The Effects of World PvP in WoW

Joe Iuliani: I guess I should start off my mentioning I'm thirty-five, have a full time job and love to game. Maybe I'm still new to MMORPGs, but I was always told that PvP stands for Player versus Player. I think I may be getting too hung up on the "versus" part. Since I really don't understand how a person, and more often these days, a group of people ganging up on a person trying to just play a game works out. I think that world PVP takes away from individuals who want to just farm for materials (farming will get its own rant) or do something zany like just make it into a damn zone.

Before anybody really gets into why I'm on a PvP server and not a PvE server, its simple why would I want to limit my options. Griefing players is not "versus." Waiting until a player is down to 10% of their life isn't “versus.” Taking an hour just to get into a dungeon because gankers are waiting outside isn't “versus.” All these world PvP issues take away from the limited amount of time some players have.

Garrett Fuller: I must confess to being a Ganking, Fragging, Player Killing type of person in any MMO I play. I really haven’t thought about why, it’s just that every time I see an Alliance player in WoW, I go after them no matter the level. The main reason I think it happens is because the same thing is done to us. I have been farming plenty of times for materials and had a group of Allies come along and make game play very difficult. It certainly is an “us against them” scenario. The thing about open world PvP in areas where characters still need to level and complete quests is that players can certainly have a rough time. In DAOC there were only a few quests that forced you to go to the PvP zones to complete your mission.

I do believe that players should have a safe place to level their characters separate from the rest of the killers out there. Still, the way WoW was constructed gives us our battlefield. There is little we can do to stop the griefing other than simply become griefers ourselves.

Joe Iuliani: I do like the versus idea, but the entire world stage isn’t the place for it. DAOC had the right idea in my opinion it combined the best elements of PVP and PVE. When you were ready to fight other players, you psyched yourself up for it. You dug in and got ready for a long haul of beating down the opposition. You were single minded on PvPing other factions. It says nothing of a player’s skill when you jump somebody who is quietly farming. There you are saying, “Oh look, dreamfoil” and two seconds later you are dead when a group of Allies or Horde come rushing by. Questing into enemy territory can be fun, but when it is nothing more than a time killing obstacle it becomes a problem.

The statement of becoming “griefers ourselves” perpetuates the ganking cycle. You kill them, they kill us and nobody really moves ahead. The only way to stop griefers is to instill some penalties against the players. The abilities of a player grows exponentially with leveling. There is no way that killing a character ten levels or more beneath should be considered anything near a reasonable fight. Not receiving credit for a griefing kill is hardly a deterrent.

Garrett Fuller: The thing about putting penalties into place does make some sense if it can be done correctly. I think Blizzard dropped the ball on putting in some kind of penalty for players who grief. It remains part of WoW just as it does in the rest of the MMO world. Because the game is in a virtual world it gives people the chance to be bullies and crush other players. Now I am all for the mantra of “Crush your enemies,” but really what can they do? The only idea I can think of is to write code that prohibits the players fighting anything 10 levels below them. There is always the argument that players should play on a PvE server if that is the case. I just think that Blizzard did not put enough thought into how to make PvP servers work for the players.

Joe Iuliani: The only real deterrent is some kind of penalty. The only DK points assigned are when you kill a computer generated MOB. I can’t imagine the type of work that goes into successfully programming this type of game, but I would bet parts of my anatomy that there is a person sitting behind all those town folk who live in Ashenvale. Killing PVE targets can be assigned a penalty but allowing paying customers to be frustrated and having their time wasted is OK?

There are plenty of other time sinks involved with WOW; I mean who doesn’t love grinding for faction or the joy farming for larval acid. On a tangent….ENOUGH WTH THE PLAUGEHOUND RUNTS, sorry needed to vent that. Having time wasted by griefing is just not something that should be endured.

How do you folks out there feel about griefing and open PVP?