by Stix on Mon Nov 15, 2004 12:19 pm
On both servers, you can't attack an enemy player unless their PvP flag is on.
On the PvP server, your PvP flag is on if you're in a "contested" or "enemy" zone. Your PvP flag is off if you are in you are in a "friendly" zone. Your PvP flag comes on when you type the command /pvp or when you attack enemy players or NPC's designated as being a part of a faction tied to the faction(s) of enemy players.
In other words, if you're in an enemy zone you can be attacked, but you can't attack them unless they attack you or type the /pvp command. In a contested zone, anyone can attack everyone. And in your friendly zone, you reverse roles with the enemy in the first scenario of this paragraph.
On the PvE server, your PvP flag is on if you type the command /pvp or when you attack enemy players or NPC's designated as being a part of a faction tied to the faction(s) of enemy players (if you're raiding Ogrimmar and you attack an NPC guard there, you'll be flagged for PvP).
Now, when battlegrounds come into play, there will be zones set aside to work like the PvP server's version of a contested zone. However, they will have special features to add to the experience. They've mentioned the possibility of siege engines and catapults and maybe towns and keeps to capture, but they haven't been very forthcoming with specifics. They wanted to include these before retail, but Vivendi, the publisher, is demanding the game be released in its current state. Battlegrounds will be implemented, however, on both types of servers some time after release. The current news is that battlegrounds are in "internal testing."
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Now, as for the major problems with the PvP server, it goes along with the "if you're in an enemy zone you can be attacked, but you can't attack them unless they attack you or type the /pvp" part. I played Alliance when I tried out the PvP server. And my foray into the Barrens was a little frustrating, to say the least:
A group of three of us were running around looking for some good small group vs. small group action. We couldn't find anyone in Ashenvale, so we went to the Barrens. When we ran into a horde member, he stopped and stared at us, immune to any attack without his flag on. We waited to see if he would be adventurous and offer the pleasure of a battle, but nope. So we ran off. But he followed us. No doubt screaming over LocalDefense that the "ALLIANCE IS HERE!!!1"
After five minutes of him following us we turned around and started circling him doing /chicken. Five minutes of that and we moved on again. And we finally ran into some more Horde members. About three of them. A little lower than us, but they outnumbered us anyway, with the other guy still following us. So we backed up and got ready for a battle. A few minutes passed and they just stood there staring at us. Oooooookay.
So we ran off again. Everyone from the Horde followed us again. We couldn't attack them, but they could attack us at any time. So we had to watch our backs. After a while we stopped and /chickened the whole group. That's when the cavalry arrived. There must have been another ten of them. And, as expected, that's when they all put on PvP and slaughtered us. And we couldn't do much about it.
But you know what we could have done on the PvE server?
/v rasp
And then made a quick run back to Ashenvale.
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Another problem is combined camping of corpses and graveyards. If you die in an enemy zone and large groups camp your corpses and the graveyard, you can't resurrect at the graveyard or at your bodies without getting slaughtered. When you try to hearthstone out, you get killed because people are there when you resurrect. About the only people that can get away are mages with blink and rogues who get lucky.
If you try to run to a graveyard in another zone to resurrect there, you end up right back at the graveyard in the zone where you died, no matter what zone your ghost is in (though, there could have been a ninja patch that changed this; I need to check that, but I doubt it's different).
On PvE, if you're done raiding, all you have to do is wait for your PvP to turn off. Then you can hearthstone out.
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I find on the PvE server that people are more willing to raid enemy zones. That can make things a lot more fun, sometimes, if you're looking for some PvP. On the PvP server, the fighting revolves around corpses and graveyards. On the PvE server, if people get tired of fighting around those areas, they can wait until their PvE flag drops, then resurrect and run off somewhere else, maybe split up to create diversions so they can break apart enemy groups and sneak away to set up a new strategy somewhere.
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What I see as a minor problem is merely the fact that you can't find any mid-level zones that aren't contested on the PvP server. So when you're levelling from about 18 to 20 on, depending on when you start taking your first contested zone seriously as a place to level, you're liable to gankage. And questing can be tough if you have to make your way through enemy players all day.
But, in all honesty, that's a preference of playstyle.
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PvE is not without it's frustrations. It can be carebearish, at times. Hell, I wanted to fight some Night Elf in Ashenvale yesterday, but I couldn't speak the same language and he wasn't catching the gist of my gestures. We were both the same level, but he didn't want to fight. So I pointed him in the direction of the gate to the Barrens and watched him get slaughtered by orc guards, /laughed and went on my way.
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With battlegrounds coming, however, you can get a contested-zone-like atmosphere on the PvE server and what I see as a better enemy territory PvP experience, as well. At least when I want to fight people, I know I can go to those areas and get it--be they instanced or whatever the hell Blizzard has in store. I just hope they do it right. If they don't do it right and battlegrounds suck, or they never finish their "internal testing," then PvP might be better simply for the contested areas. But I don't see Blizzard going back on a major system. Especially when they've kept and are keeping ones they've planned that people didn't even like that much.
We'll see, though. *shrugs* I'm still for the PvE server, either way.
