Specialty Server Types? (Question Inside)

I voted for PvP (its just what i like), but i hope there would also be PvE and RP servers also.

I think that there should be PvP, PvE, and RP servers.

Personally, I will be on RP servers. Granted, even on RP servers, RPers can still be in the minority next to such stellar players as "Iwil Pwnu" and "Pulmi Tail," but people on RP servers seem friendlier overall to me.

The purists do not represent "30-40%" of the general MMO playerbase. By purist, he was referencing the "PvPer that absolutely won't play a game without open world pvp anwhere, anytime with no restrictions." So killing newbies in the start zones, if he can't do that he's gone, not gonna play, period. Or the carebear who "absolutely won't play a game if there is any possibility at all that someone can pk him," even if said carebear travels to a "lawless" flagged zone. Again, won't play period if that's the case, dealbreaker, end of story. These two groups of players do not amount to 30% of the playerbase, most people are much more flexible in their choice of MMO, are willing to accept, even prefer, hybrid environments. My guess is that combined, they represent < 5-7% of the general MMO fanbase today.

God I would LOVE to see this. I played Everquest 1 for a great many years and to this date after trying every FTP MMO along with WoW, Guild Wars, Guild Wars 2, Rift, Tera... I always fall back to missing Everquest. I have such fond memories of how hard the game was. I miss "hell levels", I miss corpse runs and having to be careful to find your body, I miss the Bazaar off the Nexus or ever the EC Tunnels. I miss the difficulty and player interaction of the original Everquest.

The BIGGEST thing that I do NOT want to see in this game is what World of Warcraft did with their Flight Path system. I want to have to run or ride across the land to get where I am going, I want to have to venture through high level areas and be very careful or i'ma get munched! The only thing that I would conceed to this personally would be the Nexus Spire type travel system again(Put on a timer like it used to be) or a Mage creating portals.

I never said there wouldn't be open world pvp. On a mixed server you start off neutral (nobody can attack each other.) you do things like join guilds, join factions, do crimes.

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Read this very carefully, this is going to be my bible:
When you join a faction, you start out Hiding, this pretty much makes the enemy think your still neutral. Then you go to a recruiter and then you can become covert - covert allows you to attack npcs, however players cannot attack you... NOW HOLD THE PHONE, just because your covert and can attack npcs but not players, it doesn't mean you can get away with it. As soon as you attack an enemy NPC, the other players know your an enemy and can engage you for 5 minutes. You gain a "flag".

There is a third option called "Overt" this means you can attack other Overt players, and covert players who reveal themselves, but covert players can't attack you unless you attack them.

Hiding:
- acts as neutral.
- can be discovered hiding, and revealed. When revealed goes covert.

Covert:
- Can attack NPCs
- Cannot attack players.
- Can be attacked by players if you reveal youself.

Overt:
- Can attack NPCs
- Can attack other Overt Players.
- Can attack covert players who reveal themselves.

When you are killed by an overt player, you can place a bounty on him. When the bounty builds up, the server puts money plus the money you put on him, and bounty hunters can go after you. They are given tools and way to find you anywhere in the world.

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Guild Vs Guild
Guilds with 50% of the vote can become enemies with other guilds and declare war. Now nomatter where they are in the world both sides are now red to each other. This will set up interesting battles anywhere in the world. Imagine Player City vs Player City battles, sieges. Ect Ect.

To not be a part of the war you must either leave the guild or not represent it. However if you stop representing the guild you must go back to the guild hall to represent again. This means no suprise represents. You also cannot join the guild unless you go to the guild hall, unless you turn off the war, then you can invite from anywhere.



This is an example of completely optional and fair open world PvP. No griefing, no tormenting new players.

Yup i've also seen systems like this that work just fine.
As long as a pvp'er can't get to you there's no problem really. That's what you'd expect atleast.
However you have to also consider the types of people your dealing with. Pvp'ers are way different then pve players.
I started writing this post in agreement with you having no problem with sticking everyone in the same boat.
Then i remembered how most pvp'ers don't take their pve seriously, specially when grouped. They just don't care for it if their gear and play style doesn't match with what the group wants. It's not their thing and not where they seek their entertainment so why should they. And how annoying pvp chat becomes for pve players. Most of them don't want to read and come across lame arguments about who killed who under sucky circumstances. They also don't want to be trolled by pvp'ers for not enabling pvp and fighting back when taunted. Not everyone gets off at wacking their fellow man.

This being said i don't mind any of it myself. I can live in both worlds. I think the majority often wants to try pvp once they are done with pve with their main pve character. I remember good times and bad with pvp. It's like gambling. If the pvp system is good however there should be way less bad times and way more good times.

I still think having separate Servers for PvP & PvE is the best option, especially given the differing mindsets you just mentioned. I also find this to be true in shared servers.

This is .. well far from the truth actually, this may be so for most games. However in Everquest I and Everquest II, PvE gear had the best procs, some of the best PvP gear was PvE gear, a lot of it required raiding as coordination as well. What ruined PvE for me was things like Dungeon Ques, which made players less social and lazy. In most cases though, your right. However not in Everquest. That is something i've just not seen.

Some of the best raiders were on PvP servers, why? They needed the gear more then anyone else, some of their coordinations made them top-wide servers, of course they weren't as good as PvEers, however atleast they used the gear they earned in more then one way. I myself loved getting gear just for duels and such.

Its only later in the years when they made the games more like WoW/Rift/Everything else and separated the gear, they no longer needed to do any of that, it was just a chore.

Separation brought that mindset and weakness, when gear wasn't separated and mixed, what your describing was not the case. You have to see the full picture, separation itself is just bad.

I have stopped playing MMOs since 2012, all I do now is mostly log on for role-playing because of this. They just arn't going well and are boring compared to what they used to be.

Yup i'm basing what i'm saying off of other mmorpg games kuz i've never played everquest before.
I also fully agree with your last couple phrases about how mmo's have become lately.

We can give the devs our input etc but in the end they have to find the perfect balance and pinpoint what exactly is of-putting with some of the new mmo designs. The last mmorpg i've played for over 2 years had mixed servers that's why i can't seem to shake the feeling that everyone will do just fine there. Yet at the same time i fully understand and agree with everything most people are saying about having 3 specialty servers. Wouldn't be the first time people act like they know what they need when they don't though.

(Thank you for the quick double post delete =))

I like the ideas, but what happens when a player doesn't want to participate in factions and option 1 in general? What will be the gain in option 1 outside of just being able to PK other players? If no actual incentive to do so, you may find the system gets poorly under used with all the PvP'rs being divided between many servers. If you do place a worthwhile incentive to encourage the system, you are indirectly forcing PvE'rs to participate, leading to "frustrating gameplay (tm)*". The incentive would need to be purely cosmetic, and once again may not encourage players to participate, etc.

In response to Guild V Guild, what happens to the guild when 51% of the guild chooses to have a guild war, and the remaining 49% decides to leave (lets face it, guilds won't be as important in this game according to the RT responses, and there may be heavy guild jumping until players find their happy places). If that 49% decides to stay but chooses to not represent, how much guild drama will ensue? Will those players still be flagged or can they exploit the system by merely detagging and retagging at whim. Assuming normal player behaviors, we will eventually get 1 or 2 very large guilds that may never find opposition as smaller guilds won't want to war vs. them. Although an interesting idea, this may cause undesired consequences leading to "frustrating gameplay (tm)*"

Your ideas don't force PvP and do in theory make it optional, but players acting upon this system will indeed force PvP upon other players. Guilds would need 100% agreement on guild wars or the system will fail.

If they have RP servers (which I really hope they do) I'd REALLY like it if there could actually be a REAL naming ruleset at character creation...like you pick your server first, then choose what character to make...if you enter in a name like "pwnU" or "LichKingArthas" etc, it comes up that the name is invalid for this server type, please choose a valid name. Maybe a description, too, on what RP server means. SO MANY TIMES I have seen people roll on an RP server and ask what RP server even means.

I voted for RP servers, but I usually play no standard servers. I do not think permadeath works with an MMO as it takes so long to get to a higher tier that to lose it I think would make people rage quit. We have all heard the screaming from people on WoW. Imagine that person losing all his top tier gear because a rogue type character got in a cheap shot. I think at first people would start playing this type of server, but the server population would drop eventually to a non-playable level. I am fine with the different types of servers though RP, PVP, RP-PVP, etc. I am not a PVPer, but I understand those that like it.

without a question rp server

@Talathion

I feel like your mixed server idea is just about making EQN work like SWG. EQN is a completely different beast. EQN is not about just two factions but numerous factions of which many will have varying standings with one another so I don't see how the SWG's system of overt and covert can remotely work. It would pretty much force players into being PvP enabled most of the time, only for just killing anything but critters.

You could have 7 factions with their own rules and their own beliefs. It wouldn't really change it. Not really, there are many factions even of the same race not alligned to a faction, especially in everquest. How many droag factions are their? Five? How many Orc factions? six? How many elf factions? How many human factions? In the Everquest universe that will be no problem. There is so much history, factions could even have their own factions allies and enemies. I myself hate it when their is only two choices. I want several.

This might be a: TLDR, because it will be long, I like to awnser every question.

I will awnser the first question first:
Factions will have their own special equipment you can only get from representing the faction, of course it won't be any better stats then what you can get normally, just different. Factions could also have "special classes" that are not better then normal classes, but different. I'd imagine Paladin and Shadowknight would be good factional classes. Knights represent something, an order or a faction. However you shouldn't have to be a Paladin and Shadowknight to play like one. The Neutral version of the classes are Crusader and Reaver. The Paladin and Shadowknight would be better suited to fighting other players and npcs while the Crusader and the Reaver would be more suited for fighting beasts and monsters. They would be different. Faction equipment would be like "Stormtrooper Armor" which wasn't nessessarily better then all the other armor, in fact it had many weaknesses. Stormtrooper Armor's strength was it was 'ok' in about everything, which made it good in PvP, but not PvE so much. Of course it didn't say you couldn't use it in PvE, but to even wear the armor you had to "represent your faction" (IE: be covert or overt.)

This means the choice is not forced. One is just more suited to fight differently, where the PvE version is more suited to fight more things PvE.

Example: One of them is more single target oriented, while the other is more multi-target. One does not have a huge advantage over the other, you can still cleave with the sword.

(example)
Shadowknight as we know split into two classes.
Reaver is more focused on the Lifetap Aspect, stealing life from others and such and weakening one target and strengthening himself. His own spells steal life.

Shadowknight is more focused on spreading aoe diseases and infecting everything around him.


I will now awnser the second question:
In a Guild Vs Guild setting, when 51% make the choice, they are the indeed the majority. When you join a guild you should research the guilds history before you join it and make sure its what you want as a family. If indeed there is such a split inbetween votes, then the guild itself is having a problem, they are not a family. There will be many things to vote on besides just Guild vs Guild you know. (Or I hope.)

I won't say they should just leave, but in my opinion joining a guild should be a special thing, not just something you join to be in a guild with big numbers and special rights.

RP PVP
I want the most emersive experience possible, I have always enjoyed role playing

I vote for RP/PvP/PvE/Merc/Non-Merc/Progression Style Servers if content gets phased out or isn't level-scalable/PvP diety based servers/.

Then take away all the perks that large guilds get: guild halls, amenities, etc... As long as you have those, people will want to join large guilds, and large guilds will want as many members as possible, because every little contribution gets them closer to the next plateau.

Multi-guilding throws another big monkey wrench into your Guild vs. Guild thing, although allowing players to opt-out does help with that.

I'm not against 'mixed servers', I just believe that 'normal' should be PvE. There's a reason most MMO's (starting with Everquest if not earlier - don't know what The Realm and Meridian59 did) go that way.

Guilds have enough drama as it is without voting on Guild wars. You'll have people jumping from guild to guild faster than rats leaving a sinking ship.

Also: you can say the 'factional' content is 'equal', but it never works out that way - if only for the extra content the factions provide - quests and whatnot. So in order to get any of the factional rewards, the PvE player is forced to go PvP.

Here's a picture that I think sums up the feeling of a lot of people in the two camps (PvP and PvE):

I'm a roleplayer at heart. I think you should be able to murder people on a RP server... I mean how can you roleplay a thief or murderer! Or just a Evil person in general! There are some interesting ways to do ganking on a server to make it a lessened occurrence. However I think open world ganking should be acceptable but with steep consequences.... I will give some examples of my favorite MMO's

Lineage 2. Lineage 2 was an open world you could kill anyone you wanted. However if they did not strike you back, the killer turned "Red" which gave them bad Karma, the guards then would kill anyone who was Red, and if you killed someone who was Red, they had a HIGH chance to drop gear. The chance to drop gear kept a lot of people from going red. because in Lineage 2, Gear was hard to get, it takes a lot of time to craft because the failure rate was high, But what I loved about it, is if someone is pissing you off in your group, you can turn around and just murder them. That is something you guys can consider adopting or making your own version of it. The way they would redeem there Karma is they had to fight mobs and work it off, putting them in a dangerous situation to fix it. It wasn't a "wait time" or anything simple like that. So, let me describe what would happen if someone in L2 ran up and punched you there name would Flag as "Pink" then, usually they would wait to see if you struck back. if you don't and they kill you while your name is still "white" they would get a "red" name with all the penalties. However if you did strike them back and you went pink they could kill you with no penalties.

There was one person in L2 that was a ganker, he was famous but he wasn't that dangerous... after he leveled up super high, he started ganking, after a few player kills his gear was absolute trash. He mainly stayed ganking the lower levels and bots on the server.

RP servers!!!!! WITH RULES ENFORCED! Let me give you an example. In Everquest Classic... this day in age... if you even speak in general chat about anything RP you get ridiculed. The other day I was trying to revive some RPers in EQ classic on the RP Server (Friona Vie) in general chat I said this on my character Akeve " Commander Cesilia is looking to train up young seasoned Teir'Dal ((57+)) Seek her out if you wish to enlist." I got responded with " Go to an RP Server" "get lost loser" "I don't get it". I understand EQ is an old game... but it defiantly has lost the RP value with it. but making the RP server the only server where you can buy raid gear, probably has something to do with it. There are a few surviving RPers there but no one feels safe RPing in the open.

What I would like to see rules to an RP server
Someone named "SexyMoFo" Change it. It has no place in a RP server If they do not like it, there should be a normal server so they can have there stupid name. Why are you rolling on a RP server to not RP? Just to greif RPers? Well, if you are going to grief us at least force them to have a normal name to grief us. I bet it would end up converting some into RPers eventually. I can't think of anything else right now off the top of my head other then names. I'm sure others have listed plenty of rules alongside mine.

I really hope you guys consider making a system where you can openly kill someone, On a RP server it will create legends, thieves and murder guilds and give people a force to unite them to fight together against the band of bandits if they want to play as bandits.


(sidenote is there anyway to fix my forum name? I ment to put Cecilia but i accidently hit some extra letters! thanks)

The same can be said for Groupers, Raiders, Challenge mode players. All those players are above the average player, if you don't want to play that content then you don't have to, but you also miss out on their perks. You should not get the content if you don't work for it. You are missing the big picture.

Only being able to "opt-in" at the guild hall how I described is how you fix it. The players must go into the guild hall to opt-in, they can't just be anywhere, as I described. I am wondering if you read my entire idea or skinned through it.

When I form a guild, we make a strong bond and become friends, just because you can't... telling everyone they cannot have features just because you cannot form such a bond with your guild seems very evil to me, its basicly saying "because some guilds can't cope, nobody should have it."