Raph's Keynote Address for the GDC.

[sinij]

I'm going to do something stupid and tell somebody what they really want.  What they want isn't unrestricted PvP, because truely unrestricted PvP means I can hack the server and it is OK.  None of this carebear rules stuff, if I get surprised or I might lose my tree, I can crash the server if I want.

Unless hacking server is part of your game that will clearly be considered an exploit and has nothing to do with what open PvP is about.

What you really want is thematically consistant PvP.  You want rules, but only so long as they make sense for the setting.  You don't want to stop pursuing your enemies because they have gone into a Safehold; you want to stop pursuing your enemies because they somehow stopped you.

You are trying to reinvent the wheel here, there is a term for "thematically consistant PvP" and it is open-PvP.

And if you want to be able to completely defeat the opposition, you don't want to play a persistant game.

You shouldn't be able to take away ability to come back and try again from your opposition. Defeat - yes, stop from trying again - no.

[Samwise]

What you really want is thematically consistant PvP.  You want rules, but only so long as they make sense for the setting.  You don't want to stop pursuing your enemies because they have gone into a Safehold; you want to stop pursuing your enemies because they somehow stopped you.

You are trying to reinvent the wheel here, there is a term for "thematically consistant PvP" and it is open-PvP.

Not quite.  "Open-PvP" means a server full of retards running around and shooting each other screaming "OMG LOLZ".  (See: Faces of Mankind.)  This is certainly consistent with some themes, but not with any that would make a fun game for the average human being.

Faction systems, where factions can attack each other but not their own members, are one form of "thematically consistent" PvP. The theme in that case is war between those factions, as opposed to an open grief-fest.

[Evangolis]

What you really want is thematically consistant PvP.  You want rules, but only so long as they make sense for the setting.  You don't want to stop pursuing your enemies because they have gone into a Safehold; you want to stop pursuing your enemies because they somehow stopped you.

While I want thematically consistent PvP, the very term "thematically consistent" is highly subjective.  Because of that, I would break PvP'ers down into two groups using that term as the divider:

I don't agree.  Thematically consistant is a primary goal of the game designer.  The point is not to cater to gamers tastes, it is to shape them; to sell your vision of the game you are playing so that players say, 'Yeah, that makes sense'.  The other primary design goal is aesthetic excellence, which makes players say 'and I like it.'  The second may be a matter of taste, but the first cannot be, or the designer has failed at his craft.

For most PvP'ers, "thematically consistent" means being able to kill at a time of their choosing.  They cannot conceive of a game or virtual world without some sort of descent into all-out war.  Nor can they conceive of villainous masterminds with more depth than simply killing everyone around them.  PvP is their theme.  In other words, they interpret "thematically consistent" to mean a theme that they invent regardless of the game milieu.

Being able to attack at the time of your choosing is tactically sound, and therefore thematically consistent.  This is part of the challenge of constructing a viable PvP setting, allowing people to use good tactics.  Surprise is good tactics.  Perching in inaccessible terrain and attacking at range is good tactics.  Vastly outnumbering your opponents is good tactics.  And all of these have been called exploits at some point.  Thematically consistent PvP allows good tactics.  Which is why it is hard to create thematically consistent PvP in a large fully 3D accessible persistant world.

Then there are those of us who interpret "thematically consistent" as making sense in the context of a game.  They want a game that resembles another world in one or more interesting ways, even if it's not really a "virtual" world.  Villains do other things besides go on killing sprees for loot.  That's the kind of PvP'er Raph is, I'm assuming.  And because he's that kind of PvP'er, he assumes everyone is, or at least enough are that he can construct a game with free-for-all PvP without much regard for the consequences.

The fundamental difference between the groups is this:  The first group plays with the primary motivation of PvP-ing, while the second group plays with the idea that PvP is only one aspect of the game world.  Because of that fact alone, they cannot coexist in the same game.  In games that attempt to cater to both, one group will eventually dominate the other.

I think Raph's right that implementing PvP that doesn't break the magic circle represents good game design.  I just don't think the majority of PvP'ers really want this because it imposes rules on one's conduct that are too much like the real world, rules that they are trying to escape by playing an MMOG in the first place.

And I don't think most people who want PvP are griefers, which is how you are defining them.  I agree with Haemish that most of us are Player M.  I take it farther, I think most non-griefer players are Player M.  Heck, I don't even think most griefers are griefers, I think they are people who have discovered the thematic inadequacies of the world, and are now playing the new game they have discovered.

I think most of them are This Guy  (Link stolen from Broken Toys)

I'm going to do something stupid and tell somebody what they really want.  What they want isn't unrestricted PvP, because truely unrestricted PvP means I can hack the server and it is OK.  None of this carebear rules stuff, if I get surprised or I might lose my tree, I can crash the server if I want.

Unless hacking server is part of your game that will clearly be considered an exploit and has nothing to do with what open PvP is about.

There you go again, infringing on PvP with rules. :-D  There is a whole school of players out there (not all of them PvPers) who don't agree with you.  You have heard them, they are the 'if it can be done in your code, then I can do it' crowd.  Your hack is their game.  Now I don't argue that you have to play by their rules, but you most certainly are going to play by some set of rules, and unless your rules include the armed takeover and reprogramming at gunpoint of the server farm as legitimate tactics, you will absolutely have rules on PvP.

Games are sets of rules.  Otherwise we just stand in the backyard yelling 'I shot you, you're dead' at each other until SOE comes out in her apron and tells us to stop yelling and play nice.

What you really want is thematically consistant PvP.  You want rules, but only so long as they make sense for the setting.  You don't want to stop pursuing your enemies because they have gone into a Safehold; you want to stop pursuing your enemies because they somehow stopped you.

You are trying to reinvent the wheel here, there is a term for "thematically consistant PvP" and it is open-PvP.

And as I said above, open-PvP is rules bounded PvP, open only within the rules you have agreed to.

And if you want to be able to completely defeat the opposition, you don't want to play a persistant game.

You shouldn't be able to take away ability to come back and try again from your opposition. Defeat - yes, stop from trying again - no.

In other words, they need safeholds, places where PvP is not open.  As long as you exclude total defeat, which by definition persistance does, you exclude total war.  PvP must have boundries of some sort, or the game we end up playing is Global Thermonuclear War.

I would really prefer a nice game of chess.

[Riggswolfe]

Player E sucks. He's my first target in every game. And when I kill him I make sure to tell him he should be playing Pikmin or something on his Gamecube. Yes, specifically, the Gamecube. And it can't be Resident Evil 4. Wussy. *spit*

I <3 PK. 

I'm going to assume this post is mostly hyperbole, like when I call PKs sociopaths. However, I wonder if you realize that you're responsible for alot of Player Es?

See, my theory is that Player E is relatively rare. I think most people start as an M. E's are created by the worst of the P's. (PKs.). They get so angry and so frustrated they want nothing to do with PvP ever again.

For example: Myself. During the so-called "golden age" of UO PvP I was an M. But, this clusterfuck of 12 year old retards turned me into a hardcore E. I wouldn't even buy a game if I saw it had any PvP in it. (To this day, if i see someone acting like those days of UO Were the good old days I have a tendency to judge them very negatively, as a player, and as a person. It is inconceivable to me that any normal person could miss that shit. ) Over time I calmed down and gradually slid back into M territory, especially when I saw intelligent PvP designs start coming out. (Which Open PvP, especially UO-style was not).

WoW has slowly swayed me back to being an M and I am now looking forward to battlegrounds. Doesn't mean you hardcore P's don't occasionally inspire fantasies of mass murder in me though.

[MaceVanHoffen]

See, my theory is that Player E is relatively rare. I think most people start as an M. E's are created by the worst of the P's. (PKs.). They get so angry and so frustrated they want nothing to do with PvP ever again.

Excellent point, and I'll second that.  Years after my UO time, I'm just now getting back to being an M.

The M group is very common simply because M is self-selecting: you try MMOG's precisely because you want to interact with other players, something beyond the E experience of a single-player game.  Then you meet the P's, have messageboard conversations about which is the most common kind of gamer, then realize you don't give a shit because the P's force you to play the game their way and bitch at you for not liking it.  The P group may or may not be the majority, but they are functionally equivalent to the majority because they are the ones impacting your play the most in a game like UO.

[SirBruce]

There's no difference between an E, though, and an M who simply never chooses to PvP.  Any game system that accomodates M must accomodate E, but can never accomodate P.  E doesn't care if people PvP in their own areas without effecting E, but P most certainly cares that he can't PvP where he can effect E.

So it's pretty easy to satisfy E and M without having PvP at all.  But still, M wants more.  So it is tempting for designers to try to increase the satisfaction of M, and give something for the P.  But no such hybrid system has ever worked very well (DAoC being perhaps the best example?); P is never satisfied with half-measures, and E's experience is slowly eroded away.  And many M folks finally figure out this hyrbid thing isn't really all its cracked up to be; maybe there's a way to do it better, but since they can't have a great M, they'd rather have a great E or a great P.

Most people are not Ms in the sense you mean it.  They're really Es except it's more than just spawn camping.  Obviously you could put this on a continuum, with Ps on one end and Es on the other, and Ms in the middle.  Well, far more people are going to be closer to the E side than the P side.  Especially since great M can't be delivered.

Bruce

[Evangolis]

Talking off the top of my head when I should be asleep, I think I disagree about delivering PvP.

The absence of PvP from the majority of computer games is part of why these games are regarded as 'immature'.  Most non-computer games are in fact PvP games.  PnP RPGs were odd because nobody 'won', or everybody won, and either way, that sounded communist.  Football has winners and losers, although both sides generally need an ice pack and a discreet shot of painkillers afterward.

I agree that so far delivery of PvP has been lacking, but that doesn't mean we should stop trying to resolve the issue.  In the end, I think part of the mass market solution lies in provioding a fair, understandable, and robust PvP game.  PvP is what the mass market knows and understands, badly implemented PvP is what computer games have generally provided.  Closing that gap is a major part of the mass market puzzle.

[Riggswolfe]

Talking off the top of my head when I should be asleep, I think I disagree about delivering PvP.

The absence of PvP from the majority of computer games is part of why these games are regarded as 'immature'.  Most non-computer games are in fact PvP games.  PnP RPGs were odd because nobody 'won', or everybody won, and either way, that sounded communist.  Football has winners and losers, although both sides generally need an ice pack and a discreet shot of painkillers afterward.

I agree that so far delivery of PvP has been lacking, but that doesn't mean we should stop trying to resolve the issue.  In the end, I think part of the mass market solution lies in provioding a fair, understandable, and robust PvP game.  PvP is what the mass market knows and understands, badly implemented PvP is what computer games have generally provided.  Closing that gap is a major part of the mass market puzzle.

See, where I disagree is that PvP has a nasty tendency to bring out the fucktard in people. It feels like the more PvP the less mature the playerbase. It's the whole anonymity thing all over again. When you don't know people and people don't know you, your inner asshole comes out. This, to me, is why so many people are turned off by PvP, especially open PvP. Sure, you can grief in PvE, but it's a whole different kind of griefing. It's a lot less...personal.

Steps like being unable to talk to factions help alot, but then we're getting into that whole rules thing that the open PvP guys dislike. (then again, I suspect the open PvP guys just love expressing their inner asshole.)

[HaemishM]

There's no difference between an E, though, and an M who simply never chooses to PvP. 

Bullshit. The E's and the P's are the FRINGE ELEMENT, who will never ever accept any kind of the opposite game play in their game. Those people are the very vocal minority. The majority of people will PVP, if given the opportunity to do so at their time and place of choosing. The majority of man lives in that middle, not on the fringes. M's don't have to PVP to accept it, but they also do not mind it's existence in the game. It is only the holy mission of E's and P's that PVE/PVP gameplay is removed from "their game."

As for successful M games: DAoC, now WoW, whose inclusion of PVP even on PVE servers has got to be considered in discussing its success. No, it is not nearly the only factor, but it most certainly has not hurt the success of the game. Compare its box sales to EQ2's box sales, and you'll see a direct comparison of a lot of mitigating factors, one of which has to be that one has PVP and one does not in anyway, not even in the form of duels. Other factors include the Warcraft/Blizzard brand name, casual vs. time-intensive playstyle, heavy forced-grouping vs. slowly building casual forced grouping, and length of treadmill. They are all factors, but PVP has got to be considered one of them.

Other M games might include Eve, which has a small user-base but supposedly a steadily growing one. PVP has hurt that game less than say the lack of marketing.

[Hoax]

Bullshit.

Your whole player M thing is a goddamn myth...

Your saying the vast majority of players only enjoy games where there are pvp-on and pvp-off zones, or pvp flags?
Think about what pvp gets reduced to in the great games you've mentioned:

Daoc = Planetside, with crappier combat and oh yeah a bunch of horrible boring shit you had to do before you could even get to the part where you capture the same bases over and over and over with no real benefit to doing so.

WoW, PvP skills = persistence, bind rushing has never been so incredibly ghey as the bind rushing in WoW.  It single handedly made me quit the game, a game who's pve I could not only stomach but often enjoyed (first time that ever happened).  Battlegrounds??  Hah we're back to DAOC's crap system, but even shittier...  Think of it as DAOC's RvR but after you captured a relic it was transported back to the enemy's realm keep automatically after 20 minutes.

I really hope that the majority of players are not so stupid as to doom all of us to another 5years of this type of crap, or I'm going back to fps despite how much I like having a character with his own look, unique personality and friends/enemies in a game.  You just can't get that in a game where switching your name is a server command.

[MaceVanHoffen]

So it's pretty easy to satisfy E and M without having PvP at all.

That's where I disagree with you.  Credit to Riggswolfe for hitting this on the head.

Fundamentally, I think most gamers want PvP, or at least want to try PvP, with a reasonable chance of success.  I assert that very, very few MMOG gamers start as an E, since the motivation for trying a MMOG tends to indicate an M or P to begin with.  Most of the time, an E is born through contact with the other extreme of P.  But like it or lump it, gamers gravitate to MMOG's because they want some form of PvP, either direct combat or some other form of competition (e.g. competing for uber spawns in EQ1 -- yes, there are a lot of gamers who do like that).

I think I'm pretty typical of the M->E crowd:  I became disgusted with combat-oriented PvP, not because I didn't like it, but because of what other players (P's) did with it.  Even during my E time, I still sought out FPS games like Unreal or Half-life to feed my PvP urges.  That's what I would offer as an indicator of the desire for PvP in most MMOG gamers:  seeking it out in other non-MMOG games even after being fed up with it in MMOG titles.  I'd be willing to bet that's typical of a very large percentage of the playerbase.

So it isn't that you can satisfy E and M without having PvP at all.  It's just that M takes what it can get from the current market.  And, as has already been pointed out numerous times, games that offer consensual PvP do much better than those at either end of the spectrum.

[HaemishM]

Bullshit.

Your whole player M thing is a goddamn myth...

Your saying the vast majority of players only enjoy games where there are pvp-on and pvp-off zones, or pvp flags?
Think about what pvp gets reduced to in the great games you've mentioned:

I'm saying that however it is done, the majority of players want to choose whether or not they are susceptible to PVP on any given night or day. I'm not saying they can't get enjoyment out of other types of games. After all, single-player games are usually just story-driven versions of PVE; they are usually more elaborate PVE, because SP games can make better use of processor power to simulate decent AI. Players want to make that choice, not have that choice thrust upon them. If they feel like killing mobs with their friends, they don't want Dirk Diggler pouncing on their rat-whacking party with purple potions screaming lollercopters the whole time.

Just like the Matrix, it's about choice. 

Daoc = Planetside, with crappier combat and oh yeah a bunch of horrible boring shit you had to do before you could even get to the part where you capture the same bases over and over and over with no real benefit to doing so.

You conveniently forget to mention that, whatever you may think of it, DAoC has the option of not having to participate in PVP when you don't want to, and just doing some PVE. Dave Rickey once quoted us some numbers that said a good majority of the players in DAoC have at some time or other participated in PVP, though there is a small minority that have never participated. And if you look at their alternate server rulesets, one of which is all-PVP anywhere/anytime, and the other is absolutely NO PVP, all PVE, both of those extreme rulesets (and not eXtrem3) are the lowest population servers.

I really hope that the majority of players are not so stupid as to doom all of us to another 5years of this type of crap

“You can never underestimate the stupidity of the general public.”
- Scott Raymond Adams (1957-Present)
American cartoonist, creator of "Dilbert" in 1989
from The Dilbert Future.

[MrHat]

I think we're all viewing battlegrounds and DAoC PvP the wrong way.

We all want PvP with proper effects, but some of the most played multiplayer games (online FPS) don't have long term effects.  You play for 20 mins and the map resets.  That's the way I'm viewing the upcoming BG's - something to do.  The issue is will it be worth paying $15 a month.  I think they should let you cap out, then give you another option, where you pay $5 a month and are only allowed to do BG's and City stuff.

[Evangolis]

[
See, where I disagree is that PvP has a nasty tendency to bring out the fucktard in people. .... It's the whole anonymity thing all over again. When you don't know people and people don't know you, your inner asshole comes out.

I've played PvE and PvP MMOs, and I've generally noticed a fairly equal distribution of fucktards.  PvP provides another conduit for the furktard, but I don't think the frequency is any higher.  It is more about the anonymous nature of online play than about the type of play.

Blaming asshattery on players ignores the fact that in the absence of rigorous and redundent design asshats will flourish.  That is one reason why I keep bringing up things like player accessible CS and Account Management tools as a basic part of MMO design, as well as secure and flexible trade channels and identification by account rather than by character.  Bad Design is the problem, not Bad People; good design accounts for the issues caused by bad people.

[HaemishM]

I've played PvE and PvP MMOs, and I've generally noticed a fairly equal distribution of fucktards.  PvP provides another conduit for the furktard, but I don't think the frequency is any higher.  It is more about the anonymous nature of online play than about the type of play.

Keep in mind that in PVE, you generally aren't going to be exposed to as many other people, especially those you don't know, as you would as a PVP player. PVP requires other players. PVE doesn't necessarily require other people. So it would be much easier to see more fucktards that PVP than PVE because you'll be exposed to them more.

And yes, bad design is a part of it, but there ARE bad people out there, people who take the anonymity of the MMOG as a free license to let their inner asshole out despite the presence of other people. Or maybe because of it.

[Hoax]

We should discuss this over in the FoM thread...

With their system it is possible for a person to get his character perma dead if he is too much of a fucktard for any faction to tolerate him.  How it works is, the faction leader (rank7) can kick a player from the faction, he then blacklists the player and can even tell allied factions to blacklist as well.  The player must then join a new faction if he is kicked/blacklisted from all the game's factions his character ceases to exist.

Its a far from perfect system but it seems like a step in the right direction.  We want open pvp, but we want it to make sense not just be l33t dewds gangbanging players in 10v1 ambush style situations where the victim stands no chance.  Nobody wants that but whereas some of you forsake open pvp because you equate it to l33t dewd gangbangs I refuse to give up the constant fear/adrenaline of playing in a wild west setting despite the inevitable l33t dewd gangbangs from time to time.

[Samwise]

Can't a single faction leader then decide to make his faction a safe haven for all the l33t smacktards?

[Riggswolfe]

Bullshit.

Your whole player M thing is a goddamn myth...

Your saying the vast majority of players only enjoy games where there are pvp-on and pvp-off zones, or pvp flags?
Think about what pvp gets reduced to in the great games you've mentioned:

By this whole tirade you've shown how out of touch with the general population you are. It has been shown time and again, that P and E are fringe. M is pretty much the core playerbase (with I suspect some leaning towards E but that may be my own prejudices speaking).

There is a reason that the vast, vast majority of MMOs cater to this playstyle. It is what people want. Shadowbane didn't sell. EQ2 isn't selling well. WoW is flying off the shelves. Some of that can be attributed to good and/or bad game design. Alot of it can be attributed to WoW delivers what most players want. (just an example with current MMOs guys, not trying to turn this into a WoW thread).

Really, you're hallucinating if you think the M players don't rule the roost and rightly so. I Don't want to be assraped by a bunch of PK fuckheads. I want the option to offer my sphincter willingly on the battleground of my choice. And most players are with me. Sorry if you're in a minority and don't like it. Here's Jesse Jackson's number. Give him a call.

[Hoax]

"I'm saying that however it is done, the majority of players want to choose whether or not they are susceptible to PVP on any given night or day. I'm not saying they can't get enjoyment out of other types of games. After all, single-player games are usually just story-driven versions of PVE"

I still call bullshit on that.


A majority of players dont want to be raped in the ass with no system to punish the rapist and no hope of winning the fight due to the combat system being so based on time spent in-game, they enjoy pve and pvp content.

Thats what I'm hearing.  If Open PvP to this point has been unable to deliver that, well then yeah open pvp has sucked for them.  That doesn't mean that everyone wants to play CTF with no score (daoc) or bind rush till one side gets bored (WoW).  If they do well then frankly we're all in for an eternity of shitty games...

@Samwise:  I dont want to start talking about FoM really, as Haemish pointed out there are too many problems for 90% of players to even get to the creamy nogut center, which makes talking about the things I like about it frustrating.

But say one faction became the haven of l33t dewd gankers, and all the other factions despised them due to their RPK ways.  Not only could every other faction just band together and kick the shit out of them but they would be put on every factions enemy list and taxed to the point where mining on anyone but their own colonies would be out of the question.  The police/military could hunt them down, or lock them out of major markets on earth by stunning them then pp checking them and sending them to jail on sight instead of only arresting if they commit a crime.  It would take a very specific set of circumstances for a faction that disregards all others and RPK's their members to get away with it, and if they did it would be a failure of the community/player base not the game.

Player justice can not be fooled by loopholes, it can only (and will from time to time) be abused by unjust players who somehow gain positions of authority.  But the same way RPK's will be kicked out of most factions due to the drama and political problems they cause, corrupt cops are kicked out of the LED for abusing their authority on a daily basis.  They already have an IAD department in the open beta who members of other factions can submit ss's and testimony to.

[Riggswolfe]

"I'm saying that however it is done, the majority of players want to choose whether or not they are susceptible to PVP on any given night or day. I'm not saying they can't get enjoyment out of other types of games. After all, single-player games are usually just story-driven versions of PVE"

I still call bullshit on that.

Well then you have your head in the sand and have little understanding of the mindset of the average person.

[Hoax]

No I dont, I just believe something other then what you believe.  But discussing things with you is tiresome.  You quote pieces of what I say and then tell me I'm wrong and insult me based on some stereotype you've made up in your head from when the bad men hurt you in UO.  All the while disparaging the immaturity of anyone who isn't a pussy when it comes to playing games, I'm getting kind of sick of that.

Somebody else pointed this out, but I thought it was a good point so I will repost it.

-Almost every game that involves 2+ people is player vrs player.  Sports, board games, table top, computer games hell most of our entertainment on tv or in the movies are stories of competition.  Just because mmog's haven't been able to execute player vrs player well, a fact I blame on the stupid level treadmill btw.  Does not change the fact that human's like to compete, they like one person to win and the other to loose.  So please go on thinking your in some vast moral majority that enjoys playing pointless, tacked-on pvp that is level/item dependent and requires little to no skill.  Like I said, I refuse to believe that as it dooms the pc game community to a future where games will suck either because they have no money or the ideas behind them are boring and stupid.

[HaemishM]

But say one faction became the haven of l33t dewd gankers, and all the other factions despised them due to their RPK ways.  Not only could every other faction just band together and kick the shit out of them but they would be put on every factions enemy list and taxed to the point where mining on anyone but their own colonies would be out of the question.  The police/military could hunt them down, or lock them out of major markets on earth by stunning them then pp checking them and sending them to jail on sight instead of only arresting if they commit a crime.  It would take a very specific set of circumstances for a faction that disregards all others and RPK's their members to get away with it, and if they did it would be a failure of the community/player base not the game.

Player justice can not be fooled by loopholes, it can only (and will from time to time) be abused by unjust players who somehow gain positions of authority.  But the same way RPK's will be kicked out of most factions due to the drama and political problems they cause, corrupt cops are kicked out of the LED for abusing their authority on a daily basis.  They already have an IAD department in the open beta who members of other factions can submit ss's and testimony to.

Here's the problem you are missing.

The majority of people do not want to play games to unfuck other people's messes. They don't want justice, and player justice is really nothing more than revenge and mob rule in disguise. That's not what the majority of people really want. They don't want revenge or justice, they want to not be bothered by it at all, unless they choose to have it happen to them.

Call it stupid, call it shortsighted, call it what you will. People ARE stupid. But they are also paying money to play a game, and if they want their play style to not be interrupted by retards on Jolt Cola, that's their lookout. You will attract more players when you give them the choice of how to play as opposed to saying you can only play "this way."

EDIT: Also, people DO like to compete. Open PVP is not about competition, it's about ownage. It's not looking for competition, it's looking for victims. Competitions have rules. Open PVP has one rule, "Just Win, Baby." Player M wants to compete, not necessarily to own.

[MaceVanHoffen]

Well, I'm not meaning to insult you.  I once thought open PvP was all I ever wanted in a game.  However ...

A majority of players dont want to be raped in the ass with no system to punish the rapist and no hope of winning the fight due to the combat system being so based on time spent in-game, they enjoy pve and pvp content.

No one's disagreeing with that.  However, we are proceeding from a different definition of "raped in the ass."  You seem to think that all areas of a game should be dangerous and prowled by PvP'ers at all time.  I think that engaging in PvP forcibly with someone who does not want it is tantamount to taking some of his monthly fee.

We don't even have to agree.  These two playstyles require different games, and that's fine.  We can each have different games even in the current market.

If Open PvP to this point has been unable to deliver that, well then yeah open pvp has sucked for them.  That doesn't mean that everyone wants to play CTF with no score (daoc) or bind rush till one side gets bored (WoW).  If they do well then frankly we're all in for an eternity of shitty games...

We're going a step further: Open PvP is fundamentally unable to deliver that.  Players have proven that open PvP simply cannot exist without abuse.  Not just abuse from time to time, but abuse with each and every play session.  As long as players are willing to construct reasons both elaborate and silly as to why they should be allowed to forcibly change the channel to ALL GANK ALL THE TIME and force everyone else in the pizza parlor to watch it, open PvP will not work.  Which means it will never work.

Player justice can not be fooled by loopholes, it can only (and will from time to time) be abused by unjust players who somehow gain positions of authority.

Yes it can, and it's easy to show how.  Players are anonymous in an online game.  In UO, I can create Lord Melron and iAmG0nnAk1ckUrA$$ on the same account.  The first character is sweet and nice, the second character is a l33t peekay.  Items and loot can be shuffled between them ad nauseum.

I don't even have to make two characters.  I can simply log off and wait enough time that the player justice police need to log off for bed, work, or whatever, and come back on to resume gankage.  Then there's also the fact that players don't want to pay a monthly fee to be a babysitter for the pimply-faced masses, though technically that's not a loophole, being more of a playerbase characteristic.

I could go on, but don't see the point.  Player justice doesn't work for so many reasons.  If the hundreds of MUD's and the social experiment that was UO didn't prove that to you, I'm not sure what would.

[Riggswolfe]

No I dont, I just believe something other then what you believe.  But discussing things with you is tiresome.  You quote pieces of what I say and then tell me I'm wrong and insult me based on some stereotype you've made up in your head from when the bad men hurt you in UO.  All the while disparaging the immaturity of anyone who isn't a pussy when it comes to playing games, I'm getting kind of sick of that.

It has nothing to do with UO or anything else. It has to do with you ignoring very blatant and obvious trends in the human psyche and the market in general. People don't mind PvP in general. But they want to choose when and where for the most part. Why is that so hard to understand? Noone is saying PvP is evil and shouldn't be done. (Except hardcore E players which UO briefly pushed me into being). They are saying that they want it when they want it and don't when they don't. That's not unreasonable. Why you deny that this is the way people are is beyond me since all observable evidence is totally against you.

As for the non-hardcore PvPers are pussies argument. That's tired and old. Get a new insult. Don't bother with carebear either, I know where the term came from so it has no power over me. That and it is overused.

As for the rest of your bitching about levels and items and boring PvP. The game you want is already made. It's called Unreal tournament. Or quake. Etc etc. MMOs come from the earlier CRPGs and part of the whole RPG aspect is leveling and items. People like those things. They enjoy getting the sword of uberness. They like the ding when they level.

[HaemishM]

immaturity of anyone who isn't a pussy

You say he is insulting you, and then claim anyone who doesn't like PVP or open PVP is a pussy?

Pot, kettle, black.

[Riggswolfe]

immaturity of anyone who isn't a pussy

You say he is insulting you, and then claim anyone who doesn't like PVP or open PVP is a pussy?

Pot, kettle, black.

I think I kinda pushed a button with my posts. I was waiting for the whole non-PvPers are pussies card. It is always tossed out by the hardcore P's.

[Hoax]

Again, you quote pieces of my posts and ignore everything else I say.  Yes you are pushing my buttons you are a E player that much is obvious.  I dont like people that deny that competition is what games are about and AI will never provide competition.  Also items/levels are what create E players, anyone who fears being attacked by superior numbers can travel with friends.  The problem with mmog PvP that causes so many players to become what you are is that a kid with more time on his hands will always be better then you are, then when he kills you (not because he has more skill but because time = levels/uber items) he will act like a kid and rub it in your face.  I can draw this conclusion as it is well established that for the most part younger players have more time for games, I know I have gone from playing 8+ hours to playing 6max and usually more like 4 a day and not at all on weekends.  The evil fucktard pk stereotype is formed almost entirely on the back of these truths imo.

Nobody, no matter what "player type" you consider them likes to not stand a chance in a fight.  The fact that most mmog's are designed with level determining whether you can even hit or damage an opponent makes it the obvious culprit for so much grief being caused by fights where one person stands 0 chance of surviving.  How do you not see that?  Of course the whole target + auto attack + mash skill buttons thing doesn't help either but lets not go there for now.

Saying that the only solution is to make a pvp on/off switch means you just have a limited imagination or are in fact a E type player.  You demand the on/off switch because you dont care if PvP is fair you want to be able to have no part in it.  I would say that puts you nowhere near the majority and you will not convince me otherwise.  I will agree that the majority of gamers do not enjoy open pvp using level/items > skill and target + auto attack combat systems, I include myself in that group.

I detest pvp in the current flavor of mmog's for the same reason you do.  But we arrive at different conclusions to the solution.  Neither of us likes to loose to some asshat because he has /played 2months and we have /played 3weeks.  I see that as a failure of the game to allow me to win a fight where I am more skilled then my opponent.  You want me to believe that the problem is you can't turn pvp off.

P.S.  I do think anyone who denies the fundamental truth that multiplayer games are almost always meant to be competition and competition is achieved from player vrs player conflict is a pussy who just can't handle losing a fight.  I also think the lvl60's who go to redridge or stonetalon and massacre lvl2x-3x players are pussies, so what?  Both groups avoid true competition, one by picking on players who do not stand a chance against them the other by trying to avoid conflict with other players all together. 

[El Gallo]

-Almost every game that involves 2+ people is player vrs player.  Sports, board games, table top, computer games hell most of our entertainment on tv or in the movies are stories of competition.

The important thing here is that the games you listed are not persistent.  We've been around this issue a number of times, but let's take chess for an example.  I can start playing chess with my friend who is a very good chess player.  He will whip my ass.  However, every time he does, we reset the board and play again.  My prior asswhippings have no impact on current game.  I get better and better, to the point where I can win some games against him.  However, if chess was a persistent game -- say, every time you lose to someone, they get to take one of your pawns for the next game, I would never be able to catch up.  Same with sports.  The Steelers may have beaten the Browns the last 10 times they played, but the 11th time the score starts 0-0, because we wipe the board, so to speak, after every season.

MMOGs have to be persistent.  That's what makes them cool.  More importantly, any board wiping mechanism has the effect of asking each of your subscribers "hey, if you have been thinking about quitting, now would be a great time to do so!"  Once you have persistence, you can't have competition with real consequences (i.e. winning helps the winner and hurts the loser) without devolving into the perma-winner/perma-loser state.  So the games don't let the winners win or the losers lose, and you get empty competition with no actual impact on the world, which isn't competition at all really.  
In short, you can have:

A non-persistent competition, and you end up with me and my friend playing chess or the Steelers playing the Browns in football, which are fun.  

B persistent non-competition, and you end up with Everquest and its progeny, which at least some people think is fun.

C Persistent competition, and you end up with the United States vs the Iroquois Nation.  Which was only fun for one side, and precludes the possibility of meaningful competition between the two sides ever again.

Most decent PvPers want "C" that doesn't devolve into perma-winners and perma-losers, but I think that's just impossible.  They want real,  meaningful battles that will reshape the face of the world, but they don't want the world to ever actually get reshaped.  I think I know what decent PvPers want: they want to be part of a virtual Pickett's Charge, on one side or the other.  I can imagine how great that would be.  Pickett's Charge was Pickett's Charge because the fate of two nations hung in the balance.  If you have Pickett's Charge but everyone knows that winning or losing means nothing come the next dawn, then you don't have Pickett's Charge anymore.  What you have is Hilsbrad Foothills.  And that's all you are ever going to get.

[WindupAtheist]

I do think anyone who denies the fundamental truth that multiplayer games are almost always meant to be competition and competition is achieved from player vrs player conflict is a pussy who just can't handle losing a fight.

Look!  An absolute vintage "I know what the game is MEANT to be, and you're a pussy if you don't like it!" hardcore PvPtard!  I thought they all fucked off to Counterstrike years ago.  Someone tag it's ear.

[Riggswolfe]

Again, you quote pieces of my posts and ignore everything else I say.  Yes you are pushing my buttons you are a E player that much is obvious.  I dont like people that deny that competition is what games are about and AI will never provide competition.  Also items/levels are what create E players, anyone who fears being attacked by superior numbers can travel with friends.  The problem with mmog PvP that causes so many players to become what you are is that a kid with more time on his hands will always be better then you are, then when he kills you (not because he has more skill but because time = levels/uber items) he will act like a kid and rub it in your face.  I can draw this conclusion as it is well established that for the most part younger players have more time for games, I know I have gone from playing 8+ hours to playing 6max and usually more like 4 a day and not at all on weekends.  The evil fucktard pk stereotype is formed almost entirely on the back of these truths imo.

Agreed for the mostr part.

Nobody, no matter what "player type" you consider them likes to not stand a chance in a fight.  The fact that most mmog's are designed with level determining whether you can even hit or damage an opponent makes it the obvious culprit for so much grief being caused by fights where one person stands 0 chance of surviving.  How do you not see that?  Of course the whole target + auto attack + mash skill buttons thing doesn't help either but lets not go there for now.

File this under Duh. Are you seeing yet why I don't bother to respond to most of your posts?

Saying that the only solution is to make a pvp on/off switch means you just have a limited imagination or are in fact a E type player.  You demand the on/off switch because you dont care if PvP is fair you want to be able to have no part in it.  I would say that puts you nowhere near the majority and you will not convince me otherwise.  I will agree that the majority of gamers do not enjoy open pvp using level/items > skill and target + auto attack combat systems, I include myself in that group.

I do want to be able to have no part in it if that is my mindset that night. I'm not alone. The vast majority of players feel the same way. Something you continue to deny despite all evidence to the contrary. The more you rant the more you're starting to look like one of those 12 year old ganktards in disquise.

I detest pvp in the current flavor of mmog's for the same reason you do.  But we arrive at different conclusions to the solution.  Neither of us likes to loose to some asshat because he has /played 2months and we have /played 3weeks.  I see that as a failure of the game to allow me to win a fight where I am more skilled then my opponent.  You want me to believe that the problem is you can't turn pvp off.

I think the problem is you don't want to play an MMO. You want to play some uber-persistent-pvp-gankfest. It doesn't exist. The so-called glory days of UO were the closest we ever got and the playerbase abandoned it for good reason.

P.S.  I do think anyone who denies the fundamental truth that multiplayer games are almost always meant to be competition and competition is achieved from player vrs player conflict is a pussy who just can't handle losing a fight.  I also think the lvl60's who go to redridge or stonetalon and massacre lvl2x-3x players are pussies, so what?  Both groups avoid true competition, one by picking on players who do not stand a chance against them the other by trying to avoid conflict with other players all together. 

Again. You don't want an MMO. You totally missed the MMO boat and what they're all about. Raph could lecture you better than I but there is a reason that you can take a survey to figure out what personality type you are. (I don't remember the survey name, it's been along, long time and I'm not even sure I remember my score.)

Killer is one part of it. So is socializer, explorer and umm...achievement if memory serves. You seem to think it's all about being a killer. Guess what, you're in a minority and you're fucking deluded. The vast, vast, vast majority are some mix and as I said before don't mind PvP but want it when they want it and not at the exclusion of everything else an MMO can offer.

MMOs can have competitive aspects, but they're among the first type of game that has more than one player that aren't centered around it. Do you get it yet?

[Stephen Zepp]

I've been watching this thread with avid interest--some great points of view on all sides!

The only thing that I wanted to interject is that there are a lot of claims of "my side is representative of the majority of gamers", and then references to WoW, or UO, or how PvP is handled (or not handled) in a particular game.

As far as I am aware (and I do a lot of research in this area), there has been no statisticial correlation between success/failure of a game soley based on it's type of PvP as a predictor. People like WoW for dozens and dozens of reasons, and it's gotten such a huge player base for those reasons (as well as being one of the currently most polished MMOGs around), but I don't think it's fair to back up any of the PvP positions in the debate by saying "WoW has huge numbers, therefore a majority of the players agree with the PvP concepts involved with that game".

People also don't like "open PvP" games (I include Planetside, Shadowbane for example in this context) not necessarily for their PvP structures, but due to an entire mash of other reasons as well. While ganking/griefing were prevalent in SB for example, I don't know of many people personally that quit the game because of that--they quit for other reasons.

[Hoax]

There have been several persistent worlds that did provide what I want combat-wise:
-10six did it well and survived with no marketing and no budget/devs for a long time (in fact to this day in an underground player-run version of a game from '99)
-EVE did but there was a huge time/money grind
-Planetside would have been cool with PvP that mattered instead of DAOC's RvR system (which I'd already tried and rejected)
-Neocron tried
-SB had something decent going if the game didn't have so much gold farming as well as other flaws
-GW is almost there but not really a persistent world imo
-FoM is trying

meanwhile there are several pvp games that are cropping up (RyL, Dark and Light and Mourning) that continue to use the same tired level+gear is always > skill formula rather then actually trying to make a good game.

I like persistent worlds, I like having an avatar, somebody who represents some facet of my personality, I enjoy limited roleplaying in futuristic settings.  I'll pass on fantasy rp'ing as it gets in the way of communcating effectively and most ppl are nazi's about it.  

I'm sorry I dont fit into one of your little molds, I hardly see that as a failure on my part.  To you apparently persistent worlds are just rpg's and should act like rpg's.  Gain level, get skill x, get item +3 and fight bigger monster of doom, but with more people.  There is a reason why I never touched DnD thats because this type of gameplay for the most part sucks, it is a fun way to kill time while sitting at the local Denny's from 11pm-3am and making stupid jokes, nothing more.  I loved Diablo1, one of the first online gaming experiences of my life, but after that I got over that "genre".  

The important aspects of the mmog genre and persistent worlds to me are not lewt/levels.
-Player's influencing the storyline/world
-An evolving storyline/world
-Player's are accountable for their in-game actions
-The player societies that grow in online worlds
-The avatar itself, its fun to have a character I dont need uber lewt just having a persona who is more then CTskin4 is a cool thing

"I do want to be able to have no part in it if that is my mindset that night. I'm not alone"
-The reason to want no part in pvp are treadmill related: you are too busy grinding through stupid treadmills, and getting killed sets you back, this is annoying.  I've never heard somebody at level cap bitch about being "forced to pvp".  Its always players who are trying to get there and getting killed, again your long level grinds are the problem here as I see it, not the pvp itself.

"first type of game that has more than one player that aren't centered around it"

Bullshit.  Thats why there is a massive number of PvE competitions in mmog's right?  
-First player to 60 on a server
-First player with full ub3r epic set xxx
-First guild to slay so-n-so
-First guild to access raid zone Y

You turned fun player vrs player competition into some kind of sick race where players burn through stupid timesinks and boring tasks as fast as possible, something ENTIRELY based on /played, thats nice.  This is the type of gameplay you want to preserve?  

Meanwhile some people will tell me that the joy is in leveling up, in exploring the zones and completing the quests ect.  Are you going to tell me that they are the majority too?  I would wager the smell the flowers types are outnumbered by the racers, not on this board but I think its been said many times this is hardly a group of avg. gamers.  Obviously that statement can not be proven but in my gut I'm damn sure from all my EQ-clone experience in various games.

[Riggswolfe]

Hoax, you're hopelessly deluded. There are 4 kinds of MMO players, and you seem to believe there is only one. What's the point? Fine you win. Only Killers matter. The other playstyles are totally invalid because they don't wish to be your victims. Let me know when you wake up and realize you and your playstyle are not the center of the MMO universe that in fact you are a small part of it.

[HaemishM]

but I don't think it's fair to back up any of the PvP positions in the debate by saying "WoW has huge numbers, therefore a majority of the players agree with the PvP concepts involved with that game".

Which certainly isn't what I have said. I said that PVP certainly isn't HURTING it, as many anti-PVP folks would like to believe. Your statement should be "WoW has huge numbers, therefore a majority of the players do not DISagree with the PvP concepts involved with that game."

[Stephen Zepp]

Hoax, you're hopelessly deluded. There are 4 kinds of MMO players, and you seem to believe there is only one. What's the point? Fine you win. Only Killers matter. The other playstyles are totally invalid because they don't wish to be your victims. Let me know when you wake up and realize you and your playstyle are not the center of the MMO universe that in fact you are a small part of it.

Hoax isn't deluded into thinking that only one type of MMO player exists. I think that what he is saying (and what I personally believe) is that there is no need to segregate your socializers/explorers, and even achievers into the "PvE" part of the game, and the killers into the PvP part of the game, with only minor cross-over. I personally think that you can provide draws for all 4 types of players and the multi-type players as well) within a single integrated design, instead of sectioning off different parts of the game for different types. Obviously no one has come up with the perfect design (and I'm no where near it myself, that's not what I'm trying to say), but I do think it's possible.

I'm working on an article (coming VERY slowly) that is about managing postive and negative conflict in a MMOG, and the main premise is that if you can design away from negative conflict (griefing/ganking/out of the game circle conflict) and towards positive conflict (competitive, complex, interactive and controlled), you don't need to segregate the 4 types of players, but can have them leverage off of each other. You KNOW you will have gankers/griefers in any MMOG, but instead of trying to limit their destructiveness (managing negative conflict), turn their tendencies into a more acceptable interaction (managing positive conflict).