Dear PVP, a letter from PVE-er

erjoh · 2022-02-11T19:22:24.145Z

Thank you for that letter. I love the PvE crowd and get the best ideas from them on style and effective building (yeah most of my PvP unique design elements come directly from PvE builds)…but in all fairness…I mean come on…a 30 ft tall 100 ft long bag of red muscle, fang, claw, and fire…it should be harder than what it is.

Tystin · 2022-02-11T19:27:43.105Z

erjoh:

a 30 ft tall 100 ft long bag of red muscle, fang, claw, and fire…it should be harder than what it is.

I had a feeling my last sentence would be picked apart

erjoh · 2022-02-11T19:34:52.202Z

You could have mentioned the wine cellar demon…everyone I know thinks that is the most exciting boss in EL…and then Harpy Vault in Siptah…no one understands how that is so over the top compared to the other vaults.

Yeah yeah yeah I know, the Warmaker champion…just never understood why folks bother with that…she doesn’t drop anything worth the work and she isn’t even the main boss. Nothing screams ignore me more than the champion. Is it bragging rights to fight her?..i just don’t get it.

But anyway. It was a very nice and well-thought out letter so thank you. Now let the flame war begin!

biggcane55 · 2022-02-11T20:54:12.127Z

erjoh:

I mean come on…a 30 ft tall 100 ft long bag of red muscle, fang, claw, and fire…it should be harder than what it is.

I agree. I fell that thier should be some things thay even a veteran level 60 fears. 9nce you hit 60 woth a thrall, it is pretty much god mode.

Taemien · 2022-02-11T21:06:15.549Z

Here’s a dirty little secret. PVPer’s play the same game PVEer’s do. For some odd reason, some in these forums act like they play entirely different and their experience in Conan Exiles is this thing that cannot be understood by those who don’t engage in it.

Meanwhile they login, smack some rocks, some trees, and monsters just like every other little ‘bluebie’ PVEer. This is about 95% of their gameplay. Then occasionally they might come across another player and engage in a click fight. And then depending on the server they may break someone’s stuff or when they login to click trees and rocks, they find themselves naked in the desert. Because of the structured nature of it, your RP-PVPers on RP-PVP servers may see more PVP than normal. But even then, it is far less often than they PVE.

Now I don’t want this to come off as this notion that since PVP is only 5% of the game, that it should only get 5% of the attention. It does need attention. But since the mechanics in PVP have direct analogues and impact on PVE play, it needs a special sort of consideration.

For example, anything including the following:

Weapon stat changes
Weapon combo changes
Weapon hit box changes
Dodge changes
Attribute changes
Perk Changes
Armor changes
Attack speed changes
Attack animation changes
Weight changes
Gathering changes
Recipe changes
Feat changes
Buff changes
Follower changes
and so forth.

Any one of those things (and many more not listed) have direct and substantial impacts on PVE. Doesn’t mean things involving those things shouldn’t be done. Sometimes things have to be plugged up (like some exploits) that have a really nasty effect on PVP. And of course somethings affect both negatively that also need to be changed just because of that.

The systems are very much intertwined in Conan Exiles. Its actually quite hard to separate the two, and I don’t believe we should be looking at the gameplay in a vacuum when it obviously doesn’t work that way. At this point, the biggest difference between the two is a server setting. As well as some connotations between player interactions. The latter being unaffected by developer inflicting changes to the game.

Barnes · 2022-02-11T21:31:03.689Z

I enjoyed your poast and want to invite it home to meet my family, and cats.

Tystin:

I’ve recently seen well-meaning posts hoping to open discussions about solutions to issues PvP has, and too many times the post gets de-railed or becomes a textual battleground- almost as if they were fighting someone in the game.

It’s been pointed out elsewhere that some people here are aspirational PvPers, just not with the WASD. That’s fine. Just don’t expect me to remain a lamb forever, when there are real concerns about the game and its directions. Furthermore there are people who have aped the current zeitgeist: write enormous bully screeds, and continually derail. I’ve witnessed and participated in the pushback against these flabby people. Otherwise, I don’t see too much acrimony.

helium3 · 2022-02-11T21:36:31.166Z

erjoh:

no one understands how that is so over the top compared to the other vaults.

Oh I understand. Did you know there’s a harpy boss in New Luxur?

Tystin · 2022-02-11T21:46:37.188Z

Barnes:

I enjoyed your poast and want to invite it home to meet my family, and cats.

Thank you! I also would like to point out that “poast” made me think of a short way of saying “pot roast” and I will now refer to pot roast night at my place as poast night, so thanks for that!

Barnes · 2022-02-11T21:48:33.145Z

For the record, I call anything friendly, heartwarming or courageous a poast to differentiate it from a normal sort of missive. You done good, keeps us from turning on each other.

Tystin · 2022-02-11T22:06:31.361Z

Thanks for the well-thought response, Taemien. I would agree that issues existing on all server types should be fixed; this includes bugs, general fixes and rebalances that work for us all. However, the issues that exist on PvP and not on PvE are the ones where PvP should get the desired changes. My desire is to see PvP be treated well by the developers while at the same time, not painting us all with the same brush so to speak.

Taemien · 2022-02-11T22:17:11.493Z

I want to point out that I don’t mean that one playstyle should have a focus over the other. Only that consideration to both needs to be had when both are affected by potential design changes. PVP only issues can be addressed without any consideration to PVE when they don’t affect it.

Tystin · 2022-02-11T22:18:32.280Z

I believe we are in agreement here

zZPut2BED · 2022-02-11T22:58:40.427Z

Yeah hopefully their next patches address what’s going on maybe make pve and pvp have separate patch’s altogether. Clearly there’s different things that the others don’t like . There seems to be no balance to the game and the recent patches with no fence stacking and the constant way to win just just mass reporting your opposing clan is kind of makes to game die even more than it already has . They can’t seem to make new players stay or old players continue to want to play

helium3 · 2022-02-11T23:11:19.559Z

Not 100% sure so I’ll ask. Are you asking FC to maintain separate PvP and PvE versions of the game?

Tystin · 2022-02-11T23:23:41.991Z

I’m not entirely sure how to answer this question, to be honest. I don’t understand what you mean by “versions of the game”. Could you explain a bit more?

TeleTesselator · 2022-02-11T23:40:49.700Z

helium3:

Not 100% sure so I’ll ask. Are you asking FC to maintain separate PvP and PvE versions of the game?

They should! Heck, as it is they’re barely willing to use a different set of server settings.

helium3 · 2022-02-12T04:07:47.277Z

Like, Conan Exiles PvE version and Conan Exiles PvP version.

Croms_Faithful · 2022-02-12T04:10:32.005Z

TeleTesselator:

They should! Heck, as it is they’re barely willing to use a different set of server settings.

I actually put this idea to them back when the forum was a more civil place.

POLL => Should the Modes be Balanced Seperately? General Discussion

Fellow Exiles I will say my peace on this matter in the following post. However for now I wish to ask you all as a community, a very important question which concerns all of us. Q: Do you believe that Funcom should balance the play modes in Conan Exiles seperately? poll Fellow Exiles, cast your votes. And if you like post your thoughts and ideas. All are welcome!

For the record, and from a personal viewpoint I agree with you. I agree it would be great and solve a hell of a lot of problems for the playerbase. But I think there are a few things holding it back, and probably even more that I am unaware of behind the scenes. For example, it would be more work. Each new update for the 3 platforms would need a PvE and also a PvP version of each patch. I am also led to believe that it also costs money to have updates certified by Microsoft and Sony. So I am guessing that would be double the costs in certification fees. Possibly longer development and testing times too. Although please do not hold me to these; they are more logical inferences that outright claims.

I guess the bottom line is that if they could wave the magic wand, great. I would welcome it. But it may be that it is just too difficult.

Tystin · 2022-02-12T04:11:27.225Z

If you’re saying completely different games to purchase, meaning in order to play both PVP and PVE I must purchase two different games, then no that is not what I meant in my post.

Tystin · 2022-02-12T04:17:13.415Z

I appreciate the insight and you might have answered an inner question I had about the possibility of official pvp or pve specific server settings/updates/patches.

Edit: I did check out this post you were kind enough to link in order to shed light on the topic, and i noticed the poll results leaned more towards separating the two.