Tyroie

I am also worried that HOs will unbalance PVP, and that for many of us, we're all going to be either spending a lot of time farming, or not PVPing. The simple fact is, in ANY form of competition between people, skill and luck (I personally prefer skill) are fun factors. Handicaps are used to keep games fun between players of different skill and luck. But HOs are an unfair handicap for -anyone- who has the time to collect them. Moreover, past experience shows that such time-based "loot" building tends to lead to a small, childish community of people with too much time on their hands.

Success in any fun-based competition should NEVER be forcedly exclusive.

Some argue that it won't matter because good HOless players will be able to beat poor HO-packed players. This arguement is invalid because it's good HO-packed players that will be the problem. Good players who are maxed out on HOs can often gain enough skill to TOTALLY shut-out any players without HOs, no matter how skilled they are. Heck, it happens often enough in any even-playingfield competition already - shooter games, sports, etc.

Some argue that if we don't like it, we shouldn't PVP, and that there are still other things we can do. But that's ENTIRELY avoiding the point. The point of our arguement is that many of us are REALLY hoping for a great, fun PVP system, and for it to just be the best it can be, and to include everyone interested! The potential is there, and fortunately the Devs have been spending a lot of time to perfect it. But this is just an issue that is really worrying us. To a further extreme, there are many people who have become tired of the rest of the content of the game, and are just hoping that PVP will be interesting enough to keep the game.

Yes, it's true, this is down to a difference of our opinions. But from our point of view, HOs step on our toes, while a lack of them don't step on yours. While we can't really know until it's released, this honestly doesn't look good for us. By what we've been told, HOs still provide a huge advantage, even when exemplared. The only real fix will be an option to make HOs act like TRUE SOs, which means affecting only one aspect of a power. The best solution will be to have an option to make HOs act like that - we can have that option on, or off, and experience both.

I just want it to be fun for everyone. That's all. :P Not to mention, many of us have already spent lots of time into such a "time sink" for the sole purpose of uberizing characters in other games, and already know that in the long run, we'll regret wasting that time to do it again. For me, a "hardcore" player is one who can really rock on an even playfield anyway, I mean, doesn't that make sense?

Games are for playing anyway, not working. Let us play!

~Tyroie

I'm at 32, and personally just itching for all the enhancement slots, but I'd have to agree that it feels awfully content-less at this point.

~Tyroie

Oooh, I'm not worried about that, I know everything will be consentual. I just would reeeeeally like to see it done well, because I DO love a good PVP system and the potential is soooo blatantly there. Final Fantasy 11 had a -great- battle system and ruined it with pointless little RPG rules and things, it's a serious shame. FF11 had the serious potential to be -fun- and so does CoV's.. I'm excited. :P

Personally, I think a lot of the skill that will be involved in this game's PVP will be positioning. I'm looking forward to tactics, and how player's high movement speed will make things interesting. I can picture people hiding, taking cover behind things, luring and flanking, or spreading enemy forces apart. Indoor battles would RUUUULE... Hehe. That's where this game's skill would be I think. I'm not gonna just stand there and trade attacks.

Ooh, though a little off subject that's something I've thought soooo much about, Kamui. Half the reason I love City of Heroes is because it has a similar viewpoint about gaming as me - it's for fun, not work or accomplishment. Games are meant to be taken lightly, which is why I have only one character and he's level 32, heh. Enjoying PVP with both casual and hardcore players in an even STRUGGLE battle is more important than 'realism' or 'accomplishment' or whatever enjoyment someone might get out of feeling like their hero is more of a hero than others'.

I prefer to think of it from the gameplay point of view. If a PVE battle is too hard or too easy, it's not fun. PVP's no different. I will be happy even if they implement something were I can only PVP with players around my own level. That suffices for me, so long as the battles are even and fun. If they implement a DAoC cap level battle thing, or if I need to find a level 50 sidekick to play at a measley level 49, I would not PVP.

I'm personally for the original idea, er, what Shadowbane used, heh. Where attacking anyone is like attacking an even con. High levels end up with an advantage but, like I could still fight with level 50s and kick some butt. :P

~ Tyroie

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The battle field needs to be leveled to get the most enjoyment out of PvP.

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Nothing truer ever said. Hehehe. If you take any competition-based game and intentionally give one player a big handicap, you ruin the game flat-out, because there's no game to that. Competition is based on skill and luck, though... I have to say I prefer skill. Heh, if a team had a handicap in a first person shooter game, it'd never be tolerated. :P Scrabble is PVP too!

...I just personally lean toward a non scaling-system. I guess the whole arguement is the extent to which levels do make a difference in PVP, where PVE is currently 100% and scaling would be 0%, so to speak. I kinda like 15% or so.. Hehe.

And about the exact differences between defence and resistance.. Goshglies, I dun have a clue how they work their numbers really, they seem to do a good job balancing stuff though. I'm just kind of assuming that they'd keep it balanced and good no matter what system they actually use.

~Tyroie

Griefing is sort of a different subject altogether. But ultimately, if Bob is consenting to PVP, and he sees a bunch of two level 2s coming after him, he -should- react to them wether he knows they're Carla and Sally or not. He's in a PVP zone or an arena or whatever, so he's expecting the fight anyway. It should be okay and fair. I don't think they'd impliment a free-for-all style PVP where you're given the opportunity to just keep killing the same person over and over anyway. Due to consent-ness, I don't think evening out the calcuations would pose that problem.

Wow, I didn't realize my thread got so big. Crazy. :P I see two issues being talked about here: Balancing players of different levels fighting one another, and the actual setting of PVP (number of players, place, etc).

While I think that all ideas should be explored, I personally think that damage scaling (and level scaling outside of sidekicking) isn't a very good idea. While scaling a high level person's damage down but not a low level person's damage up might be technically feasable and workable, it still entirely eliminates the purpose of levels just as much as scaling a low level person's damage up does... If that makes sense, hehe. I feel levels should not be the primary factor in winning, but they should be a factor.

The idea is to make lower level players competitive, but not equal. If they're competitive, they can experience PVP for themselves without that "I have no chance" feeling, and even be encouraged to level themselves to be even better. Literally making everyone equal in level would mean the only fun and fair battles would be the ones where each team has the same number of players, and that's no fun, many battles just don't turn out like that, and it would make solo PVP impossible. The wide range of damage numbers popping up everywhere during battle would also just be silly looking. It would also have many high level players feeling like they wasted their time, and people would not feel as encouraged to level.

I probably should've clarified myself earlier. Actually, AlodarnUK said it exactly right:

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The target is considered "even level" relative to your attacks.

So, a level 10 attacking a level 40 would have the same chance to hit as if he was hitting a level 10, and do the damage he would normally do against a level 10 (which the 40th would laugh at, but get enough 10ths attacking him and it should eventually worry him)

Conversely the 40th attacking a 10th will still wipe the floor with him, damage wise, but if that 10th level had defence buffs (SR scrapper with bubbles - for example) then the chance to hit him would get "floored" rather than getting jacked because of level.

If I was a 10th against a 40th, 1 on 1, I expect to get pasted, but if enough of us gang up on him, I want at least a *chance* that we can pull him down, granted some of us are going to be worm food, but I expect that.

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Mind you, this is -not- scaling. But why was he so ignored? This is effecting calculations only. This is making everyone have the -same- base chance to hit one another without enhancements or powers involved, say 60% or whatever it would be (OR rather make only very small modifications to that hit chance based on level differences). Higher levels would still have an advantage in accuracy thanks to more and better enhancements, but a group of level 30s could probably conjure up enough defense to stand against a single level 50 who doesn't have a good attack power without a lot of extra accuracy in it. An example would be that a level 30 tanker may not have the 80% smashing/lethal resistance that a higher level tanker has, but their 50% would still be very useful to their survival.

The trick then, though, would be killing that level 50, because damage would also work this way. Against all enemies in PVP you'd always be doing the same damage you do, for instance, to an orange minion (again, level difference could also make very small modifications to this if you wanted). My level 32 defender could do, say, 160 or so damage to an orange mob. A level 20 opponent in PVP would definitely feel that, but it wouldn't kill them. Similarly, they could do, say, 100 or so damage back to me, or however much damage they'd normally do to an orange mob. Yes, it's true - it'd take a heck of a lot of level 10s to take on a level 40, but even a single level 10 would still be able to effectively fight, heal, do controllery things, buff their friends, and not just be missing and utterly useless, even without being sidekicked. If you were sidekicked, I'd personally just make it so you'd have the health of a high level, but your damage and enhancements and all that would still be treated as your actual lower level. If you did the damage of a high level when sidekicked in PVP, you introduce all the same problems of scaling and discouraging people to level - It's great in PVE but in PVP with calcuation modifications, the low level players are already useful. Without the calculation modifications, obviously, sidekicking would act like normal, and I have a feeling the devs will probably just leave it like it is and people will just sidekick to PVP together.

As a side note, I think if it worked this way, accuracy and defense enhancements would have to be brought down a bit for purposes of PVP - I know I can make myself pretty much invulnerable to an orange con mob already through accuracy debuffs alone. It should take a smart team to accomplish that in PVP. Other modifications like that would have to be made I think, I just can't think of everything. Anyway, I'm hoping that way, all battles would be fun, regardless of setting or number of players. A low level player wouldn't have that "I have no chance" feeling, and a high level player would still have to keep on his toes. A smart low level team of 3 CAN win against a poorly-organized, high level group of 5.

Anyway, the second issue is the setting for PVP. I have a feeling that their arena system to just play organized matches (if I'm understanding that right) entirely removes the need for any scaling or calculation modifications, and I'm guessing that's what they'd do ultimately anyway, BUT it would still work fine with it. Actually I'm very glad they have an arena, that'd be my personal preference of PVP. ^.^ But open PVP zones and other ideas would be fun too. The idea to even out the calculations is mainly for that PVP-zone thing, where it's not consentual, to help 1 vs 1 where you can't sidekick, and just make a range of levels viable in PVP.. Otherwise a PVP zone would have to be restricted to 2 or 3 level differences, and even then people would feel obligated to get themselves up to that highest level before entering.

I think that kind of system would be a lot of fun though. Disagree/agree?

~Tyroie

Yeah, you got it, that's the idea exactly.

Hey! I looked through the previous posts but I couldn't find this. If this idea has already been brought up, I do apologize.

What if, in PVP, the calculation bonuses for being higher level than someone else (or penalties for being lower level, similarly) was either entirely eliminated or severely reduced?

The only real advantages you'd have for being higher level in PVP would be your naturally higher maximum health, number of powers, number of enhancement slots and quality of those enhancements. I feel those aspects alone make a higher level player well enough invulnerable to a lower level in a duel, but the lower level player would still be able to contribute a great deal to battles, as they wouldn't just be constantly missing someone a mere 5 levels above them. Sidekicking in PVP would still benifit you in the form of more health.

This idea is in part coming from the idea of the sidekick system, and the fact that levels really are relative. I think this would be fun, as otherwise spread-level battles would feel skill-less and unfair, unfun for both parties, just like previous games such as DAoC where you had to hit cap level just to even consider entering PVP.

What do you think?

~Tyroie