Ryzom

Many people would love to see more politicians on the battlefield, where they can taste the full consequences of their actions but saying battles are lost by politics just shows the effects of having incompetent leaders, turning tactical military victory into strategic defeat, getting into wars that they dont need to be in.. sort of thing you would expect from a system that hands executive control to someone whose qualification is the ability to win a popularity contest

arfindel wrote:That says it all.
Also annihilates any discussion.

There are players who want to live the experience of the new world, and there are players who want to win.
There are players who want to do pvp because they enjoy challenging their skills and others who see it pointless without a prize.

That's the funniest thing I've seen this week Nice butchering of my post to miss out the important parts

I read your first line and was momentarily shocked that you might have agreed with me, but then you continued and I was happy again

My entire point was that the fight means nothing if its unwinnable.
The game is about "living the world", well.. yanno what... I wouldn't be too happy "living" a fight that I could never win; maybe that's just me but I'm pretty sure you wouldn't want to live it either.

I don't give a yubo's butt whether or not there's a prize at the end (which I think I said btw, you just edited it out), I just want it to mean something. I'd be just as happy fighting on the losing side if I knew it meant something, rather than just being an unwinnable grindfest disguised as PvP.

So, since you missed the point the first time, or at least chose to ignore it, lets try it again in simple terms (each of the lower lines requires the top 3 lines to be true):

Meaningless wars are bad.
Unwinnable wars are bad.
Artificial balancing methods are bad.
I don't care if there's a prize at the end.
I don't care if I win or not.
The resolution (or not) of the war is part of the story we will have created as players. <- (Pay attention, this is the important part )

PS. What's wrong with playing to win? Do you play to lose? If so, you're doing a good job of it

PPS. 3kGET. Third on the boards, first in EE community, I believe.

sprite wrote:[...] Nice butchering of my post to miss out the important parts [...]

Ok ,) sorry, here're your "important parts":

sprite wrote:Ok we just need a Hitler reference and this thread is complete [...already quoted...]granted before Nevy were in serious financial trouble, I had faith that they would do something, now I wouldn't be too peeved considering they have bigger priorities (yes I'd still like something, who wouldn't, but it wouldn't give me serious amounts of angst if nothing happened).

The point is that we, the players, would have acheived something - the fight will have meant something and even if we don't get some magical pat on the back I'll be happy with the knowledge that we did it. [...already quoted...] I care; Ryzom is a game that provides that.

About winning a few words.

There is a big difference between winning and winning a game.
There floats around a rhetorics that suggests that we wouldn't play at all a game where wining is not possible. Too lazy to quote from different authors.

They're right!
That is why game makers chose a story with one or multiple conflicts. We like to fight and to win from time to time. Constantly losing and constantly winning is boring. That's where the balance of a game producer comes.

But the authors using the above rhetorics are using a correct statement not per se but to induce a more general assertion that is false.
In other words they tell us:
- winning has to be possible
but they want to induce:
- winning the game must be possible

Winning yes has to be made possible and keep up the entertainment such an industry has to provide. But winning the game = finishing the game, for both winner and loser.

So a fight, a raid, a (temporary)war and a duel should be won by somebody, but never the whole game. Who tries to extrapolate from winning to winning the game has an immediate interest in that.

There are times when losing can be fun. For example when you oppose a huge and long resistence to bigger forces, when you win a duel against someone with more levels, when... in short, you beat the game mechanics, and you're better by using your skills or your gear (worked and combined by yourself).
But the main statement remains correct: you fight to win... that particular fight, not the whole game.

I will not go into considerations about what kind of people wants to win the game you can read anytime old Jyudas feverish posts )

The second side of this rhetorics I meet here a lot is winning versus winning something.

Most pvp-ers want to fight and to win. Winning is by itself a reward.
But those who have enough advantages out of the current implementation try to put equal sign between winning and winning a prize (cats, mats, ops).

They are two essentially different things: one is the pride of using skills, hunting months for top gear, reading documentation, exercising a lot, levelling, having good time of reaction, inventivity, reflexes sometimes.
The other is just being happy with the prize, it's less about winning as the word means in dictionary as with earning.

On a side note it's fun to notice that same people who claim earning is what matters also are the first to despise mercenary guilds.

Working with a MMO the psychological rewards and the symbolical ones are the best tools to reward people for their efforts but delay as much as possible disbalancing the game (that happens anyway but at a faster or slower rate). One great example in Ryzom is the "kami/kara champion" title.

Long term, accumulating rewards that reflect not only on the winning characters but also on their entire group is the way Nevrax has chosen in OP implementation... and here we are on a sixth page of 4th-5th thread of a neverending discussion about it.

When I have a succesful dig I consider it a good game session
When I spend time in the game it is a pleasure to have logged in.
Of course taking part in an outpost battle it is nice to win...but not if the price of losing is frustration and hostile /tell.
Everyone logs into Ryzom for their own perception of 'fun'
If they are not havnig fun then there is a problem that needs to be addressed by GF.
The Outpost should remain Faction based, and I would like to see more involvement of the Non PvP in this area.
There are some very interesting points already raised on how this could be implemented.

here, in essense is how i see the situation

1) it's a good thing that a side can 'win' the OP battle, and judging by Spritehs condisending new signature some are wetting themselves with anticipation at the prospect.

2) there is a case to made for having a balancing mechanism for OP fights. nobody (apart from previously discussed 'we are so uber and we need to win and couldnt care less about anybody but ourselves' people) enjoys one sided battles, there is no point to them.

3) some people like being the underdog, some people like being winners, some people have picked a faction because it means something more than winning. all good, choices are important.

4) THE PROBLEM!!!!
having cats produced from outposts. now cats are a lazy, stupid thing to be in the game in any form. but when their sole source is from outposts you enter a massive feedback loop where the faction/alliance/whatever that controls most of the outposts can level their players at twice the rate of the other faction/alliance/whatever.

how crazy is that? really. it doesnt matter which side you are on to see this is a big problem. I have no issue at all with the karavan 'winning' i have an issue with the really crappy game mechanics that reinforce an unassailable* position of power.

*ofc player action has the possibility to negate this comment, with the breakdown of alliance or people getting fed up with winning, but its beside the point as we are talking about a fundemental flaw in the OP system.

you cannot have the rewards for outpost create such an imbalance between the sides. make the rewards something meaningful and fun, but not cats.

in summary cats are evil. please get rid of them
________________________
I fully expect to be flamed as another whining kami, but maybe you should actually read what i have written and not just react to it. I dont use cats, i dont want or need to be uber or whatever. i enjoy a good fight, there have been some in the past.. but i really detest the situation we are in.

arfindel wrote:Working with a MMO the psychological rewards and the symbolical ones are the best tools to reward people for their efforts but delay as much as possible disbalancing the game (that happens anyway but at a faster or slower rate). One great example in Ryzom is the "kami/kara champion" title.

there will always be inbalance as you said, I cant compete with people who dont work and can spend hours grinding, does that mean we should have some offline levelling, no of course not, I think the current implementation is about a good as it gets, artificial balancing should not and cannot be introduced. I dont care for flashy titles and psychological rewards as you put it. I like to achieve goals I set in my own head.
Each group measures their success in their own terms, for some it is outpost ownership. Many karavan recognise their achievements by not just what they have achieved for themself but how they have helped achieve overall within their group.

arfindel wrote:Long term, accumulating rewards that reflect not only on the winning characters but also on their entire group is the way Nevrax has chosen in OP implementation... and here we are on a sixth page of 4th-5th thread of a neverending discussion about it.

I love to help others, hell I love to push others to recognise a collective goal. I like it when a group works together and form a solid team that can rely on each other to assist. Hence I firmly believe the rewards should be shared by all within that group. this is what the social part of an MMO is about really

rushin wrote:1) it's a good thing that a side can 'win' the OP battle, and judging by Spritehs condisending new signature some are wetting themselves with anticipation at the prospect.

Nope, my "condescending" new sig is a reference to the fact the same people who whined so much about swapping OPs before, just finished swapping their own.

Or didn't you know Nexus and The Soul swapped OPs?

re: "no one enjoys onesided battles" - if you read up on some of my previous posts, you'll see I was one of the major people telling the kamists to actually give us some decent battles instead of giving up after losing one round. I'm glad to say that your track record seems to be improving, though there is still the occasional slipup

rushin wrote:here, in essense is how i see the situation

1) it's a good thing that a side can 'win' the OP battle, and judging by Spritehs condisending new signature some are wetting themselves with anticipation at the prospect.

I'm not sure its the overall Karavan goal, but with each hissy fit a kami throws we seem to come back an outpost better off

rushin wrote:2) there is a case to made for having a balancing mechanism for OP fights. nobody (apart from previously discussed 'we are so uber and we need to win and couldnt care less about anybody but ourselves' people) enjoys one sided battles, there is no point to them.

wel love well times, well balanced fights, if only we would get more of them. please dont try to tell us you are outnumbered/outgunned now, we have seen a full kami force appear at a battle and know their strength. even abck when I was kami I was sure the people were there, just not the will (please see last battle I attended MoM's defense of their op)

rushin wrote:3) some people like being the underdog, some people like being winners, some people have picked a faction because it means something more than winning. all good, choices are important.

I pick my faction by the people in it? legit choice? most people do the same

rushin wrote:4) THE PROBLEM!!!!
having cats produced from outposts. now cats are a lazy, stupid thing to be in the game in any form. but when their sole source is from outposts you enter a massive feedback loop where the faction/alliance/whatever that controls most of the outposts can level their players at twice the rate of the other faction/alliance/whatever.

I dont fully believe this tbh, I know where you are coming from and I respect it tho, however each person plays a role in op battles, a healer is 90% of the time a healer and melee almost 100% of the time a melee, just 1 master puts you on equal footing with most, 2 masters (melee/mage) means you have the same fight skills as most, there are many multi masters on both sides and there isnt much cats can do about that

rushin wrote:I fully expect to be flamed as another whining kami, but maybe you should actually read what i have written and not just react to it. I dont use cats, i dont want or need to be uber or whatever. i enjoy a good fight, there have been some in the past.. but i really detest the situation we are in.

read/understood/replied, might not agree with me, then again not alot of people do

Back to OP battle declarations

First of all, I cant find anything on Ryzom website or forum about rules besides an occasional post of a GM without a real explanation or reference. Maybe I missed something; if so give a link...

The situation as it is now is kinda simple, 1th player that press DECLARE, pay the few million dappers it costs, will be the attacker for a few days. So far no problem..

False attacks a problem? Not really, they just are annoying. But so are attacks on odd times or multiple attacks to annoy opposing side. Some players say multiple attacks are a tactical instrument, maybe they are, but basically they are false as any other false attack. Asking a another guild to attack OP to prevent a counter attack can also be considered as a tactical maneuver but as multiple attacks also basically false. False attacks are tactical instrument

But what happened on Arispotle? Right after a guild got attacked by a friended guild some players from opposing side started sending in tickets with complains about it, they were planning an attack, but darn they didnt declare quick enough Not long after that a MOTD appeared with a text like "false declarations will be dealed with" 2 CSR's and a GM attended that "false" battle, and nothing happened.
Few days later I saw players from the complaining corner visiting another OP battle (a friendly OP trade) asking a CSR to ban the guilds or players involved Again nothing happened. (Maybe they should use the same rule as Soccer, someone who is trying to get another player banned should be banned himself).

When I joined Ryzom everybody told me Ryzom is different, a mature community. I still think it is, with a few exceptions, like players who run to CSR when they can't handle a situation
Grow up, and wait till Dev Team change OP mechanics, maneuvering GM team in to a difficult position by asking them to judge every declaration is not gonna solve anything.

just my 2 cents