Rainwhisper wrote: »

Original post.

STEVIL wrote: »

Rainwhisper wrote: »

From Rich Lambert on the livestream: "We want one cohesive game. We want you to be able to understand how combat works in PvE, and have that translate into PvP...It's not a completely different experience."

I have played nearly every MMO since Ultima Online, and several of the text MUD's before that. One thing I've observed in over twenty years of online gaming is that the goal of creating a unified PvE and PvP experience always comes up, and never works.

I wish developers would let go of that particular Holy Grail.

PvE players want predictable fight mechanics based on an established sets of skills/spells/formula. This grows out of the RPG identity of MMORPG's, where ultimately it's a combination of math and player choices, based on established patterns, that determines success.

PvP players want unpredictable fight mechanics that require them to memorize a number of rock-paper-scissors combinations for beating specific opponents. They want the risk and challenge of possibly hugely imbalanced fights, in either direction. The playstyle is radically different, and grows more out of the MMO identity of an MMORPG, where online, action/combat games are based primarily on player skill and team co-ordination.

While I recognize that end-game, group PvE content adds elements of close co-operation and memorization, ultimately the playstyle is still different from that of PvP, particularly in terms of the unpredictability of the opposing players' actions, and the "gotcha" combinations of attacks they will choose. In addition, end-game PvE encounters are carefully-tuned for balance, something impossible in PvP because the developers generally cannot control the number of players involved, or their skill level.

Consequently, the experience of fighting another player will never feel like the experience of fighting an AI-controlled opponent. PvP players will spend hours carefully selecting combinations of armor, skills, and attacks - then practicing them - to ensure deadly combinations against various classes and builds. PvE players will focus on choosing the skills that either match their roleplaying vision for their character, or optimize their ability to accomplish specific tasks, or seem like a fun way to play for a while, knowing that the stakes aren't terribly high.

Neither playstyle is "better," but trying to establish a system that allows a player to seamlessly move between the two is never going to happen. It will always feel like two completely different games.

At some level, I think ZOS understands this, since as a PvE player, I can completely ignore armor designed for protection from critical strikes. I wish their entire development philosophy, however, reflected this reality.

While the playstyle may be different, the mechanics are not.
While some capabilities and tactics are better for one than the other or may be needed more in one than the other the functions are mostly the same.

What they can do and obviously are trying to do is provide enough options so that whichever way you want to go you have enough tools to do the job. You have impen traits that help in pvp but other traits that help in pve.

Every time the issue of separating the two comes up i dont focus on the play but on the support and development and one of them made sure to touch on it yesterday. After the blather about playstyles, they started talking about how if it splits every change has to be done and tested and evaluated two-three-four more times than now.

Splitting pve and pvp means splitting the code streams and as they grow more and more and more divergent the effort required quadruples for everything. You will move towards three to four times as long and three to four times as many bugs... and eventually some bean counter will sit down and look at the least prifitable code stream and say "if we cut that out what does that do to our overall bottom line..."

Split development in a shared product is almost always sooner or later an appealing notion but also almost always a bad idea.


Cut the releases per year in half, double the bugs per release and also see a lot more blandifying of added stuff... that is what split code would give us until the bean counter raised his hand.