I'd like to preface my post by bringing up something from the recently posted FAQ.

If you heavily commit to PvP, you will be rewarded. It will be risky, but the rewards are designed to make it worthwhile. If you'd like to dabble in PvP, you will still be rewarded and won't risk as much. We hope to entice more people to be involved in PvP, without making it a requirement.

My hope for this game is that the risk involves the possibility of losing your equipment and inventory. As much as I hate the choice of UO devs in making Trammel and therefore a safe zone for people, I think it would be the best choice for this game.

I'm sure there will be safe zones in the game where people can't loot from you, or even attack you. I'd like to see some high-risk high-reward zones where you can loot and be looted. There would be guild cities, resources to fight over, etc, etc. UO has shown that it doesn't marginalize either the people who just want to do PvE or the hardcoe PvPers.

Lorewise, my idea is this. Consider that there will be an NPC faction in the game that has exerted control over a portion of the game world. Think something similar to the New California Republic. While it isn't 100% safe in the wilderness, player characters won't be able to attack other player characters. This NPC faction would hold a considerable amount of territory including multiple towns, etc. Outside of this safe zone its more of a lawless area where players can fight over towns, resources, etc.

Honestly, I think more than anything this rests on equipment available in-game. If this game is heavily gear based ala World of Warcraft, this system will fall through. If the game allows players to be combat effective with some 'vanilla' equipment as do a good number of sandbox MMOs then this system would work great.

PvPers would be rewarded at a high risk due to competition/theft of equipment from other players, those who wish to PvE could remain in safe zones (that would still be a considerable portion of the game world).

I see no reason why PvE would have to suffer at the expense of PvP, and I see no reason why PvP would have to suffer at the expense of PvE under this system. It very much depends on the developers making sure that players are not forced into a particular path because it is a clear more profitable choice. Some people get a lot of enjoyment out of PvP, some get a lot of enjoyment out of PvE, and some get a lot of enjoyment out of being pure crafters. I respect that, and I want to encourage that.

In lawless zones there might be players fighting for control of a player (or NPC) built city on a relatively clean source of water. There might be raiders who prey on any travellers they come through, caravans of people banding together to bring goods to another town (assuming there isn't worldwide banks). In the non-PvP zones there might be a crafter seeking to build up a town and improve the life of the people, making equipment, etc. There might be raiding parties going to kill NPC raiders harassing a village or to kill an infestation of radroaches.

What do you guys think?

as it was pointed out in one of the recent posts, FULL LOOT means that you can work days to get your gear up, find good guys and through hard team work manage to beat the best "dungeon" and get rewarded, only to lose it in a second because:

a. had a bad internet connection.
b. some guys mobbed you, because someone on your team was afk or the match making assigned you someone who svck ...
c. something like it....

all i see is how this will ruining PvP, since those guys who will come obviously will not use their good stuff, trying to be lucky enough to hit someone else for his ...

I'm not advocating matchmaking at all for PvP, at least for the zones I was talking about. Going into the zones would be the same as going into any other place, with the exception that they are lawless. I think you are working under the assumption that the loot will be 'WoW' style loot. 'WoW' style loot is what pretty much makes or breaks a character. That is to say, your loot in this case is an essential part of your character that determines much of how powerful and effective he is in combat.

I think its still up in the air that loot will matter much less, similar to a UO/Darkfall/etc. In this case, I don't really see how what you said will be a problem. My system doesn't outline matchmaking or anything, its simply more of a lawless part of the world you can venture into for high risk and high reward.

Again, as I said in my post, this does depend on how vital equipment is to your character. Many MMOs have successfully made it so that equipment is not the determinant of your effectiveness. For the purposes of this topic, lets assume that it is more of a sandbox style where equipment isn't the most important factor. If this is not the case, and it is WoW style loot, this whole topic is pretty much invalidated. So I think for the purposes of discussion, it doesn't make a lot of sense to argue from that standpoint. Only time will tell in that area, but for now, discussion could take place with the more 'sandbox' style of equipment in mind.

a. A bad connection in 2010? I have 1,5 Mbit/s in a wild Russian village! (OK, it is not actually a village, but closed town differs not much) Even WoW requires no more that 256 Kbit/s
b. choose your teammates more carefully
c. not impressed

Tis is not ruining PvP, full loot gives new edge of PvP, a choice: to keep good gear in a bank cell and maybe die because of it or to risk and win. Excuse my bad English... I am a Russian bear, it's hard to type with claws.

a. Yes, there are bad connections here in the United States. I still have only 56K modem in the middle of rural America. And if it rains to hard, I get dropped.

b. It's the internet and unless you have your real life friends playing with you, any one can pretend to be anyone.

c. Ok, What I did not like about UO was that each server was controled by someone who cuold make changes that were different than other servers. Worse yet, most did not inform you of any of the changes or what they were.
The last straw for me with UO, was the server controler did not like theives so he made it nasty for those who wanted to be a theif character. Your good/evil level was double penalty if you stole, NPC's no longer had items on them but in them. So the only way that you could get at a NPC's items was to kill it.
And more things that just were not cool (proper) for a fantsy game, all because the controler presonally did not like it.

Dave Chase

It sort of sounds like you are talking about a private shard, not an official one run by the creators. Considering they aren't really official servers you can't really fault UO for that, but this still isn't TOO relevant to the discussion I was trying to bring up.

It is a maschism to play MMO on a 56k dial-up anyway, it is a 20% of a bandwidth required for comfortable gameplay. Excuse my bad English... I am a Russian bear, it's hard to type with claws.

I'm not advocating matchmaking at all for PvP, at least for the zones I was talking about. Going into the zones would be the same as going into any other place, with the exception that they are lawless. I think you are working under the assumption that the loot will be 'WoW' style loot. 'WoW' style loot is what pretty much makes or breaks a character. That is to say, your loot in this case is an essential part of your character that determines much of how powerful and effective he is in combat.

I think its still up in the air that loot will matter much less, similar to a UO/Darkfall/etc. In this case, I don't really see how what you said will be a problem. My system doesn't outline matchmaking or anything, its simply more of a lawless part of the world you can venture into for high risk and high reward.

Again, as I said in my post, this does depend on how vital equipment is to your character. Many MMOs have successfully made it so that equipment is not the determinant of your effectiveness. For the purposes of this topic, lets assume that it is more of a sandbox style where equipment isn't the most important factor. If this is not the case, and it is WoW style loot, this whole topic is pretty much invalidated. So I think for the purposes of discussion, it doesn't make a lot of sense to argue from that standpoint. Only time will tell in that area, but for now, discussion could take place with the more 'sandbox' style of equipment in mind.

zones? then simply no.

at least in PvP instances ppl come to fight and aware of the dangers, so its might be conceivable.
but PvP zones with full loot, then add max levels camp on some route taking everyone down, to the list of the above crap...

this will render PvP realistic and pointless, just as in eve online with 90% of ppl spending their time in a "PvE" zones, you basicly making FO into a mining/commercial game, with meaningless PvP which will mostly be for a niche group running in empty territory, empty of ppl, content, fun.

i prefer pvp instances for tactical game play,i prefer faction PvP zones, where you can make outpost and build up and then maybe some faction wars after (neither will work in full lot mod).


as for loot, at the moment its the most simpl way to set apart/personalize the players in what is basically every one the same world.

a. i got 15MB connection and still there is torrents and family members who surf, stuck with cable, ISP pick hours, working or just server side technical problems, death is one thing , lost of equipment is another and will require backup...
b. i got friends who i enjoy playing with but they svck at pvp and i am dont want to look for new ones, i just want a quick PvP with ppl with similar skill as i do.
c. lack of imagination, just take a look at FOnline 2238 for quick rundown for a MMO failure.

Its impossible to balance.

If u create a Zone for pvp, where full loot drops and nothing else, noone will go there.
A big empty zone mainly for the curious.

So u add something worthwhile to the zone, make it something really nice, but a bit time consuming to promote conflict.
Biggest Clan/alliance on the server owns it, everyone else is killed on sight by the ZERG.

This is why so many games have Battleground type instances.
Much more action, much faster paced.
Now the reward has to be incremental
But here full loot gives u another couple of issues.

What is the reward? Unless its purely cosmetic it will either give u an advantage, unfair for newer players, or it if is gear becomes something u cannot wear in the Battleground.
Because in a battle ground u WILL die 98769868976 times a day, the idea of constantly giving ur opponent anything valuable, or the annoying minigame of reequipping urself for every death is just dumb.


No, this game will most likely have ur basic battleground instanced zones just like most MMOs these days, and for the more hardcoe faction based pvp that u can join in the game. Like Raiders vs Traders, or BOS vs Enclave.

-Exo

I understand that, I would want to play with my mates as well. I'm suggesting another full loot pvp approach.

How about if you are in a gang that is in war with another gang and the other gang kill you, then you'll drop everything you got on yourself.

If some random person who doesn't have anything to do with you while your in a gangwar, kills you, you will only drop some items (can be random % or always the handheld things etc etc or simply nothing.. but random pvp without any reward or any kind of loss :/).

If your in a gang but not in a war the above statement applies.

If your not in a gang and get killed the statement above applies.

Also if you just randomly kill someone you could get flagged or something, making you drop more things if you die. Just a thought, you lose stuff but you'r keeping most things and gang wars suddenly turns into something interesting

its simple, Full loot doesnt work and never gonna work, unless there is also permanent death.
just as stealing in guarded zones doesnt work with a prevention mechanic you can use.

permanent death, all PvP zones with no limits the like doesnt work in MMO (unless combat reduced to a mini game for the first)

As I said, full loot ONLY in gang wars, where you are fully aware of what you are getting into.

In normal pvp you only drop handheld or you will have some sort of % to lose some items (maybe put in as all items that you are wearing cannot be dropped, only backpack items or vice versa) and the one starting the fight will be flagged, making him drop more items if killed and maybe even adding a small bounty if he kills you and you are a member of a "bigger" faction (example: NCR, VC, BoS), making them shoot him on sight.

I remember When I was playing ragnarok online, my first mmorpg from korea. There are few castle that allows guild must compete with others to obtain it. If they succeed their banner will be placed upon the castle and will be theirs in some week.
so Im thinking that fallout should have one of those, and players could get benefit upon having them.

so are we back with special PvP instances, otherwise how will you implement those gang war?

But posting too bad words and Chris will be on you

I just deleted a few posts that were a little too antagonistic, even for a PvP thread.

so are we back with special PvP instances, otherwise how will you implement those gang war?

well gang wars only apply for gangs :/ Like you are in gang X another in gang (guild/corporation/clan) Y and another in gang Z. Lets say that your gang X and gang Y is in a war, in that war you always have full loot drop when killed, this war can be ended, either by both parties giving up or making one of the gangs giving up (this should be done via a terminal/computer or just a gang window in the options menu.

Now if a gangmember from gang Z that is NOT in war with any of you happens to come by and some how dies, he will NOT get full loot drop, he will only get the normal/partial drop if he isn't flagged as a killer.

Do you get it now? So instanced pvp is not required at all, people who want to kill innocents gets flagged and gets more penalty when killed, the one who is innocent and died hardly looses anything valuable hopefully and those in war will drop it all, making war scavengers pop up maybe

And gang wars ain't instanced either, they can occur anywhere they want. People just have to stay away from 30 guys running around with big ass weapons and armors. Also you could add the feature that if a gang kills innocent people they get an overall negative reputation for the faction he is in.

Gangs are their own factions then there are the towns/cities that are bigger factions (if you are bad against them you will suffer)

//wars must be agreeable from both parties, a war request is sent from one gang to another, several wars is available but not advisable.

I think you guys are getting to wrapped up in a risk vs reward.

Risk doesnt always mean you stand to lose something tangable, it means your can get "defeated" but if you win you get a reward.

And well a 56k connection is pretty bad but with normal connections lag problems can occur especial in big battle situations. And disconnects can happen in all but highest end internet connections with back up connections.

Losing all of your hard earned gear because you happened to disconnect is not really that fun.

As pointed out earlier this leads to elitism, only the most powerful groups on the server will be able to function in the zone. Which maybe some might find appealing on paper because they assume they will be in those groups, but if your not and most people wont be it feels like you are helping fund someone else good time.

Guys ITS NOT GOING TO BE FULL LOOT!

Why do we always do this?
Before every release of a new MMO they purposfully withhold all specific game mechanic information.
They do this because they want us to do EXACTLY what is going on here now.
ASSUME that the game mechanics we would most likely want to see will make it into the game.
Then the longer u argue for it, the longer u spend trying to misinterpret one vague statement after the other to scew it in ur direction the more embedded u become in the product, so even when u eventually get dissapointed uve spent far too much time on the product anyway so u might as well try it out.

Dont get me wrong, I believe in this game and I hope its going to be great, but lets get some things clear.


There is only one way full loot, open world pvp can work.
Everyone vs everyone, full loot all the time.
Thats it.

Would that make a great Fallout MMO?
YES, of course it would.
Give clans the ability to create towns all over the map and they will fight for it.
A constant gathering of resources and crafting is necesary to replenish all that is lost, and severe limitation to movement is also essential or every conflict will turn into world war 4.
And thats it, all other versions of loot drops do not function in an MMO.

If its gang vs gang, I will bring 20 of my friends who are NOT in my gang to help me out as im killing you, they heal me and attack u, whatever is possible and I get all the loot.

If its RANDOM loot dropped it might as well be full loot, NOBODY is going to take the chance of loosing their Plasma Rifle of death no matter how many other crappy items they are wearing.

And again if there are no benefits to "gang wars" BUT the risk of loosing all ur loot, nobody will do it.
If there is a reward the biggest Clan on the server will challenge everyone, and anyone stupid enough to accept will be camped 24/7.

So the only way to implement a system like that is what I said, Free for all full loot, now listen to this:

"We hope to entice more people to be involved in PvP, without making it a requirement."

Thats the official stance, its over, there will NOT be loot drops on pvp in this MMO.


-Exo