Suggestions and ideas for increasing interest in previous PvP content

As a newer player, I'm curious about, and want to see more of, previous Frontlines. Many other players seem frustrated that the abandonment of previous PvP content causes certain Achievements to become very difficult to work toward.

If we have any suggestions or ideas for how SE could add motivation and interest to keep older PvP content alive, discuss them here. The discussion might provide some inspiration to SE.

Here are some rough ideas to start off with:

Improve incentive for using Frontline Roulette.

• Boost the Daily Reward for Frontline Roulette significantly.
• Add a small reward for using Frontline Roulette every time (beyond the Daily reward).
• Add a 'Grand Company In Need' reward to Frontline Roulette, tempting minority GCs to queue more.

Add a Weekly Quest to complete all Frontlines.

• Similar to the i90 EX Primal Weekly, or the Crystal Tower weekly.
• Reward could be anything sufficiently motivating (Large amount of currencies, Relic item, etc).

Make participation in older Frontlines more fun and appealing:

• Remove down-sync'ing to L50.
• Up-sync to L60 and i150 (similar to Deep Dungeons).
• Open up PvP queues to players of all levels.
• Allow players to gain PvE XP through PvP (similar to Deep Dungeons), and level alt Jobs with PvP.
• Unlock each Frontline at staggered levels (for example: Secure at L20, Slaughter at L40, Seal Rock at L50, Shatter at L60).

Add drops specific to each Frontline:

• Similar to the Feast Fenrir Pup.
• Finishing a match in a specific Frontline has a small chance to reward the drop.

Add a Currency specific to each Frontline (and possibly Unranked Feast):

• This currency would be exchanged for unique items themed after that specific PvP mode.
• Frontlines that unlock earlier could have leveling gear available for exchange (similar to preexisting Grand Company Seal gear, or even identical, just from an alternate source).
• Other items could be glamour gear, minions, mounts.

Allow certain Relic items to be obtained in PvP.

• Specific items would be related to specific Frontlines (as drops, as Currency exchange, or even just from Wolf Marks).

They would have to remove the ability to choose the map played. For example, in shooters like CoD, players vote on what map to play next. If the same map is played a few times it gets greyed out. So they'd need some sort of lobby system like this.

They should just stop putting so much emphasis on Grand Companies, I'm willing to be there is a dev who's struggling with this right now because this is his project. Since because what happens is that when one of them wins the most games, everyone flocks to said company and up goes the queue times. People are flocking to Adders now, mainly for lower queue times (say goodbye to that) and the

Alliances should be split up by random, like Red, Blue, and Yellow regardless of Grand Company affiliation.

This all sounds good and makes perfect sense, which just means that SE won't do it.

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Originally Posted by Koltik

This all sounds good and makes perfect sense, which just means that SE won't do it.

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Yea, the more a proposal makes sense, the less of a chance it'll actually come into fruition.

Case and point. Abolishing GC Restrictions...

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Originally Posted by PotatoTree

They would have to remove the ability to choose the map played.

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I dunno. WoW managed to keep multiple battlegrounds over several levels populated, even when they were still only server internal (and faction restricted to boot).

In the end, it's all about population. If you could pick any frontline and expect a match within reasonable time, people would just pick the one they prefer to play. But since the population is way too small for that to work, everyone flocks to the one people expect to have the best chances of a pop, typically the newest.

i think to alleviate the problem with Grand Company choices... they need to include Ishgard as a new GC, and in regards to PvP they can also queue up... keep every battle ground into 3 participants... when any three GC's fill up a queue it starts, so even if some are neglected they get priority for the next match queue.

it would give the flexibility needed to make queue times better without changing much...

and possibly incentives as well to help any GC that is underpopulated or underutilized

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Originally Posted by Zojha

In the end, it's all about population. If you could pick any frontline and expect a match within reasonable time, people would just pick the one they prefer to play. But since the population is way too small for that to work, everyone flocks to the one people expect to have the best chances of a pop, typically the newest.

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The other issue I see is that the rewards are either consistent and generic (PvPXP and Wolf Marks) or Achievement-Grind based.

Once everyone grinds out the Achievement they wanted, they toss that Frontline away and never look back, because the next one will have a new Grind and offer the exact same generic rewards.

Tying something unique but sustainable in to each Frontline map would help keep motivation going long-term. Very rough example (not a great one): Secure offers Unidentifiable Seeds, Slaughter offers Bones, Seize offers Shells, Shatter offers Ore. Or you can get a unique Interceptor Node minion or Melted Magitek Armor from Secure, a Tomelith housing object from Seize, ... and so on. The devs have shown good initiative with dredging up older PvE content (Beast Tribes and Tier IV Materia, etc) and I know they could do the same for Frontlines.

Roulette offering zero reason to do it beyond the Daily defeats so much of its potential, as well. It doesn't even have to be much, just having any reasonable incentive at all tied to Roulette would make it more tempting than specific-queue for a lot of players.

Likewise, allowing leveling players to do the maps, but staggering the release throughout the leveling process would provide a semi-sustainable captive population for each map (You will Secure and you will like it! Until level 30, anyway) and also create nostalgia / affinity for each mode by forcing players to learn it and get used to it.

I'm not very concerned with the specific solution chosen (there are so many reasonable options), but I would like to see previous Frontlines maps get a status beyond 'Dead', because they're all fun and the variety helps a lot keeping PvP interesting (same as having more than 1 dungeon in PvE).

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Originally Posted by Eorzean_username

Tying something unique but sustainable in to each Frontline map would help keep motivation going long-term. Very rough example (not a great one):[...]

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Well...the main issue with the examples you list is that they largely function similar to achievement based rewards. If you take unidentified items for example, those become unattractive once these people finish that phase of the relic (unless they're crazy enough to do another one). Minions can be sold, sure, but if you look at the feast, it has just that - without GC restriction even. Granted, with role restriction, which is arguably far, far worse, but egh. The fact that they can be sold in fact makes many people disinclined to bother with PvP, as they can just buy it instead. But if it can't be sold...it's just like an achievement reward, unsustainable, you claim it once then you're done.

You can of course try to regularly create new grinds for the old content, but the issue in that lies in the fact that you might spread the willing community too thin for "anyone" to get what they want. The current community can often barely keep one FL going, even if you double it, you might have a hard time if you spread it over 4.

It really isn't easy to set the incentives right.

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Originally Posted by Zojha

discussion

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The 'spread' issue is a good point. It may be better to focus on making the Roulette more rewarding, so that everyone is still getting funneled together (just with more variety).

One thing about more flexible objectives than Achievements (which are hard binary Have | Don't Have) is that options like grinding up several different things in a more casual way, or selling the items for profit, can motivate more participants beyond the "I'm done" Achievement breakpoint. That said, a concern will always be that players are just queuing to farm and not really trying, decreasing match quality (but I guess Achievements and Wolf Mark rewards are just as risky for that, and my queues seem mostly populated by motivated players).

I agree the incentives are a difficult thing to adjust. I definitely view my ideas as just discussion topics rather than sacred solutions. However, I also observe that FFXIV's devs have an admirable talent for creating Gysahl greens that the majority of players are willing to chase and keep chasing — I think SE could revive or invoke a lot more interest in the PvP system if they put more weight into it.

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Originally Posted by Zojha

I dunno. WoW managed to keep multiple battlegrounds over several levels populated, even when they were still only server internal (and faction restricted to boot).

In the end, it's all about population. If you could pick any frontline and expect a match within reasonable time, people would just pick the one they prefer to play. But since the population is way too small for that to work, everyone flocks to the one people expect to have the best chances of a pop, typically the newest.

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Here's the thing. What WoW did right, was actually have PvP content in their PvP. You were going to get killed, or kill someone. There was no way around it. The objectives were designed so that you must have a majority of them to win, and they were not a temporary thing, like we do here. You only have 2 of 5 bases? Better go slaughter the guys guarding one of them. Capture the Flag is self explanatory. There was PvWall, where we breached a keep, and the only way to stop it? Yup. KILL SOMEONE.

What do we have here? Kill this mob for points. Kill THIS mob for points... Where's the PvP? The more you fight your enemies, the less points you get from the mob. So taking the time to shoot anything but the mob is actually a detriment to your team. Think about that. ACTUAL PVP IS A BAD THING.

On top of that, there were serious rewards for PvP in WoW. Gear, and mounts, and titles out the wazoo. And I'm not just talking glamour gear. I'm talking gear you could actually wear and do content with. You could take it into a dungeon and wreck face with it. No, it wasn't as good as raid gear, and nobody (barring a few slow players) ever claimed it was. But it wasn't this massive 35 ilvl gap we have here, where a dungeon drop is better than gear you have to put in several hours worth of play to earn.

It's simple carrot and stick ideals. You give people a reason to do something, they'll do it. But here, it's stick and stick. There is nothing worthwhile, unless you're a serious PvP player. The mounts take an obscene grind, as they require wins, something your GC might not even be capable of. The titles are literally just "GRIND THIS OUT" to the tune of thousands of wins. Look at Feast. In order to get all the titles, you need 5k wins across 5 roles. Because, you know, that is fun. Whereas in WoW, you got achievements for actually DOING something. Capture the flag 3 times in a match. Kill a Flag Carrier in his own base, while they own their flag. Destroy [x] Siege engines. You got achievements for DOING, not just grinding.

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Originally Posted by Isala

Here's the thing. What WoW did right, was actually have PvP content in their PvP.

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So do we: Feast and Wolves den in particular. Seize is pretty much Arathi with randomly spawned, timed nodes and used to have lots of player interaction when I was in there (though admittedly, the weakest GC often tried to avoid confrontation for obvious reasons). I can't say for Secure and Slaughter, never got in there. Plus, I fondly remember winning "many" Warsong Gulches all on my own by simply sneaking the flag to the other side while everyone else zerg'd.

As for the carrot and stick...in classic WoW, all noteworthy rewards were locked behind PvP rank or reputation. PvP rank was attained how? By grinding. Depending on your relative standing at the end of the week, you'd get points and be promoted/demoted in rank, with only the highest ranks having better stuff than normal dungeon gear. Reputation followed the same formula and only exalted had any noteworthy endgame gear, the unstoppable force of Alterac being a classic among arms Warriors and the odd lolRet Paladin that refused to cave in. For the most part, though, you'd get nothing out of it. You couldn't even level with it and achievements weren't in the game yet either. Despite this, PvP population was rather healthy - only some servers really sucked due to relations of like 20% Horde and 80% alliance.

I dunno. I agree that WoW apparently had something we do not and I also agree that the incentives set for PvP are catering to dedicated PvPers, while leaving little to the more casual PvPer. I'm not sure what you think is the issue is the actual issue however.

WoW has a larger population, data centers are divided by region etc. Also, Horde players used to have long queues.

I do like the suggestion to limit what maps are available. Funneling people into 1-2 maps, while removing the GC restriction would help a bit.

Even still, the PvP community is really tiny. It feels a lot of the dev time is wasted the way they are currently creating content.

you have interesting ideas for rewards/drops, but where is the fun factor? No amount of rewards will help a boring PVP... like feast.

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Originally Posted by Zojha

I dunno. I agree that WoW apparently had something we do not and I also agree that the incentives set for PvP are catering to dedicated PvPers, while leaving little to the more casual PvPer. I'm not sure what you think is the issue is the actual issue however.

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WoW had the most important thing. A reason to fight. Two factions, creating an Us vs Them mentality from the very second you created your character. That was the original draw. As that faded over the expansions, the actual rewards increased dramatically. XIV has never had that spark, that desire to fight. We're all Warriors of Light. Why SHOULD we fight each other? So the rewards for doing so MUST BE GREATER. In WoW, I could start a brand new character, get to level 10, and PvP my way to cap, leveling and gearing up, never actually even bothering with PvE content. Can't do that here. Used to be able to play in the Wolves' Den at 30. Which was actually quite enjoyable. Can't do that anymore. So, instead of building it up, giving us something to do alongside the main adventure, they toss it at you at 50/60 like, "Oh. Here. Have... something?" Something you can't use to make money. Something you can't use to gear up. It is of literally no use to your character. So why would we get a grand PvP community like WoW does?

We have:

1. No reason to fight.
2. No tangible rewards.
3. No way to level from PvP.
4. A sloppy GC bound "attempt" at creating faction hype.

And yet, WoW does exactly that. They gave us all of those things, done so much better, long before the PvP in this game was even a crooked smile on a developer's face. Why then, can this game not understand such basic concepts when it comes to a PvP mentality, and stop making decisions that just kill PvP even more?

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Originally Posted by Isala

In WoW, I could start a brand new character, get to level 10, and PvP my way to cap, leveling and gearing up, never actually even bothering with PvE content.

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Note that this came later (Late BC or WotLK, I think) and was often argued to be mostly a method to deal with "PvP alts", min-maxed 19/29/39/49 characters with endgame enchantments and BiS gear, who easily slaughtered any normal player thanks to having 5 times their health pool and higher damage. Leveling with PvP effectively killed that and freezing XP put you into a separate queue.

Personally, I surmise it's simply a difference in community mentality. If you look at JP and EU/NA differences, you'll find that JP PvP is much more healthy and their raiding scene (and success) is much bigger as well (Despite having the same rewards as in NA/EU). JP seems a lot more performance focused and competitive. NA/EU on the other hand is far more casual and less competitive. It's no wonder PvP, a competitive mode by nature, does not thrive under such circumstances.

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Originally Posted by LalafellDown

you have interesting ideas for rewards/drops, but where is the fun factor? No amount of rewards will help a boring PVP... like feast.

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The idea is just to try to increase queue population, and unfortunately based on PvE evidence, I think bribery and accessibility is a more efficient solution for that (especially in the short term) than refined iteration and perfection of the content (which is a long-term and potentially unreachable goal).

The dedicated core PvP base is already here, it just needs queues that fill faster so matches happen more consistently and reliably. It's true that increased accessibility and rewards would draw in players less interested in the match quality than the payoff, but faced with either 40 minute queues filled with dedicated players or 10 minute queues partially populated with half-hearted tourists, I personally would prefer to just play more. (Others may differ)

Also, the more players drawn in for a wider variety of reasons (and thus motivated to overcome their fear, disinterest, or distrust of PvP), the more interested players the population has a chance to pick up. I never would have tried PvP without a bribe (i205 weapon in my case), but I discovered I actually like it and now PvP an important part of the game for me.

-Add in a weekly rotation of PVP specific mounts and minions that can drop at a 20% rate for the Grand Company that wins. The mounts and minions need to be very unique and recognizable so no birds or horses
-Make more pvp armor and raise the ilvl cap. Fix morale stat
-Make Grand Company specific vanity armor that you can buy for Wolf Marks at your Grand Company
-Make General Purpose dyes buyable with wolf marks. I know that kills the Pure White and Jet Black market but it's absurd anyways

The only other thing I can think of is having Gilgamesh spawn at an extremely low rate if the match is neck and neck and all Grand Companies band together to defeat him. All Grand Companies get a win if you beat him but if Gilgamesh wins, he takes everyone's winnings. Give the whole, "Even though we are enemies, we are still friends at the end of the day" vibe. Make it rare and hard to replicate so it doesn't really ever change the current matches but amazing when it actually happens

Now that you guys mention it, they did have something like morale in wow didn't they? It reduced the chance to be crit in pvp or something and was a pretty effective carrot on a string since everyone thought they'd became instantly pro once they had enough of it. Might not be a bad idea to bring it back, but I think they'd need to make a new stat on new gear... the current morale gear is wayyy too easy to get

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Originally Posted by Enlial

Now that you guys mention it, they did have something like morale in wow didn't they? It reduced the chance to be crit in pvp or something and was a pretty effective carrot on a string since everyone thought they'd became instantly pro once they had enough of it. Might not be a bad idea to bring it back, but I think they'd need to make a new stat on new gear... the current morale gear is wayyy too easy to get

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I kinda like the current sync system for gear however as it gives you a lot of freedom in choosing your secondary stats. Having a single piece of pvp gear per slot per tier would force you into something suboptimal unless they let you pick them akin to a relic.

The Grand Company lock is the biggest issue. I think they should add a GC Ranked and a non GC unranked mode. Ranked would be for GC standings and unranked would just be open to anyone regardless of what GC you're from. Ranked mode could give extra bonus for competing in it daily (maybe a few extra tomes) so that would give people incentive to do it and keep it alive.

If that can't happen because of the way the system is setup now they should add an optional mode that is open to everyone regardless of GC and instead of capture points being based on GC it could be team/alliance A,B,C.

They need something soon because it's become damn near impossible to even get into PVP anymore which is a shame because it's a lot of fun. Personally I don't care about the GC aspect of it and I rather just be paired with random people to just enjoy the PVP.

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Originally Posted by Eight

The Grand Company lock is the biggest issue. I think they should add a GC Ranked and a non GC unranked mode. Ranked would be for GC standings and unranked would just be open to anyone regardless of what GC you're from. Ranked mode could give extra bonus for competing in it daily (maybe a few extra tomes) so that would give people incentive to do it and keep it alive.

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Having 2 separate modes won't ever work with the current PvP population. Just take a look at what happened to 8v8 Feast when the ranked season started. Getting rid of GCs would be the thing to do, but we'll never know how hard that would be to implement unless SE says something since stuff like pvp ranks, standings and achievements are most likely meshed in. It's very unlikely to be as simple a change as people make it out to be.

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Originally Posted by Eight

The Grand Company lock is the biggest issue.

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GC restrictions hamper the PvP base, but it's not the only issue and I think players fixate on it slightly too much. Consider:
Edited with Zojha's correction about Feast

• Feast 8v8, no GC restrictions (but role restrictions, which may be equally problematic), 20-30+ minute queues (for a 5-8 minute match) during Feast meta. Now roughly ∞ queue times with Shatter released.
• Feast 4v4, no GC restrictions (but role restrictions, which may be equally problematic), 15-20+ minute queues (for a 3-5 minute match) during Feast meta by the time I arrived late in the season. Now roughly ∞ queue times with Shatter released.
• Secure, Slaughter, Seize: Massively higher queue times than Shatter (trending to ∞ also) despite being the same content and having the same GC restrictions.
• I deliberately switched to a minority GC, cutting my typical queue times down by 50-75% of what I had to sit through as Aether Flames. However, I still encounter intermittent dead periods where the queue will tick up 40-45 minutes or longer. After I load into the match, if I ask around others experienced the same thing (so it's probably not some mysterious queue bug, it's just not enough players queuing at all during some play windows).
• JP datacenters have stable queues despite GC restrictions (My understanding is that JP dislikes GC restrictions for reasons of inconvenience, but not because GCs are stopping them from playing)

I don't think that removing GC restrictions will resolve issues like high turnover rate for previous content and a relatively small NA/EU PvP population. It's definitely one of several issues surrounding PvP that should be iterated and improved just due to community mandate (if nothing else), but I don't think GCs are the only issue and if other problems aren't also resolved, the result of GC dissolution might be surprisingly disappointing.

Something else to compare is PvE content with drastically high or effectively ∞ queue times: L50 EX Trials, Coils, and Savage Raid Finder. Similar to PvP, these:

• Are not a guaranteed victory (baseline or when sync'd down with strangers)
• Require coordination and communication (baseline or when sync'd down)
• Offer minor or zero incentive for using the Duty Finder to do it

On the other hand, even relatively small bribes like 120 Poetics is enough to keep MSQ Roulette (of all things) popping fast and consistently all day long. Many players are not thrilled with it, but they definitely do it.

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Originally Posted by Eorzean_username

Feast 8v8, no restrictions[...]

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Minor correction here: With role restrictions. The same role restrictions that cause tanks to have insta-queues and DPS to have 30 minute queues in PvE.

I'll be damned if that wasn't a big factor.

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Originally Posted by Zojha

Minor correction here: With role restrictions. The same role restrictions that cause tanks to have insta-queues and DPS to have 30 minute queues in PvE.

I'll be damned if that wasn't a big factor.

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That is actually a really good point (as Tank main it never occurred to me to think about the Role requirement, PvE habits) and I'll revise to account for it.

You know what would increase people's interest? Not having to wait 30 minutes to get in based on their GC choice. Abolish the GC restriction

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Originally Posted by jmdude

You know what would increase people's interest? Not having to wait 30 minutes to get in based on their GC choice. Abolish the GC restriction

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Still wouldn't queue for PVP, its not fun in this game.

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