Two of the problems I’m personally interested in discussing solutions for are:
The economy - gold sinks seem greater than faucets, at a macro level. That’s an anecdotal assumption based on my own observations/readings.
Lack of open-world PvP, incentives vs disincentives - Sounds like many people are wondering why they should flag up when rewards seem minimal and costs (time and repairs) seem high. Obviously there’s the fun factor, but a common argument is that fun isn’t a good enough incentive.
Would it make sense to award players gold upon open-world PvP kills in addition to, or instead of, random gear drops? It has the potential to be a great gold faucet that also provides a material incentive to participate in open-world PvP (versus gear drops that 99% of the time get scrapped into worthless/capped repair parts and a trivial sub-1 gold piece.)
Three big considerations here:
a.) Gold dropped could be maximized based on how close opponents are to each others’ level. Too big a gap, up or down, and the gold amount dropped gets reduced. This should disincentivize both high-level players ganking helpless lowbies, and skilled players staying at low levels to maximize gold drops from killing less-skilled but higher-level players. Players would have the greatest incentive to fight people their level, and be discouraged from abusing large level differences to increase gold income.
b.) Gold dropped could be divided among all those participating in a kill, naturally making zergs less profitable based on the larger player number discrepancy that exists. There’s already a (flawed) system in place to determine who should get credit for a kill based on percentage damage dealt to a target, so we already have a potential framework to make this part work. Clearly there’s still an issue with how tanks and healers get their fair share, but that’s a separate problem that’s already been identified by plenty of people.
c.) Gold dropped could increase based on time a player has been alive, just like with the weapon XP reward system currently in place for PvP kills. This aspect plays a big part in simultaneously mitigating abuse and awarding skilled players for killing tough opponents.
Would love to talk about the details of such a system, the nuance of its implementation, and other pitfalls I haven’t considered. I might end up posting this on reddit as well for additional discussion. Thoughts?
edit:
oh I forgot, I think AGS should further reduce or even remove repair costs associated with open-world PvP deaths. Just an opinion
Couple people have mentioned how the issue could be exploited by taking turns killing in groups. By ensuring the gold drops scaled with how long people have been alive, or even with a cooldown that prevents any additional gold from dropping for some time after death, maybe this abuse could be limited. Another possibility would be to require a minimum level for PvP gold drops to take effect, making the barrier for bots higher and also easier for AGS to spot abuse.
They had this in another game I played. Same guild, 2 different factions. Just stood there in a long line killing each other and respawning. Massive XP, Massive Gold rewards.
New World devs at least thought this through with having a cooldown. Making it a Gold Faucet would remove that cooldown and lead to exploiting.
I see what you’re saying, but if that’s the concern why don’t we see that with character and weapon XP farming? Open-world player kills generate both of those (with limitations similar to what I’ve suggested in the original post) but I haven’t seen or heard of large groups standing outside town farming each other. Most likely because it’s more efficient to just go kill mobs than it is to try and abuse the current open-world player kills reward system.
How would getting gold from open-world PvP kills be different, assuming the same abuse mitigations were in place?
edit: Also, when I say “gold faucet” I mean method for creating new gold within the game. The phrase shouldn’t imply anything about how frequent or how much gold we’re talking about, just that the mechanic would be a new way to inject gold within the game.
Wars and Outpost rush (when it’s back) are already 2 of the main sources, followed by invasions. The game needs a method for the solo pve player rather than another PvP method.
Why not both? Wars and Outpost are limited to endgame levels. You should be incentivized to PvP before level 50 (and no, 10% exp bonus is not good enough).
It’s an interesting idea, but allowing players to jack up their own “worth” introduces too much room for exploitation imo. Maybe just having someone marked as a dangerous target would attract enough people interested in a good fight (and help people who aren’t avoid that person/people!)
I’m interested to try both of those out (I’m 58 currently) once they become fully enabled. There’s some skepticism about how lucrative the portals will be without further tuning (and I think chests still aren’t dropping or something? I don’t know personally, maybe someone else can confirm), and Outpost Rush is still disabled.
Invasions sound pretty cool, though I’ve also heard many people complain about getting kicked in favor of friends/company mates and missing out on the activities’ rewards. There’s definitely similar feedback about war participation.
Repair costs for PvP should be lowered. Don’t discourage PvP, I’d actually have no cost/no repairs, except during a 50v50 war. (basically open world is ‘free’)
On my server players just go to forts and then PvP happens. Or they just stay flagged all the time. I haven’t PvPed much so far, but I see fights going on in every land area I roam to.
You’re right in that Outpost Rush will significantly alleviate end-game income issues. That said, gold dropping from open-world PvP kills might provide additional incentive for people to flag up in the world.