PVP / PVE Strategy Origins...

chattygeekHD

Hello you lovely community!

Another question that I've pondered as I've begun to learn the ways of ESO:-

I have recently had great fun building my own character - starting with the old Excel sheet, and mapping out the skills that I want to invest in etc.

I've noticed that there are different strategy's in terms of gear required with regards to whether you are playing in a PVE environment or a PVP environment.

One thing I've had great fun reading, for example, is the different opinions on whether penetration is better vs critical and things like this.


My question is this:

What is the origin of needing a different build for PVP and PVE? How did this come about that this was necessary - I'm really interested in the history, how this evolved and became a thing. Or is this just typical of a MMORPG game?

Personally - I'd quite like a character that I can just gear up, and that character will just hold their own, regardless of whether I'm running around felling beasties and baddies - or if somebody has invited me to duel.. I don't really want to be thinking about having to quickly switch my gear up to avoid being at a disadvantage. (Despite the Excel fun, I'm quite a lazy gamer when compared to the likes of the PVP Elite or Veteran Dungeon Solo-ers)

Would love to hear your insight / experience / thoughts!

dmnqwk

I suspect it originated in Ancient Greece, when they invented the Olympics.

You see, people realised that different kinds of running required a different approach - there's no way a 100m sprinter could use their technique effectively for the 1500m, and the same applies to pve and pvp.

What they realised in PvE was that you can give somebody 1 button to press to deal X damage, but if they want you to press other buttons they need to have effects that stack over time (dots, cooldowns, procs etc) to create the diversity required to make a 6 minute fight meaningful. In PvP, however, the same approach wouldn't work because if you just applied dots and layered damage you'd lose the instant thrill of the action, which is created with stuns and precision immobilization techniques (pit maneuvers *snicker* ) and other controlling actions since stopping the burst from taking you down matters.

So, to summarize.
PvP is a sprint
PvE is a marathon

Disclaimer: It didn't really originate in Ancient Greece, they had different kinds of warfare long before that, but... you know.. go with it!

El_Borracho

For me, its the resistances DDs need to survive in each setting.

In PVE, the boss does not inflict crit damage so you do not have to guard against it. Which is why impen is a useless trait for armor in PVE. Secondarily, spell/weapon damage takes a back seat to crit damage. Which makes Divines (paired with the Thief mundus) the optimal armor trait for DDs because upping damage is the most important thing for DDs in PVE.

In PVP, you are guarding against other players. Divines is a useless trait in PVP. Impen nullifies crit damage, so putting that trait on an armor set that already has high armor and/or high health is optimal. Which has the effect of making spell damage/weapon damage the better offensive choice because do not get the Divines + Thief boost as most of your crit damage will be nullified. In other words, why use a build where most of the damage will not hit?

While staying alive in both settings is important, I think its far more important in PVP. While everyone dies in PVP, you should be able to take a few players with you before you die.

You can run a PVP DD in PVE overland or solo content, its just not going to work as well in group PVE content because of these basic differences.

chattygeekHD

Thanks to both - very interesting thoughts!

That makes sense - I hadn't thought that the devs would want/need to present different approaches to combat depending on whether the player was in PVE or PVP.

So to summarise (to check I'm understanding it right)

PVE is you David (or Davids!) vs. Goliath type scenario where the player needs the feeling or being an underdog, trying to survive long enough and deliver enough damage to eventually after a gruelling battle taking the bosses down.

PVP is your quick-draw type show-down where the player has the feeling of being against a (theoretically) equally matched opponent with non OP abilities (hence all the balance adjustments the devs need to do) and so it's more down to quick delivery of damage / defence against said damage / and other tricks like trapping and stunning which would otherwise not be much use against the previous Goliath0-like enemy in PVP.


Cool! I've learned something new today!

'm looking forward to getting into more PVP (I haven't done a great deal of it yet) to see the differences. I'm a PVE player at heart so it'll be interesting to see the disadvantage of a PVE build in a PVP situation at first hand.