Open world PvP Zone

[RiyahArp]

The last question is most likely gonna be the dealbreaker, though, because the only way to keep something optional is via inclusive rewards (as opposed to exclusive, because those don't leave you a choice if you want them) and if the community has shown one thing fairly consistently, it's that they'll prefer the path of least resistance to a given reward if faced with a choice.

Maybe its more productive if we all answer the three questions you list. (edit)

The important questions are:
1) What does optional entail?

Essentially you don't need to do any PVP to fulfill a PVE purpose. You don't beat the main quest by stepping into Rival Wings and playing or winning a match.

2) What measures are needed to make it optional?

Pretty much make it so the rewards are never greater than pve alternatives. The reason why we had bots in Shatter was because the exp reward at the start of stormblood was far better exp/hr compared to what a DPS could get PVEing.

For some things, it can escape this. Unique glamour isn't greater, just different. Pretty much the only complain on that side was the mounts, as mounts seem to have their own player metagame of "gotta catch em all," and the pvp mounts can become hard to impossible to get (dead modes, top 100)

3) How do you stimulate participation in an entirely optional activity without compromising its optional status?

Well, some rewards help. You don't want to rely solely on player's desire, because all activities compete for time.

You also want to make it so it's not a single strict meta to win, and rewards different styles. You want people to have fun trying to get nodes solo, or fight fates in a group, or act as bait in fates to fight other players. If it just boils down to a large group of people cruising the zone to pick off stragglers in between infrequent fights with another group its bad.

Probably some sense of pride or progression, too. Changing colors on a map, to be blunt. the danger though is players become too efficient at it, and make the map all one color. Aion had this problem; its pvp was pvpve, but the "dark" side, the asmodeans, were incredibly underpopulated on all but one server when I played.

I'd talk about gameplay but we al know the problems with it already.