Actually you're wrong, it should be able to live peacefully on the horizon along with PvE, and it has in the past in diablo 2.
Whats the problem then? there weren't any official rankings and ladders for it in Diablo 2 neither.
This is what gets me (and perhaps I made my own thread on this issue too quickly ). There is no precedent at all for that level of organized or incentivized pvp in the Diablo series. Putting in those things just sounds like square peg into round hole of the n'th degree. Not only is it unequivocally a balancing nightmare to openly support that level of pvp (just take a gander at, if not WoW, any mmorpg or rpg game out there that promotes itself as having a serious pvp aspect), but it's not at all part of the genre.
PvP in oldschool diablo was a little amusing past-time that some people ply'd at more than others. Duel games were for having a little fun, talking smack, maybe wagering some gold (or stealing piles of it), but never to establish one's self as being a pre-eminent pvp player. People with that mindset hated the diablo series (at least the ones I knew) and had a lot more fun with other titles.
I would definitely not say "keep pvp out of the game," but diablo's very minimally developed pvp was part of the experience. You didn't come for the pvp, but if you did enjoy it, you had another little thing to toy with between mf runs, leveling, or other pvm activities.
Nuvian, Diablo 2 is over 10 years old, expecting the PvP to be almost exactly the same in Diablo 3 as it was in Diablo 2 in terms of features wouldn't be right. Besides, people made ladders anyways because of popular demand (Some sanctioned by Blizzard I believe.) All I'm saying is that PvPer's are going to be really disappointed if the current news for the arena is the full extent for the release of the game.
Two things that would help out would be:
-Adding Last Man Standing back along with TDM
-Some sort of ranking system to liven a little competition
It would make the veterans to the diablo series who like PvP happy, and bring in new players who feel the same way.
The confusion aspect: Skills should not change. Duration of effects should change, that is all. lets say u have a move that stuns for 5 seconds in pve. 5 seconds in PvP is a long time, to long, so they can(because jay has said so in his latest interviews at the conference) change the duration and scale it down in a pvp scenario, and relatively easily. The more players you make in a team the easier it gets. 3v3 is generally pretty good for balancing without much work so 3v3 arena is pretty ideal. I suspect that is why it was chosen in the first place.
PvP is optional. Its not a must, you don't have to pvp. Some people take it very hardcore(i do) and some just jump in and wanna beat the shit outta there buddy every once and a while for a giggle. So make a rated arena system, and make a non rated arena system.
Hell they had simple rated and non rated options in wow when you go 2 the arena master 2 que up, its really not hard. They have a mountain of options to chose from in the actually pvp contest structure(last man standing, death match, capture the flag). there is such potential for all of them it sounds like so much fun, especially considering this is a game with NO HEALERS! Every1 is there to beat the shit out of each other and skill cap will be so high on every class because of it. Its exciting!
Just wish blizzard would make the game for the people. They don't want to split players up, what a load of shit. we want to be split up! DO IT.
Edit: had to fix spelling and grammar, god i need a new keyboard
Nuvian, Diablo 2 is over 10 years old, expecting the PvP to be almost exactly the same in Diablo 3 as it was in Diablo 2 in terms of features wouldn't be right. Besides, people made ladders anyways because of popular demand (Some sanctioned by Blizzard I believe.) All I'm saying is that PvPer's are going to be really disappointed if the current news for the arena is the full extent for the release of the game.
Two things that would help out would be:
-Adding Last Man Standing back along with TDM
-Some sort of ranking system to liven a little competition
It would make the veterans to the diablo series who like PvP happy, and bring in new players who feel the same way.
I'm not expecting it to be the same, and it isn't the same, but i did expect them to keep it on a casual level (which they did).I'm sure they will add other modes for it eventually, but a ladder/ranking system for it would create balance issues and it would put a number on players pvp skills which is what they want to avoid.
The confusion aspect: Skills should not change. Duration of effects should change, that is all. lets say u have a move that stuns for 5 seconds in pve. 5 seconds in PvP is a long time, to long, so they can(because jay has said so in his latest interviews at the conference) change the duration and scale it down in a pvp scenario, and relatively easily. The more players you make in a team the easier it gets. 3v3 is generally pretty good for balancing without much work so 3v3 arena is pretty ideal. I suspect that is why it was chosen in the first place.
These issues are at the core of why Blizzard isn't iterating on pvp for D3, at least not right now. They realize it's an entire game apart to balance and they've expeienced that before.
PvP is optional. Its not a must, you don't have to pvp. Some people take it very hardcore(i do) and some just jump in and wanna beat the shit outta there buddy every once and a while for a giggle. So make a rated arena system, and make a non rated arena system.
Participation is optional, development isn't. Blizzard would still have to spend many man-hours iterating on pvp balance if they made rated pvp a realtiy because creating that content essentially says to the world "this is a serious pvp game too," and opens the flood-gates for wow-forum-esq whining about balance 24 hours a day. Leaving it out washes their hands of it. They can (rightly) point out the game isn't about the pvp aspect and that a level of imbalance is par for the course. They might express an interest in making things more balanced at some point, but they won't be delaying other content to make it happen.
Hell they had simple rated and non rated options in wow when you go 2 the arena master 2 que up, its really not hard. They have a mountain of options to chose from in the actually pvp contest structure(last man standing, death match, capture the flag). there is such potential for all of them it sounds like so much fun, especially considering this is a game with NO HEALERS! Every1 is there to beat the shit out of each other and skill cap will be so high on every class because of it. Its exciting!
I don't know how many times someone has to say it, but this game was not intended for the WoW audience, and the pvp-players of WoW in particular are not the people intended to buy and enjoy D3 in the long-run. They've made it abundantly clear their target market is the relaxed PvM (pushing for more co-op) player who may on occasional dabble in shooting at other players. Just that mention of healers alone makes me shudder to think of what the wow-arena population would do to the Diablo community.
Just wish blizzard would make the game for the people. They don't want to split players up, what a load of shit. we want to be split up! DO IT.
I'm glad they aren't going to just "DO IT," really. They're showing integrity (mock the RMAH all you want) and adherence to the genre that Diablo is a part of while continuing to innovate and iterate on the (largely dungeon-crawling cooperative) gameplay itself.
I hope you don't take my post as insulting or insinuating that the game isn't for you, but it's my read of Blizzard's posting thus far that they're really not trying to develop pvp for the above reasons. As an oldschool gamer this really doesn't affect me one way or the other, but I do feel it's unjust to simply rant on about blizzard's position in this matter as though it were unreasonable. To my thinking, they are actually being very reasonable about it.
I don't know how many times someone has to say it, but this game was not intended for the WoW audience, and the pvp-players of WoW in particular are not the people intended to buy and enjoy D3 in the long-run. They've made it abundantly clear their target market is the relaxed PvM (pushing for more co-op) player who may on occasional dabble in shooting at other players. Just that mention of healers alone makes me shudder to think of what the wow-arena population would do to the Diablo community.
Minor nitpick: the WoW audience is sufficiently large that i wouldn't be surprised if over 75% of the people who pick up d3 have more than a year of WoW under their belt.
Just because WoW and D3 are different games does not mean that they are targetting different audiences. In other words, the same people can like both. I'll even bet there are people somewhere who like neither (shocking! DUN DUN DUNNNNN).
Minor nitpick: the WoW audience is sufficiently large that i wouldn't be surprised if over 75% of the people who pick up d3 have more than a year of WoW under their belt.
Just because WoW and D3 are different games does not mean that they are targetting different audiences. In other words, the same people can like both. I'll even bet there are people somewhere who like neither (shocking! DUN DUN DUNNNNN).
No, I totally agree that the WoW audience houses a great number of Diablo players (or potentially new diablo players). With the number of WoW players out there, having over half of them NOT buy D3 would be a little suprising. However; one should not make the mistake of assuming that presents a connection between the two genres of game. They, quite literally, are targeting a diffirent audience. Make no mistake about that. Now, those audiences DO overlap and probably alot (ie. I'm in the MMO, ARPG and RTS gaming audiences respectively, i'm also in the casual and more hardcore audience depending on the title), but they do have some player members who do NOT overlap: I see these players being primarily the dedicated pvp'ers and the hardcore raiders.
And what about that makes a person liking both or neither shocking? As I said, targets can overlap or they can not touch at all. The only reason to argue for pvp at all (imo) is because blizzard stated at some point they wanted to introduce more meaningful, competitive, or compelling pvp content. Unfortunately, i've not seen any suggestion of that and what i've read from blizzard more recently has suggested the total opposite. They are actively distancing themselves from the competitive pvp metagame. So, what's really left to be said other than "damnit blizzard, I really wanted this in the next generation of diablo," to make your voice heard?
Clearly, they have heard the pvp audience cry out. Equally clearly, they've responded "these are not the droids you are looking for."
The confusion aspect: Skills should not change. Duration of effects should change, that is all. lets say u have a move that stuns for 5 seconds in pve. 5 seconds in PvP is a long time, to long, so they can(because jay has said so in his latest interviews at the conference) change the duration and scale it down in a pvp scenario, and relatively easily. The more players you make in a team the easier it gets. 3v3 is generally pretty good for balancing without much work so 3v3 arena is pretty ideal. I suspect that is why it was chosen in the first place.
These issues are at the core of why Blizzard isn't iterating on pvp for D3, at least not right now. They realize it's an entire game apart to balance and they've expeienced that before.
PvP is optional. Its not a must, you don't have to pvp. Some people take it very hardcore(i do) and some just jump in and wanna beat the shit outta there buddy every once and a while for a giggle. So make a rated arena system, and make a non rated arena system.
Participation is optional, development isn't. Blizzard would still have to spend many man-hours iterating on pvp balance if they made rated pvp a realtiy because creating that content essentially says to the world "this is a serious pvp game too," and opens the flood-gates for wow-forum-esq whining about balance 24 hours a day. Leaving it out washes their hands of it. They can (rightly) point out the game isn't about the pvp aspect and that a level of imbalance is par for the course. They might express an interest in making things more balanced at some point, but they won't be delaying other content to make it happen.
Hell they had simple rated and non rated options in wow when you go 2 the arena master 2 que up, its really not hard. They have a mountain of options to chose from in the actually pvp contest structure(last man standing, death match, capture the flag). there is such potential for all of them it sounds like so much fun, especially considering this is a game with NO HEALERS! Every1 is there to beat the shit out of each other and skill cap will be so high on every class because of it. Its exciting!
I don't know how many times someone has to say it, but this game was not intended for the WoW audience, and the pvp-players of WoW in particular are not the people intended to buy and enjoy D3 in the long-run. They've made it abundantly clear their target market is the relaxed PvM (pushing for more co-op) player who may on occasional dabble in shooting at other players. Just that mention of healers alone makes me shudder to think of what the wow-arena population would do to the Diablo community.
Just wish blizzard would make the game for the people. They don't want to split players up, what a load of shit. we want to be split up! DO IT.
I'm glad they aren't going to just "DO IT," really. They're showing integrity (mock the RMAH all you want) and adherence to the genre that Diablo is a part of while continuing to innovate and iterate on the (largely dungeon-crawling cooperative) gameplay itself.
I hope you don't take my post as insulting or insinuating that the game isn't for you, but it's my read of Blizzard's posting thus far that they're really not trying to develop pvp for the above reasons. As an oldschool gamer this really doesn't affect me one way or the other, but I do feel it's unjust to simply rant on about blizzard's position in this matter as though it were unreasonable. To my thinking, they are actually being very reasonable about it.
Proletaria, we aren't asking for any of this "because it's like WoW." Nobody is looking to take the game in the direction of that piece of garbage (Incoming flame Storm.) I personally love the diablo series and I will be spending the hours upon hours completing the game and finding gear. What I don't like is that the arena feature is such a joke at this point. Unless someone else comes out with their own tournaments and ladders (I'm not even looking for tournaments really,) the arena is going to have most the teams queuing up with almost no strategy and no incentive to play their best. Think of WoW (I referenced WoW I must be a fanboy) and how their non rated games consist of constant leavers and teams who just charge in with no strategy. I wouldn't mind if they made a split non-ranked and ranked mode, so that if you don't want to fight against the more serious, you don't have to.
No, I totally agree that the WoW audience houses a great number of Diablo players (or potentially new diablo players).
/snip
Equally clearly, they've responded "these are not the droids you are looking for."
My last sentence was a little tongue-in-cheek.
I agree that the shared space of the diablo3-wow player venn diagram has a lot of overlap, but also has sections that do not.
I wasn't arguing in favor of pvp. Its not going to be my focus, but i do plan to give it a shot every so often.
I do however think that there are enough pvpers that either, later in the game's life, or for an expansion, there will be some pvp content added/refined.
Think of WoW (I referenced WoW I must be a fanboy) and how their non rated games consist of constant leavers and teams who just charge in with no strategy. I wouldn't mind if they made a split non-ranked and ranked mode, so that if you don't want to fight against the more serious, you don't have to.
While I only played cataclysm for the first month or two of its release (before rated bgs) your statement would be true for BGs. However, with a silent rating system for diablo, if you are a "serious" pvper, after you've stomped on enough non-serious pvpers, your rating will be putting you up against other servious pvpers and strategy and competition will emerge.
The fact that they have a rating just shows me that an officialized competition is possible, and that players will be able to determine their own skill well enough. By that I mean, the pvpers will have one or more pvp-centered d3 websites and then get an orginization of some kind going to track their own standings. the silent ratings will just let good players fight good players when they're not using any private/3rd party system.
I personally wouldn't mind that one's rating be public, but I understand blizzard's desire to not want to open that can of worms.
A MMS is a huge stepping stone of the work of making a pvp game an e-sport, so should the time come where they feel comfortable enough that pvp won't wonk-up pvm, they'll make the ratings public or add some other feature with a similar effect.
Proletaria, we aren't asking for any of this "because it's like WoW." Nobody is looking to take the game in the direction of that piece of garbage (Incoming flame Storm.) I personally love the diablo series and I will be spending the hours upon hours completing the game and finding gear. What I don't like is that the arena feature is such a joke at this point. Unless someone else comes out with their own tournaments and ladders (I'm not even looking for tournaments really,) the arena is going to have most the teams queuing up with almost no strategy and no incentive to play their best. Think of WoW (I referenced WoW I must be a fanboy) and how their non rated games consist of constant leavers and teams who just charge in with no strategy. I wouldn't mind if they made a split non-ranked and ranked mode, so that if you don't want to fight against the more serious, you don't have to.
I dont think your giving enough gamers credit. People made d2 competitive with honestly nearly the same type of pvp. People take stuff seriously. The only games your gonna have people running in with no strategy is in the very beginning of matchmaking.
Once you get out of the gallows and up where people start to take it more serious, they wont be a bunch of people just running in doing whatever. People dont like to lose. This is a fact. I mean people wig out over little league games.
I dont know how the matchmaking works, but I'm pretty sure once you get some gear and wins under your belt, your gonna be facing alot of people with the same mentality and outlook as you have about pvp, and take it serious tdm or not.
I've played a ton of games with no ranking feature. A ton. There are some servers with a bunch of noobs, and some who take every single pug game as a life or death situation. I played in those servers. We will play with those people at the top of matchmaking. It'll be ok.
Not to mention I bet they will eventually flesh the pvp out. I really dont care what Jay Wilson has to say, if it will keep more people playing, it will be done. Its about that simple. Look at the real money ah, who would have ever guessed in a million years that would happen. If pvp ladders etc will keep people coming back or bring people back or keep people using that money ah, itll be done in the future.
Proletaria, we aren't asking for any of this "because it's like WoW." Nobody is looking to take the game in the direction of that piece of garbage (Incoming flame Storm.) I personally love the diablo series and I will be spending the hours upon hours completing the game and finding gear. What I don't like is that the arena feature is such a joke at this point. Unless someone else comes out with their own tournaments and ladders (I'm not even looking for tournaments really,) the arena is going to have most the teams queuing up with almost no strategy and no incentive to play their best. Think of WoW (I referenced WoW I must be a fanboy) and how their non rated games consist of constant leavers and teams who just charge in with no strategy. I wouldn't mind if they made a split non-ranked and ranked mode, so that if you don't want to fight against the more serious, you don't have to.
I use WoW as an at-hand example, nothing more. Unless one has been under a rock since LoD, they've been exposed to a LOT of other gaming since that time. It's reasonable to presume people have new expectations for D3 and I try to be sympathetic when I explain that it isn't the hallmark of an ARPG like Diablo. I played WoW, I also played a dozen other titles (and then some) since Diablo 2. I currently play EVE online, Leage of Legends, Starcraft 2, etc. but i'm careful to not mix up what I expect out of each title in terms of content. Demanding something another game has because it worked so well there (or not) doesn't tend to work and even if it is implemented, tends to come off poorly.
Unless you can provide me with some blizzard posting about the development of this arena content or more broadly, just the development of pvp as a metagame, I am forced to assume it is just another expectation as I reasoned above. And seriously, the "you don't have to pvp," argument is just the worst line ever and really needs to die here. Developers don't have magic wands that they iterate on content with and generating pvp content would take man hours away from something else (cue the accusations that it's the RMAH). You simply cannot argue there is absolutely no negative for pvm traditionalists in the development of competitive pvp.
I agree that the shared space of the diablo3-wow player venn diagram has a lot of overlap, but also has sections that do not.
I wasn't arguing in favor of pvp. Its not going to be my focus, but i do plan to give it a shot every so often.
I do however think that there are enough pvpers that either, later in the game's life, or for an expansion, there will be some pvp content added/refined.
I choose not to speculate on how much they'll enter into that with an expansion or patch. Ironically, this will probably hinge on just how succesful the RMAH system remains a few years down the line.
Personally, my guess is that most pvp'ers are going to play Diablo 3 for a while and go back to whatever MMO, FPS, or RTS they came from or is new. In terms of competitive pvp, D3 isn't going to be anything worth spending time on (by explicit design) so why would they try to stick around in hopes of it coming to fruition when the very things they're campeigning for already exist in other titles?
Is the hope that D3 will have "perfect balance," or something? Should every blizzard rpg from here on out have a serious pvp element to it? I think both of these is unrealistic, but at this point I think i've made the case abundantly clear. These aren't the droids pvp'ers are looking for.
It's not exactly a negative thing towards PvEer's, as ultimately it will make it a better game AND it will bring more players to the scene on release. I have a good 5 or so friends who don't want to buy the game now that the arena system has no looks to be in any way competitive. Of course, there's no way in telling how many people are actually waiting for something big like this, but I think I can fairly say there will be a lot. And more players would just be better all around, for blizzard's income, for the in game queues for player searching, etc..
It's not exactly a negative thing towards PvEer's, as ultimately it will make it a better game AND it will bring more players to the scene on release. I have a good 5 or so friends who don't want to buy the game now that the arena system has no looks to be in any way competitive. Of course, there's no way in telling how many people are actually waiting for something big like this, but I think I can fairly say there will be a lot. And more players would just be better all around, for blizzard's income, for the in game queues for player searching, etc..
To try and get away from the "what makes the game better," arguments (since that's 100% opinion and we can do it ad nauseum) i'd like to simply state, expectations don't drive development at this state. Some years ago they had a concept in mind for D3, years later that became a working model where they added design components and postulated about further iteration, and today we have what's essentially the working product with bugs and design kinks to iron out.
To say that Blizzard didn't consider it's own revenue (potential) from Diablo3 and simply ignored the issues you're coming up with here is quite silly. They considered it as i'm sure they considered implementing pandas as a race in WoW, or considered making orcs-in-space instead of starcraft. Ultimately they've settled on a design scheme that they like and they clearly feel comfortable saying "this is how it is and this is why we made it like that."
If some potential buyers are turned off for want of serious pvp development I really have no words for them and frankly don't understand how they could have arrived at such expectations. However; all is not lost. As I have mentioned, there are a large number of other titles out there with plenty (if not all) designer development time invested in competitive pvp. Please invest there and show your support for the genre, if you feel that you're not being represented by Blizzard. The market isn't deaf. If you all speak with your wallet and buy a bunch of arena pvp rpg's, i'm sure diablo3's expansion will have all the pvp you could want and then some.
It's not exactly a negative thing towards PvEer's, as ultimately it will make it a better game AND it will bring more players to the scene on release. I have a good 5 or so friends who don't want to buy the game now that the arena system has no looks to be in any way competitive. Of course, there's no way in telling how many people are actually waiting for something big like this, but I think I can fairly say there will be a lot. And more players would just be better all around, for blizzard's income, for the in game queues for player searching, etc..
To try and get away from the "what makes the game better," arguments (since that's 100% opinion and we can do it ad nauseum) i'd like to simply state, expectations don't drive development at this state. Some years ago they had a concept in mind for D3, years later that became a working model where they added design components and postulated about further iteration, and today we have what's essentially the working product with bugs and design kinks to iron out.
To say that Blizzard didn't consider it's own revenue (potential) from Diablo3 and simply ignored the issues you're coming up with here is quite silly. They considered it as i'm sure they considered implementing pandas as a race in WoW, or considered making orcs-in-space instead of starcraft. Ultimately they've settled on a design scheme that they like and they clearly feel comfortable saying "this is how it is and this is why we made it like that."
If some potential buyers are turned off for want of serious pvp development I really have no words for them and frankly don't understand how they could have arrived at such expectations. However; all is not lost. As I have mentioned, there are a large number of other titles out there with plenty (if not all) designer development time invested in competitive pvp. Please invest there and show your support for the genre, if you feel that you're not being represented by Blizzard. The market isn't deaf. If you all speak with your wallet and buy a bunch of arena pvp rpg's, i'm sure diablo3's expansion will have all the pvp you could want and then some.
Implementing a respectable PvP system can do nothing but have a positive impact on Diablo 3. There is simply no downside and no reason why it shouldn't be done when viewed from a development time spent per reward reaped basis. PvP content simply doesn't require near the development time that PvE does, and it awards enormous replay value and a completely fresh and unique side of the game to enjoy. Slight balancing does require some work, but if there truly already is a "PvP team," this should be their job. If it isn't, what the hell are they being paid for?
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To Jay Wilson and everyone else: Diablo 3 can be competitive without being an E-Sport.
Well changing skill effect completely for PvP is bad idea..
Explain why.
Because you play the entire game with fireball doing "X" and suddenly it's doing "Y" because "it's pvp". that's retarded and bad design.
Though i am in favor of a separate skilltree or something for pvp. But yea... never liked pvp and pvm skills mixed. Hell it's a tough call. I just dont want them balancing the entire game around pvp like they do WoW.
jay wilson said he wants it to be a PvE driven game.. so.. that's all that needs to be said right?
Exactly, this is a PVM game almost pure and simple. You should be happy they even implemented an arena style. Now sure i do love pvp but i understand im buying and playing this game to kill monsters with my buddies. I would love to see a ranking of at least win/loss on my toon sheet sure, but the argument that people will re roll just to clear their w/l doesn't hold water with me. With all the time that would be spent to maxing your toon i really think people will just keep playing. And hell what if they do re roll? moar time spent in the game is pretty much the whole goal of the D3 team.
But aside from some statistics and maybe a couple different game modes, I'm really against having a whole new set of skills JUST for pvp. As stated before it would be extremely complicated, then of course if THOSE don't work out, god forbid, I can just see the Dev team sweating for months trying to balance it all out. Pretty much you are asking for a different game then they are making. I'm sure Blizz would love to have a perfectly balanced game to get the most out of its player base, but with the style and format of D3 its just unreasonable. I predict other pvp modes and maybe some ranking if people whine enough, but don't hold your breath for a balanced pvp alongside brand new talents. What do we have now? ~20 skills per class, x5 with runes. so 100 skills, being able to pick any 6, that's a ridiculous amount of versatility. Anyway, i think the path they are on now is near perfect, i would just be happy that the games finally getting ready to come out =D
The problem with separating skill effects for PvE and PvP is that it creates confusion, especially for the players that won't PvP very often and therefore won't get used to the PvP specific effects. It is much easier for most players to learn how the skills work if they have near identical effects in PvE. With that said they are not turning their backs to PvP balance completely. Both cooldowns and crowd control durations are adjusted for PvP, but not damage and the basic function of the skill.
The only thing that makes me a little sad is that they won't support additional PvP modes. I would love to play some Capture the Flag and King of the Hill, but that won't be possible. When the goal is not simply to kill the opponent there are some significant advantages to playing certain classes/builds. I hope that they will come up with some game modes that are balanced enough to be included in the future, even if none of them are of the conventional type we are used to.
Personally i would be happy with those games modes even if they WERE imbalanced, it would just prove to be a challenge =)
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This is what gets me (and perhaps I made my own thread on this issue too quickly ). There is no precedent at all for that level of organized or incentivized pvp in the Diablo series. Putting in those things just sounds like square peg into round hole of the n'th degree. Not only is it unequivocally a balancing nightmare to openly support that level of pvp (just take a gander at, if not WoW, any mmorpg or rpg game out there that promotes itself as having a serious pvp aspect), but it's not at all part of the genre.
PvP in oldschool diablo was a little amusing past-time that some people ply'd at more than others. Duel games were for having a little fun, talking smack, maybe wagering some gold (or stealing piles of it), but never to establish one's self as being a pre-eminent pvp player. People with that mindset hated the diablo series (at least the ones I knew) and had a lot more fun with other titles.
I would definitely not say "keep pvp out of the game," but diablo's very minimally developed pvp was part of the experience. You didn't come for the pvp, but if you did enjoy it, you had another little thing to toy with between mf runs, leveling, or other pvm activities.
Two things that would help out would be:
-Adding Last Man Standing back along with TDM
-Some sort of ranking system to liven a little competition
It would make the veterans to the diablo series who like PvP happy, and bring in new players who feel the same way.
The confusion aspect: Skills should not change. Duration of effects should change, that is all. lets say u have a move that stuns for 5 seconds in pve. 5 seconds in PvP is a long time, to long, so they can(because jay has said so in his latest interviews at the conference) change the duration and scale it down in a pvp scenario, and relatively easily. The more players you make in a team the easier it gets. 3v3 is generally pretty good for balancing without much work so 3v3 arena is pretty ideal. I suspect that is why it was chosen in the first place.
PvP is optional. Its not a must, you don't have to pvp. Some people take it very hardcore(i do) and some just jump in and wanna beat the shit outta there buddy every once and a while for a giggle. So make a rated arena system, and make a non rated arena system.
Hell they had simple rated and non rated options in wow when you go 2 the arena master 2 que up, its really not hard. They have a mountain of options to chose from in the actually pvp contest structure(last man standing, death match, capture the flag). there is such potential for all of them it sounds like so much fun, especially considering this is a game with NO HEALERS! Every1 is there to beat the shit out of each other and skill cap will be so high on every class because of it. Its exciting!
Just wish blizzard would make the game for the people. They don't want to split players up, what a load of shit. we want to be split up! DO IT.
Edit: had to fix spelling and grammar, god i need a new keyboard
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I'm not expecting it to be the same, and it isn't the same, but i did expect them to keep it on a casual level (which they did).I'm sure they will add other modes for it eventually, but a ladder/ranking system for it would create balance issues and it would put a number on players pvp skills which is what they want to avoid.
These issues are at the core of why Blizzard isn't iterating on pvp for D3, at least not right now. They realize it's an entire game apart to balance and they've expeienced that before.
Participation is optional, development isn't. Blizzard would still have to spend many man-hours iterating on pvp balance if they made rated pvp a realtiy because creating that content essentially says to the world "this is a serious pvp game too," and opens the flood-gates for wow-forum-esq whining about balance 24 hours a day. Leaving it out washes their hands of it. They can (rightly) point out the game isn't about the pvp aspect and that a level of imbalance is par for the course. They might express an interest in making things more balanced at some point, but they won't be delaying other content to make it happen.
I don't know how many times someone has to say it, but this game was not intended for the WoW audience, and the pvp-players of WoW in particular are not the people intended to buy and enjoy D3 in the long-run. They've made it abundantly clear their target market is the relaxed PvM (pushing for more co-op) player who may on occasional dabble in shooting at other players. Just that mention of healers alone makes me shudder to think of what the wow-arena population would do to the Diablo community.
I'm glad they aren't going to just "DO IT," really. They're showing integrity (mock the RMAH all you want) and adherence to the genre that Diablo is a part of while continuing to innovate and iterate on the (largely dungeon-crawling cooperative) gameplay itself.
I hope you don't take my post as insulting or insinuating that the game isn't for you, but it's my read of Blizzard's posting thus far that they're really not trying to develop pvp for the above reasons. As an oldschool gamer this really doesn't affect me one way or the other, but I do feel it's unjust to simply rant on about blizzard's position in this matter as though it were unreasonable. To my thinking, they are actually being very reasonable about it.
Minor nitpick: the WoW audience is sufficiently large that i wouldn't be surprised if over 75% of the people who pick up d3 have more than a year of WoW under their belt.
Just because WoW and D3 are different games does not mean that they are targetting different audiences. In other words, the same people can like both. I'll even bet there are people somewhere who like neither (shocking! DUN DUN DUNNNNN).
No, I totally agree that the WoW audience houses a great number of Diablo players (or potentially new diablo players). With the number of WoW players out there, having over half of them NOT buy D3 would be a little suprising. However; one should not make the mistake of assuming that presents a connection between the two genres of game. They, quite literally, are targeting a diffirent audience. Make no mistake about that. Now, those audiences DO overlap and probably alot (ie. I'm in the MMO, ARPG and RTS gaming audiences respectively, i'm also in the casual and more hardcore audience depending on the title), but they do have some player members who do NOT overlap: I see these players being primarily the dedicated pvp'ers and the hardcore raiders.
And what about that makes a person liking both or neither shocking? As I said, targets can overlap or they can not touch at all. The only reason to argue for pvp at all (imo) is because blizzard stated at some point they wanted to introduce more meaningful, competitive, or compelling pvp content. Unfortunately, i've not seen any suggestion of that and what i've read from blizzard more recently has suggested the total opposite. They are actively distancing themselves from the competitive pvp metagame. So, what's really left to be said other than "damnit blizzard, I really wanted this in the next generation of diablo," to make your voice heard?
Clearly, they have heard the pvp audience cry out. Equally clearly, they've responded "these are not the droids you are looking for."
Proletaria, we aren't asking for any of this "because it's like WoW." Nobody is looking to take the game in the direction of that piece of garbage (Incoming flame Storm.) I personally love the diablo series and I will be spending the hours upon hours completing the game and finding gear. What I don't like is that the arena feature is such a joke at this point. Unless someone else comes out with their own tournaments and ladders (I'm not even looking for tournaments really,) the arena is going to have most the teams queuing up with almost no strategy and no incentive to play their best. Think of WoW (I referenced WoW I must be a fanboy) and how their non rated games consist of constant leavers and teams who just charge in with no strategy. I wouldn't mind if they made a split non-ranked and ranked mode, so that if you don't want to fight against the more serious, you don't have to.
My last sentence was a little tongue-in-cheek.
I agree that the shared space of the diablo3-wow player venn diagram has a lot of overlap, but also has sections that do not.
I wasn't arguing in favor of pvp. Its not going to be my focus, but i do plan to give it a shot every so often.
I do however think that there are enough pvpers that either, later in the game's life, or for an expansion, there will be some pvp content added/refined.
While I only played cataclysm for the first month or two of its release (before rated bgs) your statement would be true for BGs. However, with a silent rating system for diablo, if you are a "serious" pvper, after you've stomped on enough non-serious pvpers, your rating will be putting you up against other servious pvpers and strategy and competition will emerge.
The fact that they have a rating just shows me that an officialized competition is possible, and that players will be able to determine their own skill well enough. By that I mean, the pvpers will have one or more pvp-centered d3 websites and then get an orginization of some kind going to track their own standings. the silent ratings will just let good players fight good players when they're not using any private/3rd party system.
I personally wouldn't mind that one's rating be public, but I understand blizzard's desire to not want to open that can of worms.
A MMS is a huge stepping stone of the work of making a pvp game an e-sport, so should the time come where they feel comfortable enough that pvp won't wonk-up pvm, they'll make the ratings public or add some other feature with a similar effect.
I dont think your giving enough gamers credit. People made d2 competitive with honestly nearly the same type of pvp. People take stuff seriously. The only games your gonna have people running in with no strategy is in the very beginning of matchmaking.
Once you get out of the gallows and up where people start to take it more serious, they wont be a bunch of people just running in doing whatever. People dont like to lose. This is a fact. I mean people wig out over little league games.
I dont know how the matchmaking works, but I'm pretty sure once you get some gear and wins under your belt, your gonna be facing alot of people with the same mentality and outlook as you have about pvp, and take it serious tdm or not.
I've played a ton of games with no ranking feature. A ton. There are some servers with a bunch of noobs, and some who take every single pug game as a life or death situation. I played in those servers. We will play with those people at the top of matchmaking. It'll be ok.
Not to mention I bet they will eventually flesh the pvp out. I really dont care what Jay Wilson has to say, if it will keep more people playing, it will be done. Its about that simple. Look at the real money ah, who would have ever guessed in a million years that would happen. If pvp ladders etc will keep people coming back or bring people back or keep people using that money ah, itll be done in the future.
I use WoW as an at-hand example, nothing more. Unless one has been under a rock since LoD, they've been exposed to a LOT of other gaming since that time. It's reasonable to presume people have new expectations for D3 and I try to be sympathetic when I explain that it isn't the hallmark of an ARPG like Diablo. I played WoW, I also played a dozen other titles (and then some) since Diablo 2. I currently play EVE online, Leage of Legends, Starcraft 2, etc. but i'm careful to not mix up what I expect out of each title in terms of content. Demanding something another game has because it worked so well there (or not) doesn't tend to work and even if it is implemented, tends to come off poorly.
Unless you can provide me with some blizzard posting about the development of this arena content or more broadly, just the development of pvp as a metagame, I am forced to assume it is just another expectation as I reasoned above. And seriously, the "you don't have to pvp," argument is just the worst line ever and really needs to die here. Developers don't have magic wands that they iterate on content with and generating pvp content would take man hours away from something else (cue the accusations that it's the RMAH). You simply cannot argue there is absolutely no negative for pvm traditionalists in the development of competitive pvp.
I choose not to speculate on how much they'll enter into that with an expansion or patch. Ironically, this will probably hinge on just how succesful the RMAH system remains a few years down the line.
Personally, my guess is that most pvp'ers are going to play Diablo 3 for a while and go back to whatever MMO, FPS, or RTS they came from or is new. In terms of competitive pvp, D3 isn't going to be anything worth spending time on (by explicit design) so why would they try to stick around in hopes of it coming to fruition when the very things they're campeigning for already exist in other titles?
Is the hope that D3 will have "perfect balance," or something? Should every blizzard rpg from here on out have a serious pvp element to it? I think both of these is unrealistic, but at this point I think i've made the case abundantly clear. These aren't the droids pvp'ers are looking for.
To try and get away from the "what makes the game better," arguments (since that's 100% opinion and we can do it ad nauseum) i'd like to simply state, expectations don't drive development at this state. Some years ago they had a concept in mind for D3, years later that became a working model where they added design components and postulated about further iteration, and today we have what's essentially the working product with bugs and design kinks to iron out.
To say that Blizzard didn't consider it's own revenue (potential) from Diablo3 and simply ignored the issues you're coming up with here is quite silly. They considered it as i'm sure they considered implementing pandas as a race in WoW, or considered making orcs-in-space instead of starcraft. Ultimately they've settled on a design scheme that they like and they clearly feel comfortable saying "this is how it is and this is why we made it like that."
If some potential buyers are turned off for want of serious pvp development I really have no words for them and frankly don't understand how they could have arrived at such expectations. However; all is not lost. As I have mentioned, there are a large number of other titles out there with plenty (if not all) designer development time invested in competitive pvp. Please invest there and show your support for the genre, if you feel that you're not being represented by Blizzard. The market isn't deaf. If you all speak with your wallet and buy a bunch of arena pvp rpg's, i'm sure diablo3's expansion will have all the pvp you could want and then some.
Implementing a respectable PvP system can do nothing but have a positive impact on Diablo 3. There is simply no downside and no reason why it shouldn't be done when viewed from a development time spent per reward reaped basis. PvP content simply doesn't require near the development time that PvE does, and it awards enormous replay value and a completely fresh and unique side of the game to enjoy. Slight balancing does require some work, but if there truly already is a "PvP team," this should be their job. If it isn't, what the hell are they being paid for?
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Because you play the entire game with fireball doing "X" and suddenly it's doing "Y" because "it's pvp". that's retarded and bad design.
Though i am in favor of a separate skilltree or something for pvp. But yea... never liked pvp and pvm skills mixed. Hell it's a tough call. I just dont want them balancing the entire game around pvp like they do WoW.
Exactly, this is a PVM game almost pure and simple. You should be happy they even implemented an arena style. Now sure i do love pvp but i understand im buying and playing this game to kill monsters with my buddies. I would love to see a ranking of at least win/loss on my toon sheet sure, but the argument that people will re roll just to clear their w/l doesn't hold water with me. With all the time that would be spent to maxing your toon i really think people will just keep playing. And hell what if they do re roll? moar time spent in the game is pretty much the whole goal of the D3 team.
But aside from some statistics and maybe a couple different game modes, I'm really against having a whole new set of skills JUST for pvp. As stated before it would be extremely complicated, then of course if THOSE don't work out, god forbid, I can just see the Dev team sweating for months trying to balance it all out. Pretty much you are asking for a different game then they are making. I'm sure Blizz would love to have a perfectly balanced game to get the most out of its player base, but with the style and format of D3 its just unreasonable. I predict other pvp modes and maybe some ranking if people whine enough, but don't hold your breath for a balanced pvp alongside brand new talents. What do we have now? ~20 skills per class, x5 with runes. so 100 skills, being able to pick any 6, that's a ridiculous amount of versatility. Anyway, i think the path they are on now is near perfect, i would just be happy that the games finally getting ready to come out =D
Personally i would be happy with those games modes even if they WERE imbalanced, it would just prove to be a challenge =)