Conflict Not Always The Answer

Deadmano · January 2016

So today I just reached a personal milestone in Cyrodiil. All shards, all quests, every dolmen and every cave explored, cleared and achieved gained. But chalk it up to luck or my irregular gaming time, yet I have only ever ran into conflict a handful of times. I am sure most of you know what it is like to be in a campaign owned by 90% of your opponents, that you have to sprint on your horse for the majority of 10+ minutes to get to the other side of Cyrodiil as you finish a quest, only to be ganked half way and start all over...

Today was a rather interesting day, as I actually made "friends" with 2 Dominion players. Truth be told, I was attacked outright by both players (presumably self-defense) as I stood there and simply /wave'd. Now I am unsure if they decided to stop because I was waving, not fighting them back, or if they saw my 2 companions and wizened up.

What really made my night was that I /beckon'd one of the Dominion players, who in turn followed me to a Dolmen in Bruma and we actually took it down, together. At that moment there was no silly war, there was no enemy. There was simply a group of adventurers turning the tide against the greater evil and I was proud to call that Dominion member one of my own.

So remember next time you're in Cyrodiil, unless you are explicitly going out for PvP purposes, to capture forts and whatnot; you are not obliged to kill other players, possibly ruining their day. Treat others the way you wish to be treated. You can thank ZOS for forcing us to deal with PvP in a PvE environment due to the quests, etc. But the players will prevail at the end of the day!

Here's 2 screenshots I managed to get, wish I captured more of the awesomeness that ensued:

It is moments like this where I was there was a global chat, or that /s and /y were visible to the other alliance players... At least local chat... We can't even whisper them...

Volkodav · January 2016

How awesome! I wish more people thought like you do. :}

Deadmano · January 2016

Volkodav wrote: »

How awesome! I wish more people thought like you do. :}

Well, clearly in the shots I have instilled some form of trust. My only worry was that it would go to waste soon as another EP player comes along and wipes them... People can lose faith so easily.

For me, I distinguish players as two types. The PvPers that will stop at nothing to wipe EVERYTHING in their way, and the PvE and/or I-Am-Not-On-Duty-For-A-Raid-Tonight who simply want to get their tasks done without interference.

So my rule is I try to defuse the situation with a /wave and/or other comical gestures. It is quite amusing to watch them run all over the place, and slowly creep forward, as a squirrel would to a hand holding a peanut... If they keep attacking me and my health drops past 60% I then have no choice but to attack until they either surrender and run away (I allow them the option to retreat) or they end up dying. The latter has only occurred twice luckily.

I had quite the amusing instance where I met a Daggerfall player inside a cave, we were a group of 3 at the entrance having just gotten in... I wave, he turns and runs flat into a HUGE horde of mobs he had been evading... I jump in to try and help him, wipe out the majority of the mob whilst he tries to take a few cheap shots at me, my one guild member jumps in, transforms into a werewolf and chases him halfway across the hall before I recall her and we finish our objective and leave. We waited over 10 minutes for him to come outside, purely for the laughs; he eventually came out and then goes straight back in. We left.

I can completely understand the "fear" of it all, and as I explained there is nothing worse than having to start back from square one when you're so far away from a friendly fort.

But hey, if we all do our part and be cautious yet friendly enough then we can all get along, even in a "PvP" zone. This isn't an arena, it is an entire landspace with many worldspaces to explore. The freedom and choices are there, and I look forward to meeting many a Daggerfall and Dominion player in the foreseeable future! Now if only I could drop food and such at their feet as a gesture of my goodwill... What kind of roleplay is this?! And my only choice of communication is frantically waving, jumping around hoping they mirror my moves which seems to be a sign of acceptance?! :P

Makkir · January 2016

You can whisper members of the other alliances by the way...

MrDerrikk · January 2016

Deadmano wrote: »

Now if only I could drop food and such at their feet as a gesture of my goodwill... What kind of roleplay is this?!

You can get the Trophy from the Deshaan Public Dungeon and use that in front of them?

Prabooo · January 2016

spy (cough)

Volkodav · January 2016

Deadmano wrote: »

Volkodav wrote: »

How awesome! I wish more people thought like you do. :}

Well, clearly in the shots I have instilled some form of trust. My only worry was that it would go to waste soon as another EP player comes along and wipes them... People can lose faith so easily.

For me, I distinguish players as two types. The PvPers that will stop at nothing to wipe EVERYTHING in their way, and the PvE and/or I-Am-Not-On-Duty-For-A-Raid-Tonight who simply want to get their tasks done without interference.

So my rule is I try to defuse the situation with a /wave and/or other comical gestures. It is quite amusing to watch them run all over the place, and slowly creep forward, as a squirrel would to a hand holding a peanut... If they keep attacking me and my health drops past 60% I then have no choice but to attack until they either surrender and run away (I allow them the option to retreat) or they end up dying. The latter has only occurred twice luckily.

I had quite the amusing instance where I met a Daggerfall player inside a cave, we were a group of 3 at the entrance having just gotten in... I wave, he turns and runs flat into a HUGE horde of mobs he had been evading... I jump in to try and help him, wipe out the majority of the mob whilst he tries to take a few cheap shots at me, my one guild member jumps in, transforms into a werewolf and chases him halfway across the hall before I recall her and we finish our objective and leave. We waited over 10 minutes for him to come outside, purely for the laughs; he eventually came out and then goes straight back in. We left.

I can completely understand the "fear" of it all, and as I explained there is nothing worse than having to start back from square one when you're so far away from a friendly fort.

But hey, if we all do our part and be cautious yet friendly enough then we can all get along, even in a "PvP" zone. This isn't an arena, it is an entire landspace with many worldspaces to explore. The freedom and choices are there, and I look forward to meeting many a Daggerfall and Dominion player in the foreseeable future! Now if only I could drop food and such at their feet as a gesture of my goodwill... What kind of roleplay is this?! And my only choice of communication is frantically waving, jumping around hoping they mirror my moves which seems to be a sign of acceptance?! :P

Your ways of disarming the opponents are absolutely charming. As I said before,it would be great if others found it within themselves to play more like you do. :}

TheShadowScout · January 2016

Every now and then, one meets some player in Cyrodil that sees you as more then just a quick AP gain.... it happens, though very rarely.
Me, half the time I go with a "live and let live" attitude, half the time I might go with a "gank before getting ganked" attitude. Only once I have had an encounter where the former kept the other from attacking me...

I kinda wish there was more to cyrodil then PKing everything in sight. But I suppose most are too afraid to forego the "surprise attack bonus"...

As for player interaction... did they change things? Since I know I recieved whispers from enemy faction players in the past... (it was a request for another rematch after I evened a score back when I started poking my sorceror into cyrodil, though I had to decline since the other clearly was a better PvPer then me, I only won the second fight thanks to some NPC guards assist...)

Enodoc · January 2016

This is a great story. It brings to mind the idea I had a while back; it was basically an "I am not a threat" flag, a way of indicating to 'enemy' players that you had no interest in fighting them. The idea is that it would turn the 'enemy glow' of your character from red to yellow (like what happens to mobs in certain quest places once you finish the quest there). The enemies would still be able to kill you, but they would know that you had no intention of killing them. (As a way of avoiding people exploiting the system and getting the jump on an enemy, a player who flagged themself yellow would be unable to initiate PvP combat.)

Lysette · January 2016

Enodoc wrote: »

This is a great story. It brings to mind the idea I had a while back; it was basically an "I am not a threat" flag, a way of indicating to 'enemy' players that you had no interest in fighting them. The idea is that it would turn the 'enemy glow' of your character from red to yellow (like what happens to mobs in certain quest places once you finish the quest there). The enemies would still be able to kill you, but they would know that you had no intention of killing them. (As a way of avoiding people exploiting the system and getting the jump on an enemy, a player who flagged themself yellow would be unable to initiate PvP combat.)

This is a really good idea.

Magdalina · January 2016

Lemme show you another one =P

That's 3 "mortal enemies"(EP, AD and DC; I'm EP) binding over defeated body of a district boss xD Was fun to take it down when even with tab targetting the boss the DC's caltrops slowed me and AD and my streak CC'd them both lol. The DC is actually a friend using an alt and the AD is just a random AD who's attacked us several times before but I asked her to stop this time as we were tying to get the boss down and she switched onto boss instead:)

Garldeen · January 2016

If not in one of the more 'combaty' type areas of the map, I will generally ignore other factions unless they attack me. Having, many times, ridden for ten mins to do a PVE quest, only to get killed means I know how annoying it can be. Did feel good when I got a thank you message from a lower level player thanking me for not attacking him as he had already spent 2 hours and 4 deaths trying to get the skyshard

I kill myself enough by randomly falling off things without needing the help of others!!

RatedChaotic · January 2016

Makkir wrote: »

You can whisper members of the other alliances by the way...

Guess that means use xbox live or psn for us consolers. We cant /whisper.

Deadmano · January 2016

Makkir wrote: »

You can whisper members of the other alliances by the way...

Really?! The only reason I assumed we can't is because I did try on several occasion (using their player name) but the auto-complete did not appear and my messages failed to go through... I must try it again sometime.

Obviously when you first meet a player of the opposing factions you won't really have time to whip up a whisper, haha, but once we have established a neutral ground I will definitely try; thanks!

Enodoc wrote: »

This is a great story. It brings to mind the idea I had a while back; it was basically an "I am not a threat" flag, a way of indicating to 'enemy' players that you had no interest in fighting them. The idea is that it would turn the 'enemy glow' of your character from red to yellow (like what happens to mobs in certain quest places once you finish the quest there). The enemies would still be able to kill you, but they would know that you had no intention of killing them. (As a way of avoiding people exploiting the system and getting the jump on an enemy, a player who flagged themself yellow would be unable to initiate PvP combat.)

The only issue I see with this is that if you can't retaliate you are basically a martyr... I would want the ability to defend myself if I am being attacked if they clearly have no intention of being neutral or friendly... There should be a /nap function where you can request another opposing faction player to agree to not attack each other, that way it takes both sides to confirm and only works for players who have agreed to do so. Perfect for when your buddy is a determined Dominion follower and you're with the Pact but would want to quest with them and such...

wonkydog wrote: »

I kill myself enough by randomly falling off things without needing the help of others!!

I can't begin to tell you how true this is for me... Those damn ledges seem perfectly fine until you fail touching a rock on the way down and all you can do is watch with bated breath as you freefall for what seems like forever... Luckily you can revive then and there, provided you weren't trying to escape an enemy player...

MrDerrikk wrote: »

Deadmano wrote: »

Now if only I could drop food and such at their feet as a gesture of my goodwill... What kind of roleplay is this?!

You can get the Trophy from the Deshaan Public Dungeon and use that in front of them?

Oh dear, you aren't referring to that bag of meat, are you?!

@Magdalina I am so glad to see you managed to have an equal encounter!!

In general it is great to see a fully positive response from all this! I was half expecting to see some negativity involving "lore" and "but but but they're the enemy... traitor!" etc. Inb4...

Keep up the awesome work, community!! And I really hope console players will get the ability to chat!

Brrrofski · January 2016

In all honesty, waving or not I would have killed you

Magdalina · January 2016

@Deadmano, add a , at the end of the name of someone from another alliance

Lightninvash · January 2016

Deadmano wrote: »

So today I just reached a personal milestone in Cyrodiil. All shards, all quests, every dolmen and every cave explored, cleared and achieved gained. But chalk it up to luck or my irregular gaming time, yet I have only ever ran into conflict a handful of times. I am sure most of you know what it is like to be in a campaign owned by 90% of your opponents, that you have to sprint on your horse for the majority of 10+ minutes to get to the other side of Cyrodiil as you finish a quest, only to be ganked half way and start all over...

Today was a rather interesting day, as I actually made "friends" with 2 Dominion players. Truth be told, I was attacked outright by both players (presumably self-defense) as I stood there and simply /wave'd. Now I am unsure if they decided to stop because I was waving, not fighting them back, or if they saw my 2 companions and wizened up.

What really made my night was that I /beckon'd one of the Dominion players, who in turn followed me to a Dolmen in Bruma and we actually took it down, together. At that moment there was no silly war, there was no enemy. There was simply a group of adventurers turning the tide against the greater evil and I was proud to call that Dominion member one of my own.

So remember next time you're in Cyrodiil, unless you are explicitly going out for PvP purposes, to capture forts and whatnot; you are not obliged to kill other players, possibly ruining their day. Treat others the way you wish to be treated. You can thank ZOS for forcing us to deal with PvP in a PvE environment due to the quests, etc. But the players will prevail at the end of the day!

Here's 2 screenshots I managed to get, wish I captured more of the awesomeness that ensued:

It is moments like this where I was there was a global chat, or that /s and /y were visible to the other alliance players... At least local chat... We can't even whisper them...

ok this is a nice thing you did. Now as to the bolded part cyrodiil is a pvp environment it was never meant for pve they have thing for the pve players so its not a completely waste of space for them. but it is a pvp environment.

Asherons_Call · January 2016

I had a similar experience in route to clearing PVE achievements in Cyrodiil. I would play in servers dominated by my faction and play at off peak hours. I rarely had confrontation. When I did come across another player from the other factions my first defense was to whip out my lute. It has a way of disarming people when they know I'm not going to attack them. The last bit of PVE I have in Cyrodiil is my fishing achievement and I'm almost there. This is another disarming activity where you will rarely be attacked

Deadmano · January 2016

Lightninvash wrote: »

ok this is a nice thing you did. Now as to the bolded part cyrodiil is a pvp environment it was never meant for pve they have thing for the pve players so its not a completely waste of space for them. but it is a pvp environment.

Indeed it is a PvP zone, and you will never hear me complain about it. But at the same time you cannot argue that the quests in the quest hubs are NOT PvE orientated, because they are... The quests you get from the PvP quest givers are just that. There are many elements of PvE in Cyrodiil, the delves, the mobs, fishing, etc. Why have them?

If they're trying to make it hybrid they should have the option to toggle PvP on and off, and if toggled enemy/ally forces are invisible to you so there can't be any spying. Easy enough to do, will it be done? Who knows.

But I am really not going to get into the conversation of PvP vs. PvE zone, it has been discussed to its death. I am perfectly happy with the way things are, just would be nice to communicate with the "enemy" if so desired.

Magdalina wrote: »

@Deadmano, add a , at the end of the name of someone from another alliance

@Magdalina is that a trick or something?! You just add a comma at the end of their name then a space and then your message and it will work? Huh, I must try that, thank you!

Brrrofski wrote: »

In all honesty, waving or not I would have killed you

And in all honesty, unless you're a NB Vampire, you wouldn't last very long as we are always a group of 3.

I respect your PvP attitude.

Lightninvash · January 2016

Deadmano wrote: »

Lightninvash wrote: »

ok this is a nice thing you did. Now as to the bolded part cyrodiil is a pvp environment it was never meant for pve they have thing for the pve players so its not a completely waste of space for them. but it is a pvp environment.

Indeed it is a PvP zone, and you will never hear me complain about it. But at the same time you cannot argue that the quests in the quest hubs are NOT PvE orientated, because they are... The quests you get from the PvP quest givers are just that. There are many elements of PvE in Cyrodiil, the delves, the mobs, fishing, etc. Why have them?

If they're trying to make it hybrid they should have the option to toggle PvP on and off, and if toggled enemy/ally forces are invisible to you so there can't be any spying. Easy enough to do, will it be done? Who knows.

But I am really not going to get into the conversation of PvP vs. PvE zone, it has been discussed to its death. I am perfectly happy with the way things are, just would be nice to communicate with the "enemy" if so desired.

I bolded the part I wanted to address. yes they are pve aspects and it is for the pve players to have some content in pvp but that doesn't make it a pve environment

. I find that they put delves in and dolomins in so that when you see a group doing them you can go in wipe them out and finish it in the name of ur alliance. that's how I see it haha. granted sometimes I have done a co op with another person in a diff faction for a dolomen and once we beat it, I used him as help, I attacked and we 1v1 and killed him. because better him die than he turn on me and kill me

I mean all is fair in love and war

Peel_Ya_Cap_517 · January 2016

I just like how you said, "deal with PvP in a PvE environment"... Lol, what?!

Deadmano · January 2016

Lightninvash wrote: »

yes they are pve aspects and it is for the pve players to have some content in pvp but that doesn't make it a pve environment . I find that they put delves in and dolomins in so that when you see a group doing them you can go in wipe them out and finish it in the name of ur alliance. that's how I see it haha. granted sometimes I have done a co op with another person in a diff faction for a dolomen and once we beat it, I used him as help, I attacked and we 1v1 and killed him. because better him die than he turn on me and kill me I mean all is fair in love and war

Dolmens is a tell-tale sign, usually, as when a player approaches they are summoned and it is quite hard to miss something so massive... So we often go to investigate just for fun and see if we can't help out! Though once we were doing a Dolmen and none of us were paying attention that we were being picked off one by one by a vampire NB, basically 2-3 shot who then proceeded to finish off the dolmen, haha! Maybe that was you?!

But I hear you, it's a warzone, you are expected to kill off the enemy, doesn't mean you are forced to. I am just glad I got the majority of what I needed done! I plan to do PvP, but only once I hit VR14-16 and once I have all the gear I have been planning on... Then maybe take a shot at being Emperor, if but only for a few minutes. :P

Asherons_Call wrote: »

I had a similar experience in route to clearing PVE achievements in Cyrodiil. I would play in servers dominated by my faction and play at off peak hours. I rarely had confrontation. When I did come across another player from the other factions my first defense was to whip out my lute. It has a way of disarming people when they know I'm not going to attack them. The last bit of PVE I have in Cyrodiil is my fishing achievement and I'm almost there. This is another disarming activity where you will rarely be attacked

Damn you! You've now reminded me of the fishing achievement I have to do... NOOOOOOO!! I really hope the chances have been raised, considering it is a PvP zone and all... This will probably be my least favourite as the tension is so high, haha.

Also, you must be really good at the lute, some tunes are outright annoying and I'm surprised it hasn't triggered anyone! :P We need a /whiteflag command, though I have been contemplating using /surrender!

Robbmrp · January 2016

We've done the same thing in Imperial City when turning in trophies. We came across another faction player and waved, they waved back and we all went about our business. Sometimes it can be really nice when you don't have to fight every other factions players

Then again, sometimes it's really nice to kill them all!

mwahahahahahahahahahahaha

Drakilian · January 2016

Magdalina wrote: »

Lemme show you another one =P

That's 3 "mortal enemies"(EP, AD and DC; I'm EP) binding over defeated body of a district boss xD Was fun to take it down when even with tab targetting the boss the DC's caltrops slowed me and AD and my streak CC'd them both lol. The DC is actually a friend using an alt and the AD is just a random AD who's attacked us several times before but I asked her to stop this time as we were tying to get the boss down and she switched onto boss instead:)

Ooh, yeah, Libi's great (I'm EP player and I've only met one other opposing faction player as friendly as her, would have to be sneaky zipp)

Nice job on the district boss to, haha. I've only ever managed to duo that flesh taro arch (he doesn't spawn adds so he's kind of a pushover, just got to kite him lots) but the baron scares me because the normal twilights already hit like trucks.

Deadmano · January 2016

Peel_Ya_Cap_517 wrote: »

I just like how you said, "deal with PvP in a PvE environment"... Lol, what?!

@Peel_Ya_Cap_517 you should maybe read the entire line more carefully...

Deadmano wrote: »

You can thank ZOS for forcing us to deal with PvP in a PvE environment due to the quests, etc.

You're welcome.

Lightninvash · January 2016

Deadmano wrote: »

Peel_Ya_Cap_517 wrote: »

I just like how you said, "deal with PvP in a PvE environment"... Lol, what?!

@Peel_Ya_Cap_517 you should maybe read the entire line more carefully...

Deadmano wrote: »

You can thank ZOS for forcing us to deal with PvP in a PvE environment due to the quests, etc.

You're welcome.

he is still right those are just pve aspects in a pvp environment

may have to agree to disagree haha

Peel_Ya_Cap_517 · January 2016

@Deadmano

I did, thank you. I think its funny that you consider Cyrodiil a PvE zone just because it has some quests in it..

Brrrofski · January 2016

Deadmano wrote: »

Lightninvash wrote: »

ok this is a nice thing you did. Now as to the bolded part cyrodiil is a pvp environment it was never meant for pve they have thing for the pve players so its not a completely waste of space for them. but it is a pvp environment.

Indeed it is a PvP zone, and you will never hear me complain about it. But at the same time you cannot argue that the quests in the quest hubs are NOT PvE orientated, because they are... The quests you get from the PvP quest givers are just that. There are many elements of PvE in Cyrodiil, the delves, the mobs, fishing, etc. Why have them?

If they're trying to make it hybrid they should have the option to toggle PvP on and off, and if toggled enemy/ally forces are invisible to you so there can't be any spying. Easy enough to do, will it be done? Who knows.

But I am really not going to get into the conversation of PvP vs. PvE zone, it has been discussed to its death. I am perfectly happy with the way things are, just would be nice to communicate with the "enemy" if so desired.

Magdalina wrote: »

@Deadmano, add a , at the end of the name of someone from another alliance

@Magdalina is that a trick or something?! You just add a comma at the end of their name then a space and then your message and it will work? Huh, I must try that, thank you!

Brrrofski wrote: »

In all honesty, waving or not I would have killed you

And in all honesty, unless you're a NB Vampire, you wouldn't last very long as we are always a group of 3. I respect your PvP attitude.

I actually do have a vamp magica NB with 3.3 spell damage, so I'd certainly give it a go!

Deadmano · January 2016

Peel_Ya_Cap_517 wrote: »

@Deadmano

I did, thank you. I think its funny that you consider Cyrodiil a PvE zone just because it has some quests in it..

So let me reiterate... What I mean was, while you are WITHIN the QUEST HUBS doing PvE things, PvP is brought into it. You are doing quests that have NOTHING to do with PvP and then you may be ganked at any point... You have a set goal of doing one thing, and while it may be refreshing to keep on your toes and have an unexpected battle or two, it is still a forced thing.

If you want purely PvP, remove the PvE aspects, I am all for it. If you want to introduce PvE, at least place some form of protection in the quest hub towns or something. But don't botch things up by trying to make both work, it can't happen.

So no, I do not refer to Cyrodiil as a PvE environment, I see it as strictly PvP with a lot of PvE elements which in turn, turn it into a PvE environment when there is no PvP happening.

Preyfar · January 2016

I've ended up doing Dolmens with random AD and EP I've come across. Most of the time, I'm prepared for war, and ready to attack at a moment's notice. But if they don't attack me first, sometimes I'll let it slide. It's not always about combat. Just most of the time. =D

niawrathb16_ESO · January 2016

This is a great story, and I agree it would be nice if there was some basic way of communicating , like a white flag emote or peace or something.

I personally had the uncomfortable situation of running into the middle of a duelling club with a large group (seeing the fight symbol on the map) we attacked and it took sometime before we realised the situation...then we all died as some stopped attacking and others didn't. A couple of members from the group went back to apologise. Communication is key, its not that I believe what we did was wrong exactly as others have said it IS a PVP zone but being able to understand a situation and make the choice is always preferable.