PvP: Lets learn together.

Hey all, and thanks for taking enough interest in my post to come inside and take a peek. I have been playing CoH since Dec 2004 and I have been PvPing since the arena landed on me in Galaxy City many years ago.
Please note that I do not think, claim, or feel that I am above anyone on this server who PvPs or who would like to learn PvP. I am simply here to provide the new and vet pvper's alike, some information that I had to
learn through trial and error over the many years of playing.

There are four basic types of PvP that everyone should be familiar with. But since this post is about information, allow me to tell you these four types. Within the "types", I will explain your objective and give you a few tips on being more effective.

• Zone PvP (solo)
• Zone PvP (team)
• Arena PvP (solo)
• Arena PvP (team)

• Melee ATs(not including Stalkers): As a melee AT, you are a virtual killing machine! You can take a fair amount of damage, as well as put it out. I have noticed two types of melee ATs that frequent the zones solo. The 1st type of melee fighter likes to fight long drawn out battles with other tough melee ATs, as One would do in PvE for example (think bosses or AV's perhaps). While there is no "set" rules or goals in PvP, this should be avoided for the most part. Although you and said opponent may have agreed to fight 1v1, the rest of the zone however, did not. Long drawn out fights identifies you as weakened, stationary targets for the rest of the zone, and usually result in one of the 2 fighters (if not both) being ganked. Now, I don't want any of the Melee AT's to think that I am telling you not to fight one on one, I just want you to remember that there are more people in the zone than your actual opponent. So stay alert. The other type of melee AT in zones are the "squishy killers". These fighters focus solely on the AT's with less HP, defense, and overall survivalbility. I prefer this method of targeting for a few reasons: A) The quicker you get the kill, the faster you can get out without dying or becoming the target yourself. B) Squishies are usually buffer/debuffers, which if taken away from the opposing side can be damaging. Even if that just means making them phase or hibernate, you have taken them away from buffing/debuffing for that period of time. Melee AT's can be very fun overall, and very survivable when paired with certain pool powers. You can cause a lot of frustration in open zone, score kills, and help your side, all while remaining alive most of the time.

• Buffer and DeBuffer ATs: Face it. Zoning alone on these ATs sucks, but it can be done rather successfully. As a buffing/debuffing class, you have a wide range of powers that make life easier for all those on your side, and hell for those opposing you. As a solo buffer, I would focus on staying on the outskirts of the battle ( as far as your perception will allow) and stay moving. This allows you to keep a clear view of the battle at hand without allowing you to react quickly if someone needs a heal or buff, without actually having to be in the fire fight alone. Also, staying back a few paces decreases the chance of you being spotted in the battle since you are not in the thick of it. Get in.Buff.Gtfo. A buffer can fight solo if he chooses too, but I would not recommend it(With the exception of Corrs and Master-minds).If you choose to fight solo, target the lowest HP player you can find, hope he doesnt have a strong offense and wittle him down. But mainly,your job is to keep players alive, stronger, and increase the overall performance of said players..while trying to stay alive as long as possible. The solo debuffer plays a bit different. A solo debuffer will have a easier time taking down opponents due to the sheer volume of debuffing it can do. When solo, try to find the target that has the least amount of HP and offense, debuff, and go to work on him/her. Becareful about debuffing targets around NPC's. Alot of players will run into NPC mobs when attacked for a sense of safety, or when they have Offensive toggles such as Radiation Infection or Snow Storm on them, hoping that the NPCs we deal with you before you can deal with them.

• Offensive/Ranged ATs: Aim,Build Up gogogogogogo! Just kidding, kind of. Offensive AT's such as Stalkers, blasters, Doms ect are pretty successful in solo zone pvp. In most cases, they can build for more hit points and cap their HP higher than the scrapper base HP. They dish out a ton of damage, but they are still very squishy, with HP never higher than 1606hp. The offensive AT should be an oppurtunist. The first chance they get to inflict colossal amounts of damage, do it! But..do it with caution. Yes, you can kill most AT's in the zone with enough fire power, but just as easy as it was for you to find and punish you target, some one is doing the same thing to you. If you have noticed by now, Opponents with the lowest HP should always be you 1st target as stated before. Fighting that brute on your blaster might be fun, but while you are taking dmg and giving it, drawing the fight out, there is a stalker/corr/dom/brute or what ever, waiting for you to take enough damage for them to get a quick kill. What you should do when solo is move. Move around alot, and as often as possible. Find a weaker target, or damaged one and finish him of and then keep moving. Becareful where and when you attack too. Many of your attacks that you like will root you, meaning you will be stuck in the animation of the a attack for a second or however long the activation time for that power is, and when that happens you become a non-moving, pre-occupied target(thats when I come to AS you). Stalkers have it a bit different. while a blaster or Dom can unleash 800pts of dmg at range with no interuptions, a stalker has to hit you while in hide to deal maximum dmg. Sounds easy right? well hittin your target in Hide, with a regular attack isnt too hard to do, and yes you will get a crit, but a stalkers true potential lies in Assassin Strike - An Interuptable melee hand snipe basically. You cant move while AS'ing or be interupted. If you think that is easy, grab a blaster and try have a friend move around, jumping flying runing, whatever, and try to snipe him within five feet of you with out interuption it, or try chasing and ASing moving targets with a friend. Solo stalkers should just wait til something is at half HP or less and AS him, or if his HP is low enough, crit him only if you are certain it will kill him. You do not have as many HP or as high of a defensive base as anyother melee toon, and you will come out of hide..hello stalker pew pew pew.

• Melee AT's (not including Stalkers): This time around as a Melee AT, you have a few different roles. You may want to taunt persuing Offensive AT's off of your buffers/squishies, or you may choose to proctect them with the "kill the aggressor first" approach. Either way, its not just about you anymore. If your whole team dies, but you stay alive, do you think the the other team is saying, "damn, that scrapper/tank/brute is still alive..we failed"? Prolly not, so keep close by the squishies, because they will be getting attacked soon enough, allowing you to quench your thirst for blood with their defense provided by you. You can also be part of a very strong damage spike (when your team coordinates a timed burst of damage from all players) and scrappers bring even more to that with the chance to crit. Try being bait for a change too. If you have noticed that a certain opponent only attacks you or your teammates when you have seperated from the group, tell your team that you will bait him out for an ambush, because you are the most likely to survive his Alpha. Melee can be very fun, as stated before but when you team, focus more on the big picture than that one epic long fight.

• Buffer and DeBuffer AT's: Being on a team makes keeping up with buffs/heals alot easier..and a lot more important too. Now you can see everyone of importance to you and what buffs they have via the team window. You are still going to be the oriority target for the opposing side, so becareful how close to combat you get. Also, please be careful with healing/buffing a player to closely. for example, if a blaster gets AS'd by a stalker, dont jump right night to the blaster to heal him, because guess who is in range of the next AS/Melee attack now.. Rememeber to always stay moving, but never to far out of the range of your team. Standing safey by the hero base, while your team is by the villain base, dying is doing your team no good. Also pay attention to what buff you are using on what players. I woud never tell you to exclude a player any buffs but whats more effective..putting fortitude/forge on a blaster/dom or a controller/mastermind? Oh, dont get heal rooted in the middle of the battle...its bad news. For Debuffers, the game gets a little more complicated too. Sure, dropping Sleet and Heat Loss on that tank is nice, but the team is attacking that Defender on the other side of the map. Stay focused because a properly played debuffer is worth as much as a well played buffer. Your debuffs can potentially make a target die quicker than the buffers buff on the team. Oh, btw, you are probably target #2.

• Offensive/Ranged AT's: Your team is like Voltron. The Buffer is the Head, the body are your Melee AT's. That makes you the arms and legs. The team moves ithe the direction that you lead them. The debuffer calls a target out and you deievler the punishment. You to have to stay focused and aware of whats around you aswell. You arent anygood to the team if you go off fighting a random target while they jumped in the line of fire to debuff and spike another. Not much different than playing solo, except now you get buffs and more people to add damage with you.

• Inspirations: Alot of PvPers discourage new PvPers from using inspriations.. I think that is total ********. This is not PvE where you can make a toon perform Godly versus AI. This is PvP. where your opponent is as, or even smarter than you. Your opponent may have a self heal, but you dont..why not pop some respites to stay alive? No aim and/or build up? thats why they make reds and yellows. Do not listent to people who want you to play inspiration free beacuse most of the time it is a AT that has powers that would give him a greater advantage over your AT/build, and he knows that. There is no such thing as a true pvper because he doesnt use inps, that person just doesnt understand the game as good as he thinks he does. Inspiration were meant to be used just like Drain Psyche, Dull Pain, Aim or Build Up are. Not using Inspirations should only be done if you happened to agree with the no Insp challeged someone has issed you and you are comfortable that both fighters builds are somewaht equaly (not a regen scrapper telling a Super Reflex scrapper to duel without insp).

• Phase Shift/Hibernate: Once again, you are no less of a pvper for using these powers in a bad situation. In fact, I would consider you a more knowledgable player than the person who is chastising you for using them. They do have their own unique drawbacks, While phased, you cannot attack any other player or be affected by anything that is affectable. While hibernated, you cannot move and are basically a sitting duck for the players surrounding you once you emerge. They both cast a "no phase timer" on you which will not allow you to phase again for a period of time. I reccomend taking one of these power if you consider spending any reasonable amount of time in a pvp zone. You can buy temporay phase shift from the Market or pick up a temp phase by completeing the Warburg patrol mission.

• Combat Evasion: The reason you see many PvPers using Super Jump and Super speed, is because it provides maximum mobility, and if you remember from earlier, moving = good. Constantly moving will help you break line of sight, Prevent most Assassin Stikes and Melee attacks. Also, using your enviroment when ecasping is very under rated. If a player is attacking you, and jumping through the air, run under a bridge, or building overhang. You can jump/fly to building tops to escape most foes too. And although this is kind of a ***** move, jumpimg in or running through a mob of NPCs (friendly to you of course) can stop an occassional pursuti on you.

Good read,thanks for posting it.

I love PvP'n, idk what pre-i13 PvP was like so im not goin to comment on that but i do have a opinion on Inspire use and I wouldnt say that im an expert, far from it infact but i frequent RV now and again on my Invul/EM tank that would benefit heavily from inspire use and i still dont use 'em.

My thoughts are that you will never hit the Damage cap using any power without some outside help (team buffs) and for a toon to pop 8 big reds, 3 big purples is wrong, IMO. Why build up a toon and IO it out if you're goin to use inspires? Answer, because its easier to kill your opponent. I understand people want to dominate other players but where is the fun if there is no danger? I want to be challenged not just blaster hop around tryin to get a hit through soft-capped defense, i hate the long drawn out fights. Im not afraid to die but if i die from a 800 point AS, a 600 point ET and a 500 point TF, with the whole time me spamming my lowsy 300 point ET and 200 point TF that just dosnt get through the defense, thats when i get p***ed.

Quote:

Originally Posted by EN3MY The 1st type of melee fighter likes to fight long drawn out battles with other tough melee ATs, as One would do in PvE for example (think bosses or AV's perhaps). While there is no "set" rules or goals in PvP, this should be avoided for the most part. Although you and said opponent may have agreed to fight 1v1, the rest of the zone however, did not. Long drawn out fights identifies you as weakened

Tell me, how would i end a fight quickly against a soft-capped Stalk?
Because, aside from Elude, Retsu and Accolades there is no way to get to the soft-cap without inspires.
This isnt an attack mate, im all for PvP. I just want to understand why you would build up different toons and spend millions on IO's and hours on badging when you could just use purples and reds and then just mash buttons. Wheres the skill in that?



Powers like, Elude, Retsu, Hibernate, Phase etc, im all for because its a power and for you to work it into your build shows some skill. Wheres the skill in hitttin F1, F1, F1, F1, F1, F1, F1, F3, F3, F3...


Oh, i saw nothing on Heavies or gettin Droned. Where do you stand on the use of these pokemons?


And again, not an attack on you personally mate, i just want to at least try to understand why people think Inspires are good to use.

Member of the Stoned Templars

{|-|} Easy Kills {|-|} A&TC {|-|}

I was going to post "LoLPvP"

But This is a pretty good guide. Look forward to reading part 2

Nice read. Thanks for writing it up.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bud Ive fought Elk on his thermal plenty of times, just have to kite and take 'em out before they take you out...simple and ZOMG no insps Besides, drainers are part of the game. If i get drained of all my end i accept it, die and move on. A fight shouldnt be about who'll run outta Inspires first...

I'm not going to try to talk you out of your code of play. Although, Inspirations are part of the game, as drainers are. They are there to be used. Are there other PvP games where people say, "No using potions"?

It is not unreasonable to put forward that an aspect of a fight could and, perhaps, should be about running out of Inspirations first. It could be about other things, too, like who runs out of Endurance or Health first. The latter two may be considered bigger aspects of a fight, whereas Inspirations are, similarely, another facet of the fight and not necessarily the be all/end all of it.

Here is a nice article about i mentality you should have if you want to be good at pvp. I know some of the people who posted here should really read it.

http://www.sirlin.net/articles/playi...in-part-1.html

The biggest draw back to PvP is that there is little to no "middle ground".

In one corner you have the srs PvP'ers talking about Purple'd and PvPIO'd builds. They are min-maxed to the extreme. They know the quirks of the system and know how to abuse them. They have want to kill anyone as quickly as possible as be done with it.

In the other corner you have the PvE'r who pokes into PvP zones on occasion, but really is PvE optimized, cant really afford a second IO'ed build just for PvP. Gets crushed by afore mentioned srs PvP'r, subsequently mocked, then leaves and doesn't come back.

There really isn't an entry point for the casual PvP player aside from private arena matches. Zone PvP just isn't much fun unless there are enough on each side that the casual player can blend in and not have a massive bulls-eye over head.

I keep 95% of my PvP to the arena in private matches with friends because I know that we aren't suprsrs about it and after its done the only gloating I have to deal with is "thx 4 th3 IO drop".

net

Great guide man, looking forward to the rest of them This may even entice me back to pvp every now and again.

Actually I dont PvP with my Bots MM. I know I should, but I dont use him much at all. If ever there was an easy button in this game, Bots/Dark is it. With IOs he sits softcapped to range and AoE, with 35% melee. I just feel dirty using him anymore.

Anyways, Ill get a post up from Mids later today for my fire/fire/fire tanker. Heavily optimized for PvE, and while a decent in PvP, it lacks the punch and mobility needed in zone PvP. Fire Melee's DoT is great for grinding away hps, but the lack of burst beyond the FE GFS hampers it.

Edit: damned posting from work . . . .

Quote:

Originally Posted by NetMinder The biggest draw back to PvP is that there is little to no "middle ground". In one corner you have the srs PvP'ers talking about Purple'd and PvPIO'd builds. They are min-maxed to the extreme. They know the quirks of the system and know how to abuse them. They have want to kill anyone as quickly as possible as be done with it. In the other corner you have the PvE'r who pokes into PvP zones on occasion, but really is PvE optimized, cant really afford a second IO'ed build just for PvP. Gets crushed by afore mentioned srs PvP'r, subsequently mocked, then leaves and doesn't come back.

I agree on the Middle Ground but that is the case every PVP game.

Re: player commentary.

To be fair Net in most cases of people getting mocked in zone it's the person who lost who starts the flood by crying foul. Yes there are plenty of cases I can think of that prove my statement wrong but my personal EXP is that most PvPers keep it quiet/casual until provoked.

Oh and one last thing My Fire blaster on live is still PvE specced (and all commons) and does ok in PvP.

Hell the only toon i have fully setted out is my LOLstormie and there is not a single purple/ PVP IO on him . . . expect the chance for placate

Quote:

Originally Posted by NetMinder There really isn't an entry point for the casual PvP player aside from private arena matches. Zone PvP just isn't much fun unless there are enough on each side that the casual player can blend in and not have a massive bulls-eye over head. I keep 95% of my PvP to the arena in private matches with friends because I know that we aren't suprsrs about it and after its done the only gloating I have to deal with is "thx 4 th3 IO drop". net

I started out only pvping with my friends and then moved into the zones and arenas only after i felt comfortable in doing so. Granted there were a lot more PvPers at that time and I sucked ***, so i died A LOT.

Still do die a lot. I'll leave it up to my opponents to decide if they think I still suck or not . .. I don't care what they think but they can make that decision on their own and if they feel the need to spout off about if i have an ignore button.

Granted you won't ever see me in the zones doing anything other then picking up temps because I am one of those who feel the changes that cannot be undone in the zones are PvP game breaking for me.

One last thing about the casual pver who ventures into a pvp zone.
Just remember that once you enter a pvp zone ..its just that. PVP.

Yes there are PvE mobs in the zones, and yes you can attack them, gain inf, and xp, but 1st things 1st...Do not have tunnel vision on the pve content in a pvp zone.

I have killed my share of pvers in pvp zones, and in each case, I can tell you for a fact that they are either:
A. Farming pillboxes, with total disregard to player contolled enemies
B. Farming mobs, with total disregard for player controlled enemies
C. Gathering badges " "

Had they have taken a little more consideration in the fact that this is a pvp zone, and actually tried to fight me back or even become the aggressor, the chances of me actually dying rise dramatically (even if it is on a smal chance, a smal chance is a lot more than no chance).

*thumbsup*

Me and EN3MY currently have a weekly RV PvP event in the works with prizes supplied. More details to come very soon.