DaarthIbby Posted February 9, 2012 Share Posted February 9, 2012 Seriously, the pvp design flaws of Aion only too recognizable to me in my first month of playing SWTOR. Mainly, faction superiority leads to total domination. The dominated quit pvp'ing or playing all together, leaving nobody with a game to enjoy. This is what, in my opinion, killed Aion. Its a poison pill that is not seen by programmers or the power players, but, it is devasting to a game only after it is too late. In Aion, the faction that had the larger population enjoyed an advantage of leveling with more group opportunies, and, winning any pvp confrontations. That "minor" gear advantage quickly steamrolled to better gear at a much faster rate than could be accessed by the other faction. The gear lead led to winning points, credits, etc., at an accelerated rate over the opponents. Better gear, greater dominance, exponential imbalance to pvp game play, apathy leading to less and less pvp, game death. The game was over early once the gear lead was established. The geared faction were impossible to shake out of a fort. They basically horded the spoils of combat. Such dominance leads to disinterest by the inferior side. It doesn't take long for players in a perpetual disadvantage when entering a battle to soon chose not to bother with it. It becomes a waste of time since there is no challenge, no fun, and no gain for having entertained the dominators. Population equity, an offered solution, had no affect in the outcome. The exponential difference in gear simply created a chasm too far to bridge. I have created a mixture of 7 characters so far in my first month. Things I have noticed in my first month of playing. 1) New zones and fleet station for republic average 35 players non peak, 80 players peak. New zones and fleet for imperial are 100 players non peak, over 200 peak. Imperial is vastly more active. Nothing scientific, just numbers I remember if I happened to look in the corner of my screen. 2) New imperial players enjoy what feels like a more linear quest progression. The maps are not filled with nearly as many dead ends and other terrain obstacles to have to struggle with in trying to complete missions. Leveling my imperials has been faster. 2) PVP: An awful lot of imperial players are able to finish a warzone with zero deaths. The announcers state with certain frequency how an imperial is unstoppable or whatever it is he says. This is especially true of bounty hunters. I don't know why, they are just showing up in the final credits with rare death scores. 3) PVP: I rarely see a republic win in any warzone in my first month. I would guess that all the equations of probability and statistics would show that it is impossible that only bad players role republic and all the leets rolled imperial. The answer has to be in programmed mechanics and gear. I am always on a winning team when I play my ineffective, lowbie, sith juggernaut. I just wish this toon felt like it had an effect in the outcome. 4) PVP: I rarely see an imperial player stunned or cc'ed in any fashion. Republic players seem to be in a perpertual state of being stunned, choked, slowed, or otherwise. Again, I don't why this is and it is just a perception, not a conclusion. I just know that I have lost all my interest in PVP with my Republic toons because I just feel they are goats tied to a stake in a den of lions. 5) I have an imperial sniper and a juggernaut. Both kinda boring. One hides and hopes. The other jumps in and then yawns. But kudos to creating a play style where the animations of a sith are simply much more aggressive. I like that. Not important to pvp, but hey, style points count. For pvp, I just rolled a sith inquisitor and want to take this one to the 50. My observations of this faction/class have shown me they rule everywhere they show up so far. I wish to see if I can duplicate this result. I don't know what SWTOR has planned for pvp. But if history of other games is an indicator, the wizards of game design are going to go "oh" only after their digital baby has already drowned. The lessons of other MMO's should have been "never do what we did". but alas, game designers keep repeating this death cycle. Darn shame too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jellison Posted February 9, 2012 Share Posted February 9, 2012 Bright Wizards = Sorcs. I play PvP, but how immensely OP sorcs are bothers me a bit. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Erudain Posted February 9, 2012 Share Posted February 9, 2012 haha....you went empire thinking they were the underdogs ala Asmodians? no sir... Asmos in this game rock... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JustinxDuff Posted February 9, 2012 Share Posted February 9, 2012 Bright Wizards = Sorcs. I play PvP, but how immensely OP sorcs are bothers me a bit. BWs were way more OP than sorcs are. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BloodsurgeX Posted February 9, 2012 Share Posted February 9, 2012 The lessons of other MMO's should have been "never do what we did". but alas, game designers keep repeating this death cycle. In a world where the majority of players want to play the "evil" side because it's cool and edgy. How does a developer counter that? How is it a developers fault? People on here will argue that a lot of players rerolled Empire because they are the majority of the players. That may be true that people rerolled but the thing is, when the game was brand new and the thousands of players who had never played the beta or even watch a youtube vid knew they wanted to be Empire. This was before the threads that Rep classes suck(not true), empire stories are better(not true) ever appeared. From the very beginning the majority of the playerbase wanted Sith not Jedi. The only game that was even partly immune to this was Pre-BC wow because alot of players avoided the Horde because all the races were "ugly", but blood elves fixed that. They could break every Empire mirror class and buff every Rep class and most players still wouldn't switch sides. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Erudain Posted February 9, 2012 Share Posted February 9, 2012 Then I guess Aion was a weird one having the Angelic race (Elyos) outnumber the Demonic one (Asmodians) Oh...wait...just remember... Elyos had better loot drops, better racial skills, more world bosses, etc ...ohh but Asmodian could do front-flips... Nevermind, carry on... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elyree Posted February 9, 2012 Share Posted February 9, 2012 Did I just buy Aion?( No. This game is actually fun. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ilifus Posted February 9, 2012 Share Posted February 9, 2012 No you buy TOR Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Amiracle Posted February 9, 2012 Share Posted February 9, 2012 Close.....they both use the RNG for everything. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alement Posted February 9, 2012 Share Posted February 9, 2012 I know what you mean. I played an Asmo for 2 years, but in the last few months before ToR released NCFail made some changes that made being an Asmo...less awful. We actually capped Divine and held it for awhile. Then ToR came out and everyone quit playing Aion. On topic: I got my Assassin to lvl 50, Valor 60, and the BM bags with RNG have pissed me off beyond belief. So I rolled a Republic toon. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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