Best MMO PvP you ever played?

[rowdey]

1. pre LDON everquest 1

2. Darkfall

 

dont know about anyone else but i like a pvp with some kind of punishment for dieing and some kind of reward for winning .. and not some worthless lame reward like a title or "PVP exp" in both those games if u won a fight u were rewarded with loot that the player u defeated had.

Before people complain about losing their hard earned gear well its all about the system that the game inpliments and how easy it is to get gear. Darkfall has one of the best gear systems out there and the best pvp hands down of any MMO .. Alot of people just dont know about darkfall.

For me whats the point of a "PVP" server without a reward such as loot to gain from killin someone. Its pointless to play on a pvp server .. what so u can camp someone while they try to quest/level .... fun stuff shouldnt get boring anytime soon

[Network]

- Ragnarok online best pvp hands down

- swtor pvp may not be amazing yet but still really fun and pve aspects are awsome

[Vincedaddy]

Lol not this mmo, probably wow during burning crusade

[Safgril]

PRE CU SWG

Asheron's Call

Asheron's Call 2

[Sykomyke]

Guild Wars had the best instanced team-based PvP. The variety of skills and interplay between them made it much more cerebral than your typical mashfest.

 

DAoC and Planetside had the best open-world mechanics and terrain. It's not a coincidence that those games had 3 realms instead of 2 - it allows the 2 losing realms to team up and basically autobalance itself versus the winning realm.

 

This. SO much this.

 

Guild Wars builds were balanced, intuitive, and required thought in not only the skills your chose, but the points you put into them.

[Vonrictus]

DAOC had the most class diversity, objectives, non-timed BGs and 3 realms to make sure the fights were balanced even if Albion had 50% of the server population.

[Soulaufein]

1) DAoC

2) DAoC

3) Warhammer low level RvR

[Nocturnalis]

Shadowbane - for the FFA pvp and the ability to completely wipe a guild and their Keep/Fort off the map. Can you say siege engines real ones. Also the thief class was epic......EPIC!

 

All other MMO's more or less left the same from Anarchy Online (my first sorry, I missed the UO and EQ boat) to SWTOR.

[Rollento]

The problem with threads like these is their all subjective, sure there were great mechanics in all MMOs (including WoW), but for a game to win in the 21st century it needs to bring innovation. Hopefully BW and EA are looking at the success of some of the listed games on here, but developing something more unique to them. Edited January 26, 2012 by Rollento

[Gwal]

Arcade beat em up like lolpvp - Age of Conan. It was meaningless laughs.

 

Intense organised mass pvp and world PvP - Lineage 2. 200 v 200 running pvp battles to deny a world boss from your enemies and take it for yourself. 200+ v 200+ sieges to take castles and throttle or caress the world economy. It had some harsh loss penalties though which made every battle won or survived meaningful and the lack of instances meant wars between guilds led to world pvp anywhere outside the hub cities.

[bklynfinest]

+1

 

UO through UO:T2A was the awesome, everything before Trammel (Renaissance) care bearness ruined a game that forced you to be one up on your enemy at all times, whether that meant fighting or straight up fleeing.

 

Skill-based character progression, immersive crafting and vending (house vendors/stores were first AH -- not to mention to be a good merchant you advertised on forums, built relationships -- true sandbox!), customizable UI (you could actually drag the display/skill/inventory gumps) -- most of these are not implemented as well on modern MMO games. Not to mention the rep, Order/Chaos system that governed the risks/rewards of PKing and PvP. All from a game started in like '97 - a full 15 years ago.

 

Oh my gosh if old school UO gameplay, skill progression, crafting, housing was duplicated in a modern 3D engine, it would slay, but only attract the truly hardcore gamer, cuz if you died, your entire corpse could be looted of its inventory.

 

/nostalgia

 

 

There's actually a great front page post on wtfman.com about balance in today's mmos that still can't match UO. Unfortunetly, can't access the site through work

[Rykzon]

I bet half the people saying Daoc had never played the game. Just fanboys "cause daoc was such a great game!"

 

i hate nostalgia.

[Tohrazer]

swg and eve

[Asmerroth]

RF-Online hands down. 3 Factions, not this 2 Faction Crap, every 8 Hours the Factions would fight over an Objective to get Resources for your Faction and the good old fight for leveling spots.....aaaah how i miss the PvP from this.

[Roak]

I've enjoyed pvp in many mmos but never lasted beyond a couple of months in all but a couple because the endgame stuff to support pvp just hasn't been there (sound familiar)

 

Best (longest played) were:

 

ultima 2.5 years, proper world pvp, proper faction system, murderers, had to risk pvp areas to do the most challenging pve (post trammel), actual economy, player loot the good old days - honestly a t2a or even renaissance build (to get more players in) ultima modern remake would keep many, many people happy for many years

 

swg 2 years, perma overt teras kasi/commando, permadeath jedi, player city with faction bases

 

the rest I left after a couple of months:

 

darkfall: awesome pvp but no hardcap on skills was dumb imo, should've been set at 1k or so so people had to choose what to be, not just be everything at once.

 

dcuo: fun, fast paced pvp, needs more though

 

lotro: played as a warg for about 3 months, good fun but restricted to one zone and the stupid amount of cc on freep side wore thin - good keep takeover/defence mechanism though

 

vanguard, warhammer, rift left because of population issues, no population in vanguards case, severe imbalance on the other 2 (I was on high pop faction and got bored of no action)

 

eve: too slow, got a stealth ship, got kicked from corp because i went on holiday for a week, why so serious

 

aoc: got tired of waiting for the fabled pvp update and bored of hanging round keshatta all day with nothing else to do

 

only mmo regret: missing daoc because I was still playing ultima

Edited January 26, 2012 by Roak

[masterbason]

RF Online 4ever!

 

Best real mmorpg PvP!

[Elyree]

I bet half the people saying Daoc had never played the game. Just fanboys "cause daoc was such a great game!"

 

DAoC should be a case study in bungled opportunities. By all rights it should have crushed EQ. It had that much potential. If only it had been in better hands than Mythic.

[masterbason]

RF-Online hands down. 3 Factions, not this 2 Faction Crap, every 8 Hours the Factions would fight over an Objective to get Resources for your Faction and the good old fight for leveling spots.....aaaah how i miss the PvP from this.

 

This wow/swtor guys don't know how is to fight for leveling spots and also 3 faction!! best of best!

[Zarthorn]

DaoC, often immitated never bettered even by it's own creators.

 

The RvR was the pinnacle of what PvP should be! It was fun, it was addictive and it meant something to everyone that participated.

 

Maybe Bioware should go watch some old footage of what made DaoC so great, then take a look at the WZ's and Ilum and hopefully then, they will realise how they got it wrong.

[rakhabit]

Planetside - No gaming experience will come close to the first time I took part in a massive battle in PS. I can't wait for Planetside 2.

 

Bloodline Champions - Not really an MMO, but it's the best pvp game out right now. Everyone who likes skill based pvp should give this game a shot.

 

[RadehX]

1. EVE ONLINE

2. EVE ONLINE

3. EVE ONLINE

...

...

...

...

89. Take your pick.

 

Nothing comes even close to open world PVP in EVE. It's the only game where getting killed actually results in you losing something. Tried WoW, DAoC, Rift, UO (lol), and SWG. Nothing comes even close to EVE in terms of PVP.

 

The developer is also one of the most responsive developers I ever came across. They are continually tweaking the game in a good way (overall).

 

Having said that, SWTOR is probably the first non-EVE MMO that I genuinely enjoy and the only one I see myself playing for more than 1-2yrs. Playing EVE since 2004, and can't see myself unsubscribing because it's the only MMO with great PVP.

[Vant]

-Stealthers served no purpose other than their own "stealthwar" that didn't bother other people actually playing a class that served a purpose. And no, any decent player doesn't play a stealther because there is NO counter to being invisible. period. It just shouldn't be in a game at all. SWTOR's Camouflage is an entirely differnt matter since it's more like a "purge"....the stealth-classes are just as in every other mmo, you can't avoid them because you can't see them and when they "pop" you're dead because they are walways too powerfull when they can pick their battle. Same DPS in open fight, i'd never complain...in DAoC, they couldn't pick on anything from their stealth attacks, maybe 15% of someones life on the opening - just how it should be. (late daoc, not talking about first 2 years where it was more like 50%)

 

 

You lost me with this. The first two years of DAoC were the best. After Shrouded Isles was released the game became entirely too gear dependent. In the first two years on my Scout I was unstoppable.

[Elyree]

You lost me with this. The first two years of DAoC were the best. After Shrouded Isles was released the game became entirely too gear dependent. In the first two years on my Scout I was unstoppable.

 

Balance was horrible the first two years of DAoC.... Stungard? Rangers/Scouts/Hunters owning the realm ranks.... Thanes sitting in a corner crying because they couldn't kill anything.

Edited January 26, 2012 by Elyree

[goxwerd]

1: DAOC

2/3: Guild Wars (not really an MMO), Warhammer (the combat system was mostly good for most of the game's lifespan, despite the city / fort system being ****ed for equally as long)

 

 

DAOC commentary:

 

1. DAOC had an effective overarching system because there were 3 realms. Reasonably good internal balancing.

 

2. DAOC had good gameplay options because there were no "rails". The developers didn't add over-engineered microgoals here and tokens there to make you do specific things.

 

Look at how ****** Ilum is -- players want "TOKENS" and **** to drop in Ilum to make it "worthwhile". Players do Warzones only because they give commendation tokens. Everyone and their brother wants *********** tokens as a reason to PvP, instead of simply killing players because it's fun.

 

In DAOC, you simply got points for doing the one thing common to all PvP: killing *********** players. None of this clicking on chests in Tatooine ********. No retarded medal farming "hey let's stand in the acid pit more". No clicking gimmicky objectives on Alderaan.

 

You kill players, you get points. Period.

 

3. DAOC PvP had a greater purpose -- relics that mattered. No game since has implemented an overarching reason for your entire faction to cooperate to WIN THE GAME. Although it has to be said: relics had a significant impact on PvE. And this is probably why we will never see a similar system for WoW/Rift/SWTOR or any PvE-centric game.

 

4. Gear. DAOC gear, for a very long segment of its life, was easy as **** to get to a competitive level. During vanilla, you did your epic quest, gg. During SI, you talked to a crafter and paid a few hundred gold. During ToA (**** TOA) you ****ed your ******e with a sharp object. After they nerfed TOA, it was a short grind.

 

 

 

Additional note on #2: This is pretty significant IMO, because this may never change for MMOs in the future. Specifically, Mythic was lazy as **** and simply bad at making their "content". They were too haphazard to go and "MAKE RAILS" like Trion, BioWare, Blizzard.

 

Modern developers sink a lot of development and QA time into creating things like 47 different tokens, finely-tuned token acquisition rates and gear acceleration and titles and rewards and map markers and objective capture times and ... get the picture? Developers nowadays over-engineer the games.

 

They call it "features" and "content". What it does is force players to min/max their "TOKENS PER HOUR".

 

Back in DAOC's day, the devs were lazy *****es working out of their garage. Not really, but at that level. PvP in DAOC was barebones and simple: kill players, collect RP. Kill door, kill lord, take keep. Keep helps you kill players, collect RP. Did I mention killing players and collecting RP?

 

The system was absurdly simple. This means that players are the ones who decided how they wanted to play -- did they want to StealthZerg™? 8-man roam? Zerg that milegate? Camp Darkness Falls? Any of the above, because they all involved ... get this: KILLING PLAYERS, COLLECTING RP.

 

Nowadays, developers try to tune rewards for zerging, roaming, camping, ganking. If you played Warhammer, you saw this -- keep trading, because players try to optimize RP/hour. Because devs tried to "incentivize" keep warfare. What do we do in Ilum? Trade caps. What do we do in Huttball? Farm medals. We don't PvP anymore, because the developers give us "TOKENS" and micro-objectives, and zone quests.

 

None of which involve killing players.

 

Developers are trying too hard at all the wrong things.

 

Mythic didn't try hard when they made DAOC. They let the players try hard after they lucked out with a solid PvP system.

 

Sigh.

 

 

 

 

best analysis of MMO PVP i have read in awhile.

[Centaurius]

havent read past the first page but to the OP SWG base wars pre-NGE were amazing server wide events that were lag-filled slideshows but were still the BEST pvp i've ever played.