Curse

Willow · Aug 05, 2005, 06:13 AM // 06:13

Those of you who are familiar with my posts may know that I exclusively play PvE.

So I've read alot of pretty inflammatory posts by PvPers. Most of the time I just end up confused.

One thing that I've wondered about alot: how much time do you need to spend to be PvP competitive? I've heard someone say 600 hours. I imagine that's exaggeration on their own part. I haven't even played GW for 600 hours.

How much does the faction system give people rewards? How many rewards are needed to be competitive? Is PvP actually fun? These are the answers I sought in my journey of self-discovery.

So I did a little experiment: I made a PvP character, "A Bad Player." I have played PvE for 168 hours, and thus have many ill-gotten gains that I have "grinded" for, even though I was just trying to play the game.

So I didn't use those resources.

I used one of the PvP templates- the mesmer anticaster to be precise. I've never played a primary mesmer, but it looked fun, and I've had good times with Domination as a secondary skill.
I 'cheated' just a little bit. I used a minor vigor rune and a sword hilt of +4 armor vs. physical.

Let me tell you something: I suck at PvP.

You may be thinking "of course she sucks at PvP, she's a PvEr." No, I genuinely sucked at PvP. For my first build of a character that comes prefab with Savage Strike and Final Blow (both of which I've used in the past), I picked a wand for my weapon.

So, once that little mistake was done with, I went off to the random arenas.

And I died. A lot.

But I also got some wins. And some kills. I started to get the hang of my mesmer disruption. At the end, I was on 3 consequitive wins, going on 4. (My computer crashed. To those of you on my team, I hope you managed to pull through! It was going well.)

And most shocking of all... I was having fun.

In 45 minutes, I got 146 faction. That's a little under 200 faction an hour.

Just what you can unlock with that is left as an exercise to the reader. It seems like a lot to me, since I've played some long stretches of PvE, and I could get a good chunck of faction doing the same with PvP. My impression is that faction unlocking is very powerful, since you get exactly what you want.

I also imagine that with increased play, I'd amp up my character and get better at PvP as a player, and get better faction return rates.

So how much time do you need to invest to be competitive? I invested almost none, and felt competitive.
(Admittedly, random team arenas are not the pinnacle of competition. But I know that I would not be competitive in the tombs even if I brought all of my PvE unlocked items. I'm sure my team would be elated that the Me/W forgot her sword.)

How much time do you need to invest to have fun? This might be a more important question for people to answer. It's going to vary from person to person. In my case, it wasn't much. I'll probably be playing PvP again. And if you're a caster, I'll hit you with my sword.

Asplode · Aug 05, 2005, 06:22 AM // 06:22

At this point I've dropped nearly 1,300 hours into Guild Wars, much more that if you count 24/3 Weekend Beta Events, and shave off a good 1/3 of that in AFK time, and I spent about an eighth of that in PvE progression, a quarter of that in helping my friends and guildies on my monk, and the rest in PvP, most of it in HoH pushes (and even then a good half of that in WAITING for the group to happen -_-

and some random/team 4v4 faction farming 4tw. Not too much GvG, and overall I'm going to throw modesty aside and say I'm an excellent PvPer, in ALL branches of the art, monking, messing, eleing, necroing (or putrid spam 4tw), rangering (or spirit spamming *cough*), and heck even some melee.

....so to answer your question, 42.

Makkert · Aug 05, 2005, 06:27 AM // 06:27

A PvP player's view is different.
you use some skills, they want flexibility. flexibility to respond and adjust builds fast. flexibillity means skills, runes, etc. So yes, that makes a difference.
As for faction...Having now a better understanding of it: yes it is nice. But PvE is just faster to get a skillpoint.

Kishin · Aug 05, 2005, 06:56 AM // 06:56

Don't sell yourself short. First plunge into PvP for a primarily PvE player is always rough, and you were kinda using a terrible template to start off with. I for one am glad you had fun, and hope you will keep trying and no doubt improving.

I'll leave the flexibility/competitiveness scourging for another thread. I've already weighed in there, and have no desire to detract from genuine congratulations.

Halanna · Aug 05, 2005, 09:45 AM // 09:45

Quote:

Originally Posted by Willow

One thing that I've wondered about alot: how much time do you need to spend to be PvP competitive? I've heard someone say 600 hours. I imagine that's exaggeration on their own part. I haven't even played GW for 600 hours..

This is really dependant on the person. Some people feel they can't be PvP competitive unless they have every single skill, rune, weapon upgrade unlocked. IMO, that's ridiculous. If you play through the PvE portion to the end and don't have 8 skills unlocked that you can use in a PvP build, there is something wrong. Runes are more difficult to come by (if not impossible for superior without farming) through PvE, but as you pointed out, faction will take care of that.

Some people are quite happy with their first PvP build, use it with their team/guild while they play a second character to unlock skills for other classes. It depends on the player.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Willow

How much does the faction system give people rewards?

So far I've unlocked 4 elites (mostly those in Hell's Precipice or Abaddons Mouth just simply so I don't have to go there with a second/third PvE char) and one superior rune. Faction, to me, adds up pretty quickly. Unfortunately, you can not gain 20,000 faction in a day and this has some people upset.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Willow

Let me tell you something: I suck at PvP.

Not necessarily. Try tombs also. Arena is a different experience than tombs. There is a short learning curve to PvP, mostly related to map layouts, relic runs, etc. But on an 8 person team, you can really only be as good as the people you are playing with.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Willow

But I know that I would not be competitive in the tombs even if I brought all of my PvE unlocked items. I'm sure my team would be elated that the Me/W forgot her sword.).

Everyone makes mistakes, from equiping the wrong weapons to runes and have to re-roll their character. If you are in a total random PUG in tombs this might be a problem, but if you are playing with friends, they will wait while you re-roll.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Willow

How much time do you need to invest to have fun? This might be a more important question for people to answer. It's going to vary from person to person. In my case, it wasn't much. I'll probably be playing PvP again. And if you're a caster, I'll hit you with my sword.

In my case it was one character through PvE to be useful to my team in PvP. My first character was a elem/mo. I was mostly elem at first, then switched to monk because that is what we needed one day. Since then I have gone on to unlock every ranger and mesmer skill.

I am still playing monk for my team.

Glad you are having fun, hope to run into you in tombs someday.

A NERD1989 · Aug 05, 2005, 10:07 AM // 10:07

pvp makes the game play last longer so you should do it

BrokenSymmetry · Aug 05, 2005, 10:15 AM // 10:15

Great post, Willow. It clearly indicates that you can have fun in PvP without having unlocked "everything". Myself, I as already having PvP fun (and wins) before I even had unlocked a single elite skill...

Shadow_Avenger · Aug 05, 2005, 10:19 AM // 10:19

Quote:

Originally Posted by A NERD1989

pvp makes the game play last longer so you should do it

I would agree, PvP is actually the real end game after the current PvE outing.
As for flexible builds, having all the skills etc etc, and the PvP flames.
They are posted by hardcore PvP players, the noisy minority. You don't need all the skills to be competitive at all. The first round of arenas are just for fun really, once you get to the team arenas then you may want to do it with a few friend, pick skills that complement each other, alittle pre planing goes far, i.e. if you are 3 rangers, there is no point in all 3 of you taking quickening of the zepher, 3 necros, only the one with the highest death magic skill should summon minions etc.
After this it is Tombs and HoH, These are actually very much like the ascention missions, all you really need to do is remember that they are much more diverse, no fixed pattern to win as you are playing people not scripted AI.
Now if you are the sort of competitive person who cannot stand losing, then I would suggest you stay away from PvP, or atleast refrain from posting flames everytime you lose to a new player developed stratergy.

TheStonedOne · Aug 05, 2005, 10:29 AM // 10:29

At lv7 of my 1st char i was already at arena , pvp is fun

If ur not doin pvp at al , i kinda think u missing out on a lot of content.
So good for you , that u decided to try it and like it^^

And whoever tells u that u need to have unlocked everything to enjoy pvp , is full of it.
It will prolly help abit , but in the end how u use skills is more important , and although a super rune might just give that little bit of xtra dmg /time on a skil , its not that big a difference.

Divinitys Creature · Aug 05, 2005, 11:07 AM // 11:07

You have to unlock mods in order of weakest to strongest same with runes.
Also your 200 faction won't buy you anything. You need 1000 faction for a bsaic skill. Compare it to how you can farm skill points in PvE in 14 minutes per point.

Anyways the state of the game letter has said they will be improving faction and Xp rewards so hopefully faction will become a more viable way to unlock things.

Rieselle · Aug 05, 2005, 11:17 AM // 11:17

As a fellow sucker at PvP, I congratulate you

Although I've had a fair amount of success and fun in random arenas, when playing Team Arenas / Tombs (even with a little bit of planning and discussion beforehand, and trying to make a balanced group), I almost always get instantly destroyed by some people running a specialised team build - all rangers, minion spam, etc etc.

I shudder for the next few months as more people get near-complete skillsets, and poor lil' me trying to use whatever I think is useful and playing in a PUG, getting stomped repeatedly by whatever outrageous trick build is currently in fashion.

Santanus_Perro · Aug 05, 2005, 01:19 PM // 13:19

I played quite a bit of PvP in the betas and had a blast. For some reason, I ended up doing almost all PvE once the game was live. Now that myself and a couple guildmate (also PvErs) are starting some Droknor's PvP we find ourselves getting owned. Here we are, on Ventrilo, great communication skills, and getting owned. Our problem is we do not have any experienced PvPers to help us with the learning curve. It seems like such a daunting task to field a team to simply be competitive. And I might as well forget bringing my W/MO by myself to find a team. No one will team up with me even when I announce that I am a damage build and a team player. With it being so hard to be competitive at this point, and difficult to PUG that I play GW less and less. Any suggestions would be helpful.

Willow · Aug 05, 2005, 09:47 PM // 21:47

Quote:

Divinitys Creature said:

Also your 200 faction won't buy you anything. You need 1000 faction for a bsaic skill. Compare it to how you can farm skill points in PvE in 14 minutes per point.

Well, faction seems like a subpar way of unlocking skills. I've got all six professions between by PvE characters- I can just buy most skills from the merchant. But I don't see any "weapon-mod-unlocking" or "rune-unlocking" merchants. That's where the faction unlocking is really going to shine.

14 minutes for a skill point? I don't think you and I are playing the same way!

PAC · Aug 06, 2005, 12:11 AM // 00:11

Quote:

Originally Posted by Willow

14 minutes for a skill point? I don't think you and I are playing the same way!

I agree. To farm 1 million XP (50 skill points)=1000000/20000*14/60=less than 12h... pls Divinity, enlighten us!

Weezer_Blue · Aug 06, 2005, 12:35 AM // 00:35

To have fun? roughly 800 hours to get all the skills unlocked, plus however many hours it would take for ever single person I ever come in contact with in a PvP environment to unlock all of their skills. Why? Because I like a fair competition, I like playing different builds, I like competing alongside PUG's and actually winning, and I like fun games.

... To squeeze by in PvP miserably? About a minute to make some piece of crap premade template. But that's not fun for me. I don't like playing on outdated unfun, and uneffective builds someone made for me, that I can't alter to my personal preferance.

Willow · Aug 06, 2005, 01:26 AM // 01:26

Then Weezer, I pity you.

Zelc · Aug 06, 2005, 03:37 AM // 03:37

When I had about 350 hours played, I had a majority of the skills for all 6 professions unlocked, and most of the minor/major and some of the superior runes unlocked.

Divinitys Creature · Aug 06, 2005, 06:00 PM // 18:00

Basically my guild developed an efficient way of doing UW quests and after an hour of playing we can get almost 5 skill points each. At the moment we don;t do this because nearly all of them left because the grind was killing them

Remember you need to have favor also

and it's just about the most unbearable activity I can imagine.
Others have told us how they can comfortably do the same "run" in about 25 minutes and I used this figure in my analysis of faction, see link below.

Faction is good for mod and rune unlocks

www.guildkarma.com
NOW RECRUITING
PvP rewards wrong (need increase) by a factor of 16+ or 8+ since patch
WTB: 450 SKILL POINTS/ 9 MILLION EXP AND A WAY TO GET 1 MILLION GP | OR 630,000 FACTION

Loviatar · Aug 06, 2005, 07:10 PM // 19:10

[QUOTE=Weezer_Blue]To have fun? roughly 800 hours to get all the skills unlocked, plus however many hours it would take for ever single person I ever come in contact with in a PvP environment to unlock all of their skills.

that is pathetic

did you note that she said she had fun at all?

the answer is simply as long as it takes to have fun at whatever level of play you want

IT IS A GAME NOT YOUR REASON TO EXIST