history.  That is adding content to the game.

The upcoming ones turn into new opportunities.  Seem the "reset button" works just fine for humans since sports were created and it would work in MMO.  Olympics\World Cup resets every four years and that is more or less a would wide event.  No reason to not copy it.  It works.  Not much difference between a digitial and physical court as you still need people to show up and compete in a given time frame.  It is good to see scheduling tools start to show up in MMOs as it is a step in the right direction of control teh "reset button".

Yes. it's a reset button. And yes, it works great for non persistant events.  See Quake.  Resets every round.

[Venkman]

Everyone had to build their device to do the same task.

...

They never told me beforehand that I wouldn't be getting anything for winning. They just sprung it on me during the award ceremony. They never even mentioned that I had created the only working device. The altercation came after that as they were wrapping up the event. They told me that I didn't really deserve anything since I hadn't actually competed with anyone else.

In that context, yea, that sucks. They should have been clearer. I also wonder if the reasons yours was the only one to work is because everyone else there was no reward nor penalty so couldn't be arsed to bother getting theirs to work.

Reset buttons break immersion in MMORPGs. 

Serious question: how does that matter anymore? I think it's long since been proven that the primary motivation to continue playing after the first few months has less to do with escaping into an immersive fantastical world and more because you're caught on the rails of playing with friends while you continue advancing your holdings/abilities.

As long as the character/holdings aren't reset, people seem to have acclimated quite well to resets.

[Jayce]

I think LC's story is a great metaphor.  The organizers were afraid of the long term consequences if they didn't reward everyone involved.  There might not have been any future events if they didn't encourage participation.

I think this is a disservice to the losers too.  What is there to look up to and strive for if you lose but you get the same prize as everyone, including the clear winner?

I don't know if LC's story is true, false, biased, or missing information, but in general, you should get something for trying, but you should get something a LOT cooler for winning.  Otherwise there is no incentive to try for it and nothing special if you do put out the effort.

[slog]

I think LC's story is a great metaphor.  The organizers were afraid of the long term consequences if they didn't reward everyone involved.  There might not have been any future events if they didn't encourage participation.

I think this is a disservice to the losers too.  What is there to look up to and strive for if you lose but you get the same prize as everyone, including the clear winner?

I don't know if LC's story is true, false, biased, or missing information, but in general, you should get something for trying, but you should get something a LOT cooler for winning.  Otherwise there is no incentive to try for it and nothing special if you do put out the effort.

So lets say you give the winners something meaningfull, like and Axe of Destruction that's just a little better than any existing weapon.  You just made it MORE likely that the winners will continue to win, as they have better equipment.

So then you decide to give the winners gold stars or some other token.  The winners then say "PvP is meaninless!! These awards suck". 

[Slayerik]

It doesn't matter when you drop items on death. Just saying...

Gives you a short term advantage.

[LC]

In that context, yea, that sucks. They should have been clearer. I also wonder if the reasons yours was the only one to work is because everyone else there was no reward nor penalty so couldn't be arsed to bother getting theirs to work.

The 1st - 3rd place trophies for my event were sitting there on the award table. They just skipped over them when they handed out the trophies.

[Jayce]

Taking a step back, does it really matter if the prize is something to let you do the original task better?

In LC's example, the Science Fair prize wasn't a personal session with Stephen Hawking.  It was a trophy.  Everyone would have oohed and ahhed over the trophy and the losers would have redoubled their efforts to win it next year.  But if it were the personal science lesson with the smartest scientist alive, he would have had an even greater advantage next year.

In MMOGs we give the personal lesson. Why aren't people competing for some "meaningful" reward system that's parallel to the system of items or whatever with which the fighting is done?  And I don't mean trophies.  The parallel reward system would have to be THE point of the game, not some side achievement.

EVE is a little like that.  You can make lots of money running missions in Empire, but people still fight over the resources in 0.0.

[LC]

What you guys seem to want is a game of monopoly in which the bank gives out infinite $2000 loans to anyone that goes bankrupt. The whole philosophy is wrong because eventually everyone gets bored and never wants to play again.

Zombies Vs Zombies

 

[slog]

What you guys seem to want is a game of monopoly in which the bank gives out infinite $2000 loans to anyone that goes bankrupt. The whole philosophy is wrong because eventually everyone gets bored and never wants to play again.

Zombies Vs Zombies

 

Actually, I'm from the school that thinks PvP doesn't work in MMOs.  That being said, I haven't played Eve yet, so I'm not sure whay that works.

[TheCastle]

I like this topic too much to leave... Ill put forth great effort to not make vault quality posts.

Anyway what about this kind of system...
There are only so many of each type of item that can be given out based on performance every month.
Every month the system is reset.
Combine that with a system that allows you to check the status of each of these items.
Who has it currently and its history dating as far back as when the game was first released.

Then on top of that you give out simple cosmetic rewards to people based on achievements.

There are only so many Omega blaze Bastard swords of destruction with insanely good stats that can be handed out each month. Once you have earned one once you go down in history as being the 18nt person to ever own one and a medal that proves it. You use the sword for a couple weeks and pwn the hell out of people before it comes time for everything to reset.

[Azaroth]

I'm interested in this topic.

After skimming the last page, it seems to have turned into a discussion about ESports.

That, I'm not interested in.

Someone update me.

[tmp]

What you guys seem to want is a game of monopoly in which the bank gives out infinite $2000 loans to anyone that goes bankrupt. The whole philosophy is wrong because eventually everyone gets bored and never wants to play again.

Note, winning a monopoly game doesn't actually reward the player with anything but maybe longer e-peen. Each new game everyone starts again from the same (and shared) power level... something completely opposite to the 'persistent growth' model used by MMOs. In short, not sure this analogy works. The FPS matches are perhaps closer here, and quite a few of them do actually allow player to respawn after death, essentially giving them these loans to keep going.... without much of ill consequences, as they use different ways to determine final winner(s)

[Venkman]

There's too wide a variety in the definitions for "meaningfulness" in PvP.

• On one extreme, COD4 is just fine. You gain XP and levels and new abilities and access to new weapons and other foozles. You do this in battles though that have no persistence.
• On the other extreme is Eve where you roll over your opponents holdings, after having spent weeks planning, months/years building, and days and hours coordinating battle in the world's largest game of Risk.

Personal achievements only vs personal and cumulative group reward. First I think people need to decide what matters to them most. Is it winning to achieve (typical MMO PvE mentality)? Is it winning to help the group get bigger through more resources (Eve, SB)?

Once you decide that then it becomes easier to discuss in sub-groups "best" systems.

I personally like Eve's the best. If they could make space flight a statistically-affected game of Freespace 2 with all else being the same, I'd probably have that as my forever fallback game rather than WoW. I could always find a niche in Eve even as part of large-ish Corporations/Alliances that had other parts doing crazy things. I'm always just driven away by the sheer boredom of the play part. I never felt rich enough to blow through my own ships in battle nor social enough to feel confident borrowing tackler after tackler while I blowed them up too through lack of skill.

[Ratman_tf]

Part of what's wrong in the world today. I'd be fuckin' livid if I were LC, too.

Don't compete if you are afraid to lose. Just like field day for kids these days...I hear everyone gets ribbons. Sure, it's nice for fat Bobby but in the end it's teaching bad precedents to kids. You see, in the real world noone gives a fuck and you don't get points for trying and failing. Why teach bullshit? Why celebrate mediocrity?

Dude. Do you think pro football players give their paycheks back if they don't make it to the superbowl?

[Jayce]

I personally like Eve's the best. If they could make space flight a statistically-affected game of Freespace 2 with all else being the same, I'd probably have that as my forever fallback game rather than WoW. I could always find a niche in Eve even as part of large-ish Corporations/Alliances that had other parts doing crazy things. I'm always just driven away by the sheer boredom of the play part. I never felt rich enough to blow through my own ships in battle nor social enough to feel confident borrowing tackler after tackler while I blowed them up too through lack of skill.

See http://forums.f13.net/index.php?topic=15037.0 .  Where we are right now, tacklers are free for the taking, no questions asked.  And the pilots are valued too.

But enough shameless promotion   back to the topic, I would like to reiterate that ESports and persistent MMOG PvP are two totally different animals and should be treated that way.  I still see a lot of people here conflating them.

I think there are a few qualifications for persistent PvP to work:
1- some sort of drop on death, either full or a partial kind that hurts (like AC's drop items).  If death does not hurt, ESports ensue.
2- gear should only enter the equation as a slight bump in effectiveness. You should be able to risk as much as you want to for an increase in your effectiveness, but the risk should equal the reward.  This counterbalances #1 and keeps it from being a game breaker.
3- there has to be a safe place to retreat to if you're totally beaten to avoid the Shadowbane effect.

[Jayce]

Part of what's wrong in the world today. I'd be fuckin' livid if I were LC, too.

Don't compete if you are afraid to lose. Just like field day for kids these days...I hear everyone gets ribbons. Sure, it's nice for fat Bobby but in the end it's teaching bad precedents to kids. You see, in the real world noone gives a fuck and you don't get points for trying and failing. Why teach bullshit? Why celebrate mediocrity?

Dude. Do you think pro football players give their paycheks back if they don't make it to the superbowl?

No, but does everyone get a ring, including the teams eliminated early?

[Slayerik]

Part of what's wrong in the world today. I'd be fuckin' livid if I were LC, too.

Don't compete if you are afraid to lose. Just like field day for kids these days...I hear everyone gets ribbons. Sure, it's nice for fat Bobby but in the end it's teaching bad precedents to kids. You see, in the real world noone gives a fuck and you don't get points for trying and failing. Why teach bullshit? Why celebrate mediocrity?

Dude. Do you think pro football players give their paycheks back if they don't make it to the superbowl?

You know how much winning they had to do to get to that level? They in no way tried, failed, and were rewarded. If their skill level doesn't stay at the top when in the pros, they are replaced by one of hundreds coming from college. That's a stupid example and you know it.

Many football players salaries also reward bonuses for 80 catches, or 1000 yards, 100 tackles, etc.

Anyway, yeah.

[UnSub]

What you guys seem to want is a game of monopoly in which the bank gives out infinite $2000 loans to anyone that goes bankrupt. The whole philosophy is wrong because eventually everyone gets bored and never wants to play again.

... except it is a game of Monopoly with several hundred thousand players who pay you money to keep playing and not everyone starts at the same time.

Wanting to keep players playing vs players allegedly wanting a 'meaningful' experience (is it meaningful if you get ganked in the first five minutes of a persistent event and have to spend the rest of the session watching others play?) that they can 'win' is a basic disconnect with this kind of discussion about MMO PvP. At minimum, PvP shouldn't drive players away from the game for either winning or losing.

[Tuncal]

I'd like to add two names to the thread:

1. Shattered Galaxy. MMORTS, single shard (for all intents and purposes), 3 factions. Map was divided in provinces, where a limited amount of players could zone into - you also gained different spawn points depending on where you zoned from, so map control was important. You leveled as you units leveled, however most of the game was played at cap. The cool thing was regiments - the game's guild equivalent - were encouraged to transfer to whatever faction was least powerful, so the balance of power shifted often. They also reset everyone to lvl 1 once every few months, while making sure to give the people who participated in the reincarnation extra character points - so the veterans were rewarded, but not massively so.

2. DotA. Don't laugh, I think it's a very interesting case of PvEvP design with quick and gratifying character progression. Not persistent PvP by any means, but it was damn addictive for a mod - much like CS. It also had a lot of replayability with loads of characters to choose from, and relatively balanced abilities.

[TheCastle]

You guys should take note of some of the major differences and similarities between real life sports and competitive games.

In Football the people who play and are known are much fewer in number compared to the vast ocean of spectators.
In WOW there are pretty much zero spectators and everyone is trying to compete with each other in a vast sea of faces for the same prizes.
That is a pretty huge difference.

Furthermore I am willing to bet that a pretty significant fraction of people that fill each stadium have never even played football themselves to any serious degree. I don't believe that playing a quick game of football with your friends on a Saturday morning is at all comparable to playing some scenarios in War. Playing Football with your friends on a Saturday morning is more comparable to playing some quake dm with your friends.

And on another note:
Time investment for superior gear is actually similar to the time investment it takes to get in shape and learn how to play a real sport competitively. If you think you can just wake up one day and decide you can play professional football or even run a 3 minute mile you will possibly have about the same chances of success as you would attempting to beat someone who is well geared and 10+ levels over you in 1 vs 1. Actually I would think you would have almost zero chance of competing at all under those circumstances.

So I do think it is somewhat hard to say gaining better gear and tweaking out your toon is not comparable to training hard for a sport in real life. Its also similar in the respect that most people at tip top shape perform about the same depending on how they trained. Exactly like when you compete against others in a game when everyone has the best gear available.

I suppose the only defining difference in this case would be that over time gear continues to get better and better because of the nature of the mmog. Well I suppose in that same respect the best professional basketball team from now would also stomp the best basketball team from 20 years ago. Escalation is an observable phenomenon in real life sports why not games too?