I hate pvp but really want the curses

About 300 or so was what one of the forum guys got. He was throwing matches early on with a brig, but won a few when other match throwers showed up.

@pithyrumble it's got to be way more than 300. in the 90s not on a 4+ streak wins are worth like 1/4 of a level. Ita probably about 20-30 losses per level at that point.

Odd mentality.

I understanding hating PvP. I don't hate PvP; I'm embrace the PvEvP approach and enjoy it all, but I do understand it.

Still. Hating PvP means PvP isn't fun.

But throwing a match isn't fun either. Dive. Spend unfun time under the waves while matchmaking does its thing. Then spawn and have the unfun task of trying to get sunk WITHOUT scuttling or getting sailed out of bounds.

At that point, if it is all unfun, why not try fighting? Find some fun in the process. And experiment with different tactics and sailing challenges. And maybe you'll find some fun in PvP after all.

Whereas throwing a match will never be fun. One path is definitely unfun. The other path has at least a slim chance of adding to your knowledge and experiences and stories of the game. Even if it's a slim chance, isn't that worth it?

@lordqulex

Defending should get loser points too. PvE gets to be played with the understanding I'm almost definitely gonna get sunk and lose loot. I'm not bored and frustrated by the system. I get to contribute loot into the system. A couple of lucky suckers find a happy little loot goblin and get a nice allegiance bonus.

2000 fights isn't worth it. For either of them. I played Season 1. I bought my skelly curses because Spinal will always be the best Skelly ever.

But yeah. I'm not bothering.

Honestly, I'm in a similar boat Ship Mate... I have decided to go on another course. ..The Curses have often been viewed as a long stretch(THE GRIND) of a goal instead of something you can get in a weekend. I can only example of Gold Curse for starters.

I simply live by two rules on my path to getting the Skeleton curse.

• A level at least a day or when I play.
• And always sail with the hourglass up defensively.

I have been actually going also the route of sailing Open Crews as a Captain teaching the trade and mostly helping newer players in their matches. It has been a new perspective on the game that I usually viewed it just as much a skill in a sloop to sneak in and out as it is to gun down any Scavy DOG that dares to approach my ship.

Happy sailing If you want to I'll Sail with you.
-Open Crew Captaincy

@scurvywoof said in I hate pvp but really want the curses:

You know this isn’t time-limited, right? You can just slowly do a couple of matches per session and do something else afterwards. And actually try. It’s a great way to improve on your PvP skills.

It isn't time-limited in the sense that you will probably have a few people queueing up from time to time. But a healthy population of evenly spread skill level isn't a guarantee at all going forward. And since a loss doesn't give much, people will probably have to first get on the same level than the players currently rocking 80+% winrate before seeing any meaningful progression toward the lvl 100. And even then, they will progress at a pace of 40-60% winrate and few streaks.

The optimal time to get to the curse is now unless Rare manages to make the grind appealing to a large audience in order to ensure that the mode is meaningfully populated in the long run.

@sw-jesus-chris said in I hate pvp but really want the curses:

This update was for the non PvE players buddy sorry gunna have to get good!

Think we can do better than just "get gud".

Rare has always been about the interaction between pvp and pve, I love me a good fight, but I think it would just be a more interconnected system if the current respect system was removed and merged into the regular Athena and reapers factions respectively. Gathering and selling treasure while in a specific pvp faction would give respect (and maybe some bonus gold) for that type of faction based on how much one has on the ship. Make defending a bit more important as a result.

@lordqulex said in I hate pvp but really want the curses:

@red0demon0

The entire defending mechanic needs work. You can do a world event and raise the HG just before starting to load the booty onto the ship. Rushing to an outpost to lower HG can sometimes result in a loss which gives you nearly zero allegiance. If you do make it in time you get maybe a single wins worth of allegiance.

No offense, but whoop-di-shirt. It's frankly not worth the time to even pretend faction loot is worth your time.

Not sure why I should be offended in the first place,I agree with your point, respect/ renown for defending isn't really worth the potential loss of treasure

@lordqulex said in I hate pvp but really want the curses:

@scurvywoof said in I hate pvp but really want the curses:

You know this isn’t time-limited, right? You can just slowly do a couple of matches per session and do something else afterwards. And actually try. It’s a great way to improve on your PvP skills.

There is is, the first "get good" reply on this thread. In short, skill ceilings exist. Some people won't/can't get better. That's what makes these curses locked behind PVP so punishing to some people in our community.

Wasn't really a git gud. More of throw rocks at it and giggle.

That was my intention to do until I didn't like doing it lol. You can lead a horse to water but can't make her swim...

@scurvywoof If I may be cheeky, I must say that I got some of the PvE commendation by (mostly) PvP. But overall you're right. ;)

Honestly, I reckon that my biggest grip isn't even with the length of the grind (I quite like PvP in SoT, I'm just not as cracked at it as the guys with 80+% winrates) but with the fact that, contrary to the other curses, it depends heavily on the willingness of other people of my skill level to participate.

The Arena grind was painful, but doable (I was late to the party) : joined a league, grinded 2/3h every thursday for a bit less than a year and it was enough to get to LSD and lvl 50 (as one of the worse crew of the league). With this mode, I fear that even that will be wishful thinking. With queues and matches length I seem to only be able to make roughly 1 lvl an hour at lvl 61 (and it's not gonna get better). I would not be against grinding the 120+ hours left to get to lvl 100 in both factions in a relaxed pace if I was certain that the mode would still be in a playable state 10-12 months from now (allowing me to keep my 60+% winrate, because otherwise who knows how long it would take).

The "early 2023 update" will probably make or break the mode for me.

So, you would rather spend potentially hundreds of hours more just losing, because you are too stubborn to throw a few cannon balls and apply a few planks? Its already risk free pvp if you just dive. Your not losing anything if you lose after trying, but you are losing a lot of time you could spend having fun doing something else if you actively throw constantly.

If you actually just try a little, even if you lose a lot, the wins you get will make it faster, and give you more time to get back to your pve grind, while leaving you with practice you could use to better defend your dug up loot from people who attack.

I think a major distinction here is this: "There is a, not unreasonable, position that someone should be able to get access to every part of a game they paid for by doing things they enjoy doing, because games are meant to be fun."

I don't find that position to be reasonable, and not just for Sea of Thieves. Most sandbox have stuffed parts of their game behind grinds that some people won't find fun. Some folks will enjoy scouring every corner of the map for flags in the original assassins Creed. Others won't. Pigeons in GTA4? "Burning laps" or time trials in racing games? I want to race, not play an "efficiency" mini-game against no opponents.

Games have a long history of putting special cosmetics, cars, or entire levels behind specific challenges that won't be fun to part of their player base and that isn't even unique to multi-player games.

The every part position is, jn my opinion, unreasonable and isn't reflective of how games are designed. The more expansive the game, the more likely there will be a component that people don't like.

Dinyou know how many chickens I had to sell to get to PL? Catching and selling chickens WAS NOT FUN. But I did it. For months. And months. And I didn't have cargo voyages. Or ancient bone dust crates. Or sunken ships. I had.... Chickens. But I wanted PL so I sucked it up.

Some people HATED the FotD. It's very concept invites PvP, and moreso early in its life. You'd have to be very lucky to grind the FotD successfully without PvP, and there are cosmetics behind then grind.

Any and all players have to decide is thing x worth grind y" and act to their own ideas of worth and fun. But nobody is entitled to these curses because they bought the game.

If that were the requirement, might as well say that every PvE cosmetic, every time limited item, and every title should be unlocked from the moment the game is started. I bought the game. I should have it all.

@lordqulex

Except that it is a PvEvP game and always has been. In more direct terms, any thread that is started or descends into the territory of asking for arena back or asks for PvE servers gets locked with links back to the dev update describing devs vision for the game. PvP has never been an anecdotal part of the game. It has always been a major component and anybody who feels gaslit that significant cosmetics are behind it never read the game description or any of the years worth of forum posts where the devs have been quite consistent on this.

I was around when PL weapons got put behind arena commendations. I was here when people complained that they could grind most of the glorious sea dog items by losing in arena but weapons required kills, and they were no good at PvP so Rare was gaslighting by creating a set they could never reasonably complete.

If you counted the number of requests in this forum for various cosmetics, until very recently, completing various "sets" with missing cosmetics (is it the wailing barnacle set that is still missing trousers?) was more common than a ghost curse. I was surprised how many folks want a "complete" set of named items and if even a single piece doesn't exist, even when dozens of other cosmetics are complementary colors, they feel jilted. And these requests have been far more prevalent than new curses.

Do I understand the desire? Sure. Do I have some vested interest in keeping these things PvP? Nah.

But I do find it disingenuous to say that people are ENTITLED to things sinokt because they bought the game. Or accuse rare of gaslighting because they'd esigned a part of their game that is completely consistent eithbtheir deisng mantra for the past several years. Such hyperbole is a low-brow attempt to bully an argument instead of engaging in the discussion in good faith. (accusing someone of gaslighting is rarely done in good faith...)

That's the crux of my counterpoint. Take it or leave it as you see fit.