An interesting PvP read from GR's blog..

For those that wanna read it

Pretty interesting read to be honest caught me thinking over it.I wish there was some Developer that had same orientation regarding PvP.Unfortunately in CoX only GR and Ex Libris are the ones that seem to give PvP any thought.

for the record i do like both Competitive PvP but only within group that requires tactical thinking and not so much solo where cookie cutters come in place.I love my open world pvp tho as well

Yes some interesting reading there, myself prefer arena wich means more tactical stuff, fights when actually get a score from the match, who killed the most etc. But sometimes is nice to go to a zone and pwn there aswell

I've been rather slow getting my second post written. I think I'll commit to getting at least some of it transferred from mental draft form into digital written form during lunch today.

I have a few definite thoughts about what needs to happen before an MMO genuinely breaks into e-sports (GW and WoW have both made efforts in that direction, but neither have ever come close to the success of StarCraft or CounterStrike). It can and will happen someday, I'm convinced of that - it just needs an MMO developer who stops designing PvP as an addendum to the rest of the game and starts considering what it is that is required in competitive gaming. At the simplest layer, that's a level playing field from day 1. So many people have talked the talk, but no one has yet implemented effectively.

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So many people have talked the talk, but no one has yet implemented effectively.

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Well i think its not really possible in the MMO genre to create something that will become an e-sport in terms of competition. Mainly because the developers are interested in capturing variety of player groups and view them in the traditional way of PvE and non PvE.Very few MMO's have dared to pull a pure PvP MMO and ones that did didnt have enough backup to go all the way through ---> Fury.

The only MMO at the moment that has put some serious candidate of taking over the MMO PvP and push it forward is Warhammer which centers around a good mix of competitiveness in all areas starting on an individual level in World PvP and taking it up to organised Guild PvP as well a step further to real and meaningful Realm vs Realm.

I expect to see some great things from Mythic regarding the PvP genre and i already seen a lot already (if u know what i mean)

As far as esports tho dont think MMO is possible to make it all the way there just yet mainly cause MMO still rely on the roll dice element rather than tactical skill or twitch and micro skill that FPS requires.

Maybe one day tho.I would be interested to

EDIT: I strongly think that any MMO that wants to become an esport has to capture the Chinese gamers.Since they are the ones leading esports competitions in my opinion.

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So many people have talked the talk, but no one has yet implemented effectively.

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Well i think its not really possible in the MMO genre to create something that will become an e-sport in terms of competition. Mainly because the developers are interested in capturing variety of player groups and view them in the traditional way of PvE and non PvE.Very few MMO's have dared to pull a pure PvP MMO and ones that did didnt have enough backup to go all the way through ---> Fury.

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I worked on Fury as the Community Manager . While I won't go into specifics, it wasn't a lack of backup that resulted in Fury's failure to sell and achieve a sustainable player base. There were other, much more fundamental failures that happened there.

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As far as esports tho dont think MMO is possible to make it all the way there just yet mainly cause MMO still rely on the roll dice element rather than tactical skill or twitch and micro skill that FPS requires.

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I think we're much closer than you might think. I spent some time in the past chatting with some very prominent and well known players from WoW and GW's competitive teams/guilds. The key is within your statement, in a way, and revolves around MMO designers taking the time to learn from successful e-sports games before they write their competitive PvP design docs. Ignoring the actual gameplay involved in RTS and FPS games, what is it that fundamentally makes a game suitable for e-sports? Competitive MMO PvP combat systems that fit those fundamentals already exist ... they've just been disguised behind a bunch of MMO staples that have no place in competition; largely related to timesinks.

Anyway ... I'll stop writing this here and go back to writing the blog post .

Interesting to hear about Fury.I was part of early closed beta testing till release.I like the concept a lot and seemed to be on a good way but then something went wrong and also i was very dissapointed with game engine at some point.

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what is it that fundamentally makes a game suitable for e-sports?

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Interesting question and i think is the essence of what will turn an MMO into an E-Sport.

I think its a variety of elements.

One has to be player base.Very very important having a large player base that will turn the game into a trend.Both GW and WoW as well as any other E-Sport game till now have been massive trends within the Gaming community.

Second of all has to be profit potential.Sponsors need to see the potiential of creating brand awareness through this kind of sport.Giving it some more thought i think that the brand awareness for Gaming related products and even PC products will be much higher through a successful MMO turning into an E-Sport with the appropriate coverage.

This is also directly related to player base.

Another thing has to be media collaboration.The new MMO TV i think will be a perfect platform for expanding this kind of competition.GW gamers had to follow matches in game to be able to watch. MMO TV will expand the audience without making the actual game a necessity but will also make a good advertising platform.

Finally we come to mechanics.

I think is essential that E-Sport should boil down to pure skill,preparation and tactics both individually and within a team.

So this means gear should be eliminated or be given a variety of gear that will be part of the tactical preparation of teams. (seems to work for GW this scheme)

And finally something i believe is equally important.Reward reward reward.Its what drives competitive players and is what will make teams/guilds/individuals invest time and make it worthwhile for them to participate in such a thing.

Giving out baseball cups or whatnot as rewards or even in game items i think is not enough considering the amount of effort e-athletes will put into preparation which is pretty stressful even if we are talking about a game.

Anyway enough rambling looking forward to reading the blog.

WoW's closer to E-Sports than you might think - especially with the Arena Tournament they're running right now. That's pretty much a huge test of where they can run with it.