old school pvp

[longshanks]

i came across this post of adventures by some guy from 10 years ago who had just become a murderer for the first time. i quote his experience as flws:

quote:

Today's adventure is special, not because of an especially interesting fight, but because I became:
"The Murderer name witheld"

The actual event was not so interesting. I watched a mage work his monster for a while, and then attacked and killed him.

I think what makes this episode interesting is that everything is now different for me.
1. Guards kill Murderers on sight.
2. A Bounty is generated when you become a Murderer.
3. Vendors will charge Murderers 5 times more for their service (murderers have to pay them to be "dirty").
4. Every time a Murderer dies he will suffer stat loss (str/int/dex and skills) exponentially based on his Murder Count. Keep in mind that a murderer's death does not reset the penalty. So if you die and lose 10% and die again immediately, you'll lose another 10%. Also, stat loss is cumulative with any other stat loss. Thus Resurrecting with Penalties will result in both stat loss from the Resurrection and stat loss for being a Murderer.
5. Murderers cannot insta-log from houses.

If you have never been a murderer, let me tell you, it ain't easy.
This is not a complaint, it's just a fact.
Everyone you see will either attack or run away.
Rarely will someone stop to just chat with you.

So if you want to be a murderer, be ready for all the consequences that go along with it.
Life just got a whole lot tougher for me, but if one wants to be a murderer, learn the ways and be prepared for anything!

unquote.

I didnt play ''back in the day'' but it seems that the consequences of ones' actions were a heck of a lot greater back than. Compared with the above a red today really has no consequences...

discuss.

 

[Trebr Drab]

The consequences red suffered "back in the day" were easily worked around. Most of them joined guilds of like minded griefers, sent out blue scouts or ghosts to find targets, ran dungeon raids, etc., all designed to find "wins" rather than run any real risks. Very much like ghost cams before, and stealthers now, in the Powerscroll crap on Fel.

The game of convincing the rest that they have it hard has always been present too. The fact is, they don't care as long as they can dominate the game, much like powerscrolls in UO's recent past.

 

[Evlar]

Most of the exploitative PK's weren't red, they were "blue".

 

[chuckoatl]

The consequences red suffered "back in the day" were easily worked around. Most of them joined guilds of like minded griefers, sent out blue scouts or ghosts to find targets, ran dungeon raids, etc., all designed to find "wins" rather than run any real risks. Very much like ghost cams before, and stealthers now, in the Powerscroll crap on Fel.

The game of convincing the rest that they have it hard has always been present too. The fact is, they don't care as long as they can dominate the game, much like powerscrolls in UO's recent past.

PvP has always dominated powerscrolls, has always been this way, will contue to be this way.

 

[longshanks]

Interesting. You know this guy had 100 posts and the last one basically closes with the introduction of pub 16. A pub that i see mentioned much on these boards but had never read what was actually on it. It looks to me that this is when the champ spawn was instituted and i wondered why this caused the player particular dismay. You would of thought that it would have made him more excited as i imagine the initial introduction of power scrolls to fel would have caused a bit of a gold rush...

 

[Nexus]

Interesting. You know this guy had 100 posts and the last one basically closes with the introduction of pub 16. A pub that i see mentioned much on these boards but had never read what was actually on it. It looks to me that this is when the champ spawn was instituted and i wondered why this caused the player particular dismay. You would of thought that it would have made him more excited as i imagine the initial introduction of power scrolls to fel would have caused a bit of a gold rush...

Publish 16

 

[Morgana LeFay (PoV)]

The consequences red suffered "back in the day" were easily worked around.

Very true.

Most of them joined guilds of like minded griefers

This part I take some exception to. Not everyone that was a red was a griefer. At that time, open PvP was very much a part of the game. That was how Garriott and Koster originally intended the game to be. Granted, there were a large number of reds that were griefers, for sure...but the two are not mutually exclusive.

 

[Morgana LeFay (PoV)]

Interesting. You know this guy had 100 posts and the last one basically closes with the introduction of pub 16. A pub that i see mentioned much on these boards but had never read what was actually on it. It looks to me that this is when the champ spawn was instituted and i wondered why this caused the player particular dismay. You would of thought that it would have made him more excited as i imagine the initial introduction of power scrolls to fel would have caused a bit of a gold rush...

Not knowing the poster in question, I can only guess at the reason he or she left with Pub 16, but I can tell you this, Pub 16 was perhaps the biggest sweeping change to the game...other than AoS and UO:R.

Pub 16 essentially castrated bards and tamers at that time, completely changing the way both of those character types worked. It made major changes to melee combat as well.

I had at least a half dozen guild members quit and never return due to Pub 16. So while Pub 16 introduced some things that some people liked, it also made significant changes that drove some players away for good.

 

[Trebr Drab]

The consequences red suffered "back in the day" were easily worked around.

Very true.

Most of them joined guilds of like minded griefers

This part I take some exception to. Not everyone that was a red was a griefer. At that time, open PvP was very much a part of the game. That was how Garriott and Koster originally intended the game to be. Granted, there were a large number of reds that were griefers, for sure...but the two are not mutually exclusive.

It doesn't matter if there were reds who weren't griefers. The sad fact is that there were a boatload of them that were.

And that was not how Garriott and Koster intended the game. They expected that there would be a lot of "good" players who would fight to keep PKers and that sort down. to control things in a socially organized manner, who would bear the banner of social justice. But that didn't happen nearly to the extent that was needed, and many players relished in griefing and dominating in a very anti-social way, and then formed their own social arena around that in a much larger way than the "good guys" did.

 

[Trebr Drab]

PvP has always dominated powerscrolls, has always been this way, will contue to be this way.

I hope you're wrong. And I'll keep pointing out the lunacy of it all whenever I can.

 

[Nexus]

This part I take some exception to. Not everyone that was a red was a griefer.

Don't take offence it was the Reds running around in UO that helped define the term.... Here's a quick definition of the term, probably one of the best I've read.

A griefer is a player who does things in a game to deliberately cause annoyance ("grief" in the sense of "giving someone grief") for their own enjoyment. Such a player is a particular nuisance in online gaming communities, since they often cannot be deterred by penalties related to in-game goals.

And some examples of how this relates to UO from the same source of course, with how they relate.

Using third-party hack programs - Duh....
Falsely accusing others of griefing behavior - Read Stratics much?
Written and/or verbal insults - Trash Talk yay!
Exploitation of unintended game mechanics - Anyone remember when folks were summoning 2 Shadow Wisps for example?
Spawn camping - Ghost/Stealth Cams
Saying or doing something just to irritate, upset, or otherwise harass someone - More Trash Talk
Repeatedly trying to steal another player's kills so that their time is wasted. - Raiding

At that time, open PvP was very much a part of the game. That was how Garriott and Koster originally intended the game to be.

This I take exception to. You see RG and Koster were trend setting, they had an idea, one that proved it had to be flexible, there were very few others to take notes from or to compare against. Ideas are not stiff unyielding visions, those are called faith. RG was part of the team that introduced Trammel with Renaissance, he was there for Third Dawn, those were equally apart of his vision for Ultima Online as The Second Age, and the initial launch, parts of his flexible, continually evolving idea of how UO should progress.

 

[Morgana LeFay (PoV)]

And that was not how Garriott and Koster intended the game. They expected that there would be a lot of "good" players who would fight to keep PKers and that sort down. to control things in a socially organized manner, who would bear the banner of social justice. But that didn't happen nearly to the extent that was needed, and many players relished in griefing and dominating in a very anti-social way, and then formed their own social arena around that in a much larger way than the "good guys" did.

Take another look at my statement...

"open PvP was very much a part of the game. That was how Garriott and Koster originally intended the game to be."

Now...take another look at your statement...

"They expected that there would be a lot of "good" players who would fight"

How can you say that they did not intend the game to be open PvP??!

They allowed the players to make a choice, good vs. evil...as has been a central theme throughout all of the Ultima games...the problem was, too many people made the choice to play evil.

That does not however mean that open PvP was not the intention of the creators of the game...it merely means that they mis-gauged the human inclination to do "evil" when offered autonomy.

Without getting into the 'what could have been done/what should have been done' debate...suffice it to say that what the original designers of the game intended was lost...be that because of a miscalculation on their part, an unwillingness to govern ourselves as players, or a simple machination of human nature...in the end, the original concept was abandoned, for better or worse.

 

[Morgana LeFay (PoV)]

This I take exception to. You see RG and Koster were trend setting, they had an idea, one that proved it had to be flexible, there were very few others to take notes from or to compare against. Ideas are not stiff unyielding visions, those are called faith. RG was part of the team that introduced Trammel with Renaissance, he was there for Third Dawn, those were equally apart of his vision for Ultima Online as The Second Age, and the initial launch, parts of his flexible, continually evolving idea of how UO should progress.

You are missing the point.

The ORIGINAL concept for Ultima Online was one of a world that allowed for open PvP. It was not a mistake, or a bug, that players could freely attack one another at the launch of the game.

Don't attempt to cloud the issue with the 'should Trammel have been implemented' debate. That is not the issue here.

The issue here, is that ORIGINALLY, open PvP was fully within the rules of the game. The players that chose to PK other players did so within the rules of the game. Some of them did so in order to cause grief, others did so because they were playing evil characters...which was part of the original concept for the game. So to say that everyone that was a Murderer back in those days was a griefer is a logical fallacy at best...more akin to outright slander.

 

[Righteous]

The way I remember it, back in the day was that if you where a solo player and you left Britain or Trinsic on foot/horse you would be ganked by 5 or 6 people that where hiding just outside the guard zone. If you wanted to adventure in a dungeon you had to take a couple of friends with you to prevent the griefers from killing you just before you killed the monster or any time you where low on hit points. Or my favorite way to avoid the PK squad was to play in the middle of the night.

I wouldn’t mind PvP if it was one on one, but now as it was back in the day three or more on one is the norm. If you are not part of the "PvP" scene you are seen as an outsider and free to be ganked.

I know the flames are coming "I am just some lame trammie bemoaning his fate" The truth of the matter is its only in the movies that the hero walks into the bar full of evil murderers and walks back out with a couple of small cuts and the whole bar is dead.


Righteous

Edit: Just as a side note, there are a few PvPers that I have found that are honorable and want to fight on even terms and once they beat you they leave you be and move on or ask if you would like another go at it.

 

[longshanks]

this is the post of the guys adventures.

http://www.game-master.net/pit/ubbthreads.php/forums/4/10/Adam_s_Adventures.html

It was interesting to me what the guy considered good loot to be. Stuff that today is utterly worthless.

It was also funny how the guy would run away when his attack didnt work. I guess running has always been a part of pvp. i read the first 7 adventures and than went to the last one which was adventure 100.

What was also interesting in pub 16 was the following quote :

In order to provide incentives for some of Britannia’s braver citizens such that they have reason to spend more time in Felucca, we will institute several measures that are intended to increase the reward for adventuring in Felucca.

unquote

So my other question was at what publish was trammel introduced. i went back through the publishes but couldnt find the inception of trammel. It does seem though that its occurance turned fel into a ghost town overnite. was this the case?

 

[Nexus]

You are missing the point.

The ORIGINAL concept for Ultima Online was one of a world that allowed for open PvP. It was not a mistake, or a bug, that players could freely attack one another at the launch of the game.

Don't attempt to cloud the issue with the 'should Trammel have been implemented' debate. That is not the issue here.

The issue here, is that ORIGINALLY, open PvP was fully within the rules of the game. The players that chose to PK other players did so within the rules of the game. Some of them did so in order to cause grief, others did so because they were playing evil characters...which was part of the original concept for the game. So to say that everyone that was a Murderer back in those days was a griefer is a logical fallacy at best...more akin to outright slander.

No you are missing the point, RG and Koster were pioneering, they had nothing to go on, they saw that the systems in place (You know part of the original concept for the game) had flaws, and was not suitable for the long term success and survival of the game and changed it.

If there was ever truly a "Grand Plan" for UO it went out the window very shortly after launch. People should accept that and either go with the flow or go somewhere else...

 

[Morgana LeFay (PoV)]

No you are missing the point, RG and Koster were pioneering, they had nothing to go on, they saw that the systems in place (You know part of the original concept for the game) had flaws, and was not suitable for the long term success and survival of the game and changed it.

Okay, let's see if I can simplify this so that you can understand what I am saying.

Currently, it is legal for a person that is 21 years of age or older to consume alcohol in the State of North Carolina. If 3 years from now, that age was raised to 25, it would not be proper to call everyone that was under the age of 25 that purchased alcohol BEFORE the law changed a criminal.

Do you understand? PKs were PKs because the rules were set up so that they could be PKs. Not every PK was doing so because they sought to cause grief to other players.

If there was ever truly a "Grand Plan" for UO it went out the window very shortly after launch. People should accept that and either go with the flow or go somewhere else...

Ah...the old supression of ideas method.

Very nice!

 

[Morgana LeFay (PoV)]

I know the flames are coming "I am just some lame trammie bemoaning his fate"

Not from me...

...but I will say this, everything you said in your post is debatable, but not entirely untrue...just exaggerated to make a point.

But it is all completely beside the point.

My comment about reds all being "griefers" has nothing to do with "trammies" or Trammel, or right and wrong, or players leaving or whinning or anything else.

My point was that there were players that were playing the game, in the way in which it was designed to be played, and that some...not all...of those players were not doing so to solely cause grief.

 

[longshanks]

i'd like to focus the discussion back to the consequences of being a murderer in uo. It looked to me that back than there were consequences. Today it looks as if there is none or at least they are limited, even on seige.

what does one lose today?

on seige your freely lootable so u lose your suit and everything on u. Is this really a big deal? I don't think it is especially with factions, uber items are easily replaceable.

If in factions you go into stat..... (20 minutes.. yawn)

you can lose insurance gold

you can lose items on you, mainly these days thats pots aids boxes and some other easily replaceable items.

Maybe u lose a powerscroll or pinkie.

Now this is the case for red or blue alike. So in reality being a red really has no consequence, other than not being allowed on over half the game map which is no big deal cause you have 6 other characters.

Does this make sense?

Should a red suffer more than a blue upon death?

 

[northwoodschopper]

i personally think that 'red' is pointless nowadays, and everyone should just be permagrey entering into Fel.

 

[Righteous]

Not from me...

...but I will say this, everything you said in your post is debatable, but not entirely untrue...just exaggerated to make a point.

But it is all completely beside the point.

My comment about reds all being "griefers" has nothing to do with "trammies" or Trammel, or right and wrong, or players leaving or whinning or anything else.

My point was that there were players that were playing the game, in the way in which it was designed to be played, and that some...not all...of those players were not doing so to solely cause grief.

The way I remember it, prime time was die time, be it from the Griefer's or the Evil Role players. My comments earlier where not directed at you but the original post, that kill he quoted to me would be a griefer.

Righteous

 

[Trebr Drab]

And that was not how Garriott and Koster intended the game. They expected that there would be a lot of "good" players who would fight to keep PKers and that sort down. to control things in a socially organized manner, who would bear the banner of social justice. But that didn't happen nearly to the extent that was needed, and many players relished in griefing and dominating in a very anti-social way, and then formed their own social arena around that in a much larger way than the "good guys" did.

Take another look at my statement...

"open PvP was very much a part of the game. That was how Garriott and Koster originally intended the game to be."

Now...take another look at your statement...

"They expected that there would be a lot of "good" players who would fight"

How can you say that they did not intend the game to be open PvP??!

They allowed the players to make a choice, good vs. evil...as has been a central theme throughout all of the Ultima games...the problem was, too many people made the choice to play evil.

That does not however mean that open PvP was not the intention of the creators of the game...it merely means that they mis-gauged the human inclination to do "evil" when offered autonomy.

Without getting into the 'what could have been done/what should have been done' debate...suffice it to say that what the original designers of the game intended was lost...be that because of a miscalculation on their part, an unwillingness to govern ourselves as players, or a simple machination of human nature...in the end, the original concept was abandoned, for better or worse.

Ok, I took another look at your statement. Yep, I see your point. I took "That was how Garriott and Koster originally intended the game to be" to mean, as it was/turned out to be. But you're right, my bad.

 

[ChReuter]

this is the post of the guys adventures.

http://www.game-master.net/pit/ubbthreads.php/forums/4/10/Adam_s_Adventures.html

It was interesting to me what the guy considered good loot to be. Stuff that today is utterly worthless.

It was also funny how the guy would run away when his attack didnt work. I guess running has always been a part of pvp. i read the first 7 adventures and than went to the last one which was adventure 100.

What was also interesting in pub 16 was the following quote :

In order to provide incentives for some of Britannia’s braver citizens such that they have reason to spend more time in Felucca, we will institute several measures that are intended to increase the reward for adventuring in Felucca.

unquote

So my other question was at what publish was trammel introduced. i went back through the publishes but couldnt find the inception of trammel. It does seem though that its occurance turned fel into a ghost town overnite. was this the case?

A long time prior to his final episodes I made a pk on his shard in order to try running with his guild. The episodes even back then had me longing for the days when we'd sit at brit crossroads, or runs on covetous. The truth of it though was it became really boring really quick... To many rules, to much sitting, to few targets... We'd sit in shame, just waiting for someone to show up without a red bandana and only than did you get a taste of action. It just wasn't for me, my desire to kill everyone I saw was to great to hold back and only attack a very select few. Besides, there was a RP aspect to it and that's something I never could do for very long.

For the most part the fellows in the guild were good people, I just didn't enjoy the playstyle like I thought I would. After all the years and now looking back, it does make me realize that I miss having these sort of guilds running about, I just don't miss being apart of it.

Also on the topic of publish 16, a lot of us back then didn't feel publish 16 was the beginning of the end for UO pvp, to a lot of us it was the patch that included the stun mage and that str change. Of course now I think of it differently but still miss that old style fighting.

 

[Righteous]

i'd like to focus the discussion back to the consequences of being a murderer in uo. It looked to me that back than there were consequences. Today it looks as if there is none or at least they are limited, even on seige.

what does one lose today?

on seige your freely lootable so u lose your suit and everything on u. Is this really a big deal? I don't think it is especially with factions, uber items are easily replaceable.

If in factions you go into stat..... (20 minutes.. yawn)

you can lose insurance gold

you can lose items on you, mainly these days thats pots aids boxes and some other easily replaceable items.

Maybe u lose a powerscroll or pinkie.

Now this is the case for red or blue alike. So in reality being a red really has no consequence, other than not being allowed on over half the game map which is no big deal cause you have 6 other characters.

Does this make sense?

Should a red suffer more than a blue upon death?

In my opinion anti-social behavior should be discouraged. Maybe in the same manner it was done in the medieval time. You turn red a group of soldiers attacks you when you enter towns and roaming bands of soldiers show up on occasion and attack the red, not the instant kill guards but something on the level you get with a level 5 map or harder depending on how many kills you have, if you are really bad a platinum dragon shows up randomly. You can still work off your timer in the usual manner with good behavior. I think permanent stat loss is a little extreme but if you lose said battle maybe some time in jail is in order or blackness when you log in for a couple of days.

I know that’s all so unfair to the murders out there, but those of us that are minding our own business and get killed because someone stealth up to steal the kill would like a little justice now and then. Those of you that are just PvP enthusiast then maybe an area where you all can get your fill of PvP can be created where murder counts don’t happen.

Righteous

 

[Morgana LeFay (PoV)]

Ok, I took another look at your statement. Yep, I see your point. I took "That was how Garriott and Koster originally intended the game to be" to mean, as it was/turned out to be. But you're right, my bad.

Thank you. It is rare to find someone reasonable enough to actually admit when they are wrong on Uhall.

You are, as always, a gracious and well spoken poster.

 

[Trebr Drab]

i'd like to focus the discussion back to the consequences of being a murderer in uo. It looked to me that back than there were consequences. Today it looks as if there is none or at least they are limited, even on seige.

what does one lose today?

on seige your freely lootable so u lose your suit and everything on u. Is this really a big deal? I don't think it is especially with factions, uber items are easily replaceable.

If in factions you go into stat..... (20 minutes.. yawn)

you can lose insurance gold

you can lose items on you, mainly these days thats pots aids boxes and some other easily replaceable items.

Maybe u lose a powerscroll or pinkie.

Now this is the case for red or blue alike. So in reality being a red really has no consequence, other than not being allowed on over half the game map which is no big deal cause you have 6 other characters.

Does this make sense?

Should a red suffer more than a blue upon death?

In my opinion anti-social behavior should be discouraged. Maybe in the same manner it was done in the medieval time. You turn red a group of soldiers attacks you when you enter towns and roaming bands of soldiers show up on occasion and attack the red, not the instant kill guards but something on the level you get with a level 5 map or harder depending on how many kills you have, if you are really bad a platinum dragon shows up randomly. You can still work off your timer in the usual manner with good behavior. I think permanent stat loss is a little extreme but if you lose said battle maybe some time in jail is in order or blackness when you log in for a couple of days.

I know that’s all so unfair to the murders out there, but those of us that are minding our own business and get killed because someone stealth up to steal the kill would like a little justice now and then. Those of you that are just PvP enthusiast then maybe an area where you all can get your fill of PvP can be created where murder counts don’t happen.

Righteous

My thoughts have been, for a long time now, that nothing short of stat loss will work in a justice system.

Jail time, for example, leaves the player with other characters to play and PK with, and when the jail time is over they have that character back again to use. This didn't change anything.

Wondering guards won't work because the PKers will hunt them down in numbers. (They'll expect loot too, heh.)

But you need more than simply stat loss. You need to have that character still red, so that the stat loss matters. Otherwise, they can simply train that character back up before going red on that one again, meanwhile using another for PKing.

 

[Doubleplay]

To note a fond memory of mine:

There was a murderer with lots of fame who lived in the caves under Buccaneers island. He would wait down there for someone to come along, jump them and then loot everything they had. He would pile the loot at the far end of the cave, daring anyone to come down to get it.

Many is the time I tried to run the gauntlet to see what goodies were at the end of the cave. And many is the time I would convince several people to join me in the quest. Rarely did we survive lol. What fun we had!!

 

[Doubleplay]

My last post got me thinking of why this scenario was so fun. I guess it was the fact that the "owner" of the cave never had friends to help him, and us challengers never ventured down there in groups greater than three. If he had a bunch of friends to dominate the cave, or if we overpowered him with numbers, then the challenge, and the victory would have been out of reach.

The treasure at the end of the cave was an important factor. Was usually trash, but the guy would drop anything and everything he looted, so sometimes there was a vanquishing silver sword or some such to be had.

I remember he would block the passageway with crates and such. He would hide, let you go by to be subsequently trapped against a barrier as he attacked from the rear. Each trip down there had new surprises and puzzles to figure out.

Likewise, there were two guys who "owned" a small island. With similar strategy, they killed innocent fishermen as they sailed by, and trapped or tried to outsmart anyone who landed on the island to teach them a lesson. Their small house was the only one which would fit on the island. I remember one day opening a gate on the island. We led about 50 dragons and balrons through it. Then we jumped in our boat and hung around offshore to watch the carnage.
What fun!!

 

[Sergul'zan_SP]

Okay, let's see if I can simplify this so that you can understand what I am saying.

Currently, it is legal for a person that is 21 years of age or older to consume alcohol in the State of North Carolina. If 3 years from now, that age was raised to 25, it would not be proper to call everyone that was under the age of 25 that purchased alcohol BEFORE the law changed a criminal.

Do you understand? PKs were PKs because the rules were set up so that they could be PKs. Not every PK was doing so because they sought to cause grief to other players.



Ah...the old supression of ideas method.

Very nice!

Where exactly was the problem with Griefers in the original UO? Sure, they could grief you when you were vulnerable. They couldn't change their name without rebuilding the character, and player justice played a much greater role in the simplistic world that was the original Ultima Online.

ABOVE IS THE WAY GARRIOT INTENDED THE GAME TO BE.

I don't know why people do not understand this, but not every red was a griefer. In my opinion I think the blue scammers were a much bigger problem than the red "griefers" ever were. FYI people - most scammers were blue.

In Age of Shadows we have a new form a griefer - the Trammy ZERG. Is anyone here going to claim that attacking people in large groups and then sitting at Luna to burn off the counts is a noble act? Right....

While I can't agree that Trammel was a wholly bad idea, I completely agree that player justice and an even playing field belong in Felucca.