Aion (Open Beta, Launch Day Info too!)

[Draegan]

Something interesting about that table... since it only lists one slot for 'supreme commander', i'm guessing the available slots are listed for one side. That means 2744 * 2 = room for nearly 5.5k players on any server with these 'officer' ranks. Quite a lot.

Yes.

And in regards to WOW vs. Aion when you compare the GM grind to the Abyss Point grind.  You're not competing against others on your server.  As long as you have points and there is an empty spot, you get the rank.  You don't have to compete against another players play time.

Apparently they reduced the amount of damage players do to other players in some patch.

[tmp]

Oh, lets see the ones I know are in the game off the top of my head:

Stealth
Run speed buffs
AoE stuns
potions for removing roots
dispels for removing roots

It seems stealth lasts just for a short while (the in-combat 'oh shit' version in particular) All other options listed are available to both sides and can be used equally well to prevent the escape rather than allow it.

A combinaiton of any of the above...  Decent groups are always, always going to have an escape plan.  See DAOC and EvE,

Yup and these plans always work. As evidenced by the fact there has been no titan kills in EvE, and no capital ships lost; because once the players reach that level of power they are very very careful to never fight outnumbered, always run at the first sight of danger and arrange things with all other players on their level, so they can maintain the precious status quo

[amiable]

Yup and these plans always work. As evidenced by the fact there has been no titan kills in EvE, and no capital ships lost; because once the players reach that level of power they are very very careful to never fight outnumbered, always run at the first sight of danger and arrange things with all other players on their level, so they can maintain the precious status quo

How often are Titans killed in EvE?  If I recall not that often (unless your name is Shrike).  It is so infrequent as a matter of fact that every time a Titan is killed it is the subject of discussion.  How often are Capitals killed in a non-reimburable op?  Again, not that often.

I will concede that higher ranked players will occasionally die, but it certainly will not be a frequent occurence (although probably more frequent than Titan kills).

[tmp]

I will concede that higher ranked players will occasionally die, but it certainly will not be a frequent occurence (although probably more frequent than Titan kills).

I don't expect that to be frequent too, it's not like there's going to be many of these players to begin with and each death means considerable setback. Still, it's likely to happen often enough to render that vision of fixed, never changing pecking order just a hyperbole.

As far as capital ship kills in EvE go, they're pretty frequent especially when number of capital ships overall increases. Even mothership kills don't seem like much of an event anymore, anything less than that... barely worth mention.

[Falconeer]

But if there is one thing I have learned from F13 is that just because you are excited about a game doesn't mean you shouldn't critically examine it to determine where it is going to fall on its face.

And I understand your doubts and your caution, but I don't like to just bash everything because we are f13. As I said I am not sure it will work, I am just slightly annoyed by some quick failure predictions based on lousy comparisons and poor sociology, especially when diferent continents sport different playstyles. So while I think everyone could be right at this point, given the unreleased state and the lack of hands-on experience of everyone here, I am just trying to counter some simplifications.

The EVE Titan example fits, cause the point is not how many times a titan has been killed, but if the people try (and succeed) it or not. It HAS to be hard. And it fits because there's no way a GrandMarshall/Supreme Commander in Aion will be as hard to kill as a Titan. So I think it's easy to assume that if a Titan can be killed, and people go for it, a Supreme Commander will be just another phat loot target in the life of the PvP crowd. I am glad we agree on that.

[DLRiley]

Phat loot target that resembles a fly zapper surrounded by people with fly swatters. 

[Koyasha]

Yes.

And in regards to WOW vs. Aion when you compare the GM grind to the Abyss Point grind.  You're not competing against others on your server.  As long as you have points and there is an empty spot, you get the rank.  You don't have to compete against another players play time.

Apparently they reduced the amount of damage players do to other players in some patch.

I wonder how the system works exactly.  It's been noted that points don't decay over time, so obviously there must be a way for someone to lose the rank other than losing points, because otherwise, what would stop a person from achieving Supreme Commander then logging off forever or staying in the capital city forever, thus preventing them from ever losing points?  I would guess that those numbers are a minimum, and in order to get any given rank you must exceed the points that the lowest rank-holder has.  So in order to achieve General, for example, you need to be 44th on your side in points, whether that person has the minimum of 565,400 or whether he happens to have 800,000 points (and thus 43-1 have even more). 

They had better have gotten the points gain/loss balance correct and make sure people lose points often enough, or we could end up seeing people with millions of points eventually.  But again, they really could use the Balaur to even this out if it starts being a problem, by having them actively hunting down the people with the most points.  Who knows whether they will or not...

[Senses]

There's no reason to assume there isn't some system in place to keep the Supreme Commander from getting the title then disspearing forever.  Seems like a goofy thing to worry about.  And anyways, and I could be wrong, from what I have read, the best part of being a higher rank is not the title, it is the awesome stuff it allows you to do while actively engaging in PvP, which would encourage most people to go use it after they got it.

[Hindenburg]

There's no reason to assume there isn't some system in place to keep the Supreme Commander from getting the title then disspearing forever.

Man, I wish I could have that amount of optimism.

[DLRiley]

There's no reason to assume there isn't some system in place to keep the Supreme Commander from getting the title then disspearing forever.

Man, I wish I could have that amount of optimism.

When it comes to open world pvp, peoples optimism seems to overshadow their overall experience. I remember explaining why ganking sucks and some guy insist that "anti-gank" squads will shield the noobs from the "worst" that could happen. The only valid answer to that is 

[Draegan]

Hmm.  It would be interesting to see if it works like this:

Player One gains 800,700 points and becomes top dog.  He fights for a week and stays in the position and ends up with 1,000,000 points.
Player One the has a few bad days and loses a few points coming down to 950,000 points.
Player Two is second fiddle.  He busts his ass and has a great week and gets up to 960,000 points.

Does Player Two now become top dog?

Would makes sense if it works that way.

[Bzalthek]

No!  They must enter the Thunderdome!  TWO MEN ENTER!  ONE MAN LEAVES!

[DLRiley]

Player one and player two are in the same guild.

[Koyasha]

Player one and player two are in the same guild.

Only if there's not enough players.  A good comparison is NA and Korean Lineage II, from what I've heard and been told by people who've played both.  Korean is much more popular and therefore much more populated.  The number of players is high enough to force there to be fierce competition for the top end, such as the castles and the hero slots.  In NA there are far fewer players, and castles and hero slots tend to go to the top one or two guilds who make and maintain agreements to do so.  The more people are involved the more impossible it becomes to maintain control on such a system, whether through force or agreement, because force will get outnumbered, and agreements will be broken when personalities clash.

So yeah, a pvp system like this is dependent on large numbers of people being involved so that no one is capable of dominating completely through collusion or simply having the greater percentage of the high level players that exist.

[Ceryse]

Hmm.  It would be interesting to see if it works like this:

Player One gains 800,700 points and becomes top dog.  He fights for a week and stays in the position and ends up with 1,000,000 points.
Player One the has a few bad days and loses a few points coming down to 950,000 points.
Player Two is second fiddle.  He busts his ass and has a great week and gets up to 960,000 points.

Does Player Two now become top dog?

Would makes sense if it works that way.

From what I've read that is exactly how it works. Ranks are limited in how many people can occupy them once you get into the top 1000 (1st Star Officer to Supreme Commander) and among them its whomever has the higher points ranks higher; not who got there first. So, say after the first 1000 people get those ranks, they can be knocked off by people rising up in rank.

Also, as the chart shows, as you go up in rank you eventually get to the point where it can become very easy to lose a lot of points if you die a bunch, while those who kill you will gain a large amount of points.

There's been some contradictory stuff coming out, though, but I'd wager it works like that. Once you get to a certain rank, you will likely end up being more cautious, but if you don't keep at it, you could get passed in rank by someone who isn't as cautious about getting involved in PvP. It'll be interesting to see how it works in NA come release, although I doubt I'll ever get above the Soldier ranks personally.

[DLRiley]

It's only natural for the top pvp guild to have the more than one of its player as a top ranker. Number of competitors in the open world doesn't necessarily mean the quality of the competition is the same, hell competition may not even exist. Your right it gets exponentially worse when you have a low player base. With a high player you can have players who slip through the cracks so to speak and gain ranking parallel to whatever method the current top players use to farm theirs. At that point you really start getting into how active are guilds will become when it comes to suppressing the competition, though the sheer size of the pvp'ing playerbase could make that impossible.

[Draegan]

You can't suppress the competition though.  Also the more people you PVP with the less AP you get because it gets shared around.

It's a simple system and it should work.  There is nothing you can do to a rival from preventing them from getting above you other than being better that him.  I won't nearly make it that high, so it doesn't matter to me, but it is a good system for those who will dedicate themselves to it.

The only way you can guarantee AP flow is through NPC fights fortress sieges that are NPC held.  I'm not sure if that rate will be higher or lower than actively PVPing.

[Kageru]

The reason blizzard dropped the high warlord PvP ranking system is not because it didn't work, or people didn't want it, but because it strongly rewarded extreme cat-assing and people sacrificing their lives to it. Though I guess that won't be an issue here since that's probably considered "as intended".

[Morfiend]

The reason blizzard dropped the high warlord PvP ranking system is not because it didn't work, or people didn't want it, but because it strongly rewarded extreme cat-assing and people sacrificing their lives to it. Though I guess that won't be an issue here since that's probably considered "as intended".

Yeah, thats what I'm thinking. It sounds JUST like the old PVP grind in WoW. I don't see how they can have a point and rank system and no have it be a competition between the players of the realm. Unless they plan to allow everyone to be High Warlord rank.

[Nissl]

If I'm not mistaken, the HWL grind had weekly decay built into it.  To me the decay and the fact that you got a lot of honor for just showing up was what put that grind over the top, you simply had to play more than everyone on the server every week for many weeks in a row.  With a system that doesn't reward just showing up and doesn't punish you with decay it shouldn't be as rough.

Here's an interview with a highly ranked ranger in Korea.  It sounds like the biggest issue is not playtime but that you can't do much large-scale stuff and expect to keep a top ranking - everyone will focus fire you.

First post on these forums - hi to anyone who may vaguely remember me from the early days of Bat Country vs. The Six Mouths in WAR.

[amiable]

If I'm not mistaken, the HWL grind had weekly decay built into it.  To me the decay and the fact that you got a lot of honor for just showing up was what put that grind over the top, you simply had to play more than everyone on the server every week for many weeks in a row.  With a system that doesn't reward just showing up and doesn't punish you with decay it shouldn't be as rough.

Here's an interview with a highly ranked ranger in Korea.  It sounds like the biggest issue is not playtime but that you can't do much large-scale stuff and expect to keep a top ranking - everyone will focus fire you.

First post on these forums - hi to anyone who may vaguely remember me from the early days of Bat Country vs. The Six Mouths in WAR.

Hey, hey, let's look at some of his "PvP" tips!

*4star Lieut – Now – Opportunist

Never. Ever. Strike unless you feel that you ahve 100% chance of winning. 95% isn’t good enough. The risk isn’t worth it.

Most AP you get at this level is from quests. I think I’m getting around 10k~30k per day now.

Yes, it is hard but whats even more hard for me is the fact that I have to avoid all those PvP that I could’ve enjoyed. I got hotheaded for a moment today and ran out for some action and died twice.

I’d love to get that bow, but I really hate how the rank system limits you in pvp.

So basically once you get to a certain rank you:

1.  Avoid PvP like the plague and
2.  Never, ever PvP unless you are 100% sure you are going to win.

Gosh, that's sounds awfully like what someone has been saying for the past 3 pages... 

[Hawkbit]

It's the same base problem. 

It's either a straight time grind and everyone is ranked by level of catassery, or it's a true hierarchy system that ranks everyone by catassery.  The real answer is to make ALL PvP gear available at the lower ranks and let higher ranks duke it out over titles.  That way the average joe can still compete with everyone else and the superwankers can still have something to fight over. 

[Draegan]

I don't see why everyone here cares.  No one here will (at least probably 90% of you) won't ever get into that realm anyway.  All those titles are for show and/or some ability.  There is plenty of room in some of the smaller limited ranks too.

You can still quest/grind/pvp/pve your hearts away for the gear.  Why are you bitching about the top few spots?  C'mon.  It's put in there for the catass people.  This mechanic is not keeping me from enjoying the game. 

[Shatter]

I dont give a sh*t about the highest rank crap, Ill never be that guy cause I have a life..blah blah blah.  I accept that there will be a cap on just how high in rank I ll ever get and I know it wont be in the top 90% most likely.  Ill have fun in the game without being the best of the best of the best...sir!

[amiable]

I don't see why everyone here cares.  No one here will (at least probably 90% of you) won't ever get into that realm anyway.  All those titles are for show and/or some ability.  There is plenty of room in some of the smaller limited ranks too.

You can still quest/grind/pvp/pve your hearts away for the gear.  Why are you bitching about the top few spots?  C'mon.  It's put in there for the catass people.  This mechanic is not keeping me from enjoying the game.  

"I don't see why casual players NEED raid gear, it's not like they are raiding.  We deserve the best stuff..."

 

(Seriously you need to at least offer the possibility that folks can get top end gear or people will just quit, and this game is predicated on having a lot of folks playing per server....)

[tmp]

Hey, hey, let's look at some of his "PvP" tips!

(..)

Gosh, that's sounds awfully like what someone has been saying for the past 3 pages...  

Heey hey, let's look at the other tips, too!

Q. We hear you work alone. Any particular reason?

I think almost everyone nowdays go around in groups, but I don’t think Rangers fit very well in group pvp setting. Besides, whenever there’s big pvp, the person with highest rank gets focused.

gosh, that sounds awfully like what people were telling you that someone in response...

[amiable]

I think almost everyone nowdays go around in groups, but I don’t think Rangers fit very well in group pvp setting. Besides, whenever there’s big pvp, the person with highest rank gets focused.

gosh, that sounds awfully like what people were telling you that someone in response...

Could you point out where I disagreed with that?  

I didn't.  The person will get focused if they were dumb enough to participate in any PvP situation where they had a chance of losing, which most won't.  They will avoid situations where they can lose like the plague, which was my point.  High rank folks will either be stealthers who never pop out of stealth and grind the PvE options in abyss or folks with tight groups who avoid mass/even odds PvP entirely to gank loners.  The system encourages you (selects for actually) to PvP less as you gain rank.

[Threash]

The reason blizzard dropped the high warlord PvP ranking system is not because it didn't work, or people didn't want it, but because it strongly rewarded extreme cat-assing and people sacrificing their lives to it. Though I guess that won't be an issue here since that's probably considered "as intended".

Yeah, thats what I'm thinking. It sounds JUST like the old PVP grind in WoW. I don't see how they can have a point and rank system and no have it be a competition between the players of the realm. Unless they plan to allow everyone to be High Warlord rank.

The difference is once you did the Grand Marshal grind that was it.  You were grand marshal for life you didn't have to worry about it anymore.  This system actually discourages the catassing that lead to the rank 14 grind because the titles and abilities are only there as long as you hold the top spot.   This grind is forever, nobody who grinded to rank 14 on wow is going to tell you they could keep doing it much longer, i most certainly wouldn't have bothered at all if i thought i had to keep fighting for it after i got it.  I can imagine theres going to be a lot of grinding for points in order to buy the best gear available but the ranking is going to be more of a "whos hot this week" kinda thing.

[tmp]

The person will get focused if they were dumb enough to participate in any PvP situation where they had a chance of losing, which most won't.  They will avoid situations where they can lose like the plague, which was my point.  High rank folks will either be stealthers who never pop out of stealth and grind the PvE options in abyss or folks with tight groups who avoid mass/even odds PvP entirely to gank loners.  The system encourages you (selects for actually) to PvP less as you gain rank.

This seems like a pretty self-regulating system then. The people who reach high ranks are either cut down by the competition, or withdraw from active PvP if the rank is so important to them. Which allows more active players of lower ranks (or ones who are more determined to continue) to overtake them in rankings.

Consider the quoted interview -- the guy says he gained ~170k points a day when beginning, while at high rank he gets maybe 30k points if that because he feels pressure to play much more carefully and everyone is gunning for him. It works like a soft cap and makes it much easier for other players to reach his point amount and/or overtake him, as opposed to situation where he'd just keep catassing 150k a day or more. It also deals with suggestion from earlier in this thread, how such players would be never, ever defeated once they reach such ranks because everyone would be scared of them and wouldn't be willing to take risk to attack them.

All in all, this systems appears quite less problematic than people make it sound. Or rather, the raised issues don't sound like actual issues.

[amiable]

Would you care to make a friendly wager on that?

[Falconeer]

The person will get focused if they were dumb enough to participate in any PvP situation

But if they don't participate in PvP they will lose their ranks anyway!

Seriously, can't you all see how hard it'll be to keep the higher ranks? If you want to bitch about something, do it about that: "hey I catassed the world and I stayed Star Officer for 2 hours and then some bigger catass farmed Abyss Points in PvE and dumped me down!" (fake edit: Threash just did)

Of course to get up there will be an inhuman task, but what's wrong with that? Every server, in every game, has its share of inhumans playing 24/7. Do you think I consider any of you who raided the hell out of WoW humans? It's all about perspective.
And I am not saying it'll be easy or possible for the non-hardcorest-of-the-hardcore, just saying seems clear to me that, given the system, top positions will change frequently.

This reminds me of the discussion about Curt Schilling's game and the chance of changing the world. Some players hate the idea of not being able to get all the achievements in a game. "What if I am not the one who changes the world and I miss that event forever? I paid for the full game!". Some others though like the idea of their MMOs to be virtual worlds where, obviously, you can't get all the achievements and are perfectly ok with someone else getting it all given the difference in time invested and in some cases base talent/skill.
I'd say this discussion is much more about this differences in playstyle and preferences than the actual functionalities of Aion's PvP system.

[Falconeer]

Would you care to make a friendly wager on that?

I friendly wage you we'll have different results for Az-Aion, NA-Aion and EU-Aion.

[Segoris]

(Seriously you need to at least offer the possibility that folks can get top end gear or people will just quit, and this game is predicated on having a lot of folks playing per server....)

How is questing and npc killing for Abyss Points not a possibility for them to get gear? This gear, unlike WoW's, isn't tied into requiring a rank just to obtain the gear. The gear is more of the honor points system WoW put in for gear rather then the rank system, which is much more casual friendly.

[tmp]

Would you care to make a friendly wager on that?

We seem to actually agree with these predictions though, so i don't quite see what is there to bet about..?

The high rank players are likely to either limit their play or play very carefully if they want to maintain their rank. Which means the rate of advancement drops as the player's rank grows. Which puts a natural damper on the player's ability to stay ahead of the curve for prolonged time.

Where exactly is the problem, in that? Personally i find it rather positive system -- by adding tangible incentive to hunt potentiallly harder targets they shake up the usual alternative in systems where all targets are equal, that's the players gunning for nothing but the easiest targets as these give them the biggest gain/hour. It is also not very different in effect from the typical rating-based ladders, just uses slightly different mechanics to achieve that.

[amiable]

I would argue that rating leaders stay relatively fixed amongst a small group of hardcore grinders.  I think folks will complain about it incessently and it will be a substantial barrier to wide adoption when folks realize that the only way to advance rank after a certain point is exploitation or a very specific playstyle that really has very little to do with PvP.