PvE friends, what stops you from playing PvP?

[Camelrider 210]

this thread is usually done semi frequently; but i hate to break it to you OP. A lot of players have a very, very, VERY, incorrect mindset when it comes to PvP and PvP players and it will never change because they do not want to experience it. Is that bad? Eh, not really. Ultimately its their choice and their choice alone; but it is always sad (and this fortunately isn't so much the case any more) that these people openly bash that side of the game despite never trying it.

 

I have played this game since 2005. I can safely say that every single person from PvE i got to try PvP; never went back. Not a single person out of maybe 27 people. All of them for the same reason; there is nothing in the PvE side of the game that will ever warrant, manifest in, or encourage such a level of communal content and commitment. There isn't even anything mechanically to encourage that on the PvE side of the game as it encourages solo play (hence why most people on the PvE side live alone, pay for their things, and have alts to do the the things they can't do themselves.)

 

1 hour ago, Mordraug said:

Pragmatic mathematical answer from my end:  If you wanna really max your gear, one wrong afternoon and you're back to square 1.

 

You end up relying on cookie cutter gear instead, easily replaced stuff...  Kinda kills the appeal to me.  Would be better, in my opinion, if people could bring out their best scale or seryll plate with their combination of addy/glim weapons of choice and know that defeat doesn't mean another year or two (or months, I dunno, but same concept) making new ones.

 

I mean, the Vikings had it right... Valhalla, you're back in the fight next day, not spending days making new armor.

 

This doesn't really happen, the not bringing out best gear thing that is.

 

I've played since 2005. I wore a full set of scale armor in PvP in just about every single fight on my own account from 2016 to 2019. In that timespan, I died 4 times. The two times I dropped, I was reimbursed within 12 hours time with the exact same thing minus any sentimental attachments and maybe color. Addy and glimmersteel are free in PvP communities, even to new players -- I was one of the leaders of The Crusaders. We personally had a stash of around 240kg adamantine, 90kg of seryll, and 300kg of glimmersteel at time of disband, if you wanted an imp (even if you spent 95% of your time on freedom and just showed up to something once a month); it was free incl materials. If you wanted moonmetal weapons, same rule applied, literally free. We, and pretty much every other kingdom on the server had 95+ channeling benediction priests of all gods. Casts were free, you didn't even need to provide the favor unless it was a large amount of items (mind you, nothing excessive like 100+, but a 90? no problem.). Crafting of any type? completely free, typically any request was done within 8 hours, within 24 at the latest. Every single person that showed up to a decent amount of things with the appropriate combat skills (70/70/70 and SOTG) was given drake, sometimes not even that. We had a player, Punishlife, who was in our kingdom and never showed up to a single fight. Not a one. He sat on freedom about 60% of the time and chaos 40% of the time; just grinded his account and helped us make deeds pretty much in complete safety. I gave him a set of drake for free not even a month in (just one example, Angelklaine was another, OG dridmar was another). Scale was a bit harder to go around, just by rarity; so it was typically put on the most active players, but even then the same rule applied. I offered to put @nahjocheesein a scale set not even a month after joining. Hota statues, kingdom items? Free. Just participate.

 

Rares and supremes might be an issue, but even then typically because you operate as a community people typically give you the next rare/supremes that drop FOR FREE because you lost what you had, otherwise gear is simply rolled on by participating members or just handed out if participants didn't want it. High enchants like bloodthirst may be a bit harder to go around; but typically the longer the server the more common these items are. I also will admit that some items just can't be reimbursed. We had a player, Dave aka @Cartierwho rode around on chaos in a complete fantastic horse gear set. It might be the only one in the game, no way to reimburse that; but he knows we would have done our best to do so.

 

Nobody wants anyone to be out of something because its a community effort. If you're stronger, i'm stronger. I know I sound like a massive dunce, but the entire argument about "rarity" is kind've a big ol meme because PvPers do not operate by the same rules; items are items, they have pretty much no value. There is no economy. In the spoiler below i'll link some images and for anyone that looks at it I'd like you to keep in mind that ALL OF IT is given out and issued for free, you just had to ask and show up sometimes. NFI might be a bit different, like theres only enough scale for three? two? sets on the entire server of defiance; but mostly it applies. I'd also like to dispel the people don't use their best gear because its rare rumor, it's only rare on PVE because people hoard it. (And sorry for the rant, this exact topic triggers me to no end)

 

 

Apologies for so many images; everything over time has been stored on many characters and merchants. For our opponents who never knew, these are screenshots of the kingdom supply as of 2018. This isn't even counting the many gold coins set aside specifically for the purpose of reimbursing gear and paying for the upkeep of every kingdom deed on the server, including personal ones. This is also excluding (as per the last update of the 2018 spreadsheet) a combined total of 15 scale sets, 21 drake sets, and well over 60 moonmetal weapons that players were currently using. I'm also sure someone is going to look at this and go "but you guys had exclusive recruitment!" and the reply to that is no, not really. Our primary filter was effort to join. If you took the effort to personally reach out to us and have a conversation, you got in almost every time EVEN if you were new and had no reputation or established character in the game as long as we could see that you loved the game like the rest of us did.

 

Spoiler

 

 

 

Edited December 8, 2023 by Camelrider

[Beelzebub4355 21]

+1 agree 100%

[Mordraug 2,542]

27 minutes ago, Camelrider said:

*snip*

 

  Reveal hidden contents

 

 

 

See now, I did not know that.  Hope it helps swell your numbers.

[solmark 546]

I've played PvP a fair bit over the years, the main barrier to me has always been the time-sink, by the time you've figured out what the plan is, geared up (inc removing stuff you don't need or don't want to risk losing), then travel across the map, find the enemy, gate hop, fight, retreat, heal up, go again, die, respawn, go again, die again of course (was never really any good at it  ) , finally travel all the way back, it would run in to many hours that I simply don't have time to invest.

 

On the plus side though, I loved the camaraderie, the constantly being on edge, even at our own capital, the heart pumping when you're in a battle where the odds are stacked against you, knowing that, for the most part, you can get your gear replaced.

 

So in the end, I figured I'd be more valuable doing a 'Duce' and staying back at base pumping out weapons and armour, as I didn't have the time available and was more of a liability than an asset in the battlefield!

[Simyaci 425]

Maybe the question should include why people who tried PvP no longer plays PvP. The answer could be the desire for domination instead of competition, avoiding fights without overwhelming advantage, well established kingdoms trying to hoard all players and land, spies and the toxic paranoia they cause, game's PvP land defense mechanics, lack of interesting activity outside rare fights, getting stuck in small spaces with very little to do. This could be outdated but that's what I remember. I liked the kingdom I was in but not the PvP as a whole. 

[Ekcin 2,424]

I know that problem too from other games, every time when one faction got an overwhelming strength over the other/s, with the consequence that players defected to the victors, and in the end, PvP died. I don't know how far this was ever the case in Wurm though.

[Lisimba 779]

33 minutes ago, Ekcin said:

I know that problem too from other games, every time when one faction got an overwhelming strength over the other/s, with the consequence that players defected to the victors, and in the end, PvP died. I don't know how far this was ever the case in Wurm though.

 

Yeah. This is part of why I always liked "structured" PvP more. I don't really consider myself a PvP player but even so I've had a lot of fun in various games in large scale battlegrounds. But these end, and then a new one starts, and everyone is on the same footing again.

[Blazecraze 462]

The PvP community is the most friendly and inclusive community I have ever been a part of in this game.

 

It for sure is nowhere near the toxicity levels that the PvE servers operate on.

 

I've been around for Blackdog Isles on Indy, the absolute insane Pristine alliance dramas and of course, I live on Deli, the games largest cesspool.

 

Take it from me.

 

The PvP community is not toxic in comparison to PvE. 

[Finnn 3,322]

7 minutes ago, Blazecraze said:

The PvP community is the most friendly and inclusive community I have ever been a part of in this game.

 

It for sure is nowhere near the toxicity levels that the PvE servers operate on.

 

I've been around for Blackdog Isles on Indy, the absolute insane Pristine alliance dramas and of course, I live on Deli, the games largest cesspool.

 

Take it from me.

 

The PvP community is not toxic in comparison to PvE. 

but you only play on the pve servers, how so

[Blazecraze 462]

2 minutes ago, Finnn said:

but you only play on the pve servers, how so

Easy

 

I've been on PvE server twice in like 8 months - 2 dragon slaying and upkeep - also, blaze isnt my only character, up until this year he wasnt even my most played character 

[Alkhadias 548]

20 hours ago, Skatyna said:

LOOOL, good post.

 

I always played on EPIC that is/was PVP and I always said that the full loot on death system was a huge draw back for players PVPing, or the ones that did - were wearing sacrificial gears.. Was always laughed at by most other die hard PVPers for this saying I'm delusional and that the gear can be recrafted etc 😂

 

Turns out like everyone who dont play on PVP servers are indeed concerned about the same full loot mechanic.. 👌

Not my case tho.

I played for years in Tarkov, before that NewZ/ Infestation with full loot and for me it was only adding positive thrill and adrenaline. That was ultimate fun and reward, to drop a guy and loot his rare, unique weapons/ skins, armors and ammo. Such "big prizes" were compensating everything you lost earlier, were making you not even care about stuff lost- even if in total was worth much more than loot you got. I'd say otherwise, full loot mechanic is great, but as i believe- in Wurm what's in pvp, stays in pvp which sounds kinda as limitation but at the same time is understandable. Also this kind of games makes a hard bottom line that you can't pass, but up there, sky is the limit. If you lose everything- then you have nothing more to loose and you can only gain, and you can gain as much as you want/ can. In some terms, you can only gain in longer go. 

[Ekcin 2,424]

The assertions about "the toxic PvE community" are not fully justified.

 

Certainly there are differences between PvE and PvP. One is that territorial conflicts in PvE are hard to manage, and may tend to escalate under certain circumstances. Typically they arise about deeding over grounds worked on by others previously, denial of access, be it by terraforming, blocking, destroying roads and so on. GM are very reluctant to recognize griefing, and this leads to a warning in best case.

 

There are few means to defend even against malicious and abusive conduct when it happens. KoS is likely rather to aggravate it due to its multiple venues for abuse, such as chain KoS by alts, overtaking guard towers, where tower guards with their unhindered access to every deed are more menacing than templars, and even year long absence not terminating it. I figure such conflicts erupted a lot on long time overcrowded Cadence. I have not heard about such on Xanadu for years.

 

Anyway, those conflicts are rather infrequent. But granted, when happening, they are arguably ways worse than on PvP where one could just attack the offender. Sure PvP communities are closer and therefore tend to be friendly inside their camaradarie. I cannot speak about Wurm PvP but encountered extremely immature and toxic conduct mainly by younger and casual players in some games which triggered GM intervention more than once. In my work with computer networking and server administration I met colleagues from mainstream game server farms who had acted as GM here and then (there were quite some technical challenges there too). They told while of the playerbase no more than 15% were actively playing PvP, over 85% of complaints and necessary admin interventions of all kind (cheating and hacking included) came from the PvP branch.

[Tormentus 11]

I have never participated in PvP, all I (think) know about it come from investing hours reading and watching videos about it. My impression of why pvp isnt worth my time and others its:

- This community isnt suited for competing against others players, your average wurmjoe/wurmjenny already freaks out when a newbie cut down two threes, or dig a hole 20 tiles away from their perimeter, cant even think how they would react when they log in one morning, and see their castle destroyed, their dirt foundation leveled, all animals killed, farmtiles packed and token drained. They would have a seizure or committe suicide.

- Skill loss is unfair. This is the only game I know it happens, and it sucks big time, I dont see the point in this type of punishment and going PoK isnt a good idea because PoI is the meta for PvP.

- In the line of my first point, losing everything makes me look away from PvP. Why would I spend half a year of my life building a castle, preparing armours, weapons etc (you have to grind the skills to be able to craft supplies in little time), to lose everything over night when im sleeping? I dont want to lose sleep like in Life is Feudal. No, thank you.

- Game is too afk-friendly, because Wurm is about numbers in a tab. Pve combat already feels afk-ish and slow, cant even imagine how sluggish and boring PvP can be, where it doesnt matter what direction you swing your huge axe: if your opponent has higher numbers, you wont kill them. 

- Lack of skills transference (exception for Chaos in SFI). Another mechanic that doesnt make sense. I refuse to do the same grind twice, its already painful once.

[Camelrider 210]

4 hours ago, Ekcin said:

Anyway, those conflicts are rather infrequent. But granted, when happening, they are arguably ways worse than on PvP where one could just attack the offender. Sure PvP communities are closer and therefore tend to be friendly inside their camaradarie. I cannot speak about Wurm PvP but encountered extremely immature and toxic conduct mainly by younger and casual players in some games which triggered GM intervention more than once. In my work with computer networking and server administration I met colleagues from mainstream game server farms who had acted as GM here and then (there were quite some technical challenges there too). They told while of the playerbase no more than 15% were actively playing PvP, over 85% of complaints and necessary admin interventions of all kind (cheating and hacking included) came from the PvP branch.

You can't really compare the games. I can personally tell you, along with most staff members probably, PvPers are extremely hostile towards staff and most want absolutely nothing to do with staff. Is this justified? Not always, but PvPer's have had traditionally bad experiences with staff. I don't want to delve too much into this publicly as a lot of it has been dealt with privately between staff and wouldn't end well at least for me for posting it. I can also give you a personal anecdote that playing since 2005, it's very rare I ever even hear about someone complaining to staff about anything other than bugs. @Oblivionnreaveris probably a prime example of somebody that knows what I'm talking about. I know that in all that time I've only complained about a player three times, from 2005 to 2023. The first? A player abusing a duplication bug to build a deed. The second? Players glitching through cave walls. The third? Players being able to noclip through all buildings without permissions issues abusing a karma teleport bug.

 

My experience on PVE? People will report you for just about everything. It's also not at all uncommon to see players try to bait individuals into breaking the rules (example A is expanding perimeter right up to where somebody is working and then complain to staff they are working near your perimeter).

 

my 2c

 

1 hour ago, Tormentus said:

I have never participated in PvP, all I (think) know about it come from investing hours reading and watching videos about it. My impression of why pvp isnt worth my time and others its:

- This community isnt suited for competing against others players, your average wurmjoe/wurmjenny already freaks out when a newbie cut down two threes, or dig a hole 20 tiles away from their perimeter, cant even think how they would react when they log in one morning, and see their castle destroyed, their dirt foundation leveled, all animals killed, farmtiles packed and token drained. They would have a seizure or committe suicide.

- Skill loss is unfair. This is the only game I know it happens, and it sucks big time, I dont see the point in this type of punishment and going PoK isnt a good idea because PoI is the meta for PvP.

- In the line of my first point, losing everything makes me look away from PvP. Why would I spend half a year of my life building a castle, preparing armours, weapons etc (you have to grind the skills to be able to craft supplies in little time), to lose everything over night when im sleeping? I dont want to lose sleep like in Life is Feudal. No, thank you.

- Game is too afk-friendly, because Wurm is about numbers in a tab. Pve combat already feels afk-ish and slow, cant even imagine how sluggish and boring PvP can be, where it doesnt matter what direction you swing your huge axe: if your opponent has higher numbers, you wont kill them. 

- Lack of skills transference (exception for Chaos in SFI). Another mechanic that doesnt make sense. I refuse to do the same grind twice, its already painful once.

 

I just want to refer you on the skill loss that the only real loss you get from PVP is FS, which is gained the same amount as you lost. .25. This is why PVP accounts had 99-100.00fs long before PVE accounts did, even accounting for multiple deaths -- a single win repairs all that and gives you significant gain.

 

As for gear, please see my previous post at the top of this page.

[Ekcin 2,424]

Appreciated your post, and yes, PvP player often have a complicated relationship with staff, and vice versa . But well, as to your experiences in PvE it sound strange to me. I am not the most peaceful or diplomatic character, rather hot tempered and irascible, often sarcastic and snarky, frequently repenting or regretting afterwards when the damage is done. But strangely, in nearly seven years, I was not reported a single time, at least not that I was informed about. Received 1 warning in forums and 1 in discord so far . No idea what happened to you.

 

Might it all have been on Cadence? The high, in the beginning extreme population density there was a hotbed for conflicts, and a lot of extremely ridiculous fights broke out about "picked sprouts/flowers in my perimeter" and what else. The staff, flooded with such complaints, regularly from players unfamiliar with Wurm, may not always have acted perfectly, mind practically all are volunteers and have a life.

Edited December 8, 2023 by Ekcin
typo

[Mordraug 2,542]

Now this one's gonna irritate the purists but may as well say it.... 

 

Years on WO, then years on WU.... 

 

If Chaos had the same build speeds (not even talking skilling, just the action timers in general) it'd be more amusing to rebuild damaged fortifications and such.  WO timers are just too slow for most people to warrant any form of deed building that takes SO LONG only to have it become a battlefield.

 

A bit more variety would also do in combat, like unnerfing dual wielding, adding poisons with different effects for arrows (and melee weapons? on the fence there).

 

It's really hard for many people, I'm sure, to not see themselves spending more time undoing enemy damage than having fun.

 

Add the price tag on top of that, upkeeps, etc... a bad raid costs real money, specially if you have your silvers drained or whatever it is you kids do these days to others' coffers.

 

Once again, just my opinions, PvP community can take it, leave it, or modify it according to their realities which I only glimpse from the sidelines.

[Beastwolf 652]

On 12/8/2023 at 8:40 AM, Blazecraze said:

The PvP community is the most friendly and inclusive community I have ever been a part of in this game.

 

It for sure is nowhere near the toxicity levels that the PvE servers operate on.

 

I've been around for Blackdog Isles on Indy, the absolute insane Pristine alliance dramas and of course, I live on Deli, the games largest cesspool.

 

Take it from me.

 

The PvP community is not toxic in comparison to PvE. 

 

I agree, I find a lot more Toxic weirdness in PVE especially Dragons or large alliance drama.

But the communal playstyle isn't for everyone. Some want to be left alone and will harass if you if you even THINK about deeding near them.

[Lisimba 779]

I think a part of the (perceived or real, doesn't matter here) toxicity is from friction between PvP and PvE communities at large, and that gives a different view from either side.

 

If you consider yourself PvE for example, and the PvPers are making fun of PvE, that can increase your impression of the PvP community being toxic. But if you're on the other side of that wall, it's likely not toxicity to you. The same sort of thing works in reverse too of course.

[Carmichael 688]

7 hours ago, Mordraug said:

Now this one's gonna irritate the purists but may as well say it.... 

 

Years on WO, then years on WU.... 

 

If Chaos had the same build speeds (not even talking skilling, just the action timers in general) it'd be more amusing to rebuild damaged fortifications and such.  WO timers are just too slow for most people to warrant any form of deed building that takes SO LONG only to have it become a battlefield.

 

A bit more variety would also do in combat, like unnerfing dual wielding, adding poisons with different effects for arrows (and melee weapons? on the fence there).

 

It's really hard for many people, I'm sure, to not see themselves spending more time undoing enemy damage than having fun.

 

Add the price tag on top of that, upkeeps, etc... a bad raid costs real money, specially if you have your silvers drained or whatever it is you kids do these days to others' coffers.

 

Once again, just my opinions, PvP community can take it, leave it, or modify it according to their realities which I only glimpse from the sidelines.

So in regards to the timers, yes they do suck at lower levels, but once you grind (which isn't hard at all right now) and hit the 85 mark even for some skills it's SIGNIFICANTLY easier. It is also why you see just about every single pvp account on wurm node with 80-95+ skills in gather skills and deed building related skills. Just to the bare minimum of 90 at a base takes only a few months unless you want to focus on one thing

[Mordraug 2,542]

3 hours ago, Carmichael said:

So in regards to the timers, yes they do suck at lower levels, but once you grind (which isn't hard at all right now) and hit the 85 mark even for some skills it's SIGNIFICANTLY easier. It is also why you see just about every single pvp account on wurm node with 80-95+ skills in gather skills and deed building related skills. Just to the bare minimum of 90 at a base takes only a few months unless you want to focus on one thing

 

Well yeah, I know, old player and all, had a rather decent account on WO for that matter.

 

My point was more about retention of new players vs. their perception of how life's gonna be after their third 30 second timer.

 

Also, that's one  hell of a grind for a new player who jumps into pvp thinking that he'll be in good constant combat sooner than later.

 

Guess what I'm trying to say is that PvP needs tweaking to take it more to the battlefields and less to the deeds and ways to make the new players not feel like it'll be months before they'll join the fight in earnest.

 

Random suggestion:  PvP  training academies, guessing per kingdom, aka another safe deed in the mix... and players may wanna set up events where the younger players can kill each other for the entertainment of the veter... i mean for practice! 

 

Anyhoo, that's what makes WO PvP mostly unpalatable even for me as an older player, time.  On WU I'd consider it...  As for other people, well, we all do play for the dopamine one way or another and/or have heavy rl schedules.

 

Cheers!

[Zundy 99]

3 hours ago, Mordraug said:

Random suggestion:  PvP  training academies, guessing per kingdom, aka another safe deed in the mix... and players may wanna set up events where the younger players can kill each other for the entertainment of the veter... i mean for practice! 

 That's a brilliant idea, thanks for this. Speaking for Defiance we could set up something like this on the safe Islands.

[Lisimba 779]

On 12/8/2023 at 9:05 PM, Camelrider said:

I just want to refer you on the skill loss that the only real loss you get from PVP is FS, which is gained the same amount as you lost. .25. This is why PVP accounts had 99-100.00fs long before PVE accounts did, even accounting for multiple deaths -- a single win repairs all that and gives you significant gain.

 

I didn't know you could also gain fight skill like that. That's the sort of thing that would be good info for a FAQ or noob guide or something.

[Ekcin 2,424]

Just now, Lisimba said:

 

I didn't know you could also gain fight skill like that. That's the sort of thing that would be good info for a FAQ or noob guide or something.

Can't agree more. At my modest FS of 98.10 and a bit (and before) every death is a - major or minor - disaster forcing  to go on a 2-5 days killing spree (ok I refuse slaying what does not attack me in the wild so maybe miss a few targets but gain from peaceful mobs is ridiculous anyway), riding over considerable parts of the server, comparable to more than one 8x8.

[ViperSnake 14]

Some of the most toxic moments I've seen in wurm is on pve with deed borders. I've dealt with 2 separate quasi deed border wars. One involving a neighbor turning everything into a desert around us and another with a streamer over birch versus walnut tree growth segregation. The second being the most toxic and dumb argument ending with a dmz.

 

I just prefer the anarchy of pvp not having to follow as many rules as you do on pve. I too don't have much time to invest in the game and realistically fall under the "crafter" category of pvp players, but I do try to attend fights and especially deed defensive battles.

[Schiann 995]

The attitudes - especially the rampant bigotry, the mistrust, the feeling you can never compete with the people with the time and money to sink, the destruction of hard/time-intensive work and starting over...

I do enjoy the community spirit, cooperation, and purpose you can get within your village or kingdom on PvP, but the negatives mentioned previously tend to outweigh the positives for me.