PvP (Open) commanders not welcome on this forum?...

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I think you're missing the point. The official forum is missing out on excellent content (and commanders), simply because they apparently don't feel welcome.

Actually it is you that has missed the point. I'm saying it's not a big deal, a few overly sensitive players avoid the forums, so what.
 
Eh that's subjective, feeling 'violated' does not mean you are being violated, there are many yes that react when they 'feel' something even if it isn't true.
take CZ example, if they are fighting for opposite faction, its perfectly fine to blow you out of the sky.

There are plenty of valid reasons for killing people, which is why I point out that separating it can be tough, because you basically need to write down the actual griefers names and keep a look out for future behaviour, and in this case we are referring to attacks where it is so far from symmetric that it is silly, and where action is nothing but destroying another player, thus meaning that in the game there can be no possible gain from the action, destroying a clean target in a 'clean' situation, that has no possible way to change the outcome. And heck I'd say the amount of complaints seen unfortunately are not from CZ examples or such, but plenty of legit griefers about, but yes, there are also players that are very sensitive and subjective.
Hence separating an actual griefer from an actual PvP'er can be tough? :)

That's exactly my point, since it's all subjective, then the rules of engagement should only be: whatever is allowable by the game's code. Any other subjective categorization into legimate and griefer PVP would be arbitrary.

Otherwise you open the game to exploits. Eg If killing low rank players was off limits, then griefers could just log into low rank alt accounts, and then "good guy" factions couldn't oppose their reign of terror without getting alta as well. These kinds of unintended consequences shout that we should focus on emergent solutions to emergent issues.

That being said, I think the game needs more developer provided venues for "consensual" PVP in form of designated PVP CGs. The only problem is that people tend to gravitate towards a winning side, so there needs to be incentive system for fighting for a currently losing side. Maybe dividing the rewards among the number of participants?
 
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Who else can you blame about the state of PvP? Players who engage in PvP within its current rules?
Yes? Your actions have consequences, even when it is 'within the rules'.

People that attack a target knowing said target has no chance at all, are aware of this fact, heck many do it because they enjoy being so powerful against another player.
That is their actions, the consequences of such is clearly seen, by the amount of those people suddenly complaining that open is 'empty'

The people that abuse a mechanic, regardless of it being legal or not, are responsible for the consequences of that.

Combat doesn't need to be symmetrical, devs do not need to enforce and narrow the power gap, creating bland and boring situations. Especially when all that really is needed is players go "I gain absolutely nothing in the game from destroying this player, lets find someone more interesting and challenging"

However often it seems that isn't what they want, as mentioned above. so those people want a bland game, they want an empty open? because then they can always go elsewhere?

And mechanically wise, enforcing a rule of some sort is very...very difficult, no game has found a perfect solution, the best solutions out there are in my book a proper crime/punishment system for own actions, or like GTA Online, tracking how aggressive players are and slowly but surely narrow who they meet, so they only meet people that are similarly aggressive.
 
I know we have heated debates, but recent events sadden me.

I recently visited a PvP discord. I learned that they were hosting a PvP event. I asked why they weren't posting it here on the official forum, and the reply was:

"Forums aren't the place for pvp. Posters only cry about it, mods don't like it. Everyone who would be interested is on reddit or on the discord servers we posted to."

The one I spoke with didn't care to elaborate, so I'll just leave the comment here. But I'm genuinely surprised that the official forum isn't considered the goto platform for all who play Elite: Dangerous.

Maybe I'm just unaware of the importance of reddit and discord. Or that this forum was considered toxic by PvPers. I asked if it would be frowned upon if I shared the event here, and got no reply. Consent through silence I guess. So here's a link. It sounds like fun:

https://www.reddit.com/r/EliteDangerous/comments/5orehu/event_small_ship_pvp_event_this_saturday/

See you in the black commanders. :)

(talk about a divided community... :()

Having been here from the very start the short answer to your question is yes, there is an overwelming hostility to anything PvP here. I'll elaborate and explain:

Firstly this is, imo, a result of David Brabens stated views about PvP. He went out of his way during the KS, and continues to do so, to malign people who PvP, pretty much labelling anyone who shoots at another player as 'griefers'. Not gonna pull my punches here, hes been on a crusade over it. I've never witnessed a game developer speak about the actions players in such a way before. Naturally this was music to the ears of those who hold the same view.

I also believe that this likely stems from EvE and experience people have had in that game.
When a CEO refers to people as 'griefers' and 'snot nosed teenagers' you can draw your own conclusions. Like all devs they are gamers and I think its fair to assume they played EvE at one point and got rext.

So there is what seems an ideological position from Frontier regarding this and its evident in the choices made throughout the game.. 'tricks up their sleeves' to paraphrase DBs own remarks. Not to say game design shouldn't take into account stuff that can make the gameplay for others impossible, but imo they went way over the top re ED.

So from the get go the tone was set, combine this together with a fanatical hostility towards PvP of any variety within the initial community, those selected for special perks and position (think Ambassadors), etc.., and who they choose to promote (quick check here, see which groups appear on the ED website), the forum moderation policy and those selected to be moderators (there are none that don't hold anti pvp views) its resulted in the present forum situation. I can't further elaborate upon this without being harrassed and bullied by moderators as per the moderation policy.

Now I'm no angel but I tend to mostly keep my remarks to the game and I have been attacked, often personally, mercilessly because of it. I'm not alone in this respect. It may sound childish to say this but overall the forum is biased in what is allowed to be said in one direction and not the other and whilst you'll hear the occasional 'carebear' retort there has been a years long hate campaign where maligning and throwing mud at anyone who isn't a PvE fanatic has seemingly been giving a semi official approval.

The developer has also shown and continues to show bias towards playing the game a particular way and has continued to play favourites this way. At the end of the day this forum is a hostile place to anyone who dares shoot at another player and that is the responsibility of Frontier.

My advice, use reddit or find other places to discuss the game. You will save yourself endless hours of frustration and harrassment and being nitpicked to death by the thought police. Frontier have built a spiteful and vindictive echo chamber and all you will recieve are vindicitive, spiteful passive aggressiveness. Family friendly? Ha! you have to be joking.

I speak to a lot of people who play this game and this forum is considered a joke.
 
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That's exactly my point, since it's all subjective, then the rules of engagement should only be: whatever is allowable by the game's code. Any other subjective categorization into legimate and griefer PVP would be arbitrary.
Which is why I do my best to judge it by in game merit, if there is no in game merit to the action, then the desire to do said action must come from something other then in game, works fairly well in being objective on the griefing matters.

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Having been here from the very start the short answer to your question is yes, there is an overwelming hostility to anything PvP here. I'll elaborate and explain:

Firstly this is, imo, a result of David Brabens stated views about PvP. He went out of his way during the KS, and continues to do so, to malign people who PvP, pretty much labelling anyone who shoots at another player as 'griefers'. Not gonna pull my punches here, hes been on a crusade over it. I've never witnessed a game developer speak about the actions players in such a way before. Naturally this was music to the ears of those who hold the same view.

I also believe that this likely stems from EvE and experience people have had in that game.
When a CEO refers to people as 'griefers' and 'snot nosed teenagers' you can draw your own conclusions. Like all devs they are gamers and I think its fair to assume they played EvE at one point and got rext.

So there is what seems an ideological position from Frontier regarding this and its evident in the choices made throughout the game.. 'tricks up their sleeves' to paraphrase DBs own remarks. Not to say game design shouldn't take into account stuff that can make the gameplay for others impossible, but imo they went way over the top re ED.

So from the get go the tone was set, combine this together with a fanatical hostility towards PvP of any variety within the initial community, those selected for special perks and position, etc.. , the forum moderation policy and those selected to be moderators (there are none that don't hold anti pvp views) its resulted in the present forum situation. I can't further elaborate upon this without being harrassed and bullied by moderators as per the moderation policy.

Now I'm no angel but I tend to mostly keep my remarks to the game and I have been attacked, often personally, mercilessly because of it. I'm not alone in this respect. It may sound childish to say this but overall the forum is biased in what is allowed to be said in one direction and not the other and whilst you'll hear the occasional 'carebear' retort there has been a years long hate campaign where maligning and throwing mud at anyone who isn't a PvE fanatic has seemingly been giving a semi official approval.

The developer has also show and continues to show bias towards playing the game a particular way and has continued to play favourites this way. At the end of the day this forum is a hostile place to anyone who dares shoot at another player and that is the responsibility of Frontier.
I'll be honest, this seems like a defensive post, saying David Braben's view on PvP and such, because I have a very different impression, but it seems often when someone empathise that PvP is not what the game is centred around then many on the 'PvP' side get defensive, as previously state I enjoy both parts.

However entirely blaming the CEO seems odd, because those statements, about griefers and 'snot nosed teenagers' are NOT wrong, play any online game and you'll know this is not simply an empty statement, there is a reason for it, there are many people that behave like that, saying "they played EvE and got rext" really doesn't do anything for your statement either, mostly because you have no idea, it is a defensive assumption that "they don't like PvPers" but you are missing entirely is being said in my book.
Try to read my posts as well, griefers and snot nosed teenagers, generally have absolutely and utterly nothing to do with PvP, they aren't interested in a challenge, they aren't interested in battling someone else that requires skill, and these groups of people exists even flourish in many places online. Denying that simply isn't possible in my book.

You say the forum is biased, and eh I don't know, parts of it are probably but not as a whole, but you also have to look at yourself, from my perspective, of someone in the middle that enjoys both PvP and PvE your own post seems a good bit biased and very defensive, hearing things in the statements made that simply don't apply to actual PvP.
 
My hangup is the signal to noise ratio of it all really. In the past 2 months I've had maybe 6-8 encounters with other CMDRs that were hostile. I traded rares in Open, I've done all but 3 CGs in that time, I went down to Maia to see the space artichoke, and I spent a gang of time grinding Sirius rep for the permit. Seen plenty of other CMDRs in stations, in RES, in CZ, SC, everywhere. 6-8 hostile encounters in 2 months. In about half of the cases my "body language" so to speak may have been interpreted as aggerssive (scanning, deployed hardpoints, approached to less than 500M in a Vulture, etc.). I'll tell you this, in that same 2 months I've probably winged up with double that number in random people and added most to my friends list and will wing up again from time to time.

What the hell are you all doing that paints such a bright target on your backs anyway?

As an aside, I personally like the fleeting feeling in the pit of my stomach when I see a CMDR pop onto the radar. How is it gonna go this time? I live for that feeling. But then again, my other hobbies peg me as a bit of a thrill seeker too.
 
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I speak to a lot of people who play this game and this forum is considered a joke.

Unfortunately this has been heard multiple times on my end, too, and funnily enough some are not even PvP players who are disgusted at the things that are allowed to fly here in one direction against PvP users.
 
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Which is why I do my best to judge it by in game merit, if there is no in game merit to the action, then the desire to do said action must come from something other then in game, works fairly well in being objective on the griefing matters.

In game merit is valid to the player making that call. To someone collecting salt, the merit of attacking inferior targets is pretty self evident, even if we don't agree with it.

We each have a code. But that is irrelevant. The only code that can truly direct player action is the game's code. And thankfully that allows for a good deal of freedom, though with surprisingly uneven draconian/light consequences.

We can kill other players, die in a cheap ship, and all is forgiven. Or we can park wrong for 30 seconds and lose 22M CR. It's immersion breaking.
 
Which is why I do my best to judge it by in game merit, if there is no in game merit to the action, then the desire to do said action must come from something other then in game, works fairly well in being objective on the griefing matters.

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I'll be honest, this seems like a defensive post, saying David Braben's view on PvP and such, because I have a very different impression, but it seems often when someone empathise that PvP is not what the game is centred around then many on the 'PvP' side get defensive, as previously state I enjoy both parts.

However entirely blaming the CEO seems odd, because those statements, about griefers and 'snot nosed teenagers' are NOT wrong, play any online game and you'll know this is not simply an empty statement, there is a reason for it, there are many people that behave like that, saying "they played EvE and got rext" really doesn't do anything for your statement either, mostly because you have no idea, it is a defensive assumption that "they don't like PvPers" but you are missing entirely is being said in my book.
Try to read my posts as well, griefers and snot nosed teenagers, generally have absolutely and utterly nothing to do with PvP, they aren't interested in a challenge, they aren't interested in battling someone else that requires skill, and these groups of people exists even flourish in many places online. Denying that simply isn't possible in my book.

You say the forum is biased, and eh I don't know, parts of it are probably but not as a whole, but you also have to look at yourself, from my perspective, of someone in the middle that enjoys both PvP and PvE your own post seems a good bit biased and very defensive, hearing things in the statements made that simply don't apply to actual PvP.

I'm simply explaining my pov and that of others and describing my experience here. But if in doubt do a search and count the number of 'griefer' and hateful threads directed towards anyone who PvPs.. I'm not being hyperbolic, what I've said is the reality.

In short the forum has become a platform for PvE fanatics to berate and malign anyone who doesn't sing from their hymm sheet.
 
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Let's face it, this is a PvE user heavy forum, and it breeds itself accordingly.

Without commenting on moderation bias, it's pretty clear some of the moderators here, and often the more vocal ones don't like PvP.

So yes, this place is unwelcoming to PvP players.
Eh PvP'ers aren't saints, and they don't need to be but posts like this don't help your side either, just throws the victim role.

The fact is that there are significantly more PvE'ers then PvP'ers in games, that is simply a function of numbers of people who need their games to be competitive and those that do not, those that prefer solo games, or cooperative multiplayer, there are significantly more none PvP play style options then PvP, so more PvE'ers, and this being official forums, which are often loud, it isn't really surprising that PvP'ers are a minority to me, but it isn't hostile if you ask me, but many seem to think it is, and bias their posts accordingly, and yeah, guess how that goes.

Or at least that's my perspective.

My hangup is the signal to noise ratio of it all really. In the past 2 months I've had maybe 6-8 encounters with other CMDRs that were hostile. I trade rares in Open, I've done all but 3 CGs in that time, I went down to Maia to see the space artichoke, and I spent a gang of time grinding Sirius rep for the permit. Seen plenty of other CMDRs in stations, in RES, in CZ, SC, everywhere. 6-8 hostile encounters in 2 months. In about half of the cases my "body language" so to speak may have been interpreted as aggerssive (scanning, deployed hardpoints, approached to less than 500M in a Vulture, etc.). I'll tell you this, in that same 2 months I've probably winged up with double that number in random people and added most to my friends list and will wing up again from time to time.

What the hell are you all doing that paints such a bright target on your backs anyway?
Exactly this is my experience as well I play mostly in open and generally do not have an issue with griefers or such, it all depends.

the main issue is CE's if you ask me, because griefers gravitate towards those high density areas. And lets be honest, if they see an unshielded potential target, guess what they go for.
open has been a great experience for me, the problem I see, is that people do not notice x amount of silent commanders, while they just fly about doing their thing, so they aren't counting each of them as 'important' but that one commander that does hurt a lot of people most definitely counts, add that many people are just not communicating with others, plain and simply silence (I know there can be valid reasons for this) but yeah, if you do not try to interact with other players, out of fear of them going to do something bad against you, and you then only get interaction from those that deliberately destroy and grief you? yeah then your total sum is going to be a negative experience.

Generally more communication and interaction in the game of all kinds, would be a big plus to everyone. And I am still insisting that frontier should implement a 'local' voice channel for those that use headsets and hotas setups, so they do not need to type. Granted it won't be perfect but it would be better.

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I'm simply explaining my pov and that of others and describing my experience here. But if in doubt do a search and count the number of 'griefer' and hateful threads directed towards anyone who PvPs.. I'm not being hyperbolic, what I've said is the reality.

In short the forum has become a platform for PvE fanatics to berate and malign anyone who doesn't sing from their hymm sheet.
I'm talking about your words towards braben? not about the forum in general....I've never disagreed that there aren't a lot of threads like that, but many of them are also valid threads and threads made from frustration, remember that. There IS a griefer problem, like there is one in any game with PvP possibilities online of late. Denying its existence, or defending people's rights to be griefers, does not solve the problem and those that are griefers are to blame for their actions, legal or not, it is legal to do many things irl, but even so there is a host of things you do not do, because of how it would affect others, and in turn how they would treat you, this is something you avoid online entirely, you can do whatever and no one can 'treat' you negatively, and there isn't a mechanic easy solution for this, because I've yet to see any game find one, other then those previously mentioned, but even they aren't perfect. And thus griefers exploit this fact.
 
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I can tell you first hand that 13th has been in Eravate for a couple weeks now dusting ships left and right regardless of whether they're PvP fit or not. They dunk on newbies because they can't kill actual PvPers.

Makes me feel better about deleting browny over 7 times in my vette in one night, not that I felt bad for doing it in the first place. Their absolute trash and have to resort to glitches and unbalanced mechanics to try and win fights and even then they still lose.
 
Eh PvP'ers aren't saints, and they don't need to be but posts like this don't help your side either, just throws the victim role.

The fact is that there are significantly more PvE'ers then PvP'ers in games, that is simply a function of numbers of people who need their games to be competitive and those that do not, those that prefer solo games, or cooperative multiplayer, there are significantly more none PvP play style options then PvP, so more PvE'ers, and this being official forums, which are often loud, it isn't really surprising that PvP'ers are a minority to me, but it isn't hostile if you ask me, but many seem to think it is, and bias their posts accordingly, and yeah, guess how that goes.

Or at least that's my perspective.

No one's a saint, as far as I'm concerned.

There will always be extremists and there will always be reasonable people.

I just wish some people would stop pretending there's no discrimination/ostracizing going on in this forum.

The last time I checked minority != deserves to be excommunicated.
 
Whether you do pvp, pve or both shouldn't matter. The issue is that people forget that this is just a game and nothing more. I lost friends, real life friendships because they couldn't handle the fact that I wanted to do something different. That there my friends is the biggest problem; nothing we do in this game has any real impact in real life yet people will only ever see you for the person in the ship. Do they give a damn that you're a doctor or a teacher; nope, because you shot some guy in some system you're pure evil right? And I'm sure our significant others sigh when we turn around and say "5 more minutes." :D
 
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No one's a saint, as far as I'm concerned.

There will always be extremists and there will always be reasonable people.

I just wish some people would stop pretending there's no discrimination/ostracizing going on in this forum.

The last time I checked minority != deserves to be excommunicated.

I'm not saying there isn't, but just saying PvP'ers are pulling the victim card a good bit.

But again it is a function of number of people, there's significantly more PvE play styles then PvP, thus more PvE'ers, that doesn't mean PvP'ers should be verbally attacked, but at least in my book it seems like a loud minority doing the attacks on PvP'ers, unfortunately like most official forums, drama draws attention, provocative thread titles, e.t.c. click-bait basically used as ammo on both those sides.
 
I'm talking about your words towards braben? not about the forum in general....I've never disagreed that there aren't a lot of threads like that, but many of them are also valid threads and threads made from frustration, remember that. There IS a griefer problem, like there is one in any game with PvP possibilities online of late. Denying its existence, or defending people's rights to be griefers, does not solve the problem and those that are griefers are to blame for their actions, legal or not, it is legal to do many things irl, but even so there is a host of things you do not do, because of how it would affect others, and in turn how they would treat you, this is something you avoid online entirely, you can do whatever and no one can 'treat' you negatively, and there isn't a mechanic easy solution for this, because I've yet to see any game find one, other then those previously mentioned, but even they aren't perfect. And thus griefers exploit this fact.

I stand by my comments re the CEO. The key stakeholders are responsible. It seems to me there is never a missed opportunity for them to refer to 'griefing'.. It continues on.

Honestly, having played many other games for comparison, I don't think there is a 'griefer' problem at all. I've played the game since its inception (almost exlusively in Open) and I've never had a problem, I just don't happen to play the game as a non-combatant or as a fruit and veg delievery driver. At any time folks can switch between solo, pg and open.

Go and play Ark on an official PvP server for a few weeks.. then come back and tell me there is 'griefing' in ED..
 
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Whether you do pvp, pve or both shouldn't matter. The issue is that people forget that this is just a game and nothing more. I lost friends, real life friendships because they couldn't handle the fact that I wanted to do something different. That there my friends is the biggest problem; nothing we do in this game has any real impact in real life yet people will only ever see you for the person in the ship. Do they give a damn that you're a doctor or a teacher; nope, because you shot some guy in some system you're pure evil right? And I'm sure our significant others sigh when we turn around and say "5 more minutes." :D

I agree, problems abound.

Some people take the game too serious, things that happen in it can affect them irl, and the more you like a game, and time you invest the more this can happen to all of us, and does of course to a certain degree happen to all of us, stupid mistakes can make us go "that's enough for today" and such, would be fairly normal. However the blatant aggression some players get against other players, people they have no idea on how they are irl, can get insane.
Some people take the "It is a game" as a free pass to act like the biggest idiot possible annoying others and generally ruin others fun because that's what they find fun, and work to provoke others, irritate others, the list goes on, these are unfortunately not one bit better then the other group.

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I stand by my comments re the CEO. The key stakeholders are responsible. It seems to me there is never a missed opportunity for them to refer to 'griefing'.. It continues on.

Honestly, having played many other games for comparison, I don't think there is a 'griefer' problem at all. I've played the game since its inception (almost exlusively in Open) and I've never had a problem, I just don't happen to play the game as a non-combatant or as a fruit and veg delievery driver. At any time folks can switch between solo, pg and open.

Go and play Ark on an official PvP server for a few weeks.. then come back and tell me there is 'griefing' in ED..
I do not see his statement that way, but if that's what you heard them as that's what you heard them as, as for people calling people something even when they aren't, sure, that happens a lot on all sides, but that doesn't mean griefers don't exist, far far far from it, any online game proves this, it is not just an Elite: Dangerous thing.

I've played countless of games, and there is a griefer problem in Elite, how big it is, I can't say, because my personal experience with griefers has been rather limited, having not really been griefed at all, especially since I find spotting attempts of such easy, and just escape in one fashion or another, again, just because I don't have a problem and just because you don't have a problem doesn't mean there isn't a problem, and it certainly doesn't mean that those that say they have a problem are just oversensitive e.t.c.

As for Ark, I've played Ark, and its actually a good example, offline griefing is definitely something that can't happen in Elite, however griefing happens, offline griefing is when someone attacks your home steals/destroys your stuff kills you whatnot, without you having a chance to defend yourself.
And that is EXACTLY the same that is happening in Elite when some guy in big combat prepped ship decides to interdict a random small ship and blow them out of the sky.
Heck you could say it is actually less griefing in Ark, because those that raid actually can do so to gain materials and steal from you, so there is an in game reason to do it, where as Elite? there really isn't with above example that I've seen plenty of evidence for that does happen.
 
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Having been here from the very start the short answer to your question is yes, there is an overwelming hostility to anything PvP here.

Agreed. That was the case since may 2014 which is when I joined.

Firstly this is, imo, a result of David Brabens stated views about PvP. He went out of his way during the KS, and continues to do so, to malign people who PvP, pretty much labelling anyone who shoots at another player as 'griefers'. Not gonna pull my punches here, hes ,been on a crusade over it. I've never witnessed a game developer speak about the actions players in such a way before. Naturally this was music to the ears of those who hold the same view.

Sources where he did it personally? Just curious, but I haven't read any of those statements.

I also believe that this likely stems from EvE and experience people have had in that game.
When a CEO refers to people as 'griefers' and 'snot nosed teenagers' you can draw your own conclusions. Like all devs they are gamers and I think its fair to assume they played EvE at one point and got rext.

Played Eve for nine years and whilst repeatedly killing the same group of players has been my business for most of the time, noone would've ever considered it griefing. The difference is it made sense to repeatedly stalk and kill them because it served a greater purpose and there was no solo/group.

The developer has also shown and continues to show bias towards playing the game a particular way and has continued to play favourites this way. At the end of the day this forum is a hostile place to anyone who dares shoot at another player and that is the responsibility of Frontier.

Absolutely agree. However FD decided to remove any purpose from playing in open or PvP (which is a tremendous failure imho), so most people left doing it are those ganking for no reason to compensate for whatever personal problem they may have.

My advice, use reddit or find other places to discuss the game.

I'd suggest to never post on reddit - if you do, you've arrived at the cesspit of the internet and can't sink any lower :).
 
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Absolutely agree. However FD decided to remove any purpose from playing in open or PvP (which is a tremendous failure imho), so most people left doing it are those ganking for no reason to compensate for whatever personal problem they may have.
I would think the purpose with open is to meet and interact with other players? with everything that can happen there included? yes/no/maybe?
 
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