[Mega Thread] - PvE versus PvP Discussion

Playing the BETA was the first time I encountered SoT, my first in game experience was to get camped by a 4 man galleon over and over again, without knowing anything about the game mechanics, this was not very exiting, but it was the only time through the hole BETA it happens, not because nobody tried it again, but with time goes by you find ways to avoid such situations very easy.

Most of the time I sailed alone, exploring, voyaging, stealing from others and avoiding sea battles, and I loved it!
I really dislike the idea of a separation between PVE and PVP. I played hardcore WOW starting 2004 on a PVP server, and you could still do your PVE stuff. The thrill of doing PVE and the possibility of getting ganked ist where the fun starts. PVE without this gets very fast repetitive and boring. So please don't split this up.

What is not the best right now is, that there is no downside on PVP. Many argue: Hey buddy, we are pirates, pirates sink other ships and steal and plunder... yeah but really pirates take a risk to lose there ship or their life when things run bad... Here there is absolutely no downside in attack other ships, there need to be a change. The most valuable think in a pirate world is the ship, this has absolutely no value in the game right now. Kind of strange for me.
Pirates also did not start every fight because the did not had any respawn... there need to be some stuff to consider if an attack worth it or not, it is called Sea of Thieves not Sea of brutal fights till the death...

The save ports are kind of bad, because than, when somebody approaches me on my way to the save outpost I would go full speed, sinking my ship maybe by hitting the island, but who cares it worth nothing, and could unload my save treasures. Otherwise, one ore two save Outpost, witch low rewards for turned in treasures would be good for social interaction.

What also would spicing up are thinks like really thick fog to hide in, where you could see more or less nothing, but have a chance to escape a battle.
Or teaming up ships/crews to hunt down other pirates, which are strong in PVP and got a high bounty, because they rent less attacked everybody else.

@ant-heuser-kush

I am with you on this one in the main, I mean I really love this game.
I have been a Rare fan boy since I was much much younger haha. Their games got me through many a cold dark and bleak Scottish winter, Autumn...Spring.............. And summer... For many a cold, dark and bleak year!
My all time favorite video game is still Conkers Bad Fur Day, not to mention, as a kid I played Digger T rock on the NES religiously (even though I never got any good at it) and then later Goldeneye and Banjo Kazooie on the N64 to name but a few very fond gaming memories. In short I love this games developer company and it pains me to criticize anything about SOT.
I want to start by saying the art style, the sound design and the soundtrack of SOT is SO NOSTALGIC TO ME I fell in love the minute I spawned into the closed beta. Ok ok I know I'm gushing I know and I am sorry "RODL" BUT Everything about this game I have seen and played in the closed Beta so far has been mostly utterly fantastic, its more or less what I had hoped for and it has been MAD MAD fun. I had 4 days off of work and have done pretty much nothing else haha.
THANKS RARE! SO GLAD YOUR BACK WITH A VENGEANCE!

To the point now though:

I do however think eventually there will need to be more to do in the way of voyages....I spent a good two to three hours without seeing another ship on the horizon which was cool to begin with but it started to feel a bit too big and a bit too empty after awhile, I think I clocked up over three hours on one play without having to fend off anything other than skeletons and the occasional storm. On the other hand, when I did begin to encounter other players, it was 99.9% of the time very combative and frequent, I was mostly playing solo though (because I enjoy going it on my own more often) so - as you can imagine it did not always fair very well for me... perhaps a white flag option would have come in handy? Or....perhaps the Cannons on smaller rigs could be a little more powerful to bite back a bit harder with? I still enjoyed the Beta but some aspects of it could do with some fine tuning just to meet something closer to its fullest potential.
I know some of what I have to say has nothing much to do with PVP VS PVE but my small gripes so far do involve the level of immersion you get from the game while playing solo and not encountering others for long stretches of time and what I did not see and what I would have liked to have seen:

I never seen a whirlpool, water sprite or any other kind of vortex in the water, the horizon or the sky while out on the open ocean, not once, and I know that should be a thing, it just should be a thing in a game about sailing on a wide open ocean world.

I never seen any other sea life other than Sharks and plant life, no dolphins or schools of small fish or a killer whale for example. Even the occasional bale of turtles crawling about on the beaches or the odd small squid mucking around would add so much more depth to wandering and voyaging in this game.
I never seen a Kraken or any other kind of Sea Monster at all.
I never seen a ghost ship... (Other than the ferry of the damned which was more like a spooky naughty step for dying) :(

I never got cursed.... by plundering a cursed treasure or crossing a voodoo witch doctor. (The chest of sorrows was close enough though it doesn't alter how you look or what you see which is what a curse in a video game should do lol)

I never fought anything other than Sharks, Skeletons and other players. I really would have liked to have done battle with other things in such a big map, variety is the spice of life after all.

Where are all the birds? I have only seen Seagulls...

The lens flare from telescopes and sniper rifles is a bit too obvious, I think lens flare needs to be taken out or brought down a few notches in games, I also think enemy gamer tags are too big, too bright and too obvious, I think enemy gamer tags need to be limited to a few steps away kind of thing because as it stands, they appear at a good distance making a genuine game of hide and seek impossible! (also I would love it if we could sneak, like crouch down and sneak about silently, maybe the gamer tag could be muted in a crouch / sneak mode?)

My last and final gripe is, the characters in the outposts don't talk and that was the first thing that struck me when I approached the barmaid in the tavern when I first spawned in, no dialogue? That was really disappointing for a game with such a beautiful art style and sound design with the waves and the weather and the ships wood creaking and the ropes and sails and all that good stuff..no character dialog from the folks on the outposts? I dunno, to me that just felt lazy and a bit empty and lifeless.

Over all the Beta gets a 8 / 10 from me.

This game is in danger of becoming too heavily focused on PVP as there is just not enough depth to the questing / voyaging or exploring. After awhile, it does begin to feel a bit like more of the same.

I really hope to see SOT grow as time goes on BUT for the first little while I'll enjoy jamming around stealing treasure, voyaging and customizing my character (if that's a thing) and dressing him in my style and getting a custom look for him and my ship.

See ye on the waves me hearties!

@scheefinator

I'm glad they wont separate the community, that would defeat the purpose of doing a pirate game. The threat of being boarded / attacked and even captured (recruited even?) should be there, all of the time.

@ant-heuser-kush

I think it should be a constant potential danger I just think that in order for people to be inspired to do more voyaging and less attacking there ought to be a more of a cost attached to the ship and a deeper more immersive list of voyages and more variety in the world for exploration.

@ant-heuser-kush

I think the key words in my statement here that you might be overlooking a little bit is 'potential danger' that is not the same as resolute constant threat haha.

I know what your concerns are.

What I meant was, when your boat or ship is anchored and your off treasure hunting on an Island or cashing in a haul at an outpost, there should always be the 'potential' for danger to you, your ship and your cargo at all times as in the server should not be too empty and barren of other players who are up to no good, it should always be so that you are kept looking over shoulder and never at ease. Like I said in my previous post, I played over three hours of doing essentially the same kind of 'fetch quests' without being attacked or coming across a neglectful sailor's lone boat anchored up and advertising the potential for some actual piracy. Treasure hunting is not piracy at the end of the day, and so without the potential danger of stealing killing and sinking or having cargo stolen, being killed and your ship being sunk...the game ought to be called Sea Of Treasure Hunters and not Sea Of Thieves.

@scheefinator

Its a tender balance hahaha

For more PVE there needs to be more to inspire the player to DO more PVE like a richer environment and story modes or something, there needs to be something that hardcore PVP players would feel they were missing out on if they just sat around and picked off boats for chests but just the same,the game would not be a pirate game if there were no players terrorizing the sea's and making life difficult for each other. That is what its all about. Three hours and not seeing another soul and only fighting off bad weather and skeletons is not good enough or rich enough to keep players like me interested in just doing that alone, I want opportunities to steal and sink and be pirated upon more than once every three hours. haha

@scheefinator

That is to say, I don't think the game should be built around PVP alone, I just think it needs to offer more to strike a good balance for both, I like doing both..

The real thing here isn't PvP, PvE, game balance, Safe Zones or anything else. The real topic is people...
Rare described SoT on a dev video as, 'a pirate's adventure playground.' I love that analogy- and it totally fits! Look at any playground, anywhere in the world. Some kids are playing well together, some are playing quietly on their own in the corner- and some are running around screaming, trampling the toys and destroying stuff. People will do what they want to do- and scream blue murder when they're told they can't, or their way is wrong, and this way is right- which seems to me what a great deal of content on the forums has devolved into...
If anyone tells a group of people that you can go away and do what you want, chances are some of what they choose will be something you never thought could be done (positive & exciting), and some of it will be what you would never dream of doing (negative and unconstructive), but that is the gamble that must be taken.
Rare has taken that gamble- told us to go away and 'play pirate'- and every shade and flavour of that has been tried out- to the delight and dismay of all the 'kids' in the 'playground'- but that was the freedom that Rare has bestowed.
How the chaos (if you believe some) is brought under control will be interesting- and there are many great suggestions here.
I for one am not worried about the longevity of SoT. For 5 days we were all given free reign. Go, 'play pirate', try out these new toys and see what you think.
I think a lot more people than we believe jumped on the beta pre order and tried out the new pirate game for free- which might explain some of the comments about ganking, trolling and poor behaviour that has been experienced. A lot of those people have no intention of buying the game, I believe, but got some free play time on a buzzing new title- which made for a less than fun experience for some of us on the beta.
I might be wrong. On release, we will see all of these negative behaviours- because people are people- and we all play our games differently- but I really hope it will diminish. I think that a lot of people who just jumped on the beta bandwagon and caused mayhem will be cancelling their preorders over the next few days because they had no intention of buying SoT in the first place.
Hopefully, a lot of the things will level out on release, when SoT's target audience finally pay for the game and start playing. There will always be something that each of us doesn't enjoy or want to see in our games, but hopefully the artificial 'bubble' that was the beta was just that- a none- representative slice of what we can actually expect on March 20th...
I love this game. Long may it prosper. This kind of constructive discussion and reflection is just what the devs need to shape and move SoT forward...

@ant-heuser-kush

I guess all we can do is speculate at this time.

My experience playing the closed beta was over all a positive one. I had some low moments though, I was dealt with thoroughly and swiftly a few times by nasty crews of four who plagued me, stole my cargo and would not leave the island and waited for me to re-spawn after killing me and continued to hunt me over and over again to no personal gain of their own, just for sport. Those times were not nice but then losing never is and there was a good number of funny occasions when I boarded a ship or sloop and nabbed a few chests, punctured their hull with a few well placed cannon balls, dropped sail and left my victims swimming after me.
There were many times I thought I was alone on the server though and not in danger at all, those were cool for the first few trips but after awhile it was not pleasant either.

All about balance.

@scheefinator

I just logged in today now that the beta closed and fancied discussing the game now that I am excited to see whats coming.

I have not read many articles about the 'plans' for SOT but I am also not sure I require forgiveness for not being all knowing in relation to it either.

;p

@cmm-solo
That was meant to be funny...

Peace