What made PvP great Vs. What we have now

I wasn't talking bout "fine", just about "running". Because we wouldn't have any conversation anymore if the game was closed down, and being closed down is the most unhealthy state for a game

FNL was a push tried by the devteam to get a certain direction into the game, and ultimately didn't pay off. The other thing about the 25% participation is still the "how many people just participated to get their stuff done while hating it?"-question. At around that peak time of PvP there was also the peak time of threads about people entering arenas and not doing a thing, waiting for their participation marks, farming the PvP-only styles that way.

Additional hurdles make access more difficult. Last I checked anything complicated was "meh" to casual gamers, in general not just in DCUO.

Honestly can't say. 2014 was a somewhat huge year for the "all people need tons of SP" faction, and the percentage PvP provided amongst possible SP was way higher back then - of course due to PvP having not gotten much more content and related feats since then while the PvE episodes had some inflation witht the monthly episodes. 2014 was around the time of the "discrimination app" and thus people had an "extra incentive" to go for SP as well. If PvP at all times had just optional rewards, as in being a second way to gain certain styles/feats/whatever that could also be obtained in a different way, the numbers would show just players loving PvP - but it's not since the rewards in PvP are exclusive.

And for the players who were just in for the rewards, once they got all the basic feats covered, every new PvP content as in new armor set or one new map was usually done for those folks in 1-2 weeks. And trading wins made this problem even worse. (And is a good indicator that things are very wrong....)

Of course we agree on the devs - they are needed in that part, but we seemingly do not agree on the "when". My understanding is that the players need to agree on something that would really help and then the devs would have to add/fix it while keeping their "dips" on the "how". Correct me if I'm wrong, but you seem to be of the opinion that the devs would need to fix stuff first and somehow are supposed to know the what and how.

Seemingly not, or why is it that it's still mostly PvP discussions that get easily to the aggressive tone state?

I hope you got my example with the crates as something were I myself did and do not agree with the "low hurdles" approach. But it is a good indicator of how desperate Daybreak/SOE tried to get more players in general into the game, even if it is painfully clear that these bunch of players are maybe a little too.... "casual"

But from its history, DCUO is probably not in a position to be picky about its audience. The game attracts a number of players lacking quality in all aspects: skill, understanding, social behaviour etc. You find people here on the forums for their right to exploit game bugs, for their right to break the ToS/EULA, for their right to not even read it and thus for their right to just press "accept" while not being bound to anything stated in it, for their right to just smash buttons and still get the content done.... and on the other end of the scale, for their right to be treated better because they are the better players, and how their minority is more important to the game than other minorities or, in the worst cases, even more important than the majority of players.

This will not work out. DCUO has deep structural problems, short-comings that make easy solutions nearly impossible. Let's say the devs and a miracle solve every tiny balance problem in PvP with the next update, would that help? Probably not, because:

- there are still veteran players around who want their old rock-paper-scissors PvP back, no matter what
- whenever there are two ways to fix something, you will find two vocal factions in the PvP forums fighting their war about how "their" approach should be favoured, and thus one of these factions will not agree on the "how" the devs decided to pick
- fixing the combat will not make the existing content/maps/mission goals more attractive to any of the players who already decided to ignore PvP

And yes, you're right: PvE has basically the same problem, just in different colors. The community in total is too focused on their "against" each other that it forgot about "together". And only with Mr. Casual and the top players enjoying certain contents together DCUO can recover player numbers. DCUO however does not come with the required structures in progression, rewards, content access etc. to make that happen. And the deep changes needed to fix that would leave the top players without new content again due to limited manpower.

This is easy. We do not have freedom of speech on the forums. When it comes to PvP Mepps has made it perfectly clear that not all opinions are equal and open to be discussed. Mention of certain events and players are strictly forbidden and will result in a thread closure/deletion and possibly even moderation.

That is not an environment which allows for cordial discussion and puts a massive bias on the forums. Mepps controls the narrative, any threads or posts which do not conform can be deleted or closed. Anyone who challenges can be 'moderated' and lose their privilege to participate in the discussion, all at Mepps discretion. His post about PvP was an exercise in PR management. Everything Mepps says (PvP or PvE) should be met with caution, his job is to make the company look better and free it from blame, not to tell the truth.

Does explain a certain hostility against the devs. Does not explain why players here go up with that hostile aggressive tone against each other, however. As in: some players did not learn the lesson.

As for the freedom of speech bit: This is in the end private space and thus the first amendment does not apply since the government isn't involved, that simple.

Isn't the point, either. The thread reached page 3 and the usual suspects were already around: Someone who wants AM etc. back in PvP (page 1), someone who basically wants RPS back in PvP (page 1) and a discussion about pro and con of immunities (page 1&2), perfect example of what I tried to figure out: the devs can't do much because even amongst the few remaining players, there is no unity about how PvP should look in the end. That's why I said ignore what the players want

I knew if I mentioned freedom of speech I knew you would explain to me this is a private space yadda yadda yadda. But I never complained or said it wasn't that, i'm fully aware of that. The aggressive tone towards other players happens in part because one side is part of the 'in' group where there narrative can be discussed fully, while the other group has to tread carefully and use subterfuge to get their points across. This can be frustrating, accusations feel like they are one way. However I readily admit that as a general trend (not just this game) PvP discussions are more volatile than PvE ones.

Your last paragraph though, people mentioning those things isn't in and of itself a disagreement those are just idea's, doesn't mean that every person who wants RPS back wants it as an ultimatum, same with blues. It's also important to remember that just like PvE there will always be some disagreement, I still think Best Gear in Vendor is a horrible, terrible idea, but you don't see the devs stalling just because everyone isn't 100% in alinement. It's just a PR line. Some people like AM's & WM in PvP but it didn't stop them removing it because I think we can safely say there was a consensus.

PvP doesn't make money, that's fine, leave it there I think everyone pretty much agrees with that although some think it might be poorly monetised. However using the community as an excuse is blame shifting. There have been massive PvE backlashes but they pressed on because they had a vision, if they had a vision for PvP they would have pressed on just the same. I suspect they do not have a vision for PvP and are solely relying on feedback, which is why they are so indecisive. It's this limbo state and endless maybes that kills everyone. If they just make a decision, any decision (even killing it) and stick with it, people can either move on or get with the new system. But this PvP purgatory just drives endless speculation.

EDIT: https://forums.daybreakgames.com/dcuo/index.php?threads/saying-theres-no-money-in-pvp-isnt-true.300129

Knowing your history keeps you from repeating mistakes. And surprisingly some of you players thats been here long enough seems to develop memory loss constantly when it comes to any of these discussions nowadays. So a reminder is always needed to keep yall buttons checked and to not misuse information.

Or you get new players like Knarly that'll attempt to join in critical conversations with no idea what they're talking about.

There are enough previous threads on pvp, with some sort of semi-consensus (kinda?) on some specific aspects of DCUO Pvp and potential fixes.

But all that does not matter, since the dev team has already clearly stated their position. So none of those previous posts on potential pvp fixes will be picked up, not any time soon.

The OP tried, at least, to set some specific goals in this thread. But this thread has derailed, because people just cannot resist trying to give a history lesson on DCUO Pvp, or their version of DCUO Pvp history.



Freedom of speech? Mepps? Veering into strawman arguments? PvE?

STAY ON TOPIC.

Don't just keep harping on problems.

I am the only one, only one to propose something to move DCUO Pvp out of the doldrums. Discuss on the proposal's merits/demerits/faults/positives/negatives.

Stop arguing about moot points and think up what can be done to defibrillate the heart of pvp. Otherwise, its akin to NATO (no action, talk only).

I think we are on topic. As you already stated it's a catch 22 situation for the devs, I apologise for not liking that post, I have done so now if that helps. So if it's a catch 22 situation all we can do is speculate as I said in my post. Speculate about the past, present and future because the state PvP is in right now invites that kinds of speculation.

Every idea has to be weighed against previous decisions, previous opinions, potential earnings, public perception. And most things have a reference to the past.
-Monetising PvP - people will say in the past in didn't work
-Having a PvP Episode/DLC - Peoples will say in the past in didn't work
-Immunities - people will say in the past we didn't have them
You get the picture. How we view PvP now is shaped by the past. Discussing past actions is inevitable. While I think I was certainly harsh and unnecessarily personal about Mepps it's not really a strawman, I understand you may not agree but either way it'd be a different logical fallacy.

Nevertheless the point wasn't to bemoan Mepps (although my tone didn't help), it was to point out why I feel certain people who used to post here used to get so agitated. That's just my opinion, it's not a judgement, more an observation on how conversation regarding PvP can be challenging.

So back to how are we on topic, well for me, challenging the idea that people having differing opinions on PvP is necessary to actually move forward. Getting people to understand that there will always be differences and nothing will ever change that. So lets just progress with whatever. No immunities? Fine crack on, bring AM's back? Fine crack on (i'm making a point that I don't care whether the idea is popular or even if I agree). But if they ever decide to show PvP attention then they just need to make decisions and stick to them regardless of the backlash.

The only thing they should care about is making whatever they decide on actually work. I think the Revamp basically works, it wasn't always popular, but they stuck to their guns and put out something that (mostly) works. If they can find the money, they should do the same for PvP.

Apologise? What for? No need.

My point about strawman argument was not directed at you, but at the other person I quoted in my post.

One can use past history to provide context, but if there are no solutions/suggestions presented, then its NATO. No Action Talk Only.

Suggestions to improve Pvp numbers eg
- Providing support to player-hosted DCUO pvp tournaments. Such as allowing in-game system message broadcasts about the tournament, hosting the tournament live stream on DCUO/Daybreak twitch channel.

That would be me. You can go up the tree about bringing up the past all you want, it is fact that the PvP community acted very poorly when having the chance of the open dialogue back then. And now going "yaddayadda but the devs...." does not change that. And the way you seem to ignore my suggestion just makes that clear:

A semi-consensus is at this point not good enough. Get your behinds together and form a consensus out of that, then approach the devs explaining why you think that this consensus might fix the remaining problems - or even just one of the problems if it's easier to do tiny steps. That's the main suggestion, because I really think if they was one suggestion people actually agree on, the devs would actually work on it. The reminders I'm giving about this arer:

- if you agree on a system too far from PvE, don't keep wondering that even after that fix is up numbers of participation do still not improve
- if you can't form any agreement, please finally realise how massive the attitude problem in the PvP community still is and stop pushing away the history of what said attitude already did to the game

The other suggestion was to ignore what is currently broken and instead demand new content as in new types of match setups etc. Yes, PvP is down to a microscopic minority but yes, the elite end of players do not really make up much more in their minority either. Yet, the elite guys do get their "special" treat regularly why the PvP front does not. For ages by now.

The idea behind this is that one of the new PvP setups could be what the folks currently ignoring PvP are missing. This new content could be:

- an exclusive PvP only but accessible for all open world piece. I made an elaborate suggestion on that quite some time ago, with new bounties, briefings, and a new open world PvP scenario. Pro: something people basically already know. Con: something people basically already know, and exclusive content will not bring lasting increase of player numbers - go in, get new feats, attached styles, then complain on the forums how they all dislike to be "forced" into PvP content

- "Unbalanced" maps for the Q. Those could be maps with teams being assigned to roles (team defense vs team offense is around in many PvP scenarios and the most prominent example, while DCUO does not have this sort of maps). Pro: they are a lot of fun in other games, RDR had them for example. Con: Not the "tournament" style of content the "typical" PvPer in DCUO is so fond of.

- Hybrid content. For example competitive duos: villains start on one end fighting "cops" NPCs, heroes on the other end fighting "robbers" NPCs, meeting in the middle, showdown. Winner takes a small PvE reward on top, losers just get the PvP participation "reward". Maps of these kind can be kept simplistic and get a texture and NPC "overhaul" with every DLC dropping (last DLC would have been located in the Titans tower, current would have people swimming around in some "tunnel maze" in Atlantis etc.). These maps could also be scaled to "Event mode" etc. Pro: completely new content so people were likely to try it, also it would be tied in with the current main progression. Con: It's not working with the "but we want our RPS PvP back" approach, also a lot of the "typical" PvPers hate the maps with NPCs around. WIth passion

- Again Hybrid contnet. Another approach would be scaling legends character in stats and performance to the point where legends vs regular player toons is possible. This would be a lot of extra effort by now, but: this is purely on the devs themselves since they picked to change the maps instead of already then scaling the legend toons when adding legends PvE - there was no outlook on their side regarding "further content" that could also use the legend characters. Pro: /shrug. No game ever tried that. Con: pretty sure the "typical" people here will find some

If any of these catches on with people to increase numbers, the fixes needed for the combat flaws may come from the devs' end at the point of participation justifying the effort again. But I realize that both ways - fix combat so people come back or bring something new so people come back - are just gambles. In the end a large portion of players could just stay away from PvP due to the community involved or simply because it's PvP, not because it's broken. In that case no consensus, no fix, no new content would change that - but at least it would help realizing that.

Everything that you stated is 100% true. It blows my mind how people cannot see or understand this thing called working together and teamwork to get things done. Some players think that everything needs to be catered to the 1% and then wonder why DCUO is not bulging at the seams with players on a daily basis.

Lol, please. Non of your ideas are original that I and others have already said for COUNTLESS of years. The only thing different now is almost 95% of the actual pvpers don't talk on the forums nomore and mepps stating they don't want to work on pvp.

Yes the OP did try, but he/she is new around here and don't know anything. But its always nice to see people still having a push for it. Thats the only thing I will agree with you is that expressing and other ideas is pointless. But when random players who starts speaking on things they have no knowledge or experience about OR starts spreading mis-educated things then yeah, you need to get your buttons checked.

Its messed up how your saying stay on topic, but your first post to the OP was telling him how his idea wont work but yours will. I hope you didn't think that you was right.

Let not act like pvp is the only one around here that gets into heated debates like that, because I see many threads regarding pve where players too can't seem to agree on things. At least for Pvp, its competitive, so you should expect the wolves to come out when discussing ideas behind pvp. Even regarding player debates, like scarlet said, if a dev does not have a vision for their game mode then yea they are gonna have problems figuring out what to do.

They are content with Pve how it is now. Did it cost them the game quality and some players to leave? Yeah, but it was still their vision. If you don't think debates for pve don't get more heated than pvp discussion then you are definitely new around these parts.

But you seem soo focus on the players, and us not agreeing on something that happen years ago when both ps and pc side been made up and already agreed on changes to fix. You don't need a 200 word essay to explain why atomic tanks should have unblockable powers. You don't need both sides to agree that 5 tap rule is a outrageous dumb rule when you have weapons that do 3 taps. You don't need players to tell you why some of the current issues with pvp should be fix, it should be you as a dev wanting the state of your game clean.

The main issue were the uppers taking initiative. Not the pvpers having a problem with themselves. Not anymore at least.

The heat is different. But I guess you're right about the reasoning behind that sort of heat - the competitive background. it's just a bad advisor to carry that into the forums from the game.

I'm that "focused" on the non-agreement because I know what it did to the game already. And like I posted above - barely 3 pages and the usual suspect of topics are already back in. People should get over stuff that is gone from the game. But things of the past often look so shiny because the flaws are forgotten.

I'm pretty sure we would agree on a lot of stupid decisions done in the past, but I somehow don't see the devs wanting a clean state. They passed on so many chances to fix/balance weapons and powers, the last revamp being a huge opportunity since they touched everything anyway. But they came up in the end with changing power/skillpoint allocation while NOT cleaning/streamlining weapon combos etc. I see them very content with just keeping the game running, so incentive has to come from the playerbase - which is sad, but probably true.

And that is why agreement is so important. If the display of opinion on the forums leaves the impression of potentially angering another 33% of the already thin population the devs will simply not act. Because the game is "running" and they don't have to.

And that said, I don't expect you or the tournament guy to agree on this. Simply because that is how things run in this part of the forums.

I don't recall anyone asking for a hard reset for Pvp, not in the fashion I detailed, and if there were, it would have been during the two periods when I was offline from DCUO and the forums.

I did comment on the faults of his post, but I counter-proposed. You just critique others with no counter-proposal etc.

And you saying I am 25% right only, is the same thing. Real rich. But again, besides the point.

Don't go saying “That's the only thing I will agree with you is that expressing and other ideas is pointless.” and then proceed to add to the white noise.

Provide the links to the consensus threads, or just the threads themselves, that point to the same things that others were describing. Or the consensus solutions etc. And end the pointless discussion, and this thread can be closed.

The pvp was fine 4-5 years ago. Theres no need for a "hybrid" mode to make it more interesting.

Just revert it back and start there. Then, ride the wave that is the future of gaming, recoup the losses and hire back the old employees, destroy Fortnite and it's ilk, live happily ever after.

At this point, I think some honor students from high school could understand and apply this concept for Daybreak, it's so simple.

Imo, it's like the people who got the scoop on Viagr* before it got "big" and didn't capitalize.

I consider qualification a subjective matter simply because people have different standards for what they think makes someone qualified to talk about this matter. I don't think the number of hours one plays matters more than what they can actually say about PvP that is representative of the way PvP actually works, however, it's not as if there isn't a correlation between the two. I get what you're saying about qualification, but videogames don't work the same way the real world does. What does matter to me though, however, more than anything else is whether people who actually are asking for changes to PvP know what made challenging and interesting for a long time. That's why I listed my points because that's what I believe made PvP in this game enjoyable for those who were competitive while it was active.

You said only a minority of players were doing PvP back then according to a post from Spytle? If you could link to this that would be interesting. I'm not doubting you I would just like to know for myself as well. However, just because PvP is in the minority doesn't mean it's not something relevant to this game. I mean it's an MMO game so PvP is going to be of importance regardless of whether the majority of people do PvE.

As for your point about separating PvP and PvE. I believe you misunderstand what I mean by this. The separation I'm asking for is to ensure PvP is not as heavily affected like it is right now by how much PvE you do. This means doing PvE content gives you an advantage over people who are trying to do specifically PvP to gain ahead of it. This does not mean, however, that the mechanics that make PvP great should be completely disconnected from PvE. I've seen communities despising the way PvP has changed in other MMO games because eventually PvP is overtaken by PvE because the developers makes a direct correlation. I don't think this is a proper solution to PvP just because PvP becomes unprofitable compared to PvE to the point where it's not worth it to fix. A better way would be to introduce ideas from PvP to PvE so that new players are introduced to it more, and so that people see the benefit to the playstyle and how enjoyable it can be.

- Veteran players don't need their old Rock-paper-scissors mechanic back. This mechanic is a core element of the game in general, but of course it is drastically more important for PvP because it provides more challenges with regards to reaction-time, anticipation, and tactics. What amplified this mechanic to make it actually useful and worthwhile was the counter-immunity and counter-fall that came with it. It actually provided an incentive to focus on countering, which of course meant bettering your reaction, anticipation and tactics. I don't see how anyone can argue that those qualities are not relevant to having a good PvP system. Veteran players certainly wont get their early combat mechanic back from 2013-2014ish, but for the 4 years after countering remained consistent. The real problems and issues regarding all of those years in PvP was typically about power and weapon mechanics and damage, but countering stayed relatively consistent. However, now they've decided to change the power mechanics and damage drastically as well unlike anything ever before, which has also been unattractive for PvP.

- Even if there are two factions to PvP fixes there usually is a majority favorability for one side. Regardless you would think after the years of changes and the reception to those changes the devs could figure out what worked, and what didn't. Clearly what is in place right now is not working. You'd also think that the developers who design all the changes to the mechanics would have some clue as to what those mechanics are going to entail the players to do. You can't have a pure democracy for videogames regarding PvP mechanics. It's up to the developers to look at all arguments and determine which points are made the most valid in general, and whether or not they allign with what they want for the game in terms of DESIGN. Clearly they had some idea a few years ago, but now it seems as if they're just looking for whatever is going to let them continue profiting.

- No the PvP update wouldn't really do anything for them, but it might attract some players who left specifically because of those updates to come back. Those are potential players who may pay for membership simply to have the overall edge in the game once again. There could very genuinely be top-CR achieving PvErs who enjoyed the game primarily for PvP. To me that sounds better than nothing, especially when it may just bring back activity in general.

If you want specific proposals there are some few that in my opinion would immediately make PvP better. My reasoning for these changes ties back to everything I've said about what made PvP great. I tried to explain as logically as possible why these mechanics are crucial to making PvP interesting the way it has been for a long time.

Immediate Changes:

- Return counter-immunity to the way it was before revamp.
- Lower the power regeneration bonus from the Superpowered spec and PvP, and return the natural power regeneration for both legends and arena back to the original amount it was before revamp.
- Do not allow shields to be completely immune to damage in PvP. Instead allow them to reduce the damage they take in by a certain percentage.
- If possible just fix legends. Too many bugs such as Cheetah's damage, as well as some Supercharge's not doing their heals. Increase weapon damage for handblasters, and decrease the the damage done by the powers that can combo such as Amon Sur's and Sinestro's Claw or Kyle Rayner's and John Stewart's bat. They do too much damage for no power cost or better yet make them cost power when you use the combos.

(almost all the reasoning you gave can be summed up in the following statement: That is the state of PVP only because they have let it be so broken for so long when pvp worked there were a ton of us)