The reaction to PoE PvP and how to fix it

Several times, I've mentioned PvP in global, arena and duels. The general reaction is "lol, pvp." Only perhaps a dozen or two players take it seriously at all, and they tend to take it too seriously (strictly for their own wins/ranking as opposed to making it competitive) to the point no one else really bothers, ensuring PvP as it currently stands will never gain any real popularity.

This should not be very hard to fix to a substantial extent - the first thing you need is a PvP-only-characters-only league (comparable to the existing open and LLD ones) so that people who want to play PvP based almost entirely on skill instead of ProgressQuest can do so. When a couple stock PvP-only characters duke it out, especially when they're the same class, you get some real, competitive mechanics going on where whoever has more skill, wins, similar to the better competitive FPS/RTS/etc games. Otherwise, whoever's better geared usually wins, no skill involved, which is frustrating for both involved unless the better geared player is about 12 years old. Fixing that is the first and most important step to making PvP something a larger percentage of the playerbase will want to be part of. Ideally the new stock character league should have its own arena as well as the 1v1, 3v3 and CTF options - the current, open arena is often promptly emptied by level/gear disparity, it never stays lively for long.

From there, of course, balancing the classes and what they have as PvP-only league characters will be important - currently PvP-only Marauder seems to have a big lead on Witches, Shadows and probably the others too. Ideally PvP-onlys for the new "league" should automatically have their gear updated every time the balance in the league is changed, for fairness, with players notified they need to re-examine and possibly re-tweak their gear each time it changes. In any serious competitive environment, fairness and balance are key, and I believe PoE has the potential to have something worthy in that respect with some maintenance. If successful, it would surely make the game more popular and bring in more funding.

Another issue that should probably be addressed is newcomer friendliness. As-is, the PvP element is entirely unfriendly to new players - you get access at act 2 while you're still level 16-20, and if you try it, you are almost guaranteed to get stomped by someone you had no chance against. Some players, like myself, will bother to point out PvP gets a lot better once you reach act 3 and make a PvP-only to play against other PvP-onlys, but I'm sure a lot of newbies aren't getting that information and are dumping any idea of playing PvP after their first duel. Options for improving this including locking PvP until act 3, having another subleague for even lower-level players (and as the newcomer league, it should probably be further limited to prevent super-overpowered builds from being entered,) or making PvP-onlies accessible in act 2. Additionally, PvP-onlies should be better advertised - what they are, how they work, their role in providing a competitive environment, that kind of thing. Many new players I've run into had no idea what they were, or didn't know how they worked - one asked me how they get XP if they can't run PvE content, he didn't know they were level 28s out of the box. Players need to know they'll get a full, relatively balanced level 28 with a respec option and gear.

Another thing that might need to be addressed is the tendency towards draws and how long they take to play out. This is especially common with gear/level disparities and ranged combatants, so a balanced league will at least reduce it a fair bit. Even people with a massive gear/level advantage often cannot kill me (ever, as long as I play keep-away, despite the character being designed to run down and smash things at close range,) but forcing the draw is tedious and largely unproductive. Similarly, sometimes I'll find someone who does nothing all round but run away and try to hide behind obstacles because they don't feel they can fight even my stock character. Or they're a totem/trap/minion character and they try to throw stuff from out of LoS the entire match while being hopelessly unable to do enough damage to kill that way, even if I just run through it all. Currently, it looks like draw rounds only count towards half a point, they should probably take a full point off the 4 wins needed to win the set. Beyond that, I'm not sure what can be done, but it should probably be looked over further.

There is pvp forum feedback, you should create thread there and wait about 1 millions years for a chance to get read.

PVP broken since new patch, templar bypass resistances and 1 shot fest everything. PVP kind of sad place right now.

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TheLastZica wrote:

This should not be very hard to fix to a substantial extent...

You are right that shouldn't be hard.... that's impossible.

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the first thing you need is a PvP-only-characters-only league (comparable to the existing open and LLD ones) so that people who want to play PvP based almost entirely on skill instead of ProgressQuest can do so.

Great idea, let ggg waste more ressources on something almost no one is interested in. Sorry but if you are interested in pvp you have choosen the wrong game!

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Head_Less wrote:

There is pvp forum feedback, you should create thread there and wait about 1 millions years for a chance to get read.

Well, found another piece of the problem, then, so let's add that to the list of suggestions: Either move pvp feedback up under the big "Feedback" title, or merge it in entirely. If PoE is ever to have a PvP community of any size, hiding everything related to it down at the bottom of the forum is NOT productive, especially since the tabs have to be opened one-by-one.

As-is, PvP is clearly so utterly niche and based on ProgressQuest that it has absolutely 0 chance to ever become a big thing. That's what I'm hoping may eventually change and give PoE the sort of PvP community it's obviously capable of supporting with the right foundation.

Let me be clear about my opinion here: PvP as currently implemented is so niche it's not even worth having at all really, because, as shown by most peoples' reactions, it's a bad joke to the vast majority. A true, competitive form of it would likely get enough followers to justify at least trying to support the other variants, however.

This thread, and the issues discussed in it, NEED to be seen and considered by the larger majority that is currently mostly dismissing PvP as worthless outright, as well as GGG and the current PvPers.