@hotklou9848 said in Sea of Thieves or Sea of Bloodshed?:
Risk vs Reward & Time Lost vs Time Spent
A guy doing PvE got himself a quest to do. He spends 20-40 minutes doing the quest. Once he is done he loads his loot onto his ship and heads for an outpost. Along the way he gets attacked and gets sunk. He just lost the time he spent doing the quest and his loot.
A guy looking to do PvP collects resources at the outpost and sets out. He finds the guy doing his quest and kills him, gaining all of his loot. PvP-guy has comparatively MUCH less to lose, both in terms of time spent and in terms of what treasures they might have onboard which they could potentially lose in a conflict.
On top of that, most players that seek out PvP specifically are much better prepared for PvP, both in terms of skill/experience and likely what supplies they foresaw they would use during conflicts.
This confuses me.
It confuses you because you are assuming a lot of things that are not necessarily correct and you have no proof of, only your "belief" that this is the way it is - much of this because you continue to pigeon-hole people into one of two camps instead of looking at it as a spectrum.
Let me address the fallacies you are continuing to spread. You assume that someone attacks has no treasure or less to lose - how do you know? Did you board their ship? Did you sink them and find no treasure? No, you just ASSUME that because it fits your narrative or you "heard it on the internet"...so it must be true. True some will limit their losses (aka playing smart) by not carrying much and turning in often, but this is not true of all players as you continue to claim.
Now let's address your time investment claim. You have no idea how long they have been on the server and looking for prey (much less if that was the only thing they were doing in that time). Do you honestly think that all players just sail around doing nothing but looking for other players to attack? If so, then I'd say they have invested MUCH more time than any PvE leaning player as ship encounters are typically rare and my experience bares that out. In fact, a purely PvP player is at a much worse disadvantage in terms of gathering loot due to the rarity of encounters and the fact they have to win and survive to claim it. Running a Reapers Bones Emissary makes it worse since their location is displayed for all to see, making that sort of play even more difficult to profit from.
Now you bring up that PvP players are more prepared for battle. I'll give you that they may be more battle ready in terms of looking for a fight, but in reality many of those that engage in mainly PvP are not as good as you seem to think - many are just younger players having fun and a lot will turn tail if you show that you are capable of defending yourself. But YOU have the same option to be ready for battle by keeping alert. And there is nothing stopping you from gathering the necessary supplies to defend yourself - whether it be from players or any other threat in the game like skeleton ships. If you aren't doing that, then you are only hurting yourself on both fronts.
But in the end it is irrelevant if attacking players carry any loot or not, nor should they be punished or forced to do so by some arbitrary rule. For all you know they may have just cleaned out a fort or have a haul from another player on board when you encounter them, but you will never know unless you board or sink them. Tactically it makes sense to limit your losses by carrying as little loot as possible, why do you feel the need to punish/limit players for playing smart? You have the same opportunity in limiting your losses by not carrying more than you can afford to lose, I do it all the time since I primarily solo when I'm on.