Black Pits: pvp option?

SpaceInvader

Would you like to have a Player vs Player option in the Black Pits?
The location seems to fit perfectly and it would satisfy us, pvp-lovers.
I think it won't ruin the game to ppl that doesn't like to fight other players, they can just ignore this possible dialog.

Silverstar

I, personally, would not like it much or participate in it. I'm also of the the firm belief that RPGs in general, but also the infinity games in particular, make for bad PvP games. Oh and I'm sure the PvPers would also destroy spells and abilities that are remotely good or fun for the sake of "balance", which they do in every RPG or MMORPG since the mechanics are never neatly separated, unfortunately.

I would not mind other people having the option though as it in no way affects me, unless of course the developers listened to said whines about "balance".

CoryNewb

Meh, not interested, working on bg2/3 should be key goal for big features and upgrades.

Riolathel

I don't think baldur's gate would be a good game for pvp

Nor would any other infinity engine game

SpaceInvader

First thing first, I already tried pvp in BG2 and I really liked it.
2nd, if you don't mind about this option why would you vote "No"? lol

Silverstar

The "no" option states that I, personally, would not want to see it. It doesn't say "No, terrible idea, -noone should- see it/have this" which is quite a bit different. It's all semantics but the poll probably serves its purpose anyhow

Ravel

Not to be a negative nancy, but "Do you want feature 'x'?" polls aren't terribly useful or telling imo. Even though I wouldn't use it, of COURSE I would want other people to have it if it were as simple as saying yes or no on a poll.

The sad fact is that the devs have a limited amount of time to work with, so it's more a matter of if it's worth the developers' time & effort compared to the other things they're working on.

SpaceInvader

Let me ask you a question:
Did you like the fights vs the bounty hunters party, Prat's one or Sarevok's?
What if they were controlled by real people and not easy scripts?
Isn't the Challenge one of the most important factors that kept the game alive?
Then that's why pvp makes a LOT of sense to me.

marfig

SpaceInvader said:

Let me ask you a question:
Did you like the fights vs the bounty hunters party, Prat's one or Sarevok's?
What if they were controlled by real people and not easy scripts?
Isn't the Challenge one of the most important factors that kept the game alive?
Then that's why pvp makes a LOT of sense to me.

The fights against NPCs are scripted, employ a modest amount of AI and take only miliseconds to process. Not a good comparison.

PvP in Baldur's Gate would require a more complex battle system than what is in place.

* For one, we would require real-time combat, not turn-based combat with the action delays known in the game.
* Secondly the current game is unbalanced between classes and races, with a small group of choices dominating over all others, greatly reducing the possibilities of a good range of PvP class/race.
* Thirdly the current combat system employs spells that are basically one-hit killers, greatly limiting the interest in PvP. A charm person, a sleep, a hold spell, etc hit and you might as well call it quits.

Hertz

From a previous thread on PVP:

"PvP is not currently in our near-term plans. We looked into it and the amount of hardcoding in the engine is shocking.
--Trent"

I wouldn't want to see PVP in the game because there are many other things more important to code, which have a higher payoff, than rebuilding the engine from the ground up so it is robust enough and balanced enough for PVP. It would be a black hole of lost labor cost, I feel, and involve RE-building much of what they've already built.

elminster

For some reason I can kind of see pvp having a lot of dwarf and half-orc fighters, as well as (obviously human) inquisitors. Maybe some rangers, but not much else.

toanwrath

elminster said:

For some reason I can kind of see pvp having a lot of dwarf and half-orc fighters, as well as (obviously human) inquisitors. Maybe some rangers, but not much else.

I see Elven Archers, Half-Orc/Dwarf fighters/Barbarians, Inquisitors and Blackguards.

Also, if this does come out, I won't be upset. I just don't think I would try it. Personally, I didn't like the Black pits. Of the supposed "Over 6 hours of additional gameplay", I got only 1 hour and it was an hour of running at the enemy's magic user and crushing them with a Kensai and a Stalker (my mage was utterly useless except for throwing out glitterdust in some of the bigger fights). The 'running' I mentioned was only enhanced (ha, enhanced edition? get it?) by the fact that you can buy 3+ boots of speed after about halfway through.

Also, Baeloth is just annoying. His one redeeming quality: he didn't chunk all over my Cleric when I killed him (my Priest of Talos respects shiny clean armor).

elminster

toanwrath said:

elminster said:

For some reason I can kind of see pvp having a lot of dwarf and half-orc fighters, as well as (obviously human) inquisitors. Maybe some rangers, but not much else.

I see Elven Archers, Half-Orc/Dwarf fighters/Barbarians, Inquisitors and Blackguards.

Also, if this does come out, I won't be upset. I just don't think I would try it. Personally, I didn't like the Black pits. Of the supposed "Over 6 hours of additional gameplay", I got only 1 hour and it was an hour of running at the enemy's magic user and crushing them with a Kensai and a Stalker (my mage was utterly useless except for throwing out glitterdust in some of the bigger fights). The 'running' I mentioned was only enhanced (ha, enhanced edition? get it?) by the fact that you can buy 3+ boots of speed after about halfway through.

Also, Baeloth is just annoying. His one redeeming quality: he didn't chunk all over my Cleric when I killed him (my Priest of Talos respects shiny clean armor).

Maybe on the archer. I mean you aren't any good up close, so that is kind of a big negative for the class in an enclosed environment. I would say its more of an anti-caster class, but it depends on what items you start off with I suppose.

With regard to the Black Pits I lost interest in it about 6 fights or so in. I think I beat the fight where

The Beholder tells you to focus on one target at a time (that might be too vague of a description idk lol)

but after that I just did not see enough of a reason to continue. I might have gotten farther than that, its just the last fight I can recall fighting.

Metal_Hurlant

marfig said:

Thirdly the current combat system employs spells that are basically one-hit killers, greatly limiting the interest in PvP. A charm person, a sleep, a hold spell, etc hit and you might as well call it quits.

It would be so unbalanced. As you've said, Cast charm, sleep, hold, feeblemind, etc and it's all over. It would just be mages in who can cast the fastest with high level one-hit spells. No skill at all.

Nukenin

It'd just be one bloke—the one who spammed Ctrl-Y the fastest.

marfig

elminster said:

The Beholder tells you to focus on one target at a time

That beholder is an hypocrite.

VampQueen31

I'd rather resources get focused on actual content that involves writing instead of this garbage. PvP is for people who have no lives and need to pwnz people to feel good about themselves.

deltago

I like PvP but in this game;
Too easy to cheat.
It isn't balanced.
And if you attempt to balance it, it becomes more luck than skill.

SpaceInvader

Hertz said:

From a previous thread on PVP:

"PvP is not currently in our near-term plans. We looked into it and the amount of hardcoding in the engine is shocking.
--Trent"

I wouldn't want to see PVP in the game because there are many other things more important to code, which have a higher payoff, than rebuilding the engine from the ground up so it is robust enough and balanced enough for PVP. It would be a black hole of lost labor cost, I feel, and involve RE-building much of what they've already built.

I can understand your worries. But nothing like that is needed, I tried many pvps in ToB with my friends and I can assure you the turn-by-turn system is ok like this

elminster said:

For some reason I can kind of see pvp having a lot of dwarf and half-orc fighters, as well as (obviously human) inquisitors. Maybe some rangers, but not much else.

Funny, my bet is on spellcasters. We already have the basis for a pvp

marfig said:

The fights against NPCs are scripted, employ a modest amount of AI and take only miliseconds to process. Not a good comparison.

PvP in Baldur's Gate would require a more complex battle system than what is in place.

* Thirdly the current combat system employs spells that are basically one-hit killers, greatly limiting the interest in PvP. A charm person, a sleep, a hold spell, etc hit and you might as well call it quits

No BG script can be compared to a human mind that can evolve tactic at each turn by having a major understanding of what is going around.
As regards the pvp system, I played daoc, guild wars, lineage2, and many others just for the pvp.
Baldur's Gate doesn't need anything like that, the fact that a player has to choose carefully his/her actions makes it totally different.
As I said, it is exactly the same as PvE but with a person using the enemy, saying that BG isn't good for PvP is like saying the same for PvE.
As regards the last sentence... well where you probably would fail your saving-throw, another would have used a potion/item to avoid this incovenient

toanwrath said:

I see Elven Archers, Half-Orc/Dwarf fighters/Barbarians, Inquisitors and Blackguards.

Also, if this does come out, I won't be upset. I just don't think I would try it. Personally, I didn't like the Black pits. Of the supposed "Over 6 hours of additional gameplay", I got only 1 hour and it was an hour of running at the enemy's magic user and crushing them with a Kensai and a Stalker (my mage was utterly useless except for throwing out glitterdust in some of the bigger fights). The 'running' I mentioned was only enhanced (ha, enhanced edition? get it?) by the fact that you can buy 3+ boots of speed after about halfway through.

Also, Baeloth is just annoying. His one redeeming quality: he didn't chunk all over my Cleric when I killed him (my Priest of Talos respects shiny clean armor).

The fact that you don't like the Black Pits in general because they failed your expectations has nothing to do with what we're talking about
Side note: I finished them in solo with a sorcerer with Core Rules.

Nukenin said:

It'd just be one bloke—the one who spammed Ctrl-Y the fastest.

Hahahah xD that can be fixed since they can prevent us to have debugmode activated.

VampQueen31 said:

I'd rather resources get focused on actual content that involves writing instead of this garbage. PvP is for people who have no lives and need to pwnz people to feel good about themselves.

Oh lol man! You don't even know what you're talking about, aren't you?
FARMing is for no-lifers, pvp is for people who install each kind of mod (SCSI/II, Tactics, Ascension, etc.) to have a decent AI to fight vs. PvP in BG2 can be compared to chess, if any.
But the only thing I realize by reading the posts of the "No"-side is that you are opposing to something you never tried.

Mordeus

I would use the hell out of that feature. Especially if you could verse both human and computer generated characters. Not to mention a feature that restricts who you face. Wouldn't want to be a mage up against a fighter but a mage versus mage battle would be fun.

It would also be cool if you could summon up past foes to face off. Like a Tazok or Sarevok for some target practice. Sometimes you just want to have a 5 minute quick fix of a game rather than half hour/hour game sessions.

If there are problems that arise from other human players cheating. Then either restrict it versus people you know or just have a computer generated tournament. I would die if you could chose one of the NPCs to play as, as you verse a massive tournament against the other to be crown king of the NPCs.

If it was a tournament of the NPCs, then they could balance things out by altering equipment or the levels of the NPCs. So no single NPC is overpowered. They could also make it that you could pit lv1 characters against each other or up to lv9 characters.

SpaceInvader

I've found those videos with a quick search.
I don't judge the class/equip/spell choices/lag, just jope it will help to understand the dynamics of a pvp in this game.
(I don't know what language is that, probably Polish.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PZU-Z_WrwRI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qdqEa5GpjWM

Lacceh

Sorry but don't see the point.

Fatal

I say Yes. In the end of the day The Black Pits is a feature added to the game using the same engine. I love what they have done here with it now. Perhaps on BG2 the story behind The Black Pits could continue on? And if they make a 3rd BG game, then a PVP option could be added to The Black Pits

Ken

Would love me some Mage vs Mage duels.

PvP would be awesome for this game, tactics all over! And with a friend, you could easily set the "rules".

When playing against online opponents I can only imagine them using cheasy tactics.

kiros

I don't see the big issue, the game already needs to be connected to Beamdog to play anyway.
May as well present the players with an option to PVP if they really wish too.
The level of strategy and tactical elements involved with an opposing "human" player would be phenomenal.

Silverstar

SpaceInvader said:

But the only thing I realize by reading the posts of the "No"-side is that you are opposing to something you never tried.

Then you are not reading at all and haven't realized anything. The reasons people have voted no are primarily (going by the people who also posted anyway) for mechanics, concerns about the use of development time and how the game isn't balanced for it.

As for saying PvP is something we've never tried? That's a silly assumption. If you're talking about PvP in Baldur's Gate spesifically, you may be right, but when it comes to RPGs in general I doubt it. People who play one RPG tends to try other RPGs too and also MMORPGs which almost always have PvP crammed in to draw a bigger playerbase. For instance, I personally I have over 60K player kills in one that I accumulated over a couple years as it was the only way for me to acquire some sweet-looking armour sets.

SpaceInvader

Silverstar said:

Then you are not reading at all and haven't realized anything. The reasons people have voted no are primarily (going by the people who also posted anyway) for mechanics, concerns about the use of development time and how the game isn't balanced for it.

I showed you a video to prove that the mechanics already ok for a player vs player.
Balance? What do you care about balance if you're not even interested?
Not even mentioning that your concept of "balance" may be different from mine or someone else.
Or you presume to know all possible build, their weak/strong points, items combinations, etc?

Silverstar said:

As for saying PvP is something we've never tried? That's a silly assumption. If you're talking about PvP in Baldur's Gate spesifically, you may be right
...
...
...

I'm right then, ofc I'm talking about BG.

Silverstar

SpaceInvader said:

I showed you a video to prove that the mechanics already ok for a player vs player.
Balance? What do you care about balance if you're not even interested?
Not even mentioning that your concept of "balance" may be different from mine or someone else.
Or you presume to know all possible build, their weak/strong points, items combinations, etc?

You do not really have any use for any input that doesn't perfectly mirror your own, do you? If you did, you would actually read properly what other people said instead of glossing over it. I stated the reasons of several people in this thread for saying no, not mine spesifically. Refer to my first post in here for that.

Here, I will make it easy for you: I do not oppose using The Black Pits for PvP, I could simply not use it. I do not think Baldur's Gate is well-suited for PvP. I think adding PvP would break the main game when the developers started making adjustments to spells and abilities in order to balance things for the PvPers. The last point there illustrates why -I- would care about -balance-; because something I myself do not use (PvP) would still inadvertedly hurt me (my spells getting nerfed because they were useful in PvP).

Whether or not you or me or anyone think PvP works or doesn't work in BG allready doesn't matter as the game would most certainly be altered in its entirety to cater towards the people who would not be satisified with it.

Valarioth

I think PvP could be quite fun if done right. I don't envision 1v1 PvP since casters will dominate, but rather party versus party PvP. Now THAT would add a staggering amount of tactics and strategy, enough that there probably isn't a clear dominant party composition.

I think for it to work well, the game would have to be set-up to auto-pause after each round to allow both parties to assign orders more precisely. Real-time might be a bit much to handle...although it would reward those with more knowledge, skill and quick thinking--which is a huge boon in PvP games, rather than gear determining the winner.

SpaceInvader

Silverstar said:

You do not really have any use for any input that doesn't perfectly mirror your own, do you? If you did, you would actually read properly what other people said instead of glossing over it. I stated the reasons of several people in this thread for saying no, not mine spesifically. Refer to my first post in here for that.

Strange, from my point of view I always replied to what you, and you alone, said.
I'll try to do better this time.

Here we go...

Silverstar said:

Here, I will make it easy for you:

Thanks, my lord.

Silverstar said:

I do not oppose using The Black Pits for PvP, I could simply not use it.

Make up your mind bro. You DO care if you VOTE. Else you would have simply avoid voting and move to the next thread, weren't you interested.

Silverstar said:

I do not think Baldur's Gate is well-suited for PvP.

I beg to differ, as you yourself stated: you have no experience of BG pvp. How can say so?

Silverstar said:

I think adding PvP would break the main game when the developers started making adjustments to spells and abilities in order to balance things for the PvPers.
The last point there illustrates why -I- would care about -balance-; because something I myself do not use (PvP) would still inadvertedly hurt me (my spells getting nerfed because they were useful in PvP). Whether or not you or me or anyone think PvP works or doesn't work in BG allready doesn't matter as the game would most certainly be altered in its entirety to cater towards the people who would not be satisified with it.

Really? We are talking about a game that has been so since 12, almost 13 years and you think someone would agree to change something for a pvp-purpose?
None wants that.
They can put simple rules as: no Time Stop or Transformation: Mindflayer allowed. Easy.
Enjoy it or leave it, I say.

Vuki

I vote for yes but to be honest I think there is a killer character that will kill easily any opponent. Dualled assasin to fighter (for example level 5/10) is a killer and can win against any opponents (in case prebuff is forbidden).