[Mega Thread] PvP and PvE Playstyle Discussion

  • @gtothefo said in [Mega Thread] PvP and PvE Playstyle Discussion:

    @combatxkitty said in [Mega Thread] PvP and PvE Playstyle Discussion:

    @gtothefo said in [Mega Thread] PvP and PvE Playstyle Discussion:
    So what are you saying? We need more friendly activities to do? What would you suggest? I always thought it would be fun if you could play card games or whatever at the tavern.

    I think I'd just like to see more emergent reasons to approach people peacefully and with some actual in game motivations to reward it. I think there are a range of possible versions of how it could work, off the top of my head here are a few:
    If some deliveries had split fees when handed in to someone else. So If I meet someone and they're going to the other side of the map where my crate needs to be delivered when I want to go the other way, I could hand it over to them and we both benefit.
    When you talk to someone peacefully you could trade or copy treasure maps. I'm always picking up messages in bottles that are way out of my way, I'd be happy to swap them with someone who has one for the island that I'm on my way to do a story mission on.
    Racing could have more than a one off reward. So when you stop next to a ship you could have a racing mission come up as an option, if you both vote for it it names a nearby island, first person there wins x gold off the other.
    Trophy fish could be worth more to the Hunter's Call if you show them to another pirate first.
    Some missions could require two part keys that no single crew can ever collect so you need to work together to get into the vault, but you never know whether to trust them once you're inside.
    Like I say, they're all just examples, I'm sure they could come up with far better ones. Its just, at the moment there are a range of in game rewards associated with attacking someone else when I meet them and pretty much zero associated with interacting with them in any other way, which seems like putting a thumb on the scales for a game that's meant to feature a range of emergent Player interactions.

    I dont think you are wrong about this aspect of the game. There really is zero reason to team up or approach anyone besides some commendations. I know we have the alliance system but as far as I am concerned the alliance system was a rather poor half hearted attempt of bringing players together and actually in my experience has the opposite affect. I understand Rare love of "friend or foe" which is why alliance is how it is but some other reasons to come together like you mention wouldnt be a bad idea.Of course anything added would have to not totally go against the lack or predictability/ friends or foe aspect.

    With that said like any PvP, PvE or PvPvE game alot of this positive experience comes down to the player themselves. I will help out a new player if I see one even though nothing is in it for me. Example: helping with skelly captains or my crew helping a crew struggling with a riddle on an island or giving supplies if we are about to log off. That is whats so great about an open world you can forge and create your own positive experiences with others as long as you are not a total azzhat. I go by the rule of 50. 50 percent chance person is an azzhat and 50 percent chance person is not!

  • @combatxkitty said in [Mega Thread] PvP and PvE Playstyle Discussion:

    I dont think you are wrong about this aspect of the game. There really is zero reason to team up or approach anyone besides some commendations. I know we have the alliance system but as far as I am concerned the alliance system was a rather poor half hearted attempt of bringing players together and actually in my experience has the opposite affect. I understand Rare love of "friend or foe" which is why alliance is how it is but some other reasons to come together like you mention wouldnt be a bad idea.Of course anything added would have to not totally go against the lack or predictability/ friends or foe aspect.

    Totally, none of the ideas I mentioned would stop players shooting each other in the back as soon as the positive interaction is over for the PvEvP part of things, it would just be a good idea to give solid, repeatable reasons to positively interact with other players. The emergent positive interactions I've had have been a bit of playing a shanty together, doing a little pet show or just standing around awkwardly looking at each other. Like, before now I've been on an island doing something and looked over the cliff to see someone else sail up to my ship. It would be nice in those occasions to go bounding down the cliff to my ship when I realize that they have no aggressive intent rather than just letting them go.

    With that said like any PvP, PvE or PvPvE game alot of this positive experience comes down to the player themselves. I will help out a new player if I see one even though nothing is in it for me. Example: helping with skelly captains or my crew helping a crew struggling with a riddle on an island or giving supplies if we are about to log off. That is whats so great about an open world you can forge and create your own positive experiences with others as long as you are not a total azzhat. I go by the rule of 50. 50 percent chance person is an azzhat and 50 percent chance person is not!

    Totally. as I've said I usually end a session by turning any fish I've picked up to the Hunter's Call. Rare Wreckers are worth big money, so I always make sure I stop off and cast a line at any Wrecks I go past on the way to the Call and when I'm there I can't resist cleaning out the Wreck. I'm never selling that gear, but I've loaded it onto other player's ships before.

    That's why I'm personally in favour of more interesting and emergent interactions. Not, play a banjo with someone and get a banana, but if you're on your way to Marauder Arch with a bunch of Crescent Isle maps, maybe trade them off to someone on their way to that end of the map for theirs based around where you're going to be. Its that sort of thing that bought actual Pirates together, it wouldn't be forcing a sort of behaviour, it would just be a tool that people could use to create that behaviour naturally. I think at the moment there's talk of emergent friendly behaviour, but there aren't really the tools to achieve much of it.

    The point is that currently the game rewards the aggressive experiences with actual in-game rewards, as well as the excitement of the chase and battle and the sense of pure heady domination. Meanwhile the non-aggressive ones are rewarded only by the sense of camaraderie. Given that if you give the average player a gun you really don't need to reward them for shooting someone with it but you'll need to pay them a substantial amount to put it down and have a chat instead that just seems a little off kilter.

  • @gtothefo

    Wait you actually know about the taxonomy of player types and multiple of the models... yet make assumptions that most people are like you? Why are you refusing to provide any foundation for your own arguments, you actually seem to know a thing or two? Regardless of which model you want to apply, as I also indicate that people shift around consistently unlike Bartle's model would allow (one of its core weaknesses). The standpoint I am making is that people will make a menu choice if offered that suits their motivational profile of that moment the most. If the modes compete directly with each other instead of complimenting them, people will use them specifically for different needs and no longer use the Adventure mode for them. The goal of the Sea of Thieves is to create a shared world environment, a true PvEvP world. A place where regardless of what are your intrinsic motivational factors are that you meet, clash and play together, where you interact with other styles and where people create the stories and content.

    You claim that the seas are not friendly enough and most interactions are that of a foe, while my argument is that it is mainly dependent on the one initiating the interaction. The fact is that most friendly crews do not go out of their way to reach out to others, they stick around with their crew and mind their own business. The ratio of these interactions by default will therefore be more in favor of that of the foe, as those people consistently go out of their way to initiate interactions. Also the response of the crew that one roles up on is of utmost importance. Are they standing there, prepared or are they an easy target because they are caught out of position or do they open fire straight away? There is an innate risk of making contact with another crew, there is the mystery of how they will respond to you and your plea of friendly interaction.

    You believe that the current rewards are built towards being aggressive, while the actual most lucrative thing you can do is to be friendly and create an alliance, then go your separate ways. The non-aggressive rewards are far higher over a longer period of time than any short term gain of the aggressive pirate, unless you find a ship that is stacking up on loot or those that are totally unprepared for it. Yet this is not where in my idea the issue comes from. The reward in this game is cosmetic, many pirates have more than enough of it just sitting there and earning more or less is with the inflation that Rare added non-sensical. Sure novelties like a race or the exchange of maps, might add a little bit but isn't far reaching enough. We have some of these aspects and yet rarely to never see them.

    If you ask me the 2 main issues with the division of friendly/foe division is that first of all the friendly people don't need other crews by a long shot. Even as a solo the game has become overall easier and easier to do from a PVE perspective, in a crew it is nearly laughable. There is very little to fear or is hard to defeat with a single crew or even a single pirate. Most of the content scales, so sloop, brig or galleon it doesn't really matter. Rare has gone with the approach that every crew has to be able to single handedly be able to do everything in the game, to avoid content of being extremely hard to complete and motivation people to find people to do it with. If legendary voyages would actually be a challenge, if epic bosses would be available to summon but super demanding and difficult to do with a single crew. Maybe we would have some motivation to actually team up with other crews, but then again people might just not do it at all because of the fact that it would require friendly interaction with strangers.

    The second issue is that there is a severe lack in the willingness of people to talk in the game. Xbox parties aren't even able to hear you talk to them if you try. The amount of silent, mute crews you meet on the seas is astonishing. Silent pirates cannot be trusted and no friendly interaction can take place.

    The developers need to create a motivation within the game to team up with others, currently if you want to be non-aggressive... the best course of action is to just simply mind your own business and ignore everyone else. There is no motivation or urgency to create player bonds outside of some of the events, even those that have everyone rush to the same islands creates more friendly encounters by sheer I don't want to fight, but want to do the event.

  • Hello,
    I was pointed to this mega thread being a collection of people who are trying to get a no PvP server or PvE mode for SoT.
    I am here to give my voice to that suggestion.
    Its annoying that you cant play this game without being disturbed by hostile players.
    I stopped playing this game and many of my friends dont buy this game because of the forced PvP.
    A PvE mode would be perfect and I would gladly return to this game every now and then. Now I dont really have any incentive whatsoever. And If I do I most of the time join an Alliance server.

  • @stormwind81 said in [Mega Thread] PvP and PvE Playstyle Discussion:
    Custom servers are coming but with no rep/gold.

  • @limend Yeah those are for content creators not for normal players

  • @stormwind81 They are for regular players to... but currently for only creators. we have no idea when but they will drop for regular players like me and you but you can be sure they are coming.

  • Well browsing through the responses here I feel its a PvP battle even here. I thought this thread to be more of a collection for the devs to see its worth making a PvE mode.
    Since I've seen people mentioning Bartle's taxonomy of player types it should be a good point for them.
    Also most effort is always making new content, drawing, creating new models, rendering stuff, ect. That always eats the most time. Just simply creating a new mode and editing some "code" rules is not really that big of deal. Its of course nothing but its way less effort than bringing up another content. I guess they just dont want to ask for extra money to make a team develop that mode yet as im sure they have strict delivery goals like Path of Exile has and need to come up with new content every couple of weeks or months. Thing is PvE players tend to spend way more money on ingame stuff than PvP players which will in the long term really pay off imho.
    So far I see only the same reasons why some players are still against it:

    1. they are bigoted and only think of themself (they cant step into someone else's shoes and change the point of view).
    2. They are jealous if other players get an easier way to make progress. Where they had to fight for it, PvE servers might give players an easier way to get loot. (Which is understandable) but every game has to give new players an incentive to catch up to other players. thats something always happen.
    3. PvP players dont want to lose their easy kills and therefore gatekeep the idea.
    4. People just blindly overtook an "ideology" and defend it with everything they got no matter if it makes sense or not.
      In the end its a resource management issue. Do they want to make the next update a little bit less big but bring up a fun mode a lot of people are asking for or lose new players in masses and other veteran players aswell. Cause all you can see on youtube is people breaking the pirate code and just trolling each other. Of course youtube is drama related. But thats all youtube does. Attract more people who want drama. Pretty much Rust 2.0 if u ask me.
  • Again with or without server hopping I'll still find the server with the most emissaries. And limiting the times that I can do it in a row won't matter to me because I only do it 3 or 4 times. Times that by 4 people we will always find a server.

    Server hopping to create a pve server in a way is way way way worse then hopping for pvp takes 10 times as long.

    Server hopping should be limited to 5 before a cool down.

  • @stormwind81 Problem here in my opinion is as follow
    Let's think about this PvEvP (adventure) scenario. There are 4 ships doing PvE 1 only for blood and one doing PvE while searching for ships. IF PvE servers were added they would take toes 4 PvE players away and probably all of them leaving only players doing PvEvP and PvP. because of that PvP would be more common up on the seas and make it almost impossible to do PvE anymore forcing you to do it only on PvE servers ruining the PvEvP part that i personally love.

    And finally

    In the end its a resource management issue. Do they want to make the next update a little bit less big.

    It's not THAT easy to make PvE servers, they would have to have only 1 ship or it would be almost impossible to prevent "trollers" and that would not only take a lot of time to make but would take whole server for about one ship and more servers ofc = more money.

    but bring up a fun mode a lot of people are asking for or lose new players in masses and other veteran players aswell.

    Veterans who don't like PvP aspect would not play weakly if they didn't like the PvP aspect game is almost 3y old already (2.5rn?) Also how many people in Percentage iw would like to know? and how many of players with +100h or +1000h? Mostly of people i see my self wanting PvE more are players with less than 100h. They bought game with PvP in it why complain? Also would you rather keep players who like the game as it is and LOVE it or people who want you to change almost the core mechanic of the whole game for what? what insures they keep playing after that and wont get bored? that definitely didn't happen for most of the community

    Cause all you can see on youtube is people breaking the pirate code and just trolling each other.

    What piratecode? one in the tavern? its not RULE its more of an suggestion of how you should treat others. Only thinks that should be taken as unacceptable would be toxicity.

  • @stormwind81 said in [Mega Thread] PvP and PvE Playstyle Discussion:

    Well browsing through the responses here I feel its a PvP battle even here. I thought this thread to be more of a collection for the devs to see its worth making a PvE mode.
    Since I've seen people mentioning Bartle's taxonomy of player types it should be a good point for them.
    Also most effort is always making new content, drawing, creating new models, rendering stuff, ect. That always eats the most time. Just simply creating a new mode and editing some "code" rules is not really that big of deal. Its of course nothing but its way less effort than bringing up another content. I guess they just dont want to ask for extra money to make a team develop that mode yet as im sure they have strict delivery goals like Path of Exile has and need to come up with new content every couple of weeks or months. Thing is PvE players tend to spend way more money on ingame stuff than PvP players which will in the long term really pay off imho.
    So far I see only the same reasons why some players are still against it:

    1. they are bigoted and only think of themself (they cant step into someone else's shoes and change the point of view).
    2. They are jealous if other players get an easier way to make progress. Where they had to fight for it, PvE servers might give players an easier way to get loot. (Which is understandable) but every game has to give new players an incentive to catch up to other players. thats something always happen.
    3. PvP players dont want to lose their easy kills and therefore gatekeep the idea.
    4. People just blindly overtook an "ideology" and defend it with everything they got no matter if it makes sense or not.
      In the end its a resource management issue. Do they want to make the next update a little bit less big but bring up a fun mode a lot of people are asking for or lose new players in masses and other veteran players aswell. Cause all you can see on youtube is people breaking the pirate code and just trolling each other. Of course youtube is drama related. But thats all youtube does. Attract more people who want drama. Pretty much Rust 2.0 if u ask me.

    Heres my opinion on why PvE players want PvE servers.

    1. They are bigoted and prejudice against PvP players and only think of themselves. (they cant step into someone else's shoes and change the point of view).
    2. They have buyers remorse, they bought a game clearly for PvPvE and then complain about it.
    3. PvE players want an easy mode because they are bad.
    4. People just blindly think that if they cry enough they'll get what they want. Doesn't make sense that they bought a game that has PvP in it and then complain about it. Whats funny is PvE players don't spend more money then PvP players for games. PvP players spend more money on games then PvE players ever do. All the popular games with microtransactions are PvP games so your comment holds no merit here and is just false.

    Youtube is filled with players that are playing the game. The strange thing is that PvE players are more toxic if not more than PvP players. PvE players can be extremely sore losers and the language that comes out of their mouth is just crazy but I'm the one whose toxic for sinking them?? Yeah sure whatever broski.

    You are just as bigoted and biased against PvP players as you suggest we are. Hypocrite much?

  • Since this is the place for feedback I ll give some of that.
    RARE, Im going to be straight with you here, the Arctic has more inhabitants than your European servers. I am a PVP player and I can't find someone to PVP against. I hear of people stealing 8 FsOTD in a single day. I know that you cannot solve the problem of noobs in my server that dont raise the emissary flag and instead constantly do voyages. But your game is just no FUN anymore. And I consider this a major failure. At least give us the option to choose the servers we play on. Yes I know it causes instability but I really dont care anymore, I m sick of wanting to play and being forced to do voyages. Your game literally forces me to accept a playstyle I dislike. Lets face it. Nobody cares about the content you release. EVERY SINGLE PERSON IN MY SERVER DOES VOYAGES. I can count the times I ve seen a FOTD with two hands. And before everyone starts saying oh wait this isnt the company's fault, you should search for people or you re not optimistic enough or you simply arent looking enough well Im tired of searching for day 10 players with castaway chests. I ll just leave this here for you to hate spam.

  • @debrightlord And what could Rare do about it and how would "search for servers" system work may i ask? if you had option so select "Active Fotd" it would be end of them because NO ONE would take the risk anymore.

  • @limend Im not asking for an activate fotd and you re right, no one would take the risk. I m asking for some sort of indication about the server I m about to enter, tell me about the current world event, tell me about the population, so I know that this month for example your servers are empty.

  • @debrightlord There is easyer way to fix empty servers. Make the server full up again after ship leaves and not wait for 10min even when he didn't alt F4.

  • @limend Still, even if one noob player leaves, another one will take his place. Yes I know its unfixable but what am I supposed to do? Stick to doing voyages or quit a game I paid 25 euros for.

  • and what else can you get with 25€? 24 AA batteries. I would say 9 months of fun time with friends is worth more than 24 AA batteries. Also for FOTD's i have noticed they are more common on weakend's. And don't ask me what to do, there is plenty of stuff to be done already. You just do what you enjoy. If you're not happy with newbie that toke place hop/find other ship to steal from. One of the games features is that you sail with "old and new players on the seas" so by making "high end" servers it would break that. I my self can't come up with working system to fix problem that in my eye's sin't one but its only my opinion.

  • @stormwind81 said in [Mega Thread] PvP and PvE Playstyle Discussion:

    Well browsing through the responses here I feel its a PvP battle even here. I thought this thread to be more of a collection for the devs to see its worth making a PvE mode.
    Since I've seen people mentioning Bartle's taxonomy of player types it should be a good point for them.
    Also most effort is always making new content, drawing, creating new models, rendering stuff, ect. That always eats the most time. Just simply creating a new mode and editing some "code" rules is not really that big of deal. Its of course nothing but its way less effort than bringing up another content. I guess they just dont want to ask for extra money to make a team develop that mode yet as im sure they have strict delivery goals like Path of Exile has and need to come up with new content every couple of weeks or months. Thing is PvE players tend to spend way more money on ingame stuff than PvP players which will in the long term really pay off imho.
    **> So far I see only the same reasons why some players are still against it:

    1. they are bigoted and only think of themself (they cant step into someone else's shoes and change the point of view).
    2. They are jealous if other players get an easier way to make progress. Where they had to fight for it, PvE servers might give players an easier way to get loot. (Which is understandable) but every game has to give new players an incentive to catch up to other players. thats something always happen.
    3. PvP players dont want to lose their easy kills and therefore gatekeep the idea.
    4. People just blindly overtook an "ideology" and defend it with everything they got no matter if it makes sense or not.**

    Yikes are you sure you are reading this thread? I do find it funny though when someone calls a group of people "bigoted" and "selfish" because they are happy playing the game they bought. As far complaining about "forced" PvP in a PvPvE game, I think that is kinda silly. See no one is forcing you to play a game with PvP in it. Last time I checked playing Sea of Thieves wasnt a life requirement.

    Also I think this mega thread was more of a way to unclutter the forum made by the mods versus information for devs. The devs have been rather crystal clear on their PvE server stance.

    Im all for a PvE mode that compliments does not compete with main adventure and I am fairly certain many here would be ok with that too. Of course for some that just wont be good enough because they want a game they did not buy .

  • I understand that this was designed as a PVP game, and being a "pirate" and stealing other peoples loot is all in the spirit of what it is to be a pirate. However I do find it so disheartening spending several hours completing a quest for it only to be ruined by someone killing you and destroying your ship. I spent 4 hours preparing for the fort of the dammed, then in 4 minutes all my progress was lost. Sometimes I like to just relax and sail the seas and go fishing and explore but it just gets spoiled being forced into conflict. Some people aren't that good or don't have the skill level to engage in PvP and would just like to enjoy what is fundamentally a brilliant game. the game should be able to be enjoyed by people of all skill levels.
    If you don't want to do dedicated PvE severs then maybe they are some other things you could do for the people wanting this feature:
    Passive mode - A mode that you can turn on and you and your ship cannot make or receive damage from other players
    Ship and player progress not lost when doing a quest.
    A wanted level for players who are actively killing and destroying ships, making them visible on the map so people can avoid them, and they will also have skeleton ships chase after them.

    It is a great game as it is, I just feel so much more enjoyment could be had if there were the option for a more relaxed game style. 3 times I have given up playing the game because I get tired of loosing so much progress and wasting time. I am currently trying to complete the Fate of the Dammed at the moment and can already feel myself putting the game back on the shelf as alot of the time it just feels pointless to play it.

  • @tmbleweed said in [Mega Thread] PvP and PvE Playstyle Discussion:

    If you don't want to do dedicated PvE severs then maybe they are some other things you could do for the people wanting this feature:
    Passive mode - A mode that you can turn on and you and your ship cannot make or receive damage from other players

    If there is passive mode you can't sell loot to gain rep or gold.

    Passive mode in other games means you can't attack either so basically based on pve then what can you do

  • @limend sagte in [Mega Thread] PvP and PvE Playstyle Discussion:>

    What piratecode? one in the tavern? its not RULE its more of an suggestion of how you should treat others. Only thinks that should be taken as unacceptable would be toxicity.

  • @limend See, its an unending loop, there is nothing I like other than sinking people and taking their stuff. I want to role play as a pirate through this game, but nothing feels rewarding anymore. I just want information about the server I m about to enter. RARE is not aware of problems like these cause they only happen in few servers and its majority of players are happy and satisfied but wake up lads here in Europe things are not good.

  • Introductions; I've been playing for a few weeks now, say 50+ hours at this point. The game is truly stunning, the sailing, the world, the ships etc. it's all wonderful and what has gotten me hooked. I've barely scratched the surface of all that is available in the seas of Sea of Thieves.

    As I've played with friends, we've had a mix of good and bad experiences with other players. We've been learning on how to recognise a threat, how to deal with pirates, what to keep an eye out for. To be fair, it was quite helpful to look up the advice players on the forums had to reduce poor experiences.

    All this said, there's no amount of effort that a newer set of players like ourselves can put in if we're confronted by a more experienced or larger crew; plus there's always a situation in which we'll be vulnerable to a decisive attack that all but loses us the fight before it's even started.

    I come to Sea of Thieves from games such as Elite Dangerous, where I have thousands of hours. Seeing all this discussion and the passionate defense of mixing the playstyles (or not) strikes me as odd.

    Lets put aside the development challenges or costs to setting up a server for private play (especially given they're already working on setting up such a framework).
    I have yet to see a line of reasoning (beyond 'the spirit of the game') as to why they shouldn't allow for progression in solo/private servers. In Elite: Dangerous, you can play solo, private server or in Open (what Adventure mode is in SoT); and they're all populated by a plentiful number of players.

    Let me address what I've understood to be an argument made throughout this thread;

    < All the people who want to PvE will go to solo servers because you can progress without risk, making the adventure mode PvP only (ruining the experience for PvEvP players).

    • I don't think this would necessarily happen to the extent people think it would. Unless I'm mistaken, surely there's a good portion of long-time players of this game who engage in PvEvP rather than pure PvP? Otherwise surely you'd be more interested in just playing Arena. To take the example of Elite: Dangerous, plenty of players still opt to play in Open Mode despite the prevalence of pirates and whatnot because they enjoy the spice of meeting others who might come after them and PvP.
    • A secondary issue to this argument is that I've repeatedly seen certain people who don't want the private servers with progression added say things along the lines of "just don't play" or "leave then, we don't want you anyway" to people advocating that they'd prefer a solo experience... Taking this to a logical conclusion would end up with the same effect as introducing a PvE server; everyone who's adamantly in favour of a PvE server are effectively going to leave eventually as the constant PvP they encounter gets to them right? In the long run, won't you only be left with an Adventure server containing PvEvP and PvP minded players only?

    Ultimately, I am interested to understand why it's critical there be no progression in a solo or private server system? Are you not going to attract and/or retain a greater number of players by introducing such to the game?
    Why are quests such as Tall Tales not able to be done in a similar environment to the Maiden Voyage? There's progression, gold and whatnot to be made in that small intro quest. You can't be telling me it's to protect new players as they learn the ropes; you don't exactly come out after that voyage being any less inept and capable of defending yourself on open waters.
    Would people who enjoy the PvP so much, the best thing in the game according to some, not enjoy a server where most players were also interested in a good fight - with others willing to play the other content while being at this risk?

    I'm quite interested to hear from the veterans about this.

  • My stance on the whole PvP/PvE debate....(for info - I'm more a PvE player and will only defend myself if attacked)

    Fundementally the game was designed as a PvPvE experience, for both aspects to co-exist in the world together, making for unpredicatable gameplay. Effectively with the horizontal progression, the game is a session based adventure where it's up to the player to decide what they want out of that particular session.

    Do you want to go and run cargo across the map? You can
    Do you want to go and search for hidden treasure? You can
    Do you want to explore the lore of the seas? You can
    Do you want to go and steal from other pirates? You can

    You catch my drift.

    Sea of Thieves has a signficant learning curve and whilst the Maiden Voyage is helpful in learning the basics, there is only certain aspects you can learn by playing the game (I.e. where to position your ship to avoid the cannons on a Galleon).

    Sea of Thieves is also very different from your usual multiplayer experience. As mentioned above, it's more session based where your main goal is working towards a 'cosmetic' reward rather than a 'mechanic improvement' reward. Unlike other titles, this game doesn't reward you with better ships, better stat's for the hours you put in. To get better you have to understand what mistakes you made and learn from them. By all means, ask for help from Veteran players, looking up tutorials on YouTube, check out the discord, there are plenty of resources which can help pirates progress in this game.

    From the post's I've seen on the forums, most of the PvE Only/Passive mode requests come from newer players who don't fully understand what the game is about etc.

    The reason I don't believe a PvE mode would work is that SoT by design isn't a game to be completed. There isn't an End point in the game so what are the PvE players aiming for? Once you hit Pirate legend, it opens up a new quest line, but the end result is still you earn gold for cosmetics? There isn't a 'Game Over' screen to see with the end credits rolling up. The whole purpose of the game that each sesssion is unpredictable, and the unpredictability (is that even a word?!) relies on other players. You can't code unpredictability into PvE as fundementally, it has to have limits.

    The other alternative suggested is Passive mode as other online games have this option (I.E GTA Online). However if you look at the Passive mode in GTA for example, what can you do in the open world when in passive mode? Drive round? You can't bring out your weapons at all, so you can't even interact with the NPC's. Bringing that across into SoT, what are you going to do? Sail around to each island and then run round? You also couldn't have a passive mode where you are immune from other players as there are too many variables which players could work around. (Putting a kegin the water in front of your ship - the keg isn't held by the other player so how does the game know that it was an act of PvP?)

    I do believe that there could potentially be more done to help newer players, such as expanding the maiden voyage to include 1 quest from the 3 main factions (GH/OoS/MA), include combat with a Skelly ship and potentially even include a Tall Tale (to show the elements of fighting a Skelly Lord).

    I would even go as far as to allowing newer players their own server space (shared with those of similar experience) to experience the full adventure mode for a few hours/to a set amount of gold (Couple of thousand), but still with the threat of PvP. This could however be exploited by more experienced players just creating new accounts to troll.

    Apologies for the length of the post, but wanted to get my thoughts across.

  • @iceman-d18

    I understand what you suggest about the very clear intent behind the game's design. It is supposed to be session-based and using other players in the game to give rise to emergent/ random content. I find that people advocating for PvE (such as myself) are simply not interested in that sort of content though, and it's either just a boring hurdle or an inconvenience they would rather not have to deal with.

    I find the underlying assumption you appear to have made is that as a PvE player I'm looking to 'complete' the game in some way. I'll explain what my interest is primarily in this game; trying to master all the activities that I find compelling and doing so while mucking about with my friends (as crew). Evidently, I would like to be able to make money and gain reputation as I do this - so that I may partake in getting the cosmetics that make the game more immersive or to just look cool while sailing the seas.

    Unfortunately, the issue that arises with random players being placed into the same session is that there's a high chance of shenanigans ensuing that either put an end to my enjoyment of an activity immediately, or require me to go out of my way (spending additional time and effort I'd rather dedicate to the core interests I have) to avoid them.

    I don't think Passive Mode would work in Sea of Thieves, it doesn't even work in GTA Online. It's a mediocre effort to give players an out when dealing with griefers (better solved jumping servers).

  • @cotu42 said in [Mega Thread] PvP and PvE Playstyle Discussion:

    @gtothefo

    Wait you actually know about the taxonomy of player types and multiple of the models... yet make assumptions that most people are like you? Why are you refusing to provide any foundation for your own arguments, you actually seem to know a thing or two? Regardless of which model you want to apply, as I also indicate that people shift around consistently unlike Bartle's model would allow (one of its core weaknesses). The standpoint I am making is that people will make a menu choice if offered that suits their motivational profile of that moment the most. If the modes compete directly with each other instead of complimenting them, people will use them specifically for different needs and no longer use the Adventure mode for them. The goal of the Sea of Thieves is to create a shared world environment, a true PvEvP world. A place where regardless of what are your intrinsic motivational factors are that you meet, clash and play together, where you interact with other styles and where people create the stories and content.

    Because I don't believe that the issue is one of player taxonomy, I think that its one of long term player capture and endowed loss. Things like player taxonomy are useful for categorising the likely demographic of a game before launch, less so for tweaking the behaviour of that demographic once the game is established. All evidence of examinations of Bartle and similar programs show that, for example, explorers simply don't buy and engage with MMOs. There are many people who ask why players who didn't want a PvPvE experience bought a PvPvE game, and I think the issue there is not that those players are explorer types but that they cleave much more closely to a Social type and that the current balance of the game is leading to a lack of long term capture of those types of player.

    As I said, the more interesting models to relate to Sea of Thieves are those that result from endowed rewards and Nash's equilibrium in relation to the Hawks Vs Doves problem. The population that join the game are largely already self selected out and away from the general population of standard taxonomies anyway. The issue is that over time a Hawks Vs Doves population in a fixed iterative system tends towards the Nash equilibrium of an all Hawk population, which will kill the game. A tig-for-tat response can be attempted in a system where probability of success is fixed at start and rounds are iterative but unfixed, but that's not the model that fits to Sea Of Thieves. As such, in order to keep the population stable there needs to be more to retain and long term capture Dove or Tig-for-tat playstyles of Social taxonomy players. A big driver for such players away from long term capture is then the endowed loss that is contained within the system, something that is a constant and well replicated player drive away from perfect rationality that we can see from situations such as the Monty Hall Problem. Sea Of Thieves creates a far greater sense of endowed loss for PvE leaning players than PvP leaning players, thereby driving the game more quickly towards the possibility of a destructive Nash equilibrium within the player population.

    Its not that I'm unaware of the underlying game design and game theory models involved, its that I don't think your chosen models accurately or usefully model the issues that are being discussed.

    You claim that the seas are not friendly enough and most interactions are that of a foe, while my argument is that it is mainly dependent on the one initiating the interaction. The fact is that most friendly crews do not go out of their way to reach out to others, they stick around with their crew and mind their own business. The ratio of these interactions by default will therefore be more in favor of that of the foe, as those people consistently go out of their way to initiate interactions. Also the response of the crew that one roles up on is of utmost importance. Are they standing there, prepared or are they an easy target because they are caught out of position or do they open fire straight away? There is an innate risk of making contact with another crew, there is the mystery of how they will respond to you and your plea of friendly interaction.

    My point is more that the friendly interactions available lack sufficient interesting and emergent results to capture long term Social players. The current interactions are generally too binary and, in so far as the rewards that such players are actually seeking, too low reward.

    You believe that the current rewards are built towards being aggressive, while the actual most lucrative thing you can do is to be friendly and create an alliance, then go your separate ways. The non-aggressive rewards are far higher over a longer period of time than any short term gain of the aggressive pirate, unless you find a ship that is stacking up on loot or those that are totally unprepared for it. Yet this is not where in my idea the issue comes from. The reward in this game is cosmetic, many pirates have more than enough of it just sitting there and earning more or less is with the inflation that Rare added non-sensical. Sure novelties like a race or the exchange of maps, might add a little bit but isn't far reaching enough. We have some of these aspects and yet rarely to never see them.

    The issue though is not the direct loot reward of such exchanges but the spread of emergent and experiential rewards available in those interactions. I agree that the few additions I suggested aren't sufficiently varied and far reaching enough, but they would at least mean that each non-combat player encounter had a range of direct possible results. Alliancing and then going your separate ways can result in high yield loot rewards, but it doesn't result in a range of direct and emergent behaviours. The true reward in those instances shouldn't be the loot that results and the cosmetics that can be bought from them, but the new and direct interactions that result. Racing isn't the most thrilling thing in the world, but its something new that can result from an interaction. I agree that the exchange of maps is a minor option, but emergently it can result in a network of players organically exchanging information across a server. My trading a map with one player is a minor interaction, but when that map then gets traded three or four times across multiple players, when information about the nature of various encounters available on a particular server begin to build, those are the sort of emergent behaviours that create a deeper and more textured world.

    If you ask me the 2 main issues with the division of friendly/foe division is that first of all the friendly people don't need other crews by a long shot. Even as a solo the game has become overall easier and easier to do from a PVE perspective, in a crew it is nearly laughable. There is very little to fear or is hard to defeat with a single crew or even a single pirate. Most of the content scales, so sloop, brig or galleon it doesn't really matter. Rare has gone with the approach that every crew has to be able to single handedly be able to do everything in the game, to avoid content of being extremely hard to complete and motivation people to find people to do it with. If legendary voyages would actually be a challenge, if epic bosses would be available to summon but super demanding and difficult to do with a single crew. Maybe we would have some motivation to actually team up with other crews, but then again people might just not do it at all because of the fact that it would require friendly interaction with strangers.

    I do fundamentally agree, but I think that the nature of players is that however difficult you make it, people will find ways to deal with difficulty. Skill and tenacity is pretty much infinitely scalable, whereas encounters that flat out need a stranger to trigger can create that sort of interaction with a zero scale in difficulty. Pretty much whatever inherent difficulty increase is offered in the PvE areas, someone will learn to beat it solo. Ironically, the game offers solo scalable difficulty far more easily than team scalable difficulty, as a solo player emergent difficulty is fairly easily found by just manning a larger ship solo while with a crew it tops out pretty fast. Catching a Battlegill while soloing a Galleon is a task of pretty insane difficulty.

    The second issue is that there is a severe lack in the willingness of people to talk in the game. Xbox parties aren't even able to hear you talk to them if you try. The amount of silent, mute crews you meet on the seas is astonishing. Silent pirates cannot be trusted and no friendly interaction can take place.

    I agree with this also. Most PC players I know actually use things like skype to communicate and shut off the in game coms totally to avoid other players hearing them when they don't want them to. Again, I think that a little bit of training in the use of things like the loudhailer in an extended Maiden Voyage would be a big help here and clearer boundaries for players interacting with NPCs. I think that a more solid range of hailing options and a clearer set of communication flags for people and a bit of training in using them would help here. As with real ships it should be possible to spot someone with a telescope and see that they intend to communicate by signal flags rather than sort of having it sprung on players when the communication is intiated. I also think that long periods without interaction result in players forgetting how to even use those modes and weirdly result in people panicking when someone actually attempts to talk to them.

    The developers need to create a motivation within the game to team up with others, currently if you want to be non-aggressive... the best course of action is to just simply mind your own business and ignore everyone else. There is no motivation or urgency to create player bonds outside of some of the events, even those that have everyone rush to the same islands creates more friendly encounters by sheer I don't want to fight, but want to do the event.

    Again, I think this is something that most players would love to see. One of the things that is a shame about the events is that they also offer an easy gathering point for more FPS leaning players, when the most recent event launched for the first day the Lagoon seemed to be turned into a mini FPS arena. Something that I think would be interesting would be an event where the more players who engage with it the more valuable the rewards became. At the moment if five players interact with an event that drops five pieces of treasure my reward is significantly lower than if I solo it, which makes sense to a degree for a static scale with difficulty. Conversely, if there were a treasure where it were multiplied in value by how many different players turned in the same treasure as you within a set time of your turning it in, or if turned in at various different Outposts in the same window, it would really push players to more organically seek allegiances. I'd personally love to see five different players from five different sloops come together for a challenge, figure out who was taking which chest to which Outpost and then check watches to decide on a time to turn in and then scattering in five different directions to achieve a five Outpost simultaneous turn in.

  • @limend said in [Mega Thread] PvP and PvE Playstyle Discussion:

    Veterans who don't like PvP aspect would not play weakly if they didn't like the PvP aspect game is almost 3y old already (2.5rn?) Also how many people in Percentage iw would like to know? and how many of players with +100h or +1000h? Mostly of people i see my self wanting PvE more are players with less than 100h. They bought game with PvP in it why complain? Also would you rather keep players who like the game as it is and LOVE it or people who want you to change almost the core mechanic of the whole game for what? what insures they keep playing after that and wont get bored? that definitely didn't happen for most of the community

    I don't know if it counts as veteran, but I'm over 100 hours and I still engage with the PvE side far more than the PvP side, at least directly. I think the important issue is that to retain the players who love it and love the PvP side of things there needs to be a degree of retention of players who prefer the PvE side of the game. The issue is that if its true that players who hit 1000 hrs plus do start to trend towards PvP players then over time the game is going to accumulate more and more PvP leaning players within the overall population. If the game is built for a balance of PvE and PvP leaning players in the population then as the game ages something needs to be done to adjust that trend otherwise the very players who love the game might find that as the population trend changes the game they love changes also.

  • @cdr-alfonso I don't know if I'm a veteran in the game, but I'm feeling like a veteran of this thread, so I'll take a shot at responding to your question.

    Essentially there's a split over the effect that people think a PvE server with progression would have on the "ecosystem" of the game. In general terms there seem to be two fundamental positions:

    1. A PvE server would result in players splitting their play time between the two servers, PvE when they want to pick up loot and progress within the game, and PvPvE only when they want to engage in aggression with other players. Since the PvPvE server would then only have players attacking other players there would be no actual reward to attacking them, since they would never have picked anything up from PvE, PvP leaning players would just leave the game. Since PvE content runs out eventually even in the biggest world Rare would either need to massively turn up their rate of updates or eventually the PvE servers would die too and the game would be left as some sort of ghost town.

    2. The actual majority of players are those who enjoy engaging in PvPvE play, they find it fun to run in a chest under fire even when they have no intention at all of engaging in PvP play, which is why they bought a PvPvE game. Sometimes though they're just not in the mood for that, or have playtime windows so small that they can't engage with the game when there's a risk of a PvP encounter adding an unpredictable amount of additional playtime onto a session. Players would therefore continue to play in the PvPvE server at roughly the same rate they do now, just that the PvE server would let them play the game when they currently don't play it, actually upping the amount of clocked playtime in the game overall.

    The truth is probably somewhere between the two, and in actuality even most of the PvE server leaning players aren't in favour of a full adventure mode version of the main game, but rather something to some degree reduced or altered to answer some of the specific chill out/time limited needs without risking a drain on the overall game player population balance.

  • @cdr-alfonso

    There is the issue, you're not interested (find it a boring hurdle/inconvenience) in what is the core intent of the SoT's design.

    For example, take Escape from Tarkov, which is essentially an online survival BR style game. I have very little interest in BR game modes, however the aspect of scavenging/surviving in a game does appeal to me. However as the core intent of the design, is the multiplayer online BR survival, then I simply don't play it. I don't ask the developers to introduce a mode which would allow me to play an aspect of their game, ignoring what they designed the game to be, because I'm not interested interested in the core design intent.

    This is why alot of the responses on 'PvE Only' requests are simply you have bought the wrong game and SoT isn't for you.

    I'm not for one minute suggesting that you shouldn't play the game how you want to play, I'm a more PvE player myself. However what I disagree with is that the core design of the game should be changed to suit some of the player base. I've no issues if a player want's to spend all day fishing because that's what they enjoy about SoT, but why should the player who enjoy's the PvP Element, be punished by allowing a percentage of player base to 'Hide Away' in PvE Servers.

    I do find some elements of the PvP myself very frustrating, but I also appreciate that the randomness that comes with other players being on the same server is what makes each session different.

  • @gtothefo

    You've done well to summarize what I've gathered based on this thread. I agree with that assessment as to what the positions appear to be. I address in my original post the inherent issue with arguing the first fundamental position - that this race to a ghost town is likely to occur eventually if people who don't want to PvP at all eventually leave because they are tired with the game as it is. In terms of how the addition of a private server would affect the game, I'm not sure how it would affect the game any differently to the way it works on Elite: Dangerous unless the analogy doesn't fit for a reason that's escaping me right now.

    and @Iceman-D18

    Lets put aside what original developer intent is for a game, given that this is not indicative of future development of a game (see how Fortnite went from survival zombie game to battle royale super phenomenon).

    You suggest that somehow it is punishing a player who enjoys the player vs player element of this game for the people who don't enjoy it at all to be able to play on their own (not hide, that's already being done by these players on adventure servers) is somehow punishing them.
    Personally (aside from not enjoying how the pvp works to begin with), I don't see the interest in fighting players who are very much not up for a fight? The player, if they're not interested at all, is completely capable of just sailing off into the shroud at the edge of the map and there's nothing the attacker can really do but waste their own time. Then perhaps you enjoy attacking a player who's not expecting the fight coming, like, jumping them while they're unprepared. That's not exactly a fight either is it?

    I struggle to understand the position that someone who enjoys the PvP wouldn't enjoy a server where everyone else wants to PvP as well? Why must there be unwilling participants for them to enjoy themselves? How does it punish them to make all their 'targets' willing participants?
    And before someone raises the idea of "but if everyone's fighting no one is generating loot"; okay, but as already my experience at this point, making money isn't the point once you've got the cosmetics you like... it's the rep and commendations is it not?
    Finally, given the suggestion floating out on this thread that 'well PvE players on a private server should just get enjoyment out of the activities and not get any progression'; that can be reversed to say, 'well PvP players, if the servers were full of only PvP players should just get enjoyment out of the PvPing'.

    A lot of what I've read on this thread seems to indicate to me that a good portion of players that have been playing for a while derive enjoyment of jumping newer or unexpecting crews so that the odds are always so in their favour the risk to themselves is at virtually nullified. (My experience with the players who have gone after me has been that they'll either; blitz while docked, at an outpost or island - can't do much about it playing solo, then if chased for revenge they'll just run - not interested in a fair fight. On other occasions, we've been attacked without an emissary flag up with no loot on board while still preparing to set sail minutes after spawning.)

  • @gtothefo With that sentence i meant that how many percentages would want PvE mode not how many percentages prefer PvP over PvE. But how many would be willing to change core mechanics of the game. Sorry for not explaining that more clearly.

  • @cdr-alfonso

    Why should we put aside the original developer intent? Because it doesn't suit your arguement? Granted that games like Fortnite have changed from what they were originally, but that was during the early life cycle of the game/Beta testing stages.

    SoT has been out for a few years and fundementally the core design/concept hasn't changed (as in it's a session based, PvPvE experience). Why after 2 years should they change that philosphy? They have been clear over the past 2 years that they want a PvPvE experience.

    I'm suggesting by allowing a percentage of the player-base to move to seperate servers takes away from those who want to play the game as designed. The more players that are playing on the adventure servers, means the more full servers there are, meaning there is more interaction between crews (be that friendly or hostile) thus ensuring the continuation of the randomness.

    You mention that a counter arguement is that if everyone is PvP then no loot is being generated, but why should that matter to a PvP player? Well players who engage in PvP might do it to get loot from other players, it is a pirate game. Pirates steal. Players may get the same satisfaction from stealing loot as you do going digging it up etc. So there still needs to be loot to be generated. Again why should someone's experience be dimished by reducing the oppurtunities for stealing?

    You also note that you have been sunk at an outpost/island? What if the ship that sunk you wanted to go to that outpost/island? They understand that another player is a risk, so they removed that risk from their game. Now I do agree that there are a few people who's sole purpose is to just go and sink other ships for no other reason apart from that's what they want to do. They don't take the treasure, they aren't concerned with commendations, but they want to sink other ships. That is how they want to play the game and that's OK.

    PvE Only players often make out like they are being hard done to....'I want to do x without being sunk' when they have the same risks as every single other player. Someone who goes around the map sinking other players has exactly the same risks as someone who wants to go around digging up chests. The only difference is the one who goes around sinking other ships has gained skills in combat through experience to defend themselves against these risk.

    Don't want to be attacked at an Island - Don't dock there if there is any ship on the horizon, if the horizon is clear, keep checking whilst on the island and don't stay for too long?

    Don't want to lose 3 hours worth of loot? - Turn in more often - value of a Captains chest is still the same whether you sell it straight away or if you sell 20 of them at the end (Emissary is different - Risk/Reward)

    Fundementally the issue is PvE Players want their own 'Space' so they don't have to adapt to what is a challenging environment out on the seas.

  • @iceman-d18 In response to the question of what PvE leaning players are looking for in relation to a more PvE based mode of the game, largely its about a more controlled unpredictability, if that's not too much of an oxymoron.

    So, one of the big issues that some people have with PvP is that it makes the play time of a session much harder to pin down in relation to what can be achieved, which is a big issue for people with more limited time windows. If players have penciled out a reasonable window of play time and then realize that they have to deal with a PvP encounter, that can add on a chunk of time which means that they can't turn in their progress even if they come out victorious in the encounter or circle around it. Planning in for such encounters when they don't then arrive can result in potentially wasting chunks of play time. Instead if there were a PvE option, even a limited one, those smaller bits of play time could still be spent in a world that people enjoy, instead of being filled in by lesser games, and then when they have a more flexible or just far longer session available they can enjoy the full feast of Sea of Thieves.

    The other area is where players just want to take the pressure off a little bit. They want to just chill out in world that they enjoy, let the tides of the game pull them around, but fundamentally, choose to engage with what they want to engage with. PvE events are fundamentally passive and will leave you alone if you don't engage with them. Conversely, PvP encounters are inherently more pro-active in their engagement with you, they can and will hunt you out in a way that the PvE encounters really don't. One of the issues with responding "why did such people buy a PvEvP game?" is that generally, they're fine with the nature of the PvP coming for them, but sometimes, for some sessions, they'd just like a little room to take their foot of the gas. If they don't have that option from Sea Of Thieves then they will play whatever game does give them that option more and more and Sea Of Thieves less and less over time. These aren't people who hate Sea Of Thieves and bought it by accident, they're people who like Sea Of Thieves and want the Sea Of Thieves experience broadened to include a wider range of their play experiences.

    One question is why should the balance change within the game over time. PvP leaning player retention goes on for longer than PvE leaning player retention. As such, a game which had a 50/50 balance, or whatever the balance was on launch day will see a drift towards a PvP leaning population over time. Therefore, to retain the vision that was intended of the population balance on the day of launch, something will need to be done to create better PvE retention over time. There are a range of things that can be done to achieve this, an extended Maiden Voyage with actually worthwhile training should result in greater early retention generally, but probably more PvE leaning players. Alternative play modes should lead to greater mid-term retention and additional content should lead to greater long-term retention. Part of the point is that it may well be possible that to maintain the original developer intent that the game will need to be tweaked in some way or another.

    I'm not certain that a flat full PvE mode is the way to do that, to be clear, but I also think its likely that it would be a good idea for something to be done.

  • @gtothefo said in [Mega Thread] PvP and PvE Playstyle Discussion:

    @cotu42 said in [Mega Thread] PvP and PvE Playstyle Discussion:

    @gtothefo

    Wait you actually know about the taxonomy of player types and multiple of the models... yet make assumptions that most people are like you? Why are you refusing to provide any foundation for your own arguments, you actually seem to know a thing or two? Regardless of which model you want to apply, as I also indicate that people shift around consistently unlike Bartle's model would allow (one of its core weaknesses). The standpoint I am making is that people will make a menu choice if offered that suits their motivational profile of that moment the most. If the modes compete directly with each other instead of complimenting them, people will use them specifically for different needs and no longer use the Adventure mode for them. The goal of the Sea of Thieves is to create a shared world environment, a true PvEvP world. A place where regardless of what are your intrinsic motivational factors are that you meet, clash and play together, where you interact with other styles and where people create the stories and content.

    Because I don't believe that the issue is one of player taxonomy, I think that its one of long term player capture and endowed loss. Things like player taxonomy are useful for categorising the likely demographic of a game before launch, less so for tweaking the behaviour of that demographic once the game is established. All evidence of examinations of Bartle and similar programs show that, for example, explorers simply don't buy and engage with MMOs. There are many people who ask why players who didn't want a PvPvE experience bought a PvPvE game, and I think the issue there is not that those players are explorer types but that they cleave much more closely to a Social type and that the current balance of the game is leading to a lack of long term capture of those types of player.

    As I said, the more interesting models to relate to Sea of Thieves are those that result from endowed rewards and Nash's equilibrium in relation to the Hawks Vs Doves problem. The population that join the game are largely already self selected out and away from the general population of standard taxonomies anyway. The issue is that over time a Hawks Vs Doves population in a fixed iterative system tends towards the Nash equilibrium of an all Hawk population, which will kill the game. A tig-for-tat response can be attempted in a system where probability of success is fixed at start and rounds are iterative but unfixed, but that's not the model that fits to Sea Of Thieves. As such, in order to keep the population stable there needs to be more to retain and long term capture Dove or Tig-for-tat playstyles of Social taxonomy players. A big driver for such players away from long term capture is then the endowed loss that is contained within the system, something that is a constant and well replicated player drive away from perfect rationality that we can see from situations such as the Monty Hall Problem. Sea Of Thieves creates a far greater sense of endowed loss for PvE leaning players than PvP leaning players, thereby driving the game more quickly towards the possibility of a destructive Nash equilibrium within the player population.

    Its not that I'm unaware of the underlying game design and game theory models involved, its that I don't think your chosen models accurately or usefully model the issues that are being discussed.

    Thank you, this was an interesting read and shows more where you are coming from. You view it more from the long term perspective with the two opposing strategies, of which one will eventually overwhelm the other (for those that don't know the Hawks vs Doves). While in my view the main demographic of the game are those that switch between these two strategies those have the tig-for-tat mentality and the lack of a PvE mode keeps it from going to far to one side. The world lends itself towards that shift of players between the strategies and the balance it creates, by not offering the PVE to have a world suited for themselves.

    In terms of the balancing I do believe some work can be done, as I do agree with that there isn't much for the social type, as it relies too heavily upon them to create it themselves and lack of extrinsic motivational factors to stimulate it. Yet the greater sense of endowed loss is where I believe the game actually doesn't do a bad job, especially if you compare it to the PvEvP genre in general. Yes PVE will always have a greater sense of it, but the pure brutality of these losses are really minimal and largely in control of the crew out doing the PvE added in the horizontal nature and the session based premise it doesn't feel brutal to me. Yet I also come from a preference for the PvEvP genre, where most losses are way more devastating than anything this game can create and also believe that PVP players are more accustomed to losing in general. I am not sure how the Monty Hall problem comes into the equation here though.

    In regards to the Nash equilibrium, is where I believe your skills as a negotiator and your positioning comes into play. It is also why I think that the social aspect relies too much upon the players execution and intrinsic motivation to do it. Currently to have someone swap strategy, you have to be very convincing that it is the best course of action for them. How to negotiate from a power position and usually being the one that approaches the other, convincing a party that is on the offensive strategy is far more difficult than one that has alternative goals as well. It isn't impossible, yet it is the most difficult skillset to learn because of the lack of motivational factors in the game to help you in that negotiation.

    I don't believe that the requests for PvE servers are heavily coming from the long time players, but mainly from players that came into the game with wrong expectations, as I do believe people do not grasp the PvEvP concept, as it is a less explored and more niche market in general - so many people come in without understanding it. Rare is trying to mainstream the concept. Even among MMO's there are few that are really PvEvP and those that are tend to be brutally punishing when you lose. The natural selection process is less strong than in other PvEvP games because of this, I believe and is why I am more inclined to look at the player types. The others that request it are those unwilling to master their own strategy or play around the PvP element of the game. To be honest the PvE side has way more control than people give it credit, if played properly.

    You claim that the seas are not friendly enough and most interactions are that of a foe, while my argument is that it is mainly dependent on the one initiating the interaction. The fact is that most friendly crews do not go out of their way to reach out to others, they stick around with their crew and mind their own business. The ratio of these interactions by default will therefore be more in favor of that of the foe, as those people consistently go out of their way to initiate interactions. Also the response of the crew that one roles up on is of utmost importance. Are they standing there, prepared or are they an easy target because they are caught out of position or do they open fire straight away? There is an innate risk of making contact with another crew, there is the mystery of how they will respond to you and your plea of friendly interaction.

    My point is more that the friendly interactions available lack sufficient interesting and emergent results to capture long term Social players. The current interactions are generally too binary and, in so far as the rewards that such players are actually seeking, too low reward.

    I don't necessarily believe that the rewards being to low in terms of gold/reputation or that it is that binary if you are actively playing in a social manner. The issue lies more in my opinion that there is nearly no need for it from either end. Alliances are one of the most lucrative aspects you can do in the game, yet there is no reason other than the coin/reputation rewards to do it. The benefit or necessity to group together and work together towards a common goal is non-existent even for pirates that aren't very good.

    You believe that the current rewards are built towards being aggressive, while the actual most lucrative thing you can do is to be friendly and create an alliance, then go your separate ways. The non-aggressive rewards are far higher over a longer period of time than any short term gain of the aggressive pirate, unless you find a ship that is stacking up on loot or those that are totally unprepared for it. Yet this is not where in my idea the issue comes from. The reward in this game is cosmetic, many pirates have more than enough of it just sitting there and earning more or less is with the inflation that Rare added non-sensical. Sure novelties like a race or the exchange of maps, might add a little bit but isn't far reaching enough. We have some of these aspects and yet rarely to never see them.

    The issue though is not the direct loot reward of such exchanges but the spread of emergent and experiential rewards available in those interactions. I agree that the few additions I suggested aren't sufficiently varied and far reaching enough, but they would at least mean that each non-combat player encounter had a range of direct possible results. Alliancing and then going your separate ways can result in high yield loot rewards, but it doesn't result in a range of direct and emergent behaviours. The true reward in those instances shouldn't be the loot that results and the cosmetics that can be bought from them, but the new and direct interactions that result. Racing isn't the most thrilling thing in the world, but its something new that can result from an interaction. I agree that the exchange of maps is a minor option, but emergently it can result in a network of players organically exchanging information across a server. My trading a map with one player is a minor interaction, but when that map then gets traded three or four times across multiple players, when information about the nature of various encounters available on a particular server begin to build, those are the sort of emergent behaviours that create a deeper and more textured world.

    Oh, I would love more of these little niche things. I don't believe that they shouldn't be added, yet I also don't believe they will have much impact upon the overall balance. These type of things make the world in general more interesting and I believe that is always a good thing in games.

    If you ask me the 2 main issues with the division of friendly/foe division is that first of all the friendly people don't need other crews by a long shot. Even as a solo the game has become overall easier and easier to do from a PVE perspective, in a crew it is nearly laughable. There is very little to fear or is hard to defeat with a single crew or even a single pirate. Most of the content scales, so sloop, brig or galleon it doesn't really matter. Rare has gone with the approach that every crew has to be able to single handedly be able to do everything in the game, to avoid content of being extremely hard to complete and motivation people to find people to do it with. If legendary voyages would actually be a challenge, if epic bosses would be available to summon but super demanding and difficult to do with a single crew. Maybe we would have some motivation to actually team up with other crews, but then again people might just not do it at all because of the fact that it would require friendly interaction with strangers.

    I do fundamentally agree, but I think that the nature of players is that however difficult you make it, people will find ways to deal with difficulty. Skill and tenacity is pretty much infinitely scalable, whereas encounters that flat out need a stranger to trigger can create that sort of interaction with a zero scale in difficulty. Pretty much whatever inherent difficulty increase is offered in the PvE areas, someone will learn to beat it solo. Ironically, the game offers solo scalable difficulty far more easily than team scalable difficulty, as a solo player emergent difficulty is fairly easily found by just manning a larger ship solo while with a crew it tops out pretty fast. Catching a Battlegill while soloing a Galleon is a task of pretty insane difficulty.

    Well my argument isn't that it won't be possible at all. I am one of these insanely stubborn players that will go at it for hours solo to eventually beat it. Yet if it is sufficiently difficult that grouping up actually makes sense and social interactions are desirable to engage with the gameplay and defeat the boss in a more timely manner. Where sure the highest skilled or stubborn people might still do it solo, but more people would be open to doing it together. Currently everything is so easy that it is far more a liability than not.

    Sure, using a galleon as a solo is more difficult... yet that is more self-inflicted than anything else. I really haven't enjoyed the scalability in difficulty, as someone that enjoyed the tenacity and skill required to do those things in the past as a solo. I think overall the approach of everyone should be able to do it by themselves hurts the game more than it helps. It actually makes the more aggressive strategy stronger overall in my opinion.

    The second issue is that there is a severe lack in the willingness of people to talk in the game. Xbox parties aren't even able to hear you talk to them if you try. The amount of silent, mute crews you meet on the seas is astonishing. Silent pirates cannot be trusted and no friendly interaction can take place.

    I agree with this also. Most PC players I know actually use things like skype to communicate and shut off the in game coms totally to avoid other players hearing them when they don't want them to. Again, I think that a little bit of training in the use of things like the loudhailer in an extended Maiden Voyage would be a big help here and clearer boundaries for players interacting with NPCs. I think that a more solid range of hailing options and a clearer set of communication flags for people and a bit of training in using them would help here. As with real ships it should be possible to spot someone with a telescope and see that they intend to communicate by signal flags rather than sort of having it sprung on players when the communication is intiated. I also think that long periods without interaction result in players forgetting how to even use those modes and weirdly result in people panicking when someone actually attempts to talk to them.

    Yeah anything to help communication between crews would be great. A correction I would like to make in regards to PC players, yes they use discord and such to communicate and not hot mic it up, but they always still hear and are able to use the game coms at the same time. I played a bit with Xbox parties with some of the Xbox players I know and it is insane how much less friendly interactions we would have had if I wasn't on PC and couldn't have been able to hear and use the in-game coms. Like me having to tell my crew to not attack, because they seem cool and are reaching out to use over voice coms. It helped me develop my negotiation skills on the seas quite a bit, as I was the only one that could negotiate in the crew.

    The developers need to create a motivation within the game to team up with others, currently if you want to be non-aggressive... the best course of action is to just simply mind your own business and ignore everyone else. There is no motivation or urgency to create player bonds outside of some of the events, even those that have everyone rush to the same islands creates more friendly encounters by sheer I don't want to fight, but want to do the event.

    Again, I think this is something that most players would love to see. One of the things that is a shame about the events is that they also offer an easy gathering point for more FPS leaning players, when the most recent event launched for the first day the Lagoon seemed to be turned into a mini FPS arena. Something that I think would be interesting would be an event where the more players who engage with it the more valuable the rewards became. At the moment if five players interact with an event that drops five pieces of treasure my reward is significantly lower than if I solo it, which makes sense to a degree for a static scale with difficulty. Conversely, if there were a treasure where it were multiplied in value by how many different players turned in the same treasure as you within a set time of your turning it in, or if turned in at various different Outposts in the same window, it would really push players to more organically seek allegiances. I'd personally love to see five different players from five different sloops come together for a challenge, figure out who was taking which chest to which Outpost and then check watches to decide on a time to turn in and then scattering in five different directions to achieve a five Outpost simultaneous turn in.

    Yes, I do believe many would like to see more reasons to cooperate especially in terms of gameplay within the PvEvP world and that it would benefit the community overall.

  • @Iceman-D18

    We put aside the original intent because the developer may be interested in expanding its player attraction, or adapt the game as it grows older and populations change within it. They added Arena which is in itself a change from the original game is it not? The Maiden Voyage also doesn't fit into the original intent, woe is me there's no pirates to screw you over on that starting island!

    You've presented to me little reason beyond "that's how the game is, deal with it", which isn't conducive to discussion on whether or not a private server with progression would be good or bad for the game. Server sizes as is are 6 ships (6-24 players); surely you're not suggesting that with such small servers you're going to end up with a bunch of empty servers if you allow players who do not wish to partake in the PvP of this game to go do their own thing - which you are suggesting they do by telling them they shouldn't have bought the game in the first place.

    In some ways, it seems you have little confidence in the attraction of a PvPvE experience that you believe the loss of people completely disinterested in PvE would lead to a death of the Adventure mode as it is. As has been admitted to by plenty of people on this discussion, people would still engage in the PvE on the Adventure mode because they enjoy the spice of player interaction - similarly to why people still play Open mode on Elite Dangerous.

    Again, you're referring to people who just want to do their own thing without having to deal with the whole player aspect (which can be admittedly un-fun and a bad experience for some people) in a derisive way. You're inches away from making the 'git gud' argument; which also wouldn't mean much in the first place. If you're solo, there's only so much time you can dedicate to watching the horizon (during which you give up partaking in other parts of the game you prefer), so eventually you're going to get jumped. In fact, you're likely going to get jumped by a crew double your own, or even greater. It doesn't really matter how good you are, and chances are, as a newer player, they'll be better than you. So it's not going to be a fair fight and you're likely going to lose.

    Your argument in this case seems to be "the point of the game is that at random intervals you just get to lose any progress you haven't saved yet". See, that's not enjoyable to me and realistically, had I known how prevalent this sort of player interaction would be, I probably wouldn't have bought the game in the first place.

    Very little in the game's advertising explicitly talks of how important or great the PvP element of the world is, it's more of an off-hand comment or implied. The actual game is very clearly geared to get people engaged in a wide variety of other activities - with the threat of other players. There's no change in the core design to make private servers where you could engaged without that threat if that's your preference.

    Consider that in terms of benefits (loot-wise), the best course of action is to form alliances. So I presume people out fighting other players are interested in fighting other players for the sake of it (whether to steal or kill plainly). Why can't they do that to other players who actually wouldn't mind partaking in it too? I don't believe a private server would diminish the experience that much at all - as demonstrated by other games that have similar gameplay.

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