Massively^™

They need to get the pvp system out before open beta for WaR starts. It is all coming together rather closely to when subscription renewal for those that bought the game around release will be up again. Allot of players, like myself, have hit the level cap and are finding the raid dungeons too buggy/pointless to hold our attention for long. If there still isn't any content for us around the time the war beta opens up I won't see any reason to log into aoc, or even leave its giant footprint on my hard drive.

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I'll be fascinated to see what impact this update has. I think it's going to be pretty huge... I was just thinking that I'm normally not the type of person to go ahead and attack another player in the game, both because there's no reward in doing so and because my guild is trying to avoid developping a bad reputation at this stage.

However, if there is a clear bonus to attacking another player, then in situations that are borderline already (eg if there is another guy questing in the same area, using up the quest resources) there will be a big added incentive... And if this is replicated across the server I have a feeling there will be a LOT of PvP fighting everywhere once this goes live. I even wonder whether there will be PvP 'grinding' groups that will set up in places and ambush everyone who comes through... In which case the victims will probably call for help from their guilds to break the gangs. This has the potential to be very interesting.

What I'm most looking forward to though is seeing the people highlighted with criminal status and being able to gank completely guilt-free :D (that's another thing holding me back, I feel bad ganking other players, that's why I tend not to do it!).

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Well there actually are grinding groups already. On pvp servers getting into kesh is almost always a guaranteed death. There is usually at least one guild waiting for people to zone in, they just stay mounted and follow you till the shield drops. In epic kesh the strategy for "farming" the zone is to have one pvp group at the zone in and one doing the actual mob killing. As any smaller guild can tell you "owning kesh" is a bragging right coveted by most the larger guilds.

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Nothing really fundamental added here, and certainly doesn't address the problems with the patch.


The problem with the "PvP patch" and their fugative system is this: The risk versus reward is not balanced.


Look at any other game that users a similar system. In Lineage II players will flag when they kill someone, but when another player dies they have a small chance to drop an item but also lose a substantial amount of XP. The system of flagging in that game is needed to prevent ganking on a mass level, thus an equal risk versus reward.

In Ultima Online when players died they would drop all they owned. Because of this they NEEDED to make players flag or else high levels could just farm lowbies without much fear. Again it was very much an equal risk vs a reward, if you went red you were at risk but also could just kill whatever you wanted (well, try).

However Age of Conan is different. In it the only thing you will lose when you die is a small amount of PvP experience and perhaps a little time lost having to run back. The problem is that the game is not made for this kind of system for numerous reasons:

1) Risk vs reward. People have no real reason to even attempt murdering someone except for saying "hey, I'm red". You get the same PvP XP and the player loses nothing special.

2) Class balance. This is a horrible problem, due to the fact that so many classes can (and will) 1 shot others. The game these days is so based off of who gets the first hit that there will no doubt being players either forced to wait, and get hit first, or risk being a murderer. Now yes if you fight those your level (and an entire 2 bellow you :/) then it won't be a problem, but lets be honest here: A person TEN levels lower can still be a threat if they are a high DPS class and you are squishy.

3) Murderers have no where to go. There is no "thieves den" and there is no castles they can go to to stock up on supplies. Cities in the game are pretty useless, but even so it'll be difficult getting to them with guards attacking you on sight.


These are the main three reasons why, but honestly the main reason is just the risk vs reward. Carebears can shout all they want that the system is "fair" and that people who PvP should be punishied. However players should only get punished in a game if they have SET BACK THE OTHER PLAYER severly. It's like arresting a guy for making someone wait a couple of more minutes in line because he was fumbling with change -- yeah, it's annoying but it isn't hurting you.


I can agree even with a system that makes it so that ganking people

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this patch do not address the core problem at all and will not solve the main pvp grief points "zone spawn" and "npc dialog".

The griefing crowd do not PvP for shitty exp points (who arnt worth anything at all till now!) but for the fun of spreading missery - or to allow friends to farm PvM content without interruption.

FC still fail to analyse the problems their game has, and therefor fail to deliver the correct fix.

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