Two potential game issues related to PvP I've run into so far in stress test

[barcode]

when i first started playing MO1, i came from experience with generic themepark MMOs and didnt understand how to approach a full loot mmo. Similar to many other now vets, i died and lost a ton of gear in the early days since I didnt really understand the mechanics or had a poor conception of how they work. Sure there were some near rageout moments but as you continue to play you get to understand how to better manage your risk and how to rebuild from zero since you'll certainly find yourself there now and again (hint: its *really* not that bad).

get to understand that if people can kill you in game, they absolutely will. if they can exploit bugs to do so, they will abuse the shit out of it. if theres some way to make you rage out that doesnt involve killing, they'll do that too and drink in all your salty salty tears. At some point there was a bug that when thieves would snoop you it would show items from your bank in your inventory. I had afk'd for a bit and came back to players pushing me a considerable distance out of town so they could avoid the insta-kill guards back then and kill me for stuff i didnt have. get to know that players will go to any length to take your stuff, even when doing so is a complete waste of time for them.

is it bad to lose new players? yeah, i think everyone wants there to be a healthy population in game. I think in this case tho its just misconceptions on your friend's part. He didnt understand how the game mechanics work (how they exist currently in their broken state) and underestimated the lengths to which players will go to score a kill. also... farming walkers is a terrible idea, just kill some pigs and craft your gear, you certainly have enough points for it now since materials are limited and the vendor gear is garbage. if he spent half the time he did killing walkers to kill some pigs and chop a tree he would have had enough mats for several full gearsets.

-barcode

 

[Cobblecat]

Having played Eve Online for many years I hope my carefully cultivated senses of paranoia and mistrust will help me survive in this game.

 

[bbihah]

Having played Eve Online for many years I hope my carefully cultivated senses of paranoia and mistrust will help me survive in this game.

If you mistrust to the extent that you see someone and immediately come to the conclusion he saw you and now a zerg is coming to kill and you immediately run for your life. You'll do fine.

 

[Amadman]

He went back to the librarians in the middle of MK and was browsing the menus, got up to grab some coffee, came back, and someone was in the act of killing him, took his bow, his 10 gold, his arrows etc, within 10 feet of a guard (according to him).

I know it can be frustrating but as mentioned, this should be taken as a learning experience.

Since you can be killed anywhere and any time in this game, You should never have more on you than you are willing to lose. And definitely should not be going afk with anything you can't afford to lose.

 

[Truthshower]

So, follow up. My friend, who has been playing the stress test 8-10 hours a day, fighting through the login boss to get in, and is fully bought into the vision and experience of the game, is now basically ready to quit and not come back. I am fully prepared for the contingent below to just jump on, "Well, if he doesn't like it, he's a carebear and needs to go play Hello Kitty Online", but hear me out please.

After having the navmesh bugs being abused yesterday and losing those hours of gameplay to a griefer who later was just wandering around MK without issue (and actually couldn't be attacked with hte "avoid illegal actions" checkbox turned on, despite him having a gigantic murder count), this morning, he decided to grind zombies in the MK cemetary to get enough money to buy gear again. He spent a good portion of the morning grinding out 10 gold.

He went back to the librarians in the middle of MK and was browsing the menus, got up to grab some coffee, came back, and someone was in the act of killing him, took his bow, his 10 gold, his arrows etc, within 10 feet of a guard (according to him).

Then as he's running back to a priest, he sees the same player just hanging out in the bank, no reprecussions. He has said (whether he comes back or not) that he's now decided this game isn't for him and he's done. Those two sets of experiences have turned someone 100% about this game, talking about how amazing it is, to never want to touch it again.

So listen, I understand this is a beta, it's a stress test, systems are not working as intended. My point is, this is an omen of things to come unless Star Vault takes this very seriously. Getting a hardcore PvP game to not just turn into an empty niche game like MO1 is not just about improving the graphics and making it easier to get into. It's about providing a reliable and consistent set of rules whereby people can learn the game and calibrate their risk to their comfort level.

THE MOMENT that someone feels like they died and lost all their stuff to someone who is abusing the system or the system as they understood it didn't protect them, psychologically people want to just flip the table. If you are trying, and you see someone else exploiting the system, you lose all faith in the system and immediately think, "Then why am I trying?".

I know there are bugs, I know people need to calibrate this is a stress test, I am just saying, above everything else, it's these types of experiences that will cause all the "normal" gamers who might come to this game to bail and only leave the people who either have stockholm syndrome or the people who drink others' tears to stick around.

ill give you real advice most people won't. you cant play this game solo, people will tell you that you can and that they do but they do so by playing extremely cautious and are super xenophobic of other players. you want to not get camped or killed by random players? join a guild or make one. become the khurite militia of MK. as for the bugs everyone is dealing with it, it sucks. SV should fix the node line issues.

 

[Amadman]

ill give you real advice most people won't. you cant play this game solo, people will tell you that you can and that they do but they do so by playing extremely cautious and are super xenophobic of other players. you want to not get camped or killed by random players? join a guild or make one. become the khurite militia of MK. as for the bugs everyone is dealing with it, it sucks. SV should fix the node line issues.

MO does have solo players even though it is a harder life. Guilds make it easier for sure. But they are not for everyone.

 

[Illuana]

One man's trash is another man's treasure right....

That says a lot about this game, and its community. Mortal online, 1 or 2 is about full loot full pvp, full griefer all the time and won't give a damn if you lose everything repeatedly...

This is hard to take for many people, for example... myself. When I first found MO1 back in 2014 I was playing on a potatoe and getting about 12fps. I could not pvp at all, just getting close to another player would lag me for about 7 seconds and by the time I knew what happened I'd be dead already. I quickly learned that pvp was not my thing. But, I loved the game. I changed tactics from being a warrior to a tamer, its a way I can play the game on my own and not be faced with existential threat from just getting near someone. I learned to walk around naked all the time and how to play the game my way.
Eventually I got a new computer and I could play in a way that made the experience so much better but I was still just a tamer. I had earned a reputation with my guild, and the world as someone that had a knack for doing the thing I did well. I sold 100's of gold worth of pets every week until about August of last year when I found out MO2 was going to be released and now, I'm in this, and wouldn't you know it... I'm a tamer.
I've found ways to bypass the bugs of the node lines when no one else can, I have found a way to play the test phase... cause damn it, I'm so sick of everyone calling this a game... it is not a game yet, just a test phase. I report bugs sometimes I report the same bug day after day to let SV know that I am expecting them to fix this shit.

And that's what everyone should be doing. Don't look at this as a game, this is a test phase you dummies. Find bugs, exploit the shit out of everything and tell SV whenever you see anything you think needs fixed. Your friend should have reported the bugs when they happened. You should have reported them as soon as you heard of it. Just flood SV with the weight of your reports over and over and over until it gets done.
Stop whining and stop telling people, this isn't the game for you. This is a test phase and its meant for us to report this shit.

so yea.

 

[HrafnBorrsson]

Something else to possibly consider... Since this is currently essentially a free-for-all, I'm sure there are a good amount of folks who either a.) have no plans on playing when the game goes lives and are just using the free stress test as an outlet for griefing, or b.) are planning on playing live, but since their current beta/stress characters won't be their real long-term character they don't care about any bad reputation they're building for their current name.

 

[MolagAmur]

Something else to possibly consider... Since this is currently essentially a free-for-all, I'm sure there are a good amount of folks who either a.) have no plans on playing when the game goes lives and are just using the free stress test as an outlet for griefing, or b.) are planning on playing live, but since their current beta/stress characters won't be their real long-term character they don't care about any bad reputation their building for their current name.

Exactly. You can get a combat ready character in an hour or less. People are just here doing as they please.

The bugs suck, but MK is and always had been a death funnel. @OP tell your friend to move towns and/or maybe take a break and check back after a patch or two.

 

[Eldrath]

Your friend behaved like an idiot and got punished for it.

That's what hardcore games are about.

Just because someone likes the sound of a game does not mean that they actually will like it. He should be happy he found out for free.

Bugs are another matter and might well lead to mo2s death. Just like in the first part. Even though the devs and parts of the community are in denial about that.

 

[Kelzyr]

So, follow up. My friend, who has been playing the stress test 8-10 hours a day, fighting through the login boss to get in, and is fully bought into the vision and experience of the game, is now basically ready to quit and not come back. I am fully prepared for the contingent below to just jump on, "Well, if he doesn't like it, he's a carebear and needs to go play Hello Kitty Online", but hear me out please.

After having the navmesh bugs being abused yesterday and losing those hours of gameplay to a griefer who later was just wandering around MK without issue (and actually couldn't be attacked with hte "avoid illegal actions" checkbox turned on, despite him having a gigantic murder count), this morning, he decided to grind zombies in the MK cemetary to get enough money to buy gear again. He spent a good portion of the morning grinding out 10 gold.

He went back to the librarians in the middle of MK and was browsing the menus, got up to grab some coffee, came back, and someone was in the act of killing him, took his bow, his 10 gold, his arrows etc, within 10 feet of a guard (according to him).

Then as he's running back to a priest, he sees the same player just hanging out in the bank, no reprecussions. He has said (whether he comes back or not) that he's now decided this game isn't for him and he's done. Those two sets of experiences have turned someone 100% about this game, talking about how amazing it is, to never want to touch it again.

So listen, I understand this is a beta, it's a stress test, systems are not working as intended. My point is, this is an omen of things to come unless Star Vault takes this very seriously. Getting a hardcore PvP game to not just turn into an empty niche game like MO1 is not just about improving the graphics and making it easier to get into. It's about providing a reliable and consistent set of rules whereby people can learn the game and calibrate their risk to their comfort level.

THE MOMENT that someone feels like they died and lost all their stuff to someone who is abusing the system or the system as they understood it didn't protect them, psychologically people want to just flip the table. If you are trying, and you see someone else exploiting the system, you lose all faith in the system and immediately think, "Then why am I trying?".

I know there are bugs, I know people need to calibrate this is a stress test, I am just saying, above everything else, it's these types of experiences that will cause all the "normal" gamers who might come to this game to bail and only leave the people who either have stockholm syndrome or the people who drink others' tears to stick around.

I'll leave my two cents...I fully understand the frustration first of all. Losing shit after spending hours getting it is very heartbreaking. There are a few reasons why what is happening is happening.

1. Towns do not have enough guards to prevent people from killing inside city limits.
2. Just as a lesson in this game, never go AFK if you have valuables on your person. Even with the old flagging system people can and will grief you in towns ( unless 1 shot guards are around town )
3. The navmesh bs is a pain for everyone and it's on their list to be fixed.
4. The current murder/rep system was built (if I'm not mistaken) to allow high murder count players to be in town...though the reputation system should stop them if they murder in their backyard. Unfortunately it seems reporting murders does not lower the reputation enough so most murderers can get away with walking freely in the town they murder in as long as they wait the 5 minute 'criminal' timer.
5. In terms of naked blues (or fences as someone called them) I liked the idea of tagging items on an innocent player's corpse as stolen, making holding onto the item a criminal act until the item is no longer 'stolen' (idc how long the timer is). Stolen items should not be able to be banked or sold in any guarded city.

 

[oykd]

you died to askiir ?

 

[Darthus]

you died to askiir ?

Please tell me why this is funny, and no, we've died twice to Shmerrick, both during exploiting navmesh issues, though one time Askiir was with him and hit me as part of the gang navmesh abusing beating.

Thanks everyone for your responses.

Eldrath, I get your hardline "everyone has to learn their knocks and there should be no systems in games because any system will just be abused" Libertarian MMO line, but I do think you might want to reflect on how being black and white about "this game is not for you if you have a bad experience" potentially excludes a lot of people who might love the game. You said:

"Just because someone likes the sound of a game does not mean that they actually will like it. He should be happy he found out for free."

That's just flat out an incorrect assumption based on the fact that he had a negative experience. As I mentioned he played for 40 hours in 4 days, so he legit liked the game, there was just one part of the game that was so incredibly frustrating it left him never wanting to play again. If your attitude was gospel, large swaths of players would be told to get out of the game because they had a bad experience and the game would with on the vine.

Now, I'll report the good news that after calming down, he decided to remake in Haven, went to Tindrem this time and is having a good time (so far), yes with the lesson that he can't just run around with a bunch of stuff on him, no matter how safe he feels.

And I'm totally fine with the game being committed to its design, don't get me wrong. If Henrik and the team intend for capital cities to be places where you can get killed while standing in the open without reprecussion for the killer, then that's fine. I honestly would guess that they don't intend that. And the lesson of "don't carry more 1 iota more than what you absolutely need on your person for more than absolutely necessary" is a good one, which yes he learned.

I'm just reporting the experience of people who came into this game sight unseen, and I think are strong potential customers. Yes, they came from non-full loot PvP games, but my entire point is that Starvault NEEDS to figure out how to ease these types of players into the experience, or they will lose potential long-term customers.

If you walked into Starbucks and ordered a "medium" latte without saying Grande and they punched you in the face, told you to get out and never come again, and Starbucks just isn't for you, that you must not like coffee, and you should glad you made it out with your life, that's not a way to get customers. People operate under norms and expectations from playing other games, and it benefits Starvault to think about how to introduce people to these concepts in a way that doesn't have a high risk of them just baliing. It is like 1 of 2 main goals Henrik has stated for MO2.

So on the topic of being killed in town despite there being guards everywhere:

1. If it's not the intention that you should be able to be killing in the open in a town without reprecussion to the killer, fix it (eg, add more guards near where players are likely doing things like in menus learning from vendors), and don't blame the person for dying.
2. If there is a lesson there (don't step away from your computer, even in town, unless you want to die and especially with things on you), I would just suggest that it be shown to someone in a way that isn't a punch in the face. This is a game. SV wants to make money, it behooves them to educate people on how to play the game without it taking a huge amount of pain, shock and betrayal, regardless of how "hardcore" the game is.

I would actualy say (and this might be one place I agree with Eldrath) that in some ways Haven has made this situation worse (though I think Haven is the one thing that has led these potential customers to even try the game in the first place). Nearly everyone I've seen start the game from a non heavy PvP background grinds the shit out of Haven and thinks that's the point of the game, they get super attached to what they've collected and then get REALLY upset when they land in Myrland and lose it all. The transtion from Haven to Myrland frankly sucks. I understand it's part of the game, but again, I think having this shown to the player in a controlled way rather than on the receiving end of a griefer's e-peen is ideal.

 

[Rankor]

Some friends and I are in MK, and trying to get tamed horses from the Steppes. It takes about 20-30 min to walk over there, 20-30 min to find horses (if you're lucky) and maybe 15 to get back. Twice tonight, the exact same player (Shmerrick) and his friends (Askiir) waited at locations directly in between the Steppes and MK where the navmesh is just completely screwed, you run into a invisible wall and basically need to get off your horse and slowly walk it across. He would wait just beyond that, shoot people with bows, kill them, their horse and take all their loot. This happened once just outside of MK. We went back, spent another maybe 2 or so hours getting 2 more horses, took a completely different path, saw him (again) and his friends off their horses, they start shooting and it is literally a wide open flat area, so I run my horse at full speed.... directly into another invisible wall that pushes me up against a cliff face, they come over and kill me.

Now, normally I would at least get the satisfaction of reporting them, but I realized they are nowhere near a lawless city, what are they doing with all this loot? Then I realize they had other players, naked running around with them, which didn't participate in the fight at all. I realized they are most likely just killing everyone, looting all the corpses, and then just handing it to that other non-criminal player who can just walk back into MK, bank and sell it all with no reprecussions.

So, from above, two issues that feel a bit game breaking:

1. Has SV said they will take action against people who are specifically exploiting bugs to kill people? What happens to the people who've lost all their stuff to people who are exploiting? In this case it's even more challenging as they exploiting areas with invisible navmesh issues, so they could claim they didn't mean to do it at all.
2. What is to stop what I'm describing, where someone just becomes a wild murderer, but basically suffers no consequences as they can just hand off all their loot to other people who go into town for them and basically ferry things in and out?

Edit: Ok, to make things even worse, my friend immediately after saw that character Shmerrick was later seen just banking in MK and running around without a care, despite likely having a murdercount far into the double digits. Does that make any sense?

Shmerrick ran past me naked with a bow on the river below MK.....guess I should have killed him since he's Dred and they'd do the same given half a chance.

 

[Rankor]

But to circle back, there is nothing wrong with bringing up these issue NOW instead of after release. Some experienced players, no matter what, will try to exploit any issue with nodelines; it has always been a problem.

 

[Kelzyr]

I think it's valid to feel like the transition from Haven to Nave sucks and most people haven't gotten a good introduction to how the world really is because the tutorial is lacking.

You must keep in mind, both haven and mounting horses was added 3 DAYS before stress test. (Terrible decision let's be honest)

The devs are currently working on optimizing the servers and some net code instead of in game mechanics. (It wouldn't surprise me if all the things you brought up are already on their list to look at)

If the game is in an unplayable state today, come back when more work has been done to bring it to a playable experience.

Furthermore all the stuff people are grinding out today will be wiped entirely from the game so any deep attachment to it is silly. Better to lose all your shit in a phase that will be wiped than the persistent version.

 

[Darthus]

I think it's valid to feel like the transition from Haven to Nave sucks and most people haven't gotten a good introduction to how the world really is because the tutorial is lacking.

You must keep in mind, both haven and mounting horses was added 3 DAYS before stress test. (Terrible decision let's be honest)

The devs are currently working on optimizing the servers and some net code instead of in game mechanics. (It wouldn't surprise me if all the things you brought up are already on their list to look at)

If the game is in an unplayable state today, come back when more work has been done to bring it to a playable experience.

Furthermore all the stuff people are grinding out today will be wiped entirely from the game so any deep attachment to it is silly. Better to lose all your shit in a phase that will be wiped than the persistent version.

Yeah, I'm fully aware Haven came online very recently (been testing since October/November) and I have no doubt in the devs' ability to delivery quality content at a crazy fast pace. Honestly the whole game came online like a week ago when gold was removed from barrels, skillbooks were put in etc. prior to that it was just a collection of conceptual systems in a large empty dueling simulator, so we're seeing for the first time what actually "playing" the game feels like.

I'm bringing all this up so that these issue are clear to SV so that they can prioritize if they agree they are an issue. Henrik has already stated in his stream that he know Haven is still lacking (honestly hope they change up the look a bit so it's not just a direct ripoff of Fabernum). He's mentioned having NPCs that will guide you through directional blocking and attacking and all that. And that's good, but I'm partially pointing out that most people will actually fumble through that stuff and figure it out. But if they go from thinking the Haven experience is the game to Nave and get ganked in the bank in front of guards, lose all their stuff and see the murderer just kinda wandering around afterward with no consequences and no preamble, I think it's pretty reasonable that they'll come to the conclusion of "Oh, this game is for 12 year old griefers, ok I guess i was mistaken in liking it".

 

[Eldrath]

If you go afk with valueables on you in an open PvP game with full loot it´s you own fault you die. No amount of guards or flagging can account for that amount of carelessness.

You are right that Haven teaches the wrong game. Which is why it shouldn´t exist at all. It´s bullshit false advertisement to players who clearly don´t want to play a hardcore MMO. It´s part of SV inconsistent design "strategy".

Reducing Haven to a proper tutorial including getting killed and looted, and priest camped is what SV should have done. Not adding a shit PvE server that creates a false impression of the game.

Flagging and guards are a mess and I can understand any new player who looks at it and moves on. No flagging and simple but functional guards would work better.

(hint: its *really* not that bad).

Yes, this is always hilarious to me. After roughly 20 hours with simple management you don´t loose a lot of time invested each time you get killed. There are games that make you loose A LOT more. Among them are all rogue likes and even DayZ. Mortal really is not that hardcore. It´s just hardcore compared to WoW.