PvP from a casual new player (very long)

Hello! I've been playing for a few months now, have a few lvl70s and dipped my toes into PvP here and there as queues allowed and wanted to share my concerns as to why PvP is so disconnected from most players. Personally i've played many PvP games, including getting arena titles in WoW a few times and i've talked with many different people on their opinions and experiences, it helps me compare and analyze from both a "casual" and "hardcore" perspective. This is not ment to address the current issues like Light Medals, Box health, queue times, etc...

I'll start with listing the currect overall problems and then proceed on proposing solutions:

The game does not attract the "PvP Crowd"
I'll be blunt - the starting experience of the game actively turns away most PvPers, with almost all of them quitting before level 10. The most cited reason is, to put it gently, "slow combat", with "boring art design" coming in second. The former stems mostly from a very long Global Cooldown (GCD), long cast times and being unable to move while casting; the latter comes from the general art direction of the game as being on the extreme side of "family friendly" and "safe", with little sex appeal or "coolness" in character, armor, weapon and animations design.

Starting PvP is overwhelming
Any new player (especially the type that stays with FFXIV as noted above) that manages to reach the Wolve's Den is confronted with an entirely new set of abilities, all given out at once. The interface simply lines the abilities on the main bar with no concern for where they should be and overwhelming the player with "having to set up the entire UI all over again". This is a very archaic way of doing it, it might've been acceptable during Ultima or Everquest times perhaps. Feast Quartermasters don't show off the gear without getting a rating, so less motivation for players.

Nothing matters in PvP
The biggest reason why players don't stick with it is because the entire experience is completely disconnected from the rest of the game. While there is a case to be made for glamours (but then the glamour system is badly designed to begin with) there is nothing to take in or out of the PvP sphere. Nothing a player does in PvP affects anything else in the game and this insularity offers no incentive to participate.

Skillgap is too wide
The difference in skill between a regular PvPer and a newcomer is too wide, leading to new players feeling frustrated from "losing all the time". New players are unable to tell what is happening, leading to regular surprise deaths or feeling like the enemy is undefeatable. Matches drag on with little variance followed by sudden defeats. This comes from and leads to new players being unable to understand and analyze each encounter, unable to learn from it, leading to frustration and demotivates them from trying again. This demotivation leads to an easy quit because there's no motivation (reward) to balance it.

Can we address all of these? Not without fundamental changes to the spirit and gameplay. PvP will stay irrelevant until a major rework of the combat and reward systems is done. While i'm sadly not a game dev i can still provide possible solutions from personal experience of what works and doesn't.

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Any new player must be allowed to easily get in and out of PvP. Creating a new character should let anyone choose to start in the Wolve's Den BEFORE the entire lvls 1-15 starting experience, leaving the Den would then put them into the starting experience as usual.
Players start only with their main damage combo, and then going into a Hall of Novice variation called Hall of Pups with the same challenges but featuring the PvP Actions. This can be skipped to award players all the actions, but also providing a cussion for those who may feel overwhelmed to practice it in peace.

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Interface changes must be made to better serve the gameplay. Since addons aren't allowed all of this falls onto the devs to improve the UI. Player characters should be voice-acted and announce enemy and friendly cooldowns, both through audio and as a chat bubble. Simple chat messages are unaccepable as a solution to communication. Examples:

When a WHM casts Benediction (or Assize) the character exclaims "Benediction!" for everyone to hear. Similarly, when a NIN uses Assassinate, he/she should exclaim "Die!"

Divine Benison's shield visual effect should remain on the player until it wears off.

When an enemy casts Protect one of your teammates should exclaim "The Dragoon is being Protected!"

This is important as it lets all players know that a major healing cooldown was used and avoids the feeling of not being able to kill the enemies for no reason.

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The Party interface must also feature basic info on all members with cooldowns and target-of-target. Nameplates should feature buffs and debuffs, each individually togglable from the PvP Profile. Shift-clicking on any of these elements would announce its status to the party, such as "Hallowed Ground has 10 seconds cooldown." or "Hallowed Ground is ready!" - these must have chat bubbles and be ideally voice acted.

Any abilities given out by the PvP profile that replace the existing ones must find and replace the current player spells in their respective positions on the action bars, NOT simply laying them out with no rime or reason all over the main bar. Any spell that doesn't directly match existing ones should be given out of a special "New PvP Actions!" window popup that shows any actions the player hasn't put on their bars (can be toggled off in options). This should address the issue of being overwhelmed by a messy UI.

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There must be a major rework of the reward structure of PvP. My suggestion is made of 3 parts:

It is of utmost importance to tie a tangible reward for participating PvP matches for things outside of PvP:
Every Feast match played should award 30 Tomestones of Creation and Poetics, with additional 60 Creation and 10 Mendacity if you win that match.
Astragalos should award 150 Poetics per match, winning also grants 150 Creation and 15 Mendacity. Similar rewards would also apply to other PvP activities.
This gives PvE players an incentive to wet their feet in PvP while motivating PvPers to play more so they can also progress on their PvE goals without being forced to run dungeons or raids (letting PvPers access more glamour from PvE vendors?).

Another part of the rewards structure is loot. Current PvP items are nothing but glamour, and i must say that almost all of them are terrible-looking, the devs really need to get new talent onto the PvP design as nothing in there appeals to PvPers (though i'm sure many will disagree, subjective and all that). That said - the items are nigh but pointless, there must be tangible PvP loot. What i propose is the following:
There must be a set of armor and weapons for every 10 levels. This would be a green-quality set, similar to the Grand Company items and featuring all armor and weapon slots for every 10 levels with relevant stats that are usable outside of PvP. This lets players effectively PvP while leveling and keeping the gear up to date without having to go into dungeons. This must be done alongside the existing GC, crafted and vendor gear as a very competitive alternative, otherwise it will be seen as "more useless loot". Levels 1, 10 and 20 are green-quality gear, levels 30 and 40 are similar but with set bonuses, levels 50 and 60 are blue-quality matching Ironworks/Shire gear in power.

The final part of the reward structure is end-game gear. PvP Ranks should award end-game equipment that is usable outside of PvP. For example, as of patch 4.2, the following Ratings could award:
Bronze - 310 armor

Silver - 330 armor, 320 weapons

Gold - 345 armor, 340 weapons

Platinum - 360 armor, 355 weapons

Diamond - 370 armor and weapons

Feast Winners - 380 armor and weapons.

This means that very dedicated PvE players would be very motivated by pursuing PvP, casual PvE players would find another venue of getting low-end upgrades and PvPers would get compatitive items to let them enter endgame PvE content without churning through the low-end. Obviously the above item levels must be updated every content release to match the current progress.

There must also be additional items that can be purchased with Wolf Marks, all items are bound and untradable:
DoW/DoM/DoH/DoL food, Materia, Crafting materials, Exp Scrolls, Tickets, new crafting books for PvP items, Prisms, Potions, Currency exchange like 1000x Wolf Marks for 50x Tomestones of Creation (all Tomestones, Ventures and Seals should be available).

also most pvpers quit the pvp scene or the game entirely, rip

I like that PvP is disconnected from PvE with the exception of the skillset.

It'd be nice if pvpers could grind to fuel their pve endeavors, however your fourth option isn't going to necessarily attract the good kind of pvers. The people who do pvp do it because they enjoy the competitiveness and the rewards reaped from coming out on top.

The fact that you gain exp to your pve lvl and getting tomes has only attracted people to come into frontlines only to sit their and alt tab and watch movies or w/e simply because they get something out of it regardless of their participation or win/loss and because pvp match completion is faster than dungeons or PotD. They need to rework how kicking those people out works or adding a system where you get currency for participation rather than just sitting there since pvp match success hinges on group coordination.

With pve it's all about leveling and gearing quickly with the least amount of effort and if pvp is the way that best matches this then they are going to opt for it, which isn't necessarily a good thing.

As a new player who enjoys PvP, I have to say it's nice to have a MMO with the PvP disconnected from the PvE aspect of the game for many reasons.

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Originally Posted by RuneFox

As a new player who enjoys PvP, I have to say it's nice to have a MMO with the PvP disconnected from the PvE aspect of the game for many reasons.

Oh, don't get me wrong. I plainly aggree with how skills are separate, how there are no levels and gear doesn't matter. I like all that. I'm only trying to address PvP participation. This doesn't affect how the PvP is structured.

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Originally Posted by Gokki

This doesn't affect how the PvP is structured.

PvP is like PvE, it requires experience. Do you give up whe you failed Titan extreme? Most of us continues to try until we beat him. PvP is the same logic, just keep play and gaining experience on how to react and counter a real player. In time, you will also be a veteran

I agree the rewards need a significant boost. There are attractive glamour sets and a few mounts after a large amount of runs/wins but then what? Wolf Marks should be exchanged for variety of items, I like the idea of everything you listed.

In my opinion the long queue times keep me from queuing often unless it's a weekend and I have all day to wait.

There should also be some sort of "adventurer in need/needs competetors" type of reward set on every frontline mode that isn't shatter.

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Originally Posted by Oliekin

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Well you can "fix" this with: everytime u kill a person it gives u tomes/xp for rewarding you to play. Or you destroy an object or capture a base which should be lower than actually killing a person. Something like this: 10kills gives u 10% of your XP bar and 20 tomes. Or smthing like this.

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Originally Posted by Bahati

I agree the rewards need a significant boost. There are attractive glamour sets and a few mounts after a large amount of runs/wins but then what?

The problem with this is it attracts to many "i dont care just give me my reward". Theres reason why was there boom of new players playing pvp. Like: farming tomes for anima, light farming and after all that the garo event. Now we are in 4.0 with quick chat. :P

You won’t think skill gap too wide if you played 3.0 pvp... lol