There needs to be a risk attached to PVP'ing

@mostlyjustokay said in There needs to be a risk attached to PVP'ing:

If the PvE player loses nothing when their ship sinks then why do people complain about over-aggressive PvP. It sucks to get sunk and lose an hour's worth of tedious fetch quests, whether or not the fight was fun.

Because they are viewing the progression system as important and failing to understand the games PvE was intended to be mixed with PvP. Everyone is playing the same game and its find or steal loot then defend that loot from other players while mixing in interesting social interactions.

< In a perfect world, everybody would just say "ha ha, good show" and shrug off the loss. But that's not this world and it's not how this game is designed.

That's completely how the game is designed. Nothing persists across games apart from cosmetics which aren't important goals but they are nice to have as you'll naturally just acquire more as you play the game.

They designed a gold grind that turns all treasure into a vague number and gated all the progression (even though it's horizontal) behind prices that are impossible to connect to the treasure. What do sails cost? 70 fancy chests? Around 200 c**p chests? How many chickens does it take to go from 35 to 36? It's all disconnected from treasure.
What it is connected to is time. It takes forever. So when you lose treasure, you lose time.

Yes, you can get satisfaction from collecting loot and successfully defend it. However unsuccessfully defending it costs time, because that is the only thing that connects treasure to the only progression (gold/rep level) in the game.

It's not a gold grind. Treating it as such is detrimental to the experience. Again this mentality is taught by OTHER games. You're supposed to just play and have fun. The game is completely designed that way where losing to other players does not halt any meaningful progression. You're arguing that the progression is somehow paramount based on expectations that aren't even set in this game. Your entire argument here falls apart because you can't argue there is a problem with PvP because the rewards are meaningless in one context while arguing incredibly important in another. Either people can play and progress naturally or the game is set up to grind to the top to wear as many dresses as possible as they give advantages over other players.

If you personally don't care about your gold/rep level getting sunk costs nothing. That's fine. But for most players, it leads to an imbalance when you run into a player more interested in sea combat than the only character progression system in the game.

It's not imbalanced... you're supposed to be able to lose chests... its part of the gameplay. Again your argument is built on the premise that the game is pushing players to believe the progression systems are super important in the game... when everything mechanically would contradict your premise.

The person interested in combat gains nothing, maybe your treasure if you have it, and loses nothing at all since they got the combat they were after. The person interested in progress on the only progression system in the game gains nothing if they win, unless the aggressor has treasure, and loses the time spent trying to make progress on, again, the only progression system in the game.

It feels unfair, and it feels bad.

And again your measuring things differently there are people that want to progress that engage in both PvE and PvP... they lose the same thing when they lose chests acquired through either, and gain the same thing by getting chests through either. The people only doing PvP... who cares? If you lose your chest its all the same regardless of motivation. Its intended by the game. And you haven't lost anything tangible so you should at least attempt to defend the chests because you might... gasp have a bit of fun in the process of losing everything and may even succeed exploiting a mistake the enemy crew makes.

@northernmonkey0 said in There needs to be a risk attached to PVP'ing:

I think one option is to introduce bounty as another mission type almost. But this would require ship names to display, which I do want to happen.

For example you go to the tavern, there's a notice up with bounties listing ship memes and amounts and last known location (e.g. The Jolly Roger, reward for capture 1000 gold, wanted for stealing loot from NorthernMonkey0. Last spotted near Shipwreck Bay.)

If you want to claim it you have to accept, go find it based on nothing more than that information. With a notification if the bounty expires (e.g. The wanted ship leaves the server). Upon sinking the ships you maybe collect the captains log (an item floating among the barrels) and return to any outpost to claim.

Thoughts?

It's a great idea. Matches my own thinking.

@mostlyjustokay said in There needs to be a risk attached to PVP'ing:

I didn't buy Second Life I bought Sea of Thieves. I didn't buy it to ask people if I hurt them when I shot cannonballs at them and is it ok if I keep going? If I wanted a game that was about getting to know other people I'd restart WoW or something, I bought a pirate game so I could be a pirate. I didn't buy it so I could be a jerk by accident.

This is incredibly stupid and contradictory. You want to be a pirate but not a jerk? They are basically the same thing. Your supposed to steal from people in this game, which is basically being a jerk. If you feel bad because they aren't putting up a strong fight and don't want to crush their dreams... stop fighting. Its a much more elegant solution than the one you're proposing.

The game should help me do that without requiring that I stop being a pirate if it seems mean. Cause maybe I will, maybe I won't (yes, I know you always do); but we do know that a whole heck of a lot of people won't - and specifically look for opportunities to make other people's lives miserable. A reputation system won't get the worst of the worst, but it will reduce the anonymity (you'll know something about the person you're attacking) that makes it so easy to be a bully.

Why should the game help you? It gives you all the tools you need to investigate other players. Which.. is part of the game mechanics. Adding information about the player so you don't even have to attempt to bother them to figure out if they are worth your time is... removing the risk PvPers take when checking out other players. Because if you want a reward and you have to rub up against other players to see if its worth attacking, they can always preemptively attack and screw you over.

You didn't need it because you knew the players you were playing with already. I really wonder what internet you've been using the past 30 years to think that a "hey, there are no rules here and also you can kill the other people" wonderland would turn into some kind of adventure utopia and not Lord of the Flies. This is 2018 and this is the internet. Welcome, friend.

It turns into that all the time. I'm on a gank on site ship all the time and even we end up letting people go (its more convenient to take all their cannon balls that way), or work with someone to take out another galleon crew we just decided we liked less.

This is 2018 isn't even an argument.

Think of a reputation system like an icebreaker. Oh - that person is a low PvP rep and not likely to attack me, let's go say hello. Oh - that person is the legendary dread pirate whoever, he gets nothing for attacking me, lets go be fangirls. Oh - shoot, that sail means we either need to get moving or get ready. Hey - that person just picked up that treasure and we've got a favorable wind... they're about our level you wanna do this?

Because right now when you see a ship it's either: "RUN!!!!" or "FIGHT!!!!!"

Those are the two same things you'd do even with a rep system.. you just took a bunch of gameplay elements out to be able to make that decision significantly easier. The "logic" you went through would end in the same way. And it takes a bunch of unknowns and trepidation out of the picture. That's a legendary ship and we have f**k all.. let's kill him... or that's not a pvper so let's take his cannonballs... and kill him... or that guy might f**k us up... run away.

And you can.. observe other players and see if they are moving the sails, anchor stopping to try to gauge how hard it will be to take their s**t. Spy glass flashes show if they are looking at you more closely you might know they are interested in what you have or getting ready to run away.

Your information just makes it a lot easier to run or fight faster. And by putting any PvP exclusive reward system in place, there is no chance that the extreme people will stop gank on site tactics.. in fact it will likely pull more people in... because there will always be a benefit to gank on site tactics...

Also your argument here completely ignores your original premise that PvP is a problem because there is no risk and they just want to PvP for the sake of PvPing... this encourages that single minded "lets f**k s**t" up attitude even more.

I don't see how this segregates anybody in the least except that it takes a little bit of heat off of the people who don't enjoy PvP at all. Who will quit the game entirely if nothing happens. In fact it seems like you'd be more likely to have that social interaction and integration if there was some way to justify not shooting first at everybody you saw, which is the general experience for most players.

I have this idea that subtle will refocus PvP in a more closed loop and take some heat off of PvEers... but no no this doesn't work to segragate the experience at all! PvE'ers will just be more likely to get to PvE without any resistance from PvPers... thats all... no segragration... jut not mixing as much.

@mostlyjustokay said in There needs to be a risk attached to PVP'ing:

The point is to move away from gank-on-sight gameplay by offering diminishing to no rewards when encountering a ship well under your PvP ranking, and offering positive reinforcement for PvP with ships around your ability level. Why waste the cannonballs on a low level solo sloop well below your PvP reputation? You still could - if you were a jerk.

But you haven't done that at all.. you introduced an additional system that rewards PvP and there is no reason to not gank on site if you still want normal loot. You haven't taken that out of the game and if you do, your breaking the entire point of the game. Sail around, see a random ship, take there s**t or help them. If this was about who is better at sailing there would be well-structured PvP game modes with rankings.

The rest of your post is complete nonsense.

Seems like many people have never played a real MMO with true griefing before. I see that term get thrown around a lot here. I am just reading stories of people just upset about having to PVP and compete.

@mostlyjustokay said in There needs to be a risk attached to PVP'ing:

People don't generally engage in PvP hoping for a payday. It's a nice bonus, but it's not the motivation behind it.

PvP still happens with a rep system, it just incentivizes and encourages fairer PvP for those that are interested in it, that's literally it. You can still be the griefing jerk if you want to be, there's just nothing in it for you except the odd chest or chicken that might be on board.

Again this game isn't about setting up a fair face off for pvp. Otherwise, it would be structured as such. It's about seeing a random ship and having to make a decision based on the loot you have and the loot they might have.

You're saying that PvPers only PvP because they enjoy PvP and engage in it more. Yes... this is true, but then you lead to the assumption that that means the loot they get are meaningless because they enjoy PvP more. That is untrue. Yes, some people like action more then they like doing riddles... but nearly everyone grabs the loot when they can...

And now I'm done - thanks for trying to read and follow along as long as you did. Sorry it got hard for you.

It's not hard to understand. Your position is that your a jerk if you play the game the way its intended so let's redesign it so... the inevitable complaint that a "high level" player is attacking you when they shouldn't, will come next.

This game would do significantly better just making a behind the scenes skill matchmaking so new players stick with newer players.

@frunchtost The servers / gameplay don't support this though. There are 6 ships per server. You put up 10k, the bounty is on the best players on the server, even if you gang up them, they either best you or just run you in circles.

For this to work they need to move the total to 10-12 hips per server.

@mostlyjustokay said in There needs to be a risk attached to PVP'ing:

The more information an online multiplayer game gives you about another player the more likely you are to foster an environment that encourages communication and social behavior. The less information you have the more likely you are to foster an environment that inhibits communication and promotes anti-social behavior. This is not "game development 101," this is sociology 101. In a game that allows and encourages virtual violence between strangers, it would seem like that kind of science would be even more important here - unless rampant, unrestrained violence is the goal.

How? How does giving you information about a player make you want to communicate with them more?

There is a difference between society and gameplay. Yes some sociology matters but we all know we are playing by the same rules. This is not a microcosm of society where you don't know if we are all playing by the same rules.

The game sets up the same objectives for all players. Giving players enough information about how difficult it will be to take that loot from players would make it easier for some people to help, and some will gank more. Giving more players information will just allow them to decide whether or not it's worth attacking another player since its still a singularly focused objective... unless you want to play more socially, which you can easily communicate to other players.

@mostlyjustokay said in There needs to be a risk attached to PVP'ing:

Every server you log into is your first day of school, your first day on a new job, your first day on a new team, your first day at a camp, conference, or whatever. It's not by accident that nearly all of our human rituals that involve bringing anonymous strangers together begin with authority figures managing introductions of some kind. The game is our authority structure and yes, it should help us create some sort of a non-toxic social environment.

Because without that help, we already know what happens. There is no magic formula that Rare has discovered that will upend everything we know about social dynamics.

The game is an authority but not it only sets up the rules of the game. It's not trying to introduce players, it's up to players to interact with each other and on what terms. Which is whats supposed to part of the fun of this game, the trepidation and chaos interacting with other potentially hostile players might bring. It allows for a bit of lawless backstabbing as well as player cooperation. Information

I'd like to see that you can only initiate battle with other players and ships if your own ship has treasure aboard and theirs does as well. That way, everyone in the battle has something at stake and people that got sunk can't zerg back to attack right away and must find some treasure and put it aboard to be able to get back into battle.
Ships with treasure aboard could be marked with a special, easy to see flag and attackable.

I do also like the idea of player bounties for initiating attack on and killing other players, sinking ships and stealing treasure - the more players you initiate attack on and kill and the more ships you sink and the more treasure you steal, the higher the reward on your head will be for players to collect by taking you out.

@cave-waverider said in There needs to be a risk attached to PVP'ing:

I'd like to see that you can only initiate battle with other players and ships if your own ship has treasure aboard and theirs does as well. That way, everyone in the battle has something at stake and people that got sunk can't zerg back to attack right away and must find some treasure and put it aboard to be able to get back into battle.
Ships with treasure aboard could be marked with a special, easy to see flag and attackable.

I do also like the idea of player bounties for initiating attack on and killing other players, sinking ships and stealing treasure - the more players you initiate attack on and kill and the more ships you sink and the more treasure you steal, the higher the reward on your head will be for players to collect by taking you out.

Maybe carrying loot could convey some attack and defence buffs which would serve as a deterrent to newly spawned ship killers in it for mischief, but also an incentive for ships to hoard loot when PVPing. Making encounters a lot more exciting.

@mostlyjustokay said in There needs to be a risk attached to PVP'ing:

Suffice it to say - it does, and your opinion on whether or not it should means very little. I can go through the science if you want, though I'm not in the mood to play internet academic defender. It's out there, good history, peer reviewed. If you're truly interested in it, there's plenty to research. If you're just looking to poke holes in the science, you'll need a couple degrees to make any difference as far as the general consensus.

We aren't talking about similar social circumstances... we are talking about a game that is designed a particular way where everyone has to abide by the same rules.

Can you show me a peer-reviewed study that has been, repeated and applicable to playing a video game or a structured form of play? Because we aren't talking about a random group of people interacting with another group of people

Yes, you can communicate with other players. However, that carries with it a tremendous amount of risk that is due to the complete unknown variable of intention. I am not saying to remove that uncertainty entirely (I am not saying that the game should make it so you cannot attack lower level PvP reps, for example, just provide incentives that guide you away from attacking) but to reduce it by a few degrees. Right now, it is far easier and far less risky, in other words, to always run or always fight when you don't have any idea of what the other ship is up to - no decision-making required. Especially when there is zero incentive to socialize within the game structure.

Risk that is trivial because... video game. And a type of trepidation that they want players to feel when encountering other ships.

It doesn't need incentives to socialize in the game. It's a structured form of play.. like football, boxing, baseball... your given specific rules, goals, limits... if everyone is playing by the rules its a valid social experience even if conflict and competition is part of that experience.

Your decision should be based on the other ship and not entirely a binary choice based on your personal aversion to risk in general that you make beforehand. The game should, as the organizer of this event involving anonymous humans, provide some measure of ship to ship introduction/knowledge. Some ships should be obviously riskier to interact with than others.

Its no more of a binary choice than having all the information upfront. And it's not a binary choice in either case... If your assuming the only choices you have is run or fight then that binary isn't any different with or without information. You just have more information about the risk without having to interact with the other players to discover it. It literally isn't encouraging players to talk more... it's encouraging them to only talk to specific players. So before you completely dismiss my opinion.. why not attempt to apply the science to the actual game. And if the game is designed to encourage unrestricted stealing of loot.. then the mode of play will deduce most people to hostile and people will recognize those as hostile players and avoid them. Even people defending their loot will inevitably be seen as "hostile" in this case.

No, the game shouldn't do anything it isn't intending to do... Just saying it should is a terrible argument. It's organizing a game with a ruleset and letting everyone figure out what to do. That's part of the fun.

If, that is, the goal is to create a social community. If, on the other hand, we want a Lord of the Flies playground full of opportunistic murder and mayhem, with violence being the rule of the day, then it's fine the way it is.

Its goal is to create a social community around a shared experience/activity. Like boxing, do you expect them to not punch each other because one day the coach decided to introduce the two fighters before putting them in the game?

The game... is designed so you cooperate with your crew... it's not supposed to be clear about cooperating with other crews.

@jimmcq said in There needs to be a risk attached to PVP'ing:

The balance of risk vs. reward seems way off balance in ship battles. One side is all reward with no risk and the other is all risk with no reward.

When most people set off to hunt other ships, they make sure that they have first turned in any loot that they had so they have nothing to lose. i.e. there is no risk for the hunter.

When a crew has loot on their ship, there is a lot at risk in a naval battle, but if the hunter has no loot then there is no reward for them.

This. 1000x this.

@jimmcq said in There needs to be a risk attached to PVP'ing:

The balance of risk vs. reward seems way off balance in ship battles. One side is all reward with no risk and the other is all risk with no reward.

When most people set off to hunt other ships, they make sure that they have first turned in any loot that they had so they have nothing to lose. i.e. there is no risk for the hunter.

When a crew has loot on their ship, there is a lot at risk in a naval battle, but if the hunter has no loot then there is no reward for them.

Indeed. That's why only ships with loot on them and players associated with ships with loot on them should be able to engage other ships in PVP combat. It would also prevent zerging in PVP fights since people would first have to retrieve some treasure to be able to PVP again.

@cave-waverider said in There needs to be a risk attached to PVP'ing:

@jimmcq said in There needs to be a risk attached to PVP'ing:

The balance of risk vs. reward seems way off balance in ship battles. One side is all reward with no risk and the other is all risk with no reward.

When most people set off to hunt other ships, they make sure that they have first turned in any loot that they had so they have nothing to lose. i.e. there is no risk for the hunter.

When a crew has loot on their ship, there is a lot at risk in a naval battle, but if the hunter has no loot then there is no reward for them.

Indeed. That's why only ships with loot on them and players associated with ships with loot on them should be able to engage other ships in PVP combat. It would also prevent zerging in PVP fights since people would first have to retrieve some treasure to be able to PVP again.

This is why I think carrying Loot should impart buffs on the ship (call it crew Morale if you wish). So it travels slightly quicker and takes/delivers more damage. The more Loot you carry the tougher you become. Which means fights become a lot more fun.