I'm sorry but I think you're just listening to the wrong people for feedback and you devs are just so far out of touch with the pvp side of the game. It's a shame because the old UO is still the standard pvp games are held to these days and you've strayed so far from it.
Can I just make a suggestion. In an effort to get on the same page as the devs. Can the devs please list the top 10 issues/problems the factions have from their perspective. I think if we can get this information from you we can move forward with a very constructive discussion on how to fix the factions with out scrapping them... The system itself is incredible and it really pains me to see you take it away. Since factions came out 98% of my time in-game was dealing with factions and I really really just don't undetstand how the state of the factions have gotten to this point.. It still has so much potential. It just needs people who know about it to help fix it. And I'm sorry to say, the people who are helping you make these decisions are just way off. The system you are designing will not work. It has grief written all over it.
~Anthius Disius - e-GO
Chessy, ATL, GL
You know what's funny? I've asked TONS of pvpers about this system, and most of them don't even know what it is or that it's being discussed. I imagine it will be a surprise to many of them when it goes through, only for the few who still do faction fight to rage quit. You know who does know about this and wants it to go through? All the bluebies who aren't in a pvp guild, or the one's sitting in tram who like to pretend they are pvpers and understand the system. But guess who they listen to the most? The one's who speak up the most. Everyone has an opinion, but hardly anyone has any great points to make. Your request of the devs is one of those few exceptional points. When they make a change, not just nerfing something, but COMPLETELY scrapping it, they need to justify that action. A LOT of pvpers who use the current faction system deserve at least that. A lot of them are going to quit anyway if this goes through, but they at least deserve to be told WHY. But lets be honest, we know the devs here, and once they set their minds to something, they almost ALWAYS go through with it, no matter how bad it is. It's like politics. They'll never admit when they were wrong about something.
If you want to know what I think, I think they're trying to make the game more like Warkraft. Dumb it down for all the bluebies who read this board, who want to engage in group pvp but either aren't geared enough for it or lack the skill. I understand and agree with the notion that UO is single-handedly the hardest game to participate in it's pvp. First you have to invest hundreds of millions into suits, and then you need to learn how to play and get good, and in UO today, that can take years. It's not wow where they divide people up into battlegrounds based on their level, or even when you finish your char, there is a grind to get gear, but it's simplified and nothing like UO and it's extremely complex crafting and artifact systems. Or that you can play Wow battlegrounds for a couple weeks before you get really good at it. UO is hard, and we do need to do a better job reaching out to noobs. I think that's why they want to do away with the 4 faction system. They want to simplify it, make only 2 just like horde and alliance. In such a system, as opposed to our current free for all, you have far more allies. In UO today, if you are solo on a faction char, it's very difficult to survive, let alone kill anyone, when everyone else in the faction system travels in groups. If you are solo (as many noobs will be) in the new system, half the people in that system will be your allies. As I said, I think they're trying to reach out and cater to these uninvolved blues who don't participate in the current system.
But what they fail to realize is that this same group is STILL going to avoid this system. They might like it in theory, because it's something new and they hate being steamrolled in the current faction system, but when it actually gets put into practice, they're going to realize that they're still going to die a lot and still have stat loss- or whatever is being used as a substitute for that; and being vulnerable to attack on a regular basis, along with having some kind of severe penalty for dying is what's going to keep them away from it. Do you know how I know? Go to yew on atl and watch the monstrous amount of blues sitting at the gate. They all sit there, on a blue so no one can attack them, waiting for one grey or red to get dismounted so they can all jump in and gank. Sometimes even THEN they don't jump in until the person is below half life, and they almost NEVER do in faction fights until someone is low. They're like scared mice, afraid to come out of their hole. Now I can understand why, most faction guilds are elitist d-bags who make 0 attempt to bring in noobs and cultivate them, teaching them the ins and outs of pvp. And if these blues were to create their own guilds and recruit each other and go red, they would get steamrolled by the better, more experienced faction guilds, along with all the other blues who sit at the gate. But this Vice/Virtue system is not a good way to get them involved. As I said, they're not going to participate anyway. It's only going to alienate the current faction fighters who have come to love and appreciate the current system (minus the recent changes to rank and gear). One of the amazing things about the current UO pvp system, is that you can just about attack ANYONE, ANYWHERE within the felucca facet (excluding blues in the gardzone). This is what encourages people to unite under guild banners, and hence socialize and make friends; because unless you do that, EVERYONE is a potential enemy.
P.S. Look at what battle-ground fighting has done for open-world pvp in Warkraft or Swtor or for any other game that's tried it. It's dead.
