The Competitive Illusion of Crushing: War and the MMOG

[Paelos]

Who let you out of your cage? Politics get boring?

[WindupAtheist]

Ah, okay. And if you go to a restaurant and they give you regular Coke when you asked for diet, your only or at least best recourse is to storm out in anger and never go there again, no matter what? Or at least until they change managers? Even if they have the best damn burgers in the tri-county area?

No, but if you've been asking them to serve beer for the last seven years and they're clearly not paying attention, you ought to either demonstrate their folly by taking your business elsewhere or STFU and drink your Coke.  Not sit around composing reams of pseduo-intellectual drivel about how much it would r0x0r if Joe's Burger Shack had Killian's on tap.

Because these _are_ video game nuances, and there are a couple skrillion other nuances about the game that may very well be enjoyable, in much the same way that the meal may be enjoyable even if the drink isn't up to spec. This does not stop people from wanting their Diet Coke.

You're not going to convince them to give you Diet Coke.  All you're going to do is talk yourself blue while hoping someone else just so happens to open a restaraunt that has it.

Actually, based on the "everything in the world, plus a pony" attitude that pervades, it's more like hoping for a restaraunt that serves Olympian Ambrosia that tastes awesome, gets you high, has zero calories, and makes your cock bigger.

Uh, competition in general - or if you will, mediated conflict - is a, if not the, driving force for societal progress, and properly managed can produce a favorable outcome even for the losers. I doubt there's anyone alive over the age of about six who hasn't engaged in some real-world PvP.

Which has fuck-all to do with getting more MMOG players to like pwnage.  I mean, we already have PvP.  Some people like it, some don't.  All I ever hear from the board crowds, though, is that more people would love it if every MMOG didn't do it wrong.  Not that they really have the least clue how to do it any better.

The Internet is a form of society with some amazing changes from what anyone's studied. For one, the physics are entirely mutable. The issue at hand is how it might be possible to create PvP that minimizes the brokenness - or, yeah, in a larger perspective, how to give newbies and catasses a level ground, how to create advancement without the feeling of repetition.

If you put newbs and catassers on level ground, you'll have the catassers crying into their "Can't leave this raid to use the toilet!" piss-buckets, and the usual suspects will just start ranting about how the game is as meaningless as Quake.

Raph has some things to say about that last (if your game has anything that can be repeated, people will repeat it, all the while complaining about repetition) but the challenge is whether it's mechanistically and sociologically possible to create a universe that tends toward fairness, adventure, and honorable combat.

I'll give a shit what Raph says when he designs a game that doesn't suck donkey balls.  Meanwhile, the answer to your question is a simple no.  People are never going to be any more fair or honorable in an MMOG than they are now.  Why?  Because character death, even permadeath and/or social ostracization, don't mean shit in a goddamned videogame where b0n3d00d can merrily "kill himself" in the act of pissing you off and then log off and go teamkill in Tribes or torture puppies or whatever.

People will act like dicks in a game, because none of it means shit when they turn the computer off.  Period.

[Arnold]

I'll give a shit what Raph says when he designs a game that doesn't suck donkey balls.

Ultima Online was one of the greatest games, ever.  Play again?

[Krakrok]

drooooooool

You're almost as hypocritical as rscott. You'll have to keep trying though if you want to win grand prize.

[Xilren's Twin]

Raph has some things to say about that last (if your game has anything that can be repeated, people will repeat it, all the while complaining about repetition) but the challenge is whether it's mechanistically and sociologically possible to create a universe that tends toward fairness, adventure, and honorable combat.

I'll give a shit what Raph says when he designs a game that doesn't suck donkey balls.  Meanwhile, the answer to your question is a simple no.  People are never going to be any more fair or honorable in an MMOG than they are now.  Why?  Because character death, even permadeath and/or social ostracization, don't mean shit in a goddamned videogame where b0n3d00d can merrily "kill himself" in the act of pissing you off and then log off and go teamkill in Tribes or torture puppies or whatever.
People will act like dicks in a game, because none of it means shit when they turn the computer off.  Period.

Which is why some people would advocate extreme measures like banning account keys for asshattery in game.  It's about the only measure which has an out of game consequence i.e. you're out $50 or what ever it cost to buy another box/key.

Which is also why some people advocate the development of yet another niche within a niche, a premium offering with corresponding higher costs to buy in and play, and more oversight and penalties.  The theory being, the higher the real world cost, the less likely people are to act like asshats.

Would it work? In theory yes, in reality, who knows how much the price would have to be to offset the lower subscription numbers and increased Customer Service costs let alone the percentage of asshattery this would prevent.

I'd say were at least 5-10 years away from seeing anything even attempted like that (EQ's "premium" server notwithstanding).

And as to the overall uselessness of posting stuff like this at, why are you here again?  Hell I've gotten more enjoyment from the discussion of some of these games then the games themselves... like Lineage2.  What's that phrase? "Bored gamers with IT jobs"

Xilren

[WindupAtheist]

Ultima Online was a great idea, executed shittily, that didn't become worthwhile until Koster left and someone in charge finally decided to fence off the retards.

As for banning accounts, credit cards, whatever, fine.  A game company can certainly throw people out for whatever it likes.  But you'll still have scads of people engaging in any sort of non-banworthy asshattery that exists.

And if the game is open PvP, you'll have people running around wasting other folks just for the hell of it.  Period.  Tack on penalites, and they'll become a badge of honor for the asshats.  Penalties harsh enough to stop random gankage will probably stop all PvP and the system will be pointless.

So if you want open PvP, fine.  May someone make a Shadowbane minus the suck for you to r0x0r for all eternity.  But wake up and realize that free-for-all PvP is ALWAYS going to be chock full of random ganking dipshits, and there really ISN'T some secret magical design that will change that.

[eldaec]

While it isn't really connected to thread, this thread has 'War' and 'MMORPG' in the title of it's article, so I'm going to mention again that I want to play a 'Total War' MMOG.

Levelling up would consist of getting more resource points to spend on an army, 'classes' of your general would affect the units available (primarily to encourage grouping). You form up a moderately well balanced group of generals, and go off to fight pve battles against npc armies, or pvp battles against pc armies.

I also want a flying car.

kthx.

[HaemishM]

While it isn't really connected to thread, this thread has 'War' and 'MMORPG' in the title of it's article, so I'm going to mention again that I want to play a 'Total War' MMOG.

YES.

[Margalis]

Or something like Warhammer table-top game online. Would be somewhat easy to do, and could be cool as hell. Warhammer has an established system of buying guys by point cost, it would translate pretty directly.

[ParadoxEquation]

You speak of War, you speak of conflict, then you speak of competition.

Some of us?  Some of us want war.  I don't want the teams to be balanced, I don't want the odds to be fair, I don't want my opponents to be equivalent.  I want my raw abilities to be faced by those of others in a situation that is fluid, uncertain, and all the more thrilling for it.  I want to be outnumbered 4-1 and I want to have a chance of winning despite it, by merit of my abilities as a player and my knowledge of the game's mechanics.

You're talking about taking the rogue aspect of true conflict out of games, making the "PVP" more lifeless and meaningless than it ever could possibly be otherwise.  You're trying to tell me, and all people like me, that open conflict is a bad thing... when that is what truly makes these games fun for us.

At least on Tallon Zek on EQ, I didn't know what I was going to face up against.  On warcraft, I could destroy a hunter 4 levels over me and get screwed up by a mage 3 levels lower.  On UO, I might jump out of the shadows to kill someone who looked like a lumberjack only to get my ass destroyed.  I might pop out and attack a hardcore-looking PK only to completely decimate him.  I could run into a group of 15 people all looking to kill me, off three of them, and run out with 5 hp and a hard surge of adrenaline.

You're talking about removing all of those aspects of conflict that make it a fundamentally human and real thing.  Aspects that vivify the experience for us, suffusing it with the opportunity to implement our primal instincts.  As it is now, some of these games give me the chance to exercise those abilities granted me by evolution that do not belong in the modern world of today.

PVP is fundamentally designed for the mature player.  This is why we do not let six year old children fight in wars (If we want to win the war, at least.)  Only a mature mind can look at "virtual" loss and find humor or entertainment in it, only a mature individual can be defeated by an opponent and still respect them, and only a mature individual can deal with the random qualities of a world that allows open conflict... because after all, the mature individual has typically experienced real misfortune and has grown accustomed to handling it in real life, such that losing a couple of goofy items in a game is not even worth frustration or negative feelings.

I play World of Warcraft now, after about seven solid years of MMOG gaming.  A game that has taken a step in the right direction, after Asheron's Fall, Everjest, and Shadowlame.  The industry has devolved, and I hope to god that Haemish's proposition of turning conflict into one big rinky-dink sports event never, EVER happens, and if it does I hope it doesn't become an industry standard.  If that were to happen, I would likely end my seven year stint with online RPGS in disgust.

-p.e.[/i]

[Glazius]

You're talking about removing all of those aspects of conflict that make it a fundamentally human and real thing.

Sleeping in trees and scavenging leftovers from the real predators are also fundamentally human and real things.

Just sayin'.

--GF

[Margalis]

You speak of War, you speak of conflict, then you speak of competition.

Some of us?  Some of us want war.  I don't want the teams to be balanced, I don't want the odds to be fair, I don't want my opponents to be equivalent.

That's great. I want a pony.

How many times do I have to say that there are two types of PvP players and you can't please both at the same time?

Seriously, let me say it again:

THERE ARE TWO TYPES OF PVP PLAYERS AND YOU CAN'T PLEASE BOTH AT THE SAME TIME.

If you want a game with open PvP, play a game with open PvP. Some of us don't want that game. There are plenty of games that cater to you, and none that cater to another very sizable population.

There is no reason different games can't appeal to different players, or even the same game, just not at the same time.

[Mnemon]

see this kind of topic is where I think SWG had a great opportunity and seriously dropped the ball.

the game could have been about the power struggle of Imperial sympathizers and the Rebellion in the power vacuum that is a galaxy without the Emperor or Darth Vader. All of a sudden there are two sides locked in a grand civil war fighting for control of the galaxy (it isn't like all of a sudden the Emperor died and everybody fell into the New Republic - there was a great period of time as the Republic was trying to be built).

putting this into a MMORPG setting the game could have become about your faction fighting for control of the galaxy, and you doing your part to turn the tide and win the Galactic Civil War. If you were a rebel that meant expanding the reach of the New Republic. As an Imperial you are trying to stop and then reverse this tide of change.

To accomlish this you could setup a sort of capture the flag type system in each of the cities on each of the planets. at the start the populated planets could be placed under imperial and rebel control: naboo and rori for the empire. Corellia and Talus for the rebellion. Tatooine, Lok and Dantooine undecided. in each case all but one of the cities on the planet were under control of the majority group with an opposition stronghold (i.e. Moenia on Naboo).

then sides could fight and take cities under control for one side or the other. the more cities you control the better defenses you get on that planet. the more planets controlled the better bonuses that side gets in the galaxy.

and at the end of the day the fighting in the streets would mean something, when it largely doesn't. folks would care about what happened in theed the other night because it'll impact them, as opposed to now where if you're not involved you really don't care.

it would be pvp as a means to an end. not pvp just to say there's pvp.

[WindupAtheist]

You're talking about removing all of those aspects of conflict that make it a fundamentally human and real thing.  Aspects that vivify the experience for us, suffusing it with the opportunity to implement our primal instincts.

lol newb its just a game!!1!

[HaemishM]

Stuff

Nothing wrong with what you want, but you, sir, are in the minority.

EDIT:

PVP is fundamentally designed for the mature player.

On that I will agree with you. However, it has been shown time and time again the majority of MMOG players are in no way mature. They are barely at the level of eating with a cork on the fork. And it is those players who fuck it up for the mature players, just like in real life and throughout history.

The majority of players will not pay for a war-like situation, because the very fundamental tenet of all good warriors is not to fight a battle that you cannot win unless no other option presents itself. The majority of people who compete want to feel they have an actual chance to win. That is in fundamental opposition to the very basics of military strategy, which says that if you are outnumbered, outgunned and outmaneuvered, you do not fight.

Most people will pay for a game that allows them a chance to win. Open PVP games will not allow the majority of players a chance to win.

The game you want is a niche game, will always be a niche game. There's nothing wrong with niche games, but no one is really making games meant to profit off 10,000 players. Investors want returns in the neighborhood of 50k players minimum.

[sidereal]

Aspects that vivify the experience for us, suffusing it

Jesus Christ, man!  It's not a wine review.

I agree that short-term-unfair situations are fun, as long as there are a few ground rules in place.  Like everyone knows going in that it's going to be short-term unfair.  And that the situation is long-term fair.  Maybe this battle involves trying to hold out against a superior opponent, but there's a good shot that next time you'll be on the other end.

As a concrete example, if you just opened the WoW floodgates for open unscheduled PvP right now, I bet you'd have a 50% Horde unsub or reroll rate within a month.  The population imbalance is incredible, and your vision of gritty, wild partisan warfare with hints of cinnamon would actualize as nothing more than 200 50th level Night Elf hunters camping Crossroads and pelvic thrusting the Horde into oblivion.

[Margalis]

It's not an either/or scenario. Even the same game can appeal to both types of PvP players, just on separate servers or in separate game areas.

I don't think anyone is advocating getting rid of free-form PvP from all games. The point is, make some games with other forms of PvP as well - forms that a large number of customers would enjoy as much or more.

[WindupAtheist]

I don't think anyone is advocating getting rid of free-form PvP from all games.

I am!  Get rid of it all, even in games I don't play!  Delete Felucca and Trammelize Shadowbane!  CAREBEAR UBER ALLES!

[Stephen Zepp]

I read both the essay and the posts here pretty deeply, and the one thing that I didn't see anyone even mention that instead of trying to limit the conflict into a set of controlled scenarios (of whatever "flavor" you want--open PvP, instanced "competitions", consentual PvP, whatever)--why not have the wars act as Clauswitz defines--last refuge of a political conflict?

This concept isn't intended to "fix" any of the asshat/griefer issues that the thread brought up, but it is intended to bring the entire concept of physical conflict (up to and including war) to it's most consistent state--simply a means to accomplish a political goal...from land grab to resource denial to ideological conflict, if there is both a reason behind, and a persistent consequence of a conflict/war in the virtual world, the entire argument loses one of it's base assumptions--war is no longer the end, but once again a means to an end.