QiSnake

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I'm still waiting for the Stalker that would come close to me, notice that I don't see him and say in local something like : "Are you ready to die, Hero ?"

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That was a very common thing at one point, where every stalker thought it was original and witty.

"r u redy 2 die?"
"i cna c u can u c me?"
"lol u r powerelss agenst evil"
"how dose it feel 2 no u r gon2 die?"

On and on.. no way to reveal.. no way to spot. Every few seconds I would shuffle a feather to one side, as the invisible villain would shuffle against me, either humping my leg or trying to make sure they were at melee range. Eventually they'd get bored and just try to kill me, and end up doing nothing against my Personal ForceField. Problem was, once they realised I wasnt going to make an easy target of myself, it turned to :

"omg u r 2 scarrd of me"
"n00b chikin stop sheelding"
"ill get u & ur mom"

Unfortunately, back then I wasnt too hot at attacking in short chains between flicking my PFF off and on, I was either in my PFF or just dead, cursing that none of my holds were good enough to get through most characters mez resist, and that my force bolt never seemed to knock the right toggles. xP

Still, for my view of stalkers still needed a bit of a rethink/rebalance, I have to agree that attitude and playstyle makes a lot of difference. Met a few good stalkers, and a whole bunch that I can at least stomach, even if I dont like 'em. Just the way that games go I guess..

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...perhaps Controllers....are tougher to play...

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You have to be kidding right. Find a squishy, spam holds till said squishy is out of breakfrees, attack. V difficult.

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And whilst you are spamming mez on someone who has breakfrees, you're getting your [censored bum] handed to you. The nature of controller combat is similar to stalkers, I admit, its an all-or-nothing deal. Controllers either completely lock down the opponent, or they have no substantial effect at all. The difference is, even if a controller can lock you down, you have breakfrees, and the chance to find a way to escape/fight back given that their damage output isnt exactly great. With a stalker, either they floor you in a split second or they dont. The reason why controllers arent quite so despised as stalkers, is because with controllers at least you get -a- chance to play a part in the outcome of the fight.. rather than randomly being handed a letter of noticed that someone removed your lung and you have to respawn

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people see "limited skill" in pvp zones because they don't look for who is killing them and don't see how little the "skilled" PvP'ers die in the zone

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This is if you assume everyone is pouring every ounce of ability they have into a fight. In my experience, a lot of people go there to have fun, not to just get the best win/loss ratio. Some do go there to fight with their everything and try hard to survive at all costs. That explains why some people will only take part in a fight if they outnumber the enemy, or whether the enemy is already weakened, or will only engage a target who is already occupied with someone else, and the entire falling over themselves to run away when the odds swing a little against them. I dont have troubles with most tactics, because as it has been repeated so many times, they're valid tactics. Would the people who dont fight like that, be seen as unskilled by you guys?

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He used his PvE builds, he didnt respec yet. My point is there is loads more to PvP that just build and basic tactics.

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I definately agree there is more to PVP than just build and basic tactics, but once you get up there with the people who are deemed worthwhile opponents.. it does just get to be about fine-tweaking and rethinking approaches and whatnot. There is skill involved, but I would never call anything i've done or seen exactly "skillful" considering the norm. The game doesnt allow for a great deal of skill to be pumped into it, because of the automation. The only real mastery we are allowed to achieve, is over the tactics used, and the tweaking of the slots/powers to better work with other people.

Although, it becomes a different matter when there are more and more targets involved. With more teammates and out-of-team allies, and more opponents to face at a time, THAT is where the skill really starts to come in. Granted, even in mass combat you can do the skillless, numb, buttonmasher-style of play... but actually contributing towards the outcome of such battles (rather than simply hoping that it turns out alright for your team), thats were it gets interesting.

Im not very experienced in larger scale PVP, but its an interesting thought (with the idea of lag put to one side). Perhaps this is because im a controller, and my powers will have a pretty immediate effect on the flow of battle, but given time and experience in large-scale PVP, wouldnt it become somewhat routine and skillless for me again?

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Thats as dumb as saying if an empaths solo'es you, then he proves his point.

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And its almost as dumb as saying "If I can beat you in a fight, my view must be correct". Even given that the subject is PVP fighting, being able to beat someone doesnt necessarily mean your view of it all is accurate. Not trying to sound nasty towards Imaginary there at all, just making a point.

I still think that a load of people think there is no skill in PVP, simply because the majority of skill is down to good manuevering, timing, and team awareness. Its simply the way that PVP plays out in this game. Some people only feel something is truly skillful, if it is more demanding on the part of the player. Its the feeling of automation that subtracts from the feeling of really having done something skillful, or accomplished something more than an average win. This may be one of the reasons why excessive fleeing is so frustrating to some people, because when you have a 1on1 fight (when by luck, there are no interruptions), if you struggle and win, you actually feel like you've overcome some kind of obstacle and earned that KO. In other battles, no matter how finely timed, well manuevered, or well planned/executed the battle, there is no real sense of achievement.

You have to learn the skill before you can do it. To a well-practiced acrobat, two consecutive backflips isnt something skillful at all, its just routine. To an average sloppy MMO player like me, its skillful. Being 'skillful' can be seen as relative, from the point of the viewer. Many people who are considered barely competant in the PVP zones, may in truth be very skillful players. Perhaps some of us say there is no skill in PVP, because even when we admit that someone pulls off a very well done ambush, or an intelligent chain of executed powers, or escapes or gives chase in an efficient manner... to us its not really considered skill at all, its just routine. Once you get to a certain level of play-skill, most things seem like nothing more than routine. Even if someone figures out ways of demolishing you, giving you virtually no way of fighting back. You realise that its not truly skill that they used to win over you, but intelligence, or perhaps experience.

What I see at the base of this thread, is people genuinely agreeing on some core aspects, but having different branches of thought on the matter. The REAL point of difference here, is the way we dice around with the terms, and the way we personally have come to think of that one word "skill". This may just end up being yet another agree to disagree thing, because once you stray into the zone of personal opinion, there isnt much you can do. Even then, I dont think we're here to convert one another to our own views anyway, right?

Feel free to ignore this post, its a bit boring
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To be honest, in more finicky reflex-based games like Counterstrike Source, I never truly considered any of what I did a kind of skill. It was merely doing what I was supposed to. Perhaps the part some of us are orbiting around here, comes mostly from the usage of the word "skill".

To be skilled at something, would mean you are effective/efficient and experienced at the task in question. Whereas merely "having a skill" can mean you are able to participate, or engage in the act... otherwise meaning you have learned how to do it, but the way you say it denotes nothing towards how good you are at it. Try not to quote me on the dictionary here, but those are ways that it can be said, and the things they imply. So, where do we draw the line from simply participating well in PVP, and being -skilled- at PVP? Is being skilled just an alternate way of saying "I can compete well enough"? Or is it a measure of how far above the average player you are, in terms of performance?

Given that when you enter a PVP zone with at least a handful of opponents and allies to fight with, if you dont have some relatively good degree of PVP skill, you're just fodder. Normally, the gray-area for new learners is small. I think, ultimately, what is being said, is that what differenciates between a merely competant PVP player and a 'skilled' PVP player, isnt that great at all. Or maybe the game mechanics just prevent us from feeling any real sense of mastery over PVP, given that so much feels automated and down to simple manuevering/timing?

When its all said and done, I have previously thought "wouldnt it be nice if there was the potential for more skill/cunning to be used in PVP", but when I heard the stories about how SWG went down the pan, for trying to make it more involving and action-based, I soon changed my mind.

And now, I cant remember if I was supposed to actually make a point, or just state the obvious. All shall be cured now, as I eat my pizza..

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Perfectly put. I'd add one more though - a good sense of sportsmanship.


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Definately agreed, there.

Without having anything creative to add.. i'll just say im a little paranoid about this. I can see how toggleknocking can be a problem for certain builds, but if they dont get this right, it could just throw the toggleknocking effect into further unbalance.

Certain individual powers having knock-resistance sounds fair though. Although I love my little safe haven inside me PFF, i'd hate to think that they'd be making it harder for you guys to knock me out of it (when its already a hellish task, right?)

And this is the first time I realised Freon was Imaginary.. bah.

Aye, attitude has a LOT to do with how well people take to PVP, and often factors in to how fast regular PVP'ers leave. It fluxes. But for a lack of any personal suggestions, i'd have to agree that PVP is a tad too fast. I like how it sits for the moment, but at the same time, it just doesnt feel quite right.

I personally dont like stalkers, but I wouldnt want to see them become obsolete either. With so many varying AT's, playstyles and such, its going to be nearly impossible to find that happy medium between everything as it stands. At least, I can hear what you're getting at though.

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I don't really get frustrated by me being killed, in fact, that's fun!

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In competetive gaming, getting your [censored] handed to you is normally half of the fun

To be honest, if you bind fly and hover to keys nearby your moving buttons, you essentially have the benefits of the great knockback protection and tiny END drain, as well as the benefits of higher manueverability and height-gain. My normal layout on all characters is to have "V" bound to a 'lesser' travel-power or utility-power (like whirlwind), and have "F" bound to the main travel power I use. I always remember it as a kind of low-gear/high-gear thing, and i've never once had the problem of having to be quick at clicking between fly and hover :P

It does seem to come down to personal taste though. Some cant live without that knockback protection, some couldnt do as well without their air superiority. Its all down to how you operate, and what your character seems to need the most. Unfortunately a lot of people avoid the flight powerpool because of the lower speed travel power and hover, which is CONSTANTLY mistaken for a travel power. Hover, is NOT a travel power, its a 'utility' power, and is only remotely viable for travel if you have a kinetics-user at your heel most of the time.

I think a little lighthearted trashtalk is fine, but only if you have already gotten a good signal. Simply put, no matter how friendly the teasing banter, if you use it against someone you dont know/just met, someone is eventually going to take it the wrong way. I love the playful banter in PVP zones sometimes, it helps ease the stress of being smothered by stalkers all the time. I gripe at them, they gripe at me. I call them scaredycats, they call me liar-liar-pants-on-fire. Amongst friends, this kind of banter is good.

However, if you throw a line at someone you dont know, you cant guarantee how they will take it. Its pointless to just say "I was only messing around, stop taking things so seriously, nerd", because whilst you might be able to get away with saying "I [censored humped] your mother last night" to your best friend, for a laugh, you certainly wouldnt get away with it if you said it to someone passing in the street.

There are limits, and there is no written handbook to tell you where they are. Just use your common sense, and when in doubt, dont.

Oh, and its worth bearing in mind that some of the better prepared stalkers have hover/fly too. Height isnt something that can stop a lot of them, and seeing as hovers defense bonus is tiny, that alone wont save your hide from the ever-dreaded AS. Though, if you're looking to evade one, every little bit of def/res will help, though there are far better powers to help with that.

Hover is only really worth taking in PVP if you intend to take Fly too. Hover uses far less endurance and grants a small defense bonus, so its only truly useful for those who can attack at range. Fly into combat range, 'park' in hover so you sap less endurance and have the little defensive bonus, then switch to fly when needed to get moving again. Hover can be useful for getting out of range of grounded players, but in PVP people can very often get to you easily. Hover moves too slowly to get to a decent height above them to escape, and for stalkers its only good if there is a flying target who is stationary for fairly long periods of time. Then again, if you're squishy and need to be rooted by an attack or two at ground-height, activating hover may give you that tiny bit more defense which actually saves your neck.

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EXCRUCIATING PAIN + CAKE.

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= PAIN CAKE?

I hear ya, Tyl.

Just to note, mez resist (especially click mez resists) render most controllers useless against you, unless you have a few of them stacking on you before you run (running is the wise choice under threat of mez, so we often only get chance to land 2 or 3). Also, it doesnt matter if we can see the stalkers or not, what matters is if we can REVEAL them. Nothing worse than being able to technically see a stalker but being unable to actually hit the bugger to show them and prevent AS. Given the stalker defenses, i've generally found that even stalkers I can see from the moment they walk up to me, I dont normally get to interrupt. Also, you have to remember that given AS's interrupt time, there are some powers with medium/long animations that rob you of your chance of interrupting at all.

You're right, stalkers arent massively uber-everything gods. But you should be able to understand the frustration of the constant killstealage, and otherwise fun PVP sessions cut short by a very samey slicing sound and instant death. Stalkers have been heard complaining that they arent as effective against regens and tankers (mostly granites), as they are other classes, and yet still stand by their "we're only a one-trick pony" idea. I say you're only a one-trick pony if you play it like that, with a few bad build choices aside. Every time someone says something about stalkers, the flags raise and people start saying "Leave us stalkers alone". Well, if people can whine about the fact my controller has A combat use, then we can at least say we get annoyed at samey, effortless death. By effortless, I mean single-hit fight finishers (or for the pedantic, single-hit-to-brawl, or single-hit-to-placate-to-critical). I know exactly how hard it can be to work as a stalker, and i've seen some of the most respected/hated/feared stalkers in SC moving around, obviously having a hard time of picking a viable strikepoint, but you have to understand, whilst powerstalking is a valid way of doing things, leaving the base to get AS'ed to respawn to an AS to respawn to an AS to nearly fight someone but get AS'ed anyway... makes you get bored very fast, in an otherwise fun zone.

You say "OMG I CANT 1-HIT THE GRANITE! LEAVE US STALKERS ALONE WE ARE WEAK"
I say "OMG U STALKERS ARE ANNOYING, MEZ RESIST SCRAPPER DEFENSE INSTASQUISHKILL RUNNER-STEALTHERS".

Its part of the game, frustration and all. We're entitled to be annoyed, and we're entitled to leave PVP when we faceplant by AS every other breath
I just hope Tyl comes back soon.

It has been suggested before, but each and every time someone suggested adding NPC help/patrols to bases, a lot of the base-raiders blew the idea out of the water :P

I dont mind the idea, but employing villain help in a hero base would be a bad idea. Better to keep them on the same side. Alternatively, mobile turrets could be a funky idea. Like those funky little nemesis warbot thingies, perhaps. Or simply like an upgrade for certain interlinked rooms, a ridge/runner that goes along the corner of the ceiling, allowing for basic turrets to slide along and reposition (with of course, a limited track distance). People have pointed out that the risk vs reward of base raids is massively lopsided, and the attackers can simply rush vital base equipment repeatedly.

I give raids a wide berth, but if its not already implemented, these track-based guns could respawn at set intervals (if there is less than a set number on the track). Or better yet, a simple, slow moving repair-droid (or imp-like creature for magic origin bases) will sit next to damaged equipment and very very slowly heal it. That might counter a little of the zerg-rush tactics doing 10 damage a respawn... heh.

I dont think much to these ideas of mine, just... passing boredom ^^

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However, my fave are those that tell MM that they wouldn't win without their pets!!! These people should not be allowed to breed as we really need to stop the 'thick' gene from proliferating.

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Heh
"You would be useless in PVP if you didnt have your forcefield to stop my AS"
"OMG, dont use inspirations, n00b!"
"Turn hover off, and i'll win"

Or the famous brute thing that always annoys, where they attack you (when you're a squishy, and yes that means blasters too).. getting the ambush, but you manage to fight them down to the last sliver of their health in an honestly great fight.. then realising they stand a good chance of being KO'ed, they run away from you, struggling to get their travel power of choice to activate after suppression, and getting put down by a mob of NPCs. Naturally, the following broadcast is an insult towards you for supposedly being a reckless, inexperienced n00b, and forcing them, the noble, honorable PVP'er to get debt.


I wonder if villains ever get this with tanks?

Not exact recollection of the words, of course.
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PVP'er : "Archelon, you're nothing but a little n00b leech"
Me : *watching 3 stalkers repeatedly attack my PFF, occasionally placating then AS'ing unsuccessfully*
Me : "Is that so?"
PVP'er : "Yeah, you never do any damage, you just hang back and hold people"
Me : "Im a controller, what do you think im going to do? Headsplitter? Knockout Blow?"
PVP'er : "Dont play dumb, you have propel"

Yeah, propel with the containment modifier IS strong, but since when do Grav/FF controllers get a real chance of joining in, when the stalkers that are around recognise you as a controller, and a substantial threat? :P

Heh, yeah. Looking at those salvage tables when your prestige is in short supply is pretty scary. Thinking about buying that tiny, cheap-looking thing? It'll only end up costing a few mil :P
(and no, that wasnt actual stats on the advisor)

I went from the first page, to the last page. As expected, people are edging closer and closer to removing each others throats with a hockey stick :P

Im tempted, because apparently there is a little migration of Defiants heading towards Union, but im not about to abandon my characters. I have to admit, Defiant does seem to have been getting a bit more irritating recently. Why? Those easily forgettable n00blike heroes and villains who seem to really enjoy being obnoxious and irritating. I generally stay away from PuG's, and stay with friends, or if im desperate for company, i'll go with a small team who can approach me with half a grain of politeness in a tell.

Then again, I tried to start characters on Union before, and that was painful for a different reason. Whilst there appeared to be just as many obnoxious little anklebiters running around the low levels with me, they all seemed to be far less literate, and far less able to follow 2 consecutive lines conherantly, without becoming baffled. Im not a judgemental sort, but when a server gives the impression that you'll be stuck solo'ing permenantly due to the comical amount of irritation you'll get from teams... that isnt exactly good either.

Then again, isnt this all just part of MMOG's?
When I came to CoH just under a year ago, it was pretty clean of this, at least in my experience of it. Then it got progressively more irritating as time passed by. Perhaps I just came at a good time? Perhaps i've just grown into a far more jaded gamer?

Well, sometimes these things flux.
For now, im going to stay in Defiant, and im going to stay a cranky git. Going to see if I can slap a little sense into those who are determined to wreck the fun, and perhaps softly poke the unintentionally rude ones into better shape

Now might be a good time to stock up on certain players email addies, instant messenger screen-names and the like. Farewell, for now!

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I don't even bother looking at the chat in PvP zones.

I go in, I kill/be killed, and I leave.

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This kind of attitude is becoming more and more tempting to me, but unfortunately, the banter and the talk is one of the reasons I go there..

Love/hate affair I guess.

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The debt from Siren's call doesn't really bother me, once you hit the debt cap it doesn't matter any more..


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I only normally get to say that much before I personally break down in tears. :P