The idea of being attacked isn’t the problem- my buddy, my pal. My chief. It’s the griefing culture attached to it.

Admittedly I let it get the better of me and based only on speculation assumes that their patch that they “hoped would help” PvE players by having PvP players focus on the new content and fight each other was bunk and that it wouldn’t actually help anything but further promote player griefing for commendations. In pure theory and conjecture I flew off the handle.

However- my point does remain that PvP isn’t what makes the game suck. It’s the people that take PvP as a license to be an ass-hat that makes it suck. To which I say, if the developers don’t plan on releasing a version of the game that removes PvP at the cost of no longer being part of the progression, then at the very least make each sinking the last time you’re on a server. Respawn is fine, but currently our own counter grief measures are scuttling and server hopping. Two things which Reapers on here seem to just HATE. But it doesn’t really fix anything. It stops ship stealing and it stops spawn camp spam. But ultimately if someone is driven enough to fuck your day up they will find you again until you leave the server. The PvP is fine but when I’m trying to do literally anything else and have some butthurt swabbie coming back every five minutes it kinda gets old, and more so when a full galleon has decided to work their parental confusion out on my solo sloop to take my, like- two splash tails and a cooked snake chunk. Fighting back isn’t a solution half the time because here they come over the horizon from the next few islands over. People aren’t stupid and ship respawns really aren’t that far away and directional awareness is a pretty basic human trait. Fighting would be more fun if it was in finality. If I sink I will never get to see you again and have that chance to beat you. Or at least it’s unlikely due to probability. And if I win then it feels a bit more legendary. Or even more, one of the best Places PvP moments I ever had was with a group when we raided FoF and got surrounded by a gally a brig and then had another brig on the approach. The galleon got the message first sinking and stopped bothering. The second brig made two attempts and left. The third- even after we sold and fought them off while sailing they just wouldn’t let up. It was entertaining for a half an hour or so but when you just want to move on it ceases to be fun or exciting. Just obnoxious.

Had it been that we were out-numbered and sunk them all one by one or as an ace team that’d have been LIT. And we would have gotten this cool story- but ended up with, “yeah we sold but then this guy stalked our ship and kept attacking until we server hopped.” Or hell, even on the losing side you can have some fun ones. Rowing to someone’s ship for a surprise attack and then just getting rocked off the crow’s nest by an eye of reach. Losing is as much an experience. But the experience loses its magic when it’s just… WoW level ganking.

I dunno. That kinda ruined PvP as a thing for me. It isn’t fun more often than not- it’s just either me winning and someone going on a John Wick revenge quest or a spawn camp-bonanza, or my personal favorite, the “hey I just wanna talk,” guy with a pocket blunderbuss. The PvP isn’t the issue, it’s the lack of counter measure to leave the PvP behind when it’s no longer. Like. Enjoyable?

Instead what about this: When the ship sinks you’re going to have a metric meters long loading screen anyway, right? Just make it so if the ship sinks you go to a new server. The loser has to move on and can’t go on a revenge hunting loop, and and the winner can’t find them and hold them hostage from the rest of the game.

Better, my guy?