Gear based PvP is amateur hour

You don't speak for mmorpg pvp'ers- just a niche group of mmo/fps/tps pvp'ers wanting no effort involved. PvE/PvP mmorpg's need items as an addiction to leveling- to give a sense of progression and doing something with you character over a long period of time...growing stronger. Without such, you would be the same on day 379 as you had been on day 1...that's not cool for the majority who play mmorpg PvP.

You are on equal terms here- BM Sorc versus BM Sorc is as equal as you can ever get. There is virtually no time investment to reach adequate gear to fight- not nearly to the extent that "I"...as a PvP'er have grown accustomed to over the years.

There's skill based full loot games- if you are so hardcore then I haven't a clue why you aren't currently enjoying one of those atm...

I find this thread ironic....GW didn't have proper PvP as the term reflects in an MMORPG game apart from a stupid ladder and several scenarios.

The only true MMO PvP game out there is EVE online atm and the new player will never be as good compared to the veteran player with accumulated skills (not player skills but in game skills).

I think someone is laughing at you OP....his name is god.

....what he said.....

Why people sign up to an MMORPG and expect something different is beyond me, think I'll have a go at CS and complain that it's not turn based.

This.

I will stop minding that equipment has a huge impact on pvp ... the moment I can loot it from fallen enemies. That's what I loved about EVE-Online, sure, you could get a huge advantage by bringing a better ship, but not without putting some skin in the game.

But then again I'm probably a bit crazy. So messed up that I don't even remember the part from the movies where they explained how the emperor was nothing without his expertise stacked robes. Or how Yoda told Luke that "Yes, a Jedi's strength flows from his gear. But beware the skill based games, because once you start down that dark path, forever will it dominate your view on gaming!"

This was never meant to be it.

Not every game which features pvp is a pvp-centric game.

Not everything with pvp will be 100% twitch / skill based.

And nor should it be.

The FPS to MMO debate is pretty interesting.

CS had a significant skill curve. You had to spend literally years refining your aim/spatial awareness. Typically, someone had to pub for a year or two before they were even ready to start scrimming. They could get fast-tracked into competitive play if they were that talented and/or had a strong team to carry them until they picked it up quicker than a pub in a more conducive environment. A fresh player had absolutely no chance against a player who has played competitively for years, even if you gave that brand new player guns that hit twice as hard and double the HP.

Time invested = Advantage gained.

If you think of them both in that type of perspective. Functionally, there is little difference between FPS and MMO.

It's not about requiring skill. It's about not requiring gear. At least not gear that takes unreasonably long to obtain and/or requires activities that aren't exactly PVP.

Most MMORPGs don't get this right. It's either some broken expertise-like system or it's overpowered raid gear that pvp players will totally hate to get because they generally aren't that fond of PVE raiding. It's fine for the core audience of PVE players that are just mentally locked into grinding gear and winning based on gear, but it makes any kind of "PVP" activity not very competitive as, until absolutely everybody is geared, you either get an unfair advantage or an unfair disadvantage. Competitive players will feel insulted by the game's apparent need to give them the former, and annoyed by the odds being stacked against them otherwise, both cases leading to their absolute inability to tell whether a fight was won or lost because they finally learned how to play their class or because of gear.

Yeah I realize most of you want some sort of reward out of warzones (and that PVP is pretty much warzones in this game is another problem), but I ask why this has to be gear at all? Instead:
- Remove hard-to-get PVP gear
- Give PVE raid gear the same stats as normal level 50 gear plus a PVE-only stat
- PVP rewards should be faction or guild rewards, e.g. capturing a research outpost by winning a certain number of CW warzones could give a crafting critical buff; pure PVP players would be happy to PVP to help out their guildmates who would, in an ideal world, in return supply them with crafted items or credits that they'd actually need (unfortunately, in SWTOR... but that's a whole different story)

What we have in SWTOR isn't really a PVP system, it's an extension of the normal PVE grind that forces players to be a ball gagged punching ball for a while in the middle of their pvp career, which is what makes this exceptionally bad. You enjoy PVP until level 49, then comes the punching bag phase, then you may enjoy it again. Why would you even continue with PVP in a system that is designed to take the enjoyment out of PVP for a specific time once you hit 50?

I played Dota for 7 years. Didn't get a single piece of gear out of winning a match. Next match I was back to level 1 with no gear. Kept playing. Was fun the entire time.

PvP in MMOs will never work until they release the dependency on "advancement." It's a flawed concept for PvP. It works for PvE, but most developers refuse to segregate the two in the same game.

The advancement you get from PvPing is becoming better at PvP, not by having better gear, but by honing your skills and becoming more familiar with the system, the pieces in play, and the counters to them.

If PvP is fun when everyone starts the match equal - people will continue to play it with no advancement involved. When advancement become a crutch - a Skinner Box method of conditioning people to continue playing just to become "better" than everyone else, then it has failed.

Most MMOs have failed at PvP.

Some people need to learn that there is more than one sort of pvp.

I enjoy competitive / twitch gameplay. I loved Planetside, am eagerly awaiting Planetside 2 and am beta testing the new tribes MMO (although much less now that swtor has been released).

However, not all games are like that because not all gamers want that.

This game has never been marketed as being skill-based pvp or even a pvp focused game. Making the assumption that in an MMORPG the "correct" pvp system has less / no progression is just foolish.