Newcomers have no chance in pvp arenas?

P.S. If you're not up to speed, or up to gear, on arenas and want a more-fair PVP experience, go legends. It's huge in terms of getting a feel for basic PVP.

Some of those are. The power descriptions including debuffs and counters are there in-game, even if people skip them the first dozen times they see it. But the idea that you can activate a power while another power is activating without stopping the damage of the first? Nowhere is it even hinted at. It's not intuitive and good play would probably lead you away from discovering it because interrupting a channel or routinely trying to queue up powers too far in advance are bad habits.

Sure there's a learning curve, and that's good. But its fair to take issue with parts that don't get the slightest expectation in the game. A video game should tell you its own rules. That's a reasonable expectation.

By doesn't explain I meant it doesn't really point a player where to look or even explain the terminology outside of the changes made to Brainiac's ship. And you're right clipping isn't explained anywhere either or the clipping hierarchy detailed.

It would be nice if there was a cinematic as you level that requires certain things to be done, IE hold block and when the fight starts the boss lunges just to fall down, or use your hold range attack. Basically how some games like Tomb Raider have interactive cutscenes. I think those would be really cool and more informative than just reading a power description.

Personally I am a visual learner so reading doesn't always equate understanding until I see something being done.

In fact this is not ok for me. Not the players should have all the work to explore how everythings work, but the devs have to put more correct informations into the game. They have the exact informations and I don't think, its a hard work for them, to put it into the game....

Anyway: my oppinion stands: if someone have no time to see some "tricks" more often (because they got smashed with 3 hits), they don't even have the chance to ask the right questions to someone or in the forum.

Programmer call this "dirty". But in DCUO it is ok, huh?

You are actually both agreeing with each other and so do I. It might sound like prejudice to say let newbies fight with newbies but you really need to break them in gently or you'll end up scaring them away.

Good post. I honestly don't know how the matchmaking system works and how it calculates the rankings. I think it would be helpful for devs to outline the system publicly so we can see if they got it right and determine if issues are all being generated on the player side. You've pretty much nailed the theory down though and I particularly like it when you said "In PVP, players are the content". I couldn't agree more with that.

I'm leaning towards thinking problems are either a) a flaw with the arena daemon not evenly matching players gear wise, b) not enough people doing PVP which is how so many mismatches occur or c) people only doing PVP for the weekly reward box (may be intentionally losing to generate a mismatch and make the process quicker).

From your post, point number 1 is *the* most important thing to take into account. Let rookies fight with rookies for 20-30 matches; they will be evenly geared and evenly experienced and have an opportunity to properly decide if they like PVP or not.

You mentioned it right at the beginning but it is super important too. How many 8x8's have you pugged and ended up with 6x DPS and no healer? There should be some logic in there to match premades vs premades in preference to pugs.

Looking at queuing I think a global PVP chat channel could be created to announce what premades are on the current PVP roster, eg. Most Wanted [8x8], Group 021 [5x5] and hopefully a way to challenge that premade via group leader command. This might alleviate queue times and definitely spice things up in terms of inter league competition!

Also state my desire for a PVP ranking table. Sports are all about statistics and it would be great to have a leaderboard where you could analyse the stats of individual PVP players and leagues. This could be a possible extension to the future League tables Jens was talking about at SOE live.

I agree with that entirely. Reason why I came to forums was to learn the intricacies of the game and improve as a player. You can't be a good PVP player without knowing the game inside out and this is where PVP can be a positive influence on the playerbase.

My old gadgets loadout was:

Sticky Bomb, Intimidate, Distract, Energy Shield, Anaesthetic, Suppressor Turret.

Every single one of those powers clipped except Suppressor Turret. I could cast all those powers instantly 1,2,3,4,5 in less than a second and all the opposing player would see is a single animation. They could be hitting me and dealing no damage and going wtf? why? when the fact is I have three shields up absorbing damage. Then they would get hit by the Sticky Bomb. I bet a new player would be very confused to try and figure out what was happening and might even have thought I was cheating.

This is why I'm glad they at least reward you for a loss now. Before they switched them back, most people would just leave a match because they couldn't win, stealing the winner of marks and rewards. One time, I got into a match with another tank that was able to stay alive and we went 5 rounds in lairs.....and a draw gave you NOTHING! That pissed me off more than anything.

It's not a matter of learning.
It's a matter of grinding for the best gear.

Skill only goes so far when you're out matched by FAR better gear.

In my opinion, clipping is not shown in the tutorial because it is a trick of the trade. It is not an in game mechanic, per say, it is a trick gamers have come up with to maximize damage. If players learned this too early, they would not fully understand it and be able to implement it. After a while they may notice they're able to clip and start to figure it out for themselves.
Also the tutorial takes a crap ton of time as it is so i don't want it to be any longer

HACKZ! U IZ A HACKZ!

That is a PVE mentality. I played the first 3 weeks of the first PVP season in the old Checkmate gear against better geared players and still won over 1/2 my matches. Understanding the map and coordinating with teammates means more than gear in PVP.

Anyone who cares about game design, especially if they work in it but even if they don't, should play Portal with developer commentary on. It's a game with no official tutorial and no reading that teaches people with no game experience how to solve complex puzzles. Instead of instructing you to push a button to open a door, they put a button in the middle of the room with the door in field of vision. Now obviously this is a design approach that not every game can afford to apply to every concept. But the moral is very important: ALWAYS consider the learning curve.

Case in point, I quite agree that the tutorial is full enough. (Although I was glad when they redid it to explain counters.) Clipping is definitely a high-level concept that isn't even needed before 30. But it does become important because after a point the game assumes people know. And as a game designer they shouldn''t just assume people know about things without making some effort to ensure it. Player assistance is a good backup, but information is too crucial to good play experience to be left to that.

Maybe you are right, when it is a non-deathmatch-map. But in a deathmatch-map, you would have no chance, against a halfway decent (not a complete newbie) with full t4 expert mods, ht IV-mods etc. when you are geared much lower/no mods etc

Not in a 1-on-1.

With the difference in tiers that there appears to be, I doubt that two players in T1 gear could hold up against two players in T5 gear.

In a multi-player match, your tactics might help - along with group co-ordination, but if there aren't enough higher T'd characters on your group and the other team beats out the average T level by enough, the same kind of conditions will occur.

I agree that some players just focus on button mashing and not on any kind of tactics related to the battleground. I depend on this myself, so I understand your point.

Even with this point, it doesn't make me want to try T-level PVP with a T1 character.
I'm not the kind of player that grinds for end-game.
That isn't fun for me.

It would make PVP more accessible if it was constrained by T. There is still a range of CR within that, but, I'm assuming, not an overwhelming amount compared to the difference between T1 and T5 maxed-out gear.

THIS!!!! Yes!!!! PvPing should be about skill, not your gear. Eliminate match making w/ new lvl 30 folks vs folks w/ 80+ PvP gear. It's not even fun to play against new lvl 30 players when you've got high gear. Do you know how often the opponents just stand there once they realize they're up against a team of ppl w/ great gear? There's no point in continuing the match so they just put the controller down, go get a snack, grab a drink, go to the bathroom, whatever. Hell, I've done that. No amount of fighting back matters. Hell, if the high gear folks put their controllers down, they'd still probably win due to it being the equivalent of trying to cut down a redwood with a kitten.

Rather than doing all this they just need to make it where new PVPers have to work UP to get their ELO figured rather than shuffle through the mix until the game "finds" it. Gear in PVP goes so quick and if you know the combat system well enough you can beat someone in higher tiered gear. I'm not bragging by saying "I did it," I'm saying "if I can do it, anyone else can."

According to your other posts you're still learning the PVP mechanics. There is a lot of depth to them and it will take some time to master the timing as well as learn the components of all the other powersets. You get what you give though. Give a good fight despite your gear and you'll get better and earn more respect. Many of my friends and I have forfeited matches to players who don't quit despite overwhelming odds of facing a premade. You never know who is on the other end and what they are thinking.