PvP is one of those topics in any MMO that will prove divisive. Some people are perfectly happy with the state of things in their MMO of choice, while others will weep over the “death” of the scene they loved, no matter how far from the truth that may be. Changes, no matter how slight they may seem, will be dissected to a degree found nowhere else in gaming, as every little balance pass, every single stat adjustment, or battleground change can influence how well a player does the next time they do battle.
Yet, PvP players make up a minority of every MMO’s population, the vast majority of players interact with the game world through PvE only. PvP players are a very vocal minority, but in some cases this segment of players can come to represent the soul and embodiment of an MMO.
No fanbase is perfect, and no development team can claim that title, either. Friction will always exist on some level between the two, especially as MMOs evolve and grow over the years. Games like EVE Online make their PvP-focused nature known upfront in their new player experience, reminding the player early on that they will die, and often. Yet it’s not the end of the road, but a learning experience. PvP is built into its DNA, the same is true for full loot PvP games like Mortal Online 2 where everything exists to fuel the player battles that take place in its world.
Yet a game like Black Desert Online, which has open-world PvP and has since it launched, isn’t really known for this segment of its player base. In fact, in my years playing BDO, I’ve never really interacted with PvP in a meaningful way. It’s why I was so surprised by the comments on a video we uploaded to our YouTube channel a week or so ago as part of a news story we wrote for Black Desert Online’s 3000-day celebration.
Why Black Desert Players Are Angry
The myriad reasons Black Desert players are angry could probably pave a road from Heidel to Calpheon, and I won’t claim to be an expert in any of them. As someone who really hasn’t played PvP in BDO, I can’t claim first-hand experience of the “good old days.”
Yet, many of the arguments I’m seeing make sense to me, especially as someone who adores EVE Online’s free-for-all style of PvP.
In reaction to the video itself, many took issue with the buzzquote made not six seconds into the video from our friends over at MMOs.com, that Pearl Abyss had taken its PvP to the “next level.” In a reddit post (shared on our forums under the article itself), it pointed to discontent from Black Desert PvPers, specifically with the state of PvP in 2024.
Much of the consternation seems to center on the diminishing of Open World PvP, which thrived in the early days of Black Desert Online. I would hear stories of players fighting over farming spots, players being PK’ed for being a little too close to another guild’s territory, and the general griefing you’d hear about in any full PvP MMO.
Hell, in an interview earlier this year, we highlighted one such experience that turned from griefing to forming lasting friendships.
As one Black Desert Online veteran told me via a Discord DM, anonymously, “For a game where the best content is PvP, PA has been doing a bad job with it lately (the PvE, bosses, and 'dungeons' are incredibly shallow).” This sentiment seems backed up by another player, who posted a video about how the PvP changes have seen him finally leave the MMO for the foreseeable future.
Because of recent changes made by Pearl Abyss, there are now heavy penalties for those who player kill in the open world, incurring a Karma hit that can, over time, grow to where it even degrades the gear players have spent hours upon hours grinding to improve should they die to anything - be it monster or another player. Lose enough Karma and you (and all the characters of your family) become outlaws effectively, where players and town guards can kill you on sight without penalties - even in safe zones like a city.
Some changes have also made it harder to recover that Karma, which is traditionally recouped by killing monsters in the open world. This has the effect of further disincentivizing players from roaming around the world for a kill like they might have once done.
Player sentiment around PvP’s state seems to center on what PvP brought to the game in the older days - a loss of emergent gameplay. Finding yourself in a massive fight over a grinding spot could, at times, be exhilarating and a great way to break up the monotonous grind, according to Redditor Musketoon:
“I learned that this "emergent" gameplay created lots of fun social situations, the shit talk - the guild coming to defend the players, the guild war that broke out, the days of fall-out. It was never personal, but it was fun drama that I looked forward to. I liked to log in and see we had 3 dec's on us and then seek and destroy those guild mates against us in hopes to lure more of their guild into a bigger fight. Negotiating terms of peace after the fallout etc.”
Other commenters have echoed these thoughts, saying the MMO felt more “alive” during these older days. Some have panned the forced consensual Guild Wars, which were added in an update last year, where both guild leaders have to consent to war now versus the older days where you could wardec a guild and have at it, forcing them to react and defend themselves.
Some players have expressed exasperation with this system, effectively claiming you can weaponize a wardec, whereas a losing side can simply cancel an agreed upon wardec now, defeating the purpose altogether. Personally, I agree with the backlash here. This mutual consent takes some of the spontaneity and surprises out of the situation, both vital to a vibrant guild wars scene (just ask any corporation in EVE Online about this).
As a result, PvP, at least the way it used to be in Black Desert Online, seems to be in a precarious spot despite the energy the studio seems to be consuming to give players multiple avenues to participate, from its Node Wars and Arsha PvP servers to the Arena of Solare and Arsha.
It should be noted that not all Black Desert players are unhappy with the state of things - especially those who perceived the open world PvP as a way to grief and bully players. However, happy players very rarely make waves by posting in the forums or on Reddit about how happy they are - they typically just keep playing. So, the negative feedback always seems to outweigh the positive when you go looking for it.
How PvP Works In Black Desert Online - 2024 Edition
PvP in Black Desert Online still consists of Open World PvP. However, the risks associated with this form of player-versus-player combat keep many players away from it now. However, it’s still a feature, and you can flag up in any town to roam the countryside to tackle players as you see fit.
Forcing PvP comes with Karma penalties, as described before, and many players will simply play on alt accounts with cheaper, yet still powerful, gear to get their PK fix without the need to risk their main character or main family’s Karma.
PvP opens up when you hit level 50, and any player can be forced into PvP, whether they are flagged for it or not, which is why there is a Karma hit now for those who do so. The Karma hit is huge as well; according to the Black Desert Online website, killing an adventurer can result in losing 50K-120K Karma - and dying with negative Karma can result in some pretty massive penalties.
Black Desert Online has other PvP modes, though, so players can hopefully get their fix. The idea here is to provide a pretty large swathe of modes for players to make PvP more accessible to everyone, it seems.
The Guild League is a ranked PvP ladder that sees between 7-10 players battle against another Guild, while the Node Wars feature just got revamped this week, bringing some pretty sweeping changes to how they operate.
The War of the Roses is also coming, with its preseason happening earlier this year. This 300v300 battleground allows for large-scale fights not really seen in other MMOs anymore, and to participate, your guild needs to be active within the PvP scene (at least to lead, you can be picked up if you have a gear score of 700 to join in the Third Legion), having won at least one Node War or Conquest War in the prior few weeks. It’s a complex system with players designated as Captains to help control the flow of battle, complete with a tactical map, objectives to conquer, and castles to beseige.
It’s chaotic, and the earlier tests this year were a good barometer of where the mode needs to improve before the sweeping rollout later this year, but it looks like it’s aimed at creating those large scale, open world battles players might be craving - all without the penalties.
Additionally, there are PvP servers, the Arsha servers, where unrestricted open world PvP is the norm. Killing players on these servers doesn’t result in any penalties because it’s just expected if you’re on the server, you’ll be fighting each other at some point. However, even these haven’t been without their criticism from players, who feel it’s a PvP server that rewards PvE gameplay, not PvP.
Whichever way you shake it, though, there are plenty of options to PvP in Black Desert Online in 2024, and while the Node Wars revamps are still new and will need to be tested before final judgment can be passed on those, it’s clear that Pearl Abyss is still trying to support the scene while making changes to how it operates in the PvE environments.
Why Change, And What Can Pearl Abyss Do To Improve It?
One of the main reasons we’ve seen thrown around the community for the sweeping changes from how PvP operated in Black Desert Online at launch versus now is down to combating griefing. Bullies, as many have called PvPers who force it on adventurers have been called, would take out players who were grinding in powerful areas for gear and loot, and as the MMO has grown, this could impact newer players who just haven’t spent the time needed yet to get as powerful as the old guard.
I can understand this reaction. Unrestricted PvP can kill games, especially if it’s not necessarily built into the DNA of the MMO from the ground up. It works in a game like EVE Online because the space-faring MMO was built from day one to be a sandbox battleground where these emergent battles are the content. However, many games over the years have pulled the reigns back on full loot PvP simply because it’s a niche aspect of a niche genre.
Games like New World changed their PvP before the MMO even launched, as its initial pitch of a full-loot, open-world PvP sandbox might have looked appealing to hardcore PvPers, but no one else. Mortal Online 2, a game built with full-loot PvP from the start, has struggled to maintain a truly active population since its launch back in 2022, according to SteamDB.
PvPers can easily point to the original vision of the MMO as proof that the open-world PvP as it existed at launch means that PvP is also in Black Desert’s DNA. That emergent gameplay helped to invigorate the community in the early days, and mechanics like the Black Robed Man were in place to help this thrive (the Black Robed Man has since been removed from the MMO as this NPC was used to help find specific players, and could lead to griefing).
Pearl Abyss has desires to grow Black Desert as a franchise into even greater heights than it currently sits right now. Removing and penalizing ways for griefers to exist in the game is key to making sure that newer players and more casual players have a chance to coexist and thrive in the MMO. The Black Desert franchise has brought in 2 billion Euros to Pearl Abyss since its Korean launch in 2014, so there is an incentive to evolve to cater to a larger audience. Pearl Abyss is a business, after all.
We asked Pearl Abyss for comment on this story and the backlash the recent video seemed to be receiving, however the company declined to comment.
One can argue that the penalties for long-time PvPers longing for the emergent gameplay that dominated and thrived early on are way too one-sided and way too harsh. It also begs the question of what else the MMO can do to ensure that PvPers who want to bring that style of gameplay back aren’t ostracized - especially as in many MMOs, these types of players are often the most vocal and visible of a game community - and they aren’t afraid to share their opinions.
As one Black Desert player suggested in a Discord conversation, one solution could be designating certain areas as unrestricted PvP zones, and everyone entering them would understand that risk. This could allow pockets of old-style open-world PvP to thrive like they used to without the harsh penalties associated with it nowadays.
Think the Wilderness in RuneScape or The Ettenmoors in The Lord of the Rings Online.
Having these pockets of zones that are PvP-centric, even on regular servers, could help encourage the old style of PvP to thrive again - and by making them flush with loot and rewards players will want, it’ll encourage risk on both sides. Players will venture in to gather and grind, while others will roam, looking for the fights they yearn for organically.
Another idea could be to use a phasing or layering tech on the servers like World of Warcraft does while flagged for PvP. Before, the MMO would have PvP and PvE-specific servers, but with The Battle for Azeroth, that changed. Players can now flag themselves for PvP, and effectively enter a separate layer of the server where the only players visible are PvPers.
This would do away with the need to have a separate Arsha server, but it could reinvigorate PvP on the main servers. However, something like this would take a ton of dev resources to implement, especially if Black Desert’s servers aren’t really meant to be layered like this in the first place. It would also have the added benefit of ensuring players who don’t want to participate in PvP can’t simply be killed because someone else does. I find it incredible that this is still an option, even with all of the penalties associated with it to deter the practice.
Why not just remove open world PvP from Black Desert Online altogether, then? I don’t think this one is viable, purely because it’s baked into the DNA of BDO from the start. This is a part of Black Desert’s history, better or worse, and it does nothing to actually address the issues of PvPers - quite the opposite, rather. Removing this from the MMO (except, maybe, on the Arsha servers) would be a monumental change to the endgame DNA of BDO, but also something of a slap in the face to all those PvPers who want to play the MMO that they fell in love with, in a way that doesn’t penalize their play style.
At the end of the day, the changes that Black Desert Online’s developers have been making signal a shift in focus as the MMO speeds towards its second decade of operation in North America and Europe. While open-world PvP isn’t gone, it's certainly diminished in a way that makes it less appealing for hardcore PvP fans, and the new PvP modes and revamps are an attempt to capture that magic in a more confined, controlled, and fun-for-all environment.
Whether Pearl Abyss will be successful with this in the long term remains to be seen. And even if they are, this doesn’t mean there won’t be detractors. As Pearl Abyss America CEO Jeonghee “JJ” Jin told creators last year during TwitchCon, the relationship between the company and its players is akin to a “committed romantic relationship,” where both sides feature ups and downs throughout the relationship. Yet, as JJ reminded players at the event, the developer understands that the feedback comes from “passion.”
“But our players who are complaining or giving us bad feedback, they want to change, they want an improvement. So these are things that actually we probably have to hear more because happy players really don’t say anything.”
The loss of emergent gameplay is hard for any game to overcome, as oftentimes that style of content is the most compelling and memorable from any MMO. It's one of the defining features of great MMOs in the end, as it's a way to not only keep your players coming back for more to replicate those incredible moments, but they tell their friends about them, inspiring new players to pick up your game.
I started to play EVE Online, for example, after hearing about the epic battles my friends had been in, and I daresay there are many a Black Desert player who logged on for the first time after hearing a friend or content creator regale them with stories of an impromptu guild war that was triggered over a grinding spot in the older days. It can be really, really hard to recapture that passion with modes that just don't allow for the type of organic stories that a truly open world PvP system can provide.
Yet, I don't think I can blame Pearl Abyss for wanting to make these changes, as they are trying to protect the long-term health and growth of their MMO. If bullying and griefing were a real problem from their perspective, it is imperative they figure out ways to stamp it out to ensure a level playing field for all. However, whether it's fundamentally changing your PvP system or allowing it to flourish unregulated, it can have detrimental results no matter which way you look at it.
It’ll be interesting to see how things look moving forward, once hardened PvPers have a chance to dive into the Node War changes, and War of the Roses becomes a permanent fixture in the PvP scene. However, as it stands right now, things feel like they are at a crossroads between the vocal, if small, PvP community and the developer.
