@cotu42 said in [Mega Thread] PvP and PvE Playstyle Discussion:
Successful running means you get to keep the treasure that is on board, if you cannot see that as a victory or reward than you are one of the people that claims that because I gathered it, it is mine!
The issue is that running requires higher investment in the same result as having no encounter at all. The result is something like:
Dove with no encounter: X time X reward
Running Dove with successful encounter X+ time X reward
Tig for Tag with successful encounter X+ time X+ reward
Hawk with no encounter X time X- reward
Hawk with successful encounter X time X+ reward
Meaning that in a world with encounters Doves are always at the bottom end of a Nash equilibrium matrix. The only stable strategies in such an equilibrium would then be tig for tag or Hawk, which is not a healthy state for the long term continuation of the system.
They do not want a pure population of either. Also, out of the 6 ships on the seas... the majority are not all that aggressive or filled purely with hawks.
No absolutely, but the Nash equilibrium suggests that over time that balance will continue to shift. Even here its not unusual to see many veteran players talk about the fact that they trend towards PvP over time. If the Nash equilibrium of the system results in even a tiny percentage shift towards Hawk of the population over time, eventually that balance will shift, which is highly problematic.
Why... the people that attack, just because are usually the ones that do both sides. They attack when the opportunity is there, while they are out and about doing their own thing. They are also not empty unless they spend time on selling it.
What I mean here is the people attack without caring if they get anything out of it. Rolling up on a docked ship and destroying it not because they're threatened by it or think it has anything aboard but just because its easier to destroy it than to check either way.
Yet, most people are whining that we aren't supposed to tell people to get good. The amount you lose and how much you have gained as a PVE crew is also 100% reliant on learning the most important skills of PVE. Being aware of your situation and selling when you are carrying more than you are willing to lose. Yet that is considered by you as being at the bottom of the matrix.
It is at the bottom of a Nash equilibrium matrix, since its part of a non-stable population, mathematically speaking. I'm not saying that its not part of a set of worthwhile and successful strategies.
In this case I think that for many newer players the embittering moment is being told to get better at things like FPS skills that have just been ported over from other games when they have no interest in acquiring those skills. One of the issues is that the transferability of those skills can mean that players who know very little about reading the game and have very little experience in it can be a real menace while not grasping that they're really not achieving very much for either party.
Here is where we significantly differ in opinion. You believe that fleeing doves are not the ones in control. While in reality, the one being chased can by playing better than their opponents ensure that they too do not ever lose a single bit of treasure. Learn to do drive by selling at outposts with the ability to dictate the course of a chase and you can literally sell every single bit of treasure you have before you engage in battle.
No, I think that a Running Dove can be a highly successful individual strategy, but I think its part of an unstable equilibrium. Dove strategies almost always result in greater rewards over time as an individual strategy but they're always unstable for the system as a whole, its a tricky to grasp apparent paradox that makes Nash equilibriums hard to follow, but its been recreated and proven time and again.
Well, then that showcases that you haven't been on these forums for long. It isn't the social doves that are the bulk of the complaints at all. It is that of the fleeing ones that avoid all pirates, but just aren't good at it.
We could only conclude that if there was a reasonably healthy population of Social Dove interactions. All we know is that the body of complainants are people who didn't want to engage in PvP and failed at the alternatives offered them, which is a different thing. Some of them might be pure solo grinders, but as has been said again and again, it would be quite odd for them to buy a PvEvP MMO, I think that oddness is more likely explained by their being frustrated Social players.
If the PVE people believe they are the only ones taking the emotional risk, they need to learn to defeat their PVP brethren. I have reaped the salty tears of PVP crews often enough to know that this is just an assumption from one side that doesn't play the other. Play both sides of the coin and you would know this is a false statement and the game does not need to adjust to rectify fiction.
That's still a situation where the loser of a PvP combat is the one taking the emotional punishment though. Its still a case of a non-combat player having a more to lose than a combat player.
Helping new players, having a better tutorial... sure, helping people get better at the game and especially in an established title is always useful. Yet this is the nature of all games, veterans beat newbies.
Sure, helping them to understand how and why they lost and giving them somewhere safe to train is a big part of reducing unnecessary complaints though. New players just don't feel prepared for the full game, and many of them can't see where they can acquire the skills to be prepared, something to change that would reduce a huge amount of the unneeded complaints here.
Yet is there really a PVP player imbalance or just people that do not want to embrace the PvEvP nature of the game or go through the learning curve of it?
Again, that's one of those things that we're all sort of guessing at on this end of the equation and really only Rare can know. In the end, if there's no imbalance at all then its pretty much all good and there will most likely not be any changes, its all good and the game will be able to roll on more or less as is forever. We've really only got anecdotal evidence here, but it does seem to suggest that A) new PvE leaning players have a high drop off rate before learning to get into the PvPvE groove and B) veteran players seem to lean more towards PvP as their game experience goes on. All it takes really is for those two things to be true and if there was a balance on launch day or even launch year, there won't be a balance forever. The other major evidence we have for what the back end of things is what Rare have done so far to update the game, namely, add on a training area in the form of Maiden Voyage and an area that, successful or not, players can burn off some PvP energy. Those look a lot like moves to correct a PvE leaning demographic drop off, which does suggest that such a drop off is what Rare are reacting to from their end. None of it is hard evidence, but I'm not sure what other pattern it would imply.
Actions speak louder than words. It isn't about non-accountability it is about people upholding their own. If you don't listen, if you do something against the agreement, the crew needs to punish the other end for breaking their word.
But that punishment can only ever be short term and is still dependent on might makes right as part of an agreement. So long as the person is willing to drop off the server after whatever betrayal takes place they'll avoid any possible punishment, and fundamentally in any given agreement one party will be more skilled than the other, in which case the other party is stuck with nothing but trust to rely on. Its a strange thing that in a game where reputation is the name of one of the major advancement areas about Pirates of legend, pretty much everyone you meet on the seas you'll have no idea of their actual reputation or their personal story.
People want the system to take over their responsibility.
Again, I don't think that's the case, I think that people just want the system to model some of the features that similar systems in the real world require to be effective. Sea of Thieves generates a form of anonymity that no real world Pirate could ever have benefited from, and due to that absolves players of their responsibility to be held to their word. Sure a given player can hold you to a punishment for your betrayal for about half an hour, but only as long as you're willing to stick around and be punished. Effective communication does rely on an ability to hold people to account on a longer term basis, and its for that reason that communication is so ineffective and difficult to utilize in Sea of Thieves.
Why are you talking about griefing? Tweak the balance of rewarding teamwork or promoting teamwork through the difficulty level. Will this include the risk of betrayal, sure... yet that isn't griefing. The system cannot ever be out to punish the PVP end, it is part of the PvEvP aspect after all.
I don't have a problem with betrayal, as I say its more to avoid the situation where someone gets sunk just for trying to engage with the game. If we join up against a terrible force and then you betray me at the last minute and I have to hunt you down to exact vengeance, that's cool as hell, I'm down with that. If I sail in because I see an event going on and get sunk by another player so I don't bother trying to engage with it next time, that's a little disappointing. I mention griefing because I accept that there will always be some players that will sink other players first just because they like to know that they're sinking a human more than a computer programme, what I want is for people who aren't of that disposition to welcome the presence of more players into the mix, at least for a time. If its a loot multiplier the more players there are in the range of the event, a difficulty step up where even if other players just provide ablative armour they're still a huge help I don't really mind. Just something where if someone turns up just to engage with the game they're rewarded for more engagement, and if that reward is just an interesting experience that's fine, but being sunk out of hand by another player before you ever get to see the core of the event really isn't that.
I don't understand where this idea of:
- Pointing your cannons up is 'friendly', instead of just a cannon.
- Anchoring your ship is 'friendly', instead of just plain bad strategy.
- Pointing your ship at an island isn't just an indication that they want quick access to loot with their harpoons?
Anything that makes a ship unable to react to an attack is an indication that the ship doesn't intend to fight, which is a pretty clear indication of being friendly. Its the same as showing your hand to be empty by saluting or waving as a friendly indication.
Flags have no meaning, because they can be used for any means. If flags for instance would be bound to the voyage on the table, it still could be misused, but would require more effort and might be a limiting factor.
At the moment yes, but it would be pretty simple to put up a flag that had the attached meaning of, for example "Doesn't engage in spoken communication, text only" and a range of commonly intended communications for players, I really can't see any reason that someone would misuse such a signal. "Will attack anyone that comes in range, Won't chase.", "Won't fire first, Will chase if attacked", things of that nature would help a lot of misunderstandings. Personally I'd love a "Nothing worth stealing, but feel free to check" flag. As it is the flags are nice, but they're not much use to communicate the things that you really want to tell people who catch sight of you at spyglass range is all.
- When approaching a crew you must make sure to call out to them and open up a line of direct communication asap. Just rolling up and parking next to them in silence is an act usually followed by cannon fire!
I've been away from the ship plenty of times and been on an island to see people roll up on my stern and anchor without attacking. I know they could sink me if they wanted, and they know I know that, to me actions speak louder than words and that comes over as a far clearer indication that they're not looking for combat than anything they might say over loudhailer.