The New PvP System In Town - Part One

by William “JoBildo” Murphy

Players of Funcom’s Age of Conan are a loyal and vocal bunch.  Loyal in that they love what Funcom has built, and vocal in that they’re always ready to share their opinions on where the game should head next.  Since launch one of the most-wanted additions to the game has been a meaningful risk and reward system for player versus player combat.  Sure, at level 80 there are sieges between the game’s major guilds, but what about for the Everyman?  How would he (or she) get his fix for PvP?

Well, Joe Shmoe can rest easy knowing that Funcom is on the case.  On the Test-Live server this very instant is a large overhaul to the game’s PvP system that amounts to a brand new system for PvP levels that are separate from those dedicated to PvE, gear purchasable only by those players who have advanced in PvP levels, and what Funcom is calling the Notoriety System.  Let’s take a look at each of these and lay it out in plain English as to what they mean to you, the players.

PvP Levels and PvP Experience

The first thing you should know about Age of Conan’s PvP levels is that there are only 10 of them.  Not 40, not 80 – 10.  It’s a whole different world than what you get with regular PvE experience too.  For starters, all players throughout the game are worth 100 PvP experience when killed by a similarly leveled player (this seems to mean within 5 levels of each other on TestLive).  Also worth noting is that when you die you lose a wee bit of PvP experience, but you cannot lose a level from this loss.

The idea with this is to make sure that it takes some skill and time to get to the 10th PvP level.  It’s meant to be a badge of honor to be the 10th level in the PvP system, and you’ll have to be skilled and perseverant to get there.  Lastly, as an added bonus you’ll gain normal PvE experience when you are involved in a PvP kill.  The way the system was set up recently on TestLive, you receive ten percent of the experience form the killed player, as if he was a regular mob out in the wild. 

According to Funcom’s QA Tester Haven, you’ll always get at least 1 experience from a player you kill.  You may not be able to go from level 1 to level 80 in any reasonable fashion, but at least you’ll get something for all your blood, sweat, and carpel tunnel.  Now this might all sound pretty hardcore, and really it is, but fear not.  Even the casual player will be able to gain a few PvP levels and get some of the many rewards offered via the PvP Vendors being put into place when this system goes live.

PvP Items

All PvP Items will be obtained by visiting PvP vendors across the major settlements of Hyboria.  We at Ten Ton Hammer will go into where exactly these are located when we’re sure it’s not going to change, but for now it’s probably safe to assume that they’ll be in Old Tarantia, Khemi, and Conarch Village. 

PvP Items are also purchasable with normal in-game currency.  No Honor Points, Marks of Honor, or anything like that here.  If you’ve worked to gain the PvP Level needed to wield the item, you only need the gold necessary to buy it.  So don’t go spending that 100 gold on a new horse yet.  My advice would be to wait and see how much these items cost when the patch hits.  While we don’t have the exact details yet, these items seem to be some of the best in the game, and we can bet that players of all types will be eager to get their hands on them.

There’s one last tasty piece to Funcom’s new PvP overhaul – The Notoriety System.  But that, my dear lads and lasses is best reserved for another day.  Tune back in this time next week for a full overview of Notoriety and how we can all be Murderers in Hyboria.

Part Two ->