Best MMO PvP you ever played?

[Rycelow]

DAoC hands down.

 

The community that RvR generated was unmatched by any other game I've played since. Every1 would get involved to protect their realm. The battles could last an entire weekend, and guilds would coordinate to work in shifts to defend our keeps or press the attack. Even people that weren't 50 would help out by ferrying siege equipment from our guild vaults out to the front lines.

[Wookubus]

starwars galaxies.. player constructed pvp bases complete with turrets that had to be manned and the multi- guild raids on them that lasted for hours . all open world and always imperial vs rebel.. im talkng 200 vs 200 battles ..

 

 

it was so fun when all those imeprial guilds would meet up in a outside city , stratagize ...,, then 200 people gear up and take a swoop ride across tattooine for 10 mins to remain undetected until you hit thier base in a flurry or laser bolts and sabers..

[Delanay]

Guild Wars.

 

Pretty much shat on every other MMO once they got the balancing 100% right.

 

Agreed. GW pvp put the rest to shame. Back then, it was all about skill.

[_-Kaz-_]

For those who love DAoC,

 

Elders Scrolls Online looks promising...

[Lithy]

For those who love DAoC,

 

Elders Scrolls Online looks promising...

 

I heard that's using the Hero Engine? May be wrong just saying

 

 

Anyway for World PvP SWG was the best to me, and for battlegrounds WAR with it's open world just behind SWG.

Never played DAoC.

[_-Kaz-_]

I heard that's using the Hero Engine? May be wrong just saying

 

 

Anyway for World PvP SWG was the best to me, and for battlegrounds WAR with it's open world just behind SWG.

Never played DAoC.

 

That does ring a bell, you're probably right.

 

But I was thinking more along the lines of the guy who created the pvp system in DAoC is in charge of the pvp for ESO.

[crustie]

Making this thread to find out what the player base thinks is the best MMO PvP they have played and why. I know I personally have played MMORPGs for a long time and the appeal for me specifically has always been the PvP aspect of it. Include this game if you like aspects of it but I am looking at a perspective of ALL MMORPGs. Ill try to be as specific and objective as I can in my descriptions.

 

Ill start with the World PvP and who wins in my opinion. Hands down in my book was Ultima Online, we are going OLD school here. You could mark runes to the popular areas where you were sure to find a fight that was safe from any guards and when a guildie called for help, you recall there and help him out. One guy gets jumped by 2 from an enemy guild so you call your guildies and 2 of them show up and you kill them so they call their guildies and 4 more show up and before you know it there was an all out war. Why was this possible? Because traveling from one point to another did not take 20 minutes and you could feasibly help your teammates out within 30 seconds or a significant amount of time to put yourself in the fight.

 

Other part of UO World PvP that was awesome, the fight for scrolls. Scrolls would increase your stats to higher levels ala data crons here. But in order to get scrolls you had to down bosses that had them on their corpse as loot, these bosses were located in neutral zones with no guards or safety available and would only spawn at specific times. This meant you would sometimes have 4 groups or more all competing for this loot at the same time, massive wars and people pushing in to get to the boss and then once they got there they had to hold off the other groups long enough to kill the boss AND loot it, because loot was open to anyone, and then get away because if you died with the loot on you, it dropped too. Massively fun world PvP and I have not played a game since that has done it better yet.

 

How did they do it? Easy travel to zones where PvP will be happening, something for the sides to battle over that they could hold in their hand and walk off with, or use right there on the spot if they needed to that EVERYONE had incentive to possess and would fight over. After all if you didn't need it you could sell it.

 

Competitive group PvP 2v2 or greater I would go with WoW not only did you have the option of arena if your group was low but your larger battlegrounds were/are more fluid. I think this game is currently very close to it but there are still obvious tweaks to it. However for me specifically I like having a rating system in place, that being said I do not believe that the guys that are the better players and can get the ratings to get the better gear should have very significant gains in the gear they can get. Make it minor, after all the guys who can get higher level gear in PvP are already solid players, there should be a gain to their efforts be in visually by showing off their e-peen or minor adjustments to stats or maybe even the ability to make or sell something of value that will give them a benefit or more credits.

 

1 on 1 PvP, I have to go with UO again but I have to add a very specific caveat to it. When I played UO there was a specific class that was sculpted out to play as a PvP class. So when I cast one thing an intelligent opponent would cast a counter if he was quick enough, and the fight became either outplaying your opponent entirely and beating them quick or being able to dwindle them down until you could finally score a kill. The top players were ALWAYS the top players and it was very tough to take them down because the 1 on 1 PvP was purely about timing and not class ability. I understand how this kind of thing is not possible with current MMOs because there are so many classes. Only way I could see this working is if there was always a counter to something any class had to do. Besides I think a game should be built around group PvP experience and not 1 on 1.

 

So there you have it my take on the best MMO PvP. I know I have seen plenty of people suggest games I have not even played. Have you guys had the same experience as me or were they completely different and the things I said were so far off base of what you enjoy I am a noob for even suggesting it?

 

UO world pvp.... the best EVER... pre trammel that is.

Edited July 15, 2012 by crustie

[Yestreen]

I heard that's using the Hero Engine? May be wrong just saying

 

 

Anyway for World PvP SWG was the best to me, and for battlegrounds WAR with it's open world just behind SWG.

Never played DAoC.

 

They are building their own engine but they lisenced the hero engine as a template to help them construct their on.

[Mhorlok]

Planetside

[Dhregin]

SWG. DAOC. Thats all.

[KiranK]

Dark Age of Camelot.

 

Best PvP ever. It was engaging, it was rewarding, it was complicated, it had the perfect burden of knowledge, it didn't overly reward time, PVP rank wasn't a guaranteed win, it was team based, it had tactics...I mean I can go on for hours about everything DAoC did right.

 

DAoC PvP had the most longevity. It was dynamic. You could 8v8 as a test of skill. You could zerg as a test of numbers. We created our own PvP objectives out of the tools given to us, you didn't have to force feed it to us. It was an open world where all PvP play styles were possible, stealth, zerg, group vs group, 1 vs 1. It had something for anyone and everyone and no battle was ever the same as the next. I even enjoyed zerging the hell out of people and zerg vs. zerg fighting, especially when sieging or defending towers and keeps. I enjoyed 8 vs 8 skill based combat. I like dueling people as a sign of respect. Again, we got to choose what we attacked or defended, when, where, and why. There wasn't a timer or a number ticking on the side of the screen that forced me to do it.

[BurnsTwoThree]

Well I've played two MMOs. SWTOR and WoW.

 

Pre 1.2 SWTOR had me incredibly addicted as PvP was fun and very balanced but needed some fixes as abilities weren't working as intended and OP/Smug DPS were hitting far too hard especially with Biochem. Servers were dying too fast to really want to stay on the server. Good PvPers quit the game left and right because of no RWZs or Arena style PvP within a decent time period of release.

 

Post 1.2 the game has gone to crap, servers are dying left and right. PvP is no longer fun or intuitive especially for healers who aren't Smugglers/OPs. Games are decided by who has the most FOTM. Skill has become the lowest priority for RWZs.

 

So I'm gonna have to take WoW.

 

 

Subscription runs out on 7/18/12, looks like Round 2 of leave the game and wait for it to not be horrible.

Edited July 15, 2012 by BurnsTwoThree

[Helig]

All had their flaws. But overall, I'd have to give it to WoW, TBC-era (goes downhill from there).

[Soljin]

SWG Pre-CU was by far the best IMO. Player set factional bases kept world PvP thriving...to the point the servers would crash at times, but it was worth it. If you got sick of a planet...set some bases up on another planet for some new scenery and people would show up to try and take them down.

 

I remember bounty Hunters chasing me across several planets over hours of play..SOme even camped out and waited hours and days to get another chance at you...If you took them down what did they do? Well they recruited a couple fellas to help out (which is what BH's do in almost every SW's Book Ive read).

 

It was very common for the Imperials to lock down an NPC city and have an all out server war insue....

 

Small skirmishes would break out over all sorts of things....Trying to get loot rights on a Krayt Dragon, or Night Sister Queen...Hunting to close to an opposing faction player city, Just straight running into the wrong bunch of people.

 

Now granted the Skill based system made some serious balance problems, but it was also what drew me to SWG...It allowed you to really bond with your character since you built it out of hundreds of different skill combinations...If you didnt like it well start dropping skills and rebuild your character point by point....drop a couple grind up experience and train...Honestly I liked the limitless possibilities and even the Imbalance...because everyone could be OP in a variety of ways...There was no "oops guess I rolled the wrong class" It was a matter of rebuilding your toon to be competative...you were never stuck with a lemon you couldnt chage to an Apple.

[LuxD]

Making this thread to find out what the player base thinks is the best MMO PvP they have played and why. I know I personally have played MMORPGs for a long time and the appeal for me specifically has always been the PvP aspect of it. Include this game if you like aspects of it but I am looking at a perspective of ALL MMORPGs. Ill try to be as specific and objective as I can in my descriptions.

 

Ill start with the World PvP and who wins in my opinion. Hands down in my book was Ultima Online, we are going OLD school here. You could mark runes to the popular areas where you were sure to find a fight that was safe from any guards and when a guildie called for help, you recall there and help him out. One guy gets jumped by 2 from an enemy guild so you call your guildies and 2 of them show up and you kill them so they call their guildies and 4 more show up and before you know it there was an all out war. Why was this possible? Because traveling from one point to another did not take 20 minutes and you could feasibly help your teammates out within 30 seconds or a significant amount of time to put yourself in the fight.

 

Other part of UO World PvP that was awesome, the fight for scrolls. Scrolls would increase your stats to higher levels ala data crons here. But in order to get scrolls you had to down bosses that had them on their corpse as loot, these bosses were located in neutral zones with no guards or safety available and would only spawn at specific times. This meant you would sometimes have 4 groups or more all competing for this loot at the same time, massive wars and people pushing in to get to the boss and then once they got there they had to hold off the other groups long enough to kill the boss AND loot it, because loot was open to anyone, and then get away because if you died with the loot on you, it dropped too. Massively fun world PvP and I have not played a game since that has done it better yet.

 

How did they do it? Easy travel to zones where PvP will be happening, something for the sides to battle over that they could hold in their hand and walk off with, or use right there on the spot if they needed to that EVERYONE had incentive to possess and would fight over. After all if you didn't need it you could sell it.

 

Competitive group PvP 2v2 or greater I would go with WoW not only did you have the option of arena if your group was low but your larger battlegrounds were/are more fluid. I think this game is currently very close to it but there are still obvious tweaks to it. However for me specifically I like having a rating system in place, that being said I do not believe that the guys that are the better players and can get the ratings to get the better gear should have very significant gains in the gear they can get. Make it minor, after all the guys who can get higher level gear in PvP are already solid players, there should be a gain to their efforts be in visually by showing off their e-peen or minor adjustments to stats or maybe even the ability to make or sell something of value that will give them a benefit or more credits.

 

1 on 1 PvP, I have to go with UO again but I have to add a very specific caveat to it. When I played UO there was a specific class that was sculpted out to play as a PvP class. So when I cast one thing an intelligent opponent would cast a counter if he was quick enough, and the fight became either outplaying your opponent entirely and beating them quick or being able to dwindle them down until you could finally score a kill. The top players were ALWAYS the top players and it was very tough to take them down because the 1 on 1 PvP was purely about timing and not class ability. I understand how this kind of thing is not possible with current MMOs because there are so many classes. Only way I could see this working is if there was always a counter to something any class had to do. Besides I think a game should be built around group PvP experience and not 1 on 1.

 

So there you have it my take on the best MMO PvP. I know I have seen plenty of people suggest games I have not even played. Have you guys had the same experience as me or were they completely different and the things I said were so far off base of what you enjoy I am a noob for even suggesting it?

 

I agree, UO was amazing. The golden age of UO pvp was years gone by the time they added those scrolls tho.

[Ashania]

Probably the only one... but I liked Aion.

 

If you think TTK in this game is bad try outhealing the mad burst from a Sorcerer or Gladiator in that game as a Cleric. A lot of fun though, until they released the Balaurea expansion then things went downhill from there.

 

Played it for almost 2 years, left a few months before it got announced it was going F2P. Seems I got out at a good time!

 

Grinding War Hero gear is nothing compared to what it took for me to get full level 50 PVP gear in Aion

Edited July 15, 2012 by Ashania

[Dmasterr]

WoW TBC patch 2.4.3

[Neamhan]

I think people who say DAoC are looking back at it through some serious rose-colored glasses. I still love it at a macro level (the overall RvR, at least before New Frontiers ruined it) and it still has two of my favorite classes of all time (Ranger and Minstrel), but it has a lot of mechanics people would find completely intolerable today. Even if you discount the agonizingly long mez durations and completely useless classes (I'm looking at you, Thanes) there's also the horribly unforgiving interrupt system where just auto-swinging a weapon at a caster would keep them permanently interrupted and the fact that you could only regenerate endurance out of combat so you'd be stuck doing nothing but auto-attacking in anything but a short fight.

 

As far as actual PvP goes (as opposed to RvR), the winner by a clear mile is Guild Wars. Now that was a game with a lot of strategy in the PvP, yet had very, very little CC. Funny how that works out.

[Azareal]

Shadowbane for me was brilliant.

 

Player created cities that could be attacked (baned) and taken.

End game gear was player created

Focused on guilds/nations

Player controlled politics

Open world PvP

[DarthRaika]

I had a lot of fun on AION because on my Sin,ranger and sorc I could kill entire teams at my lvl when lvl'n up since I had flight pots and scrolls. Just open up on whoever I NEEDED dead fast and kill him then separate the rest of them into 1 on 1 fights (and sometimes them just falling to their death haha). However at max lvl pvp was a joke. It was almost all ganking (and I did a lot of this) or lagging out at castles. Still had fun for awhile though.

 

My fav had to be Rift though for a short window. I had a war,rogue, and mage. There was a time where all 3 of these classes had several specs to switch between during the same pvp match and you could often go into a horribly losing match and turn it around pretty much by yourself. With all the different spec combinations and abilities along with the higher skill cap of some of these there were many times I'd have 5-10times the kbs of anyone else on my team. That is just something that you don't see in most mmos. There was also the utility specs that were great for objectives that you could pull out when needed. There were a lot of times on my rogue where I would be on MM kill several ppl guarding the crystal and then switch to a running spec and solo score several times in a row.

 

However, rift really decreased the number of useful specs and their skill caps around last fall. Pretty boring now.

[TheDeadWalk]

Planetside hands down.

 

It's an MMO with a fairly level playing field. Time played lets you have more quick choices in gear loadouts, but does not make anyone a god based on gear alone.

[KiranK]

I think people who say DAoC are looking back at it through some serious rose-colored glasses. I still love it at a macro level (the overall RvR, at least before New Frontiers ruined it) and it still has two of my favorite classes of all time (Ranger and Minstrel), but it has a lot of mechanics people would find completely intolerable today. Even if you discount the agonizingly long mez durations and completely useless classes (I'm looking at you, Thanes) there's also the horribly unforgiving interrupt system where just auto-swinging a weapon at a caster would keep them permanently interrupted and the fact that you could only regenerate endurance out of combat so you'd be stuck doing nothing but auto-attacking in anything but a short fight.

 

As far as actual PvP goes (as opposed to RvR), the winner by a clear mile is Guild Wars. Now that was a game with a lot of strategy in the PvP, yet had very, very little CC. Funny how that works out.

 

Horribly long mezzes were offset by classes that could demezz. All CCs had inherent immunities after they expired or were broken. Auto-swing interrupt was offset by the total lack of gap closers. Every realm had a class specifically designed to help the entire group regenerate endurance while in combat. Rose colored glasses my hind end, the PvP was absolutely glorious. I have never enjoyed PvP as much in a game before or sense.

 

Too bad SWTOR got the Mythic C team. These guys don't have a clue what PvP is, how it should work, or what makes it fun.

[Neamhan]

Horribly long mezzes were offset by classes that could demezz. All CCs had inherent immunities after they expired or were broken. Auto-swing interrupt was offset by the total lack of gap closers. Every realm had a class specifically designed to help the entire group regenerate endurance while in combat. Rose colored glasses my hind end, the PvP was absolutely glorious. I have never enjoyed PvP as much in a game before or sense.

 

Too bad SWTOR got the Mythic C team. These guys don't have a clue what PvP is, how it should work, or what makes it fun.

 

CC immunities are something all games with CC need, so DAoC (eventually) got that right. The durations were still excessively long though, and since there were ranged AoE mezzes chances are your demezzer (which was only single target) would also be mezzed. And he'd be the first target of the assist train.

 

There was no endurance regen in combat. You must be thinking of power, since there were power regen songs. As for the caster vs melee, it was way too binary for my taste. There's a reason why no game since has had the dynamic of 'If you get to the caster you autowin, if you don't he autowins'. And woe be to the caster who draws the attention of an archer (now you're perma interrupted from range) or an assassin class (they're just on you and you can't do anything about it).

 

So yes, rose colored glasses. But even with all those poor mechanics, it still had the best RvR of any MMO I've played. We'll see if GW2 can knock it off its perch, but the resetting every couple weeks might take too much away from it.

Edited July 15, 2012 by Neamhan

[unbreak_able]

Too bad SWTOR got the Mythic C team. These guys don't have a clue what PvP is, how it should work, or what makes it fun.

 

This is evident when the Swtor staff expressed "surprise" on how popular PVP was in their game LOL

[Donkeyhacks]

EVE.

 

99% crafted equip, partial loot (other part gets destroyed), tons of reasons for pvp, balanced even for new players...

 

how is it balanced for new players? I had game before anything like interceptors were even introduced and i can tell you its not balanced for new players, for example you have a character for a year and train it to be a ****** scorpion pilot guy who has had it for 3years and has also trained caldari+warfare will dominate you 99.99% of time because player skill is irrelevant to character skill.

 

Warcraft - for fun but fairly competitive gameplay id say World of Warcraft (arena mode is great and you can have fun in 3v3 as well as play to win) but the balance is never right

 

Guild wars - I would never say the game has ever been unbalanced. and I had guildwars pretty much from release.