I have to disagree with those complaining about the changes. I started the game at the US launch in a founder pack. I hated PvP because it has always been unbalanced. Maybe the best time is when gear was capped at TRI. I couldn't enjoy PvE because of PvP griefers. This made me quit on and off multiple times. The game is finally at a state where I know I can enjoy it.

There are still ways to pvp, but now you guys complain about the top players only there.  Well, now you get how it felt for us lower gear people or those of us that just mind our business with PvE getting 1 shot by PvPers. I feel like thats what you guys miss more than actual PvP that's balanced..

As for PvE griefers I have NEVER seen this. In fact I still get someone clearly geared a lot better coming into a spot Im grinding at and killing me. Guess what I do? I go to marni or jump server. You guys can as well. Most people just grinding dont bother me in my rotation.

I can agree they need to add better tiers of content for different gear levels. I dont think grinding to get my AP higher just to grind somewhere else is going to push me to increase gear. Also their gear sets look pretty dull compared to cash shop outfits. Maybe if they made more reasons to gear up, thered be more people doing that, and even more people to PvP at different gear levels.

Why do you lie!??! what makes you lie like this ? stop making up shit dude, no one was going around ganking people, that has never been a thing, if someone killed you it maybe happened once a month and very rarely they would do it on repeat, idk what game you are playing or what toxic shit you are doing to make people kill you when you are "minding your on bussiness". if you die once while grinding means you lost, you are supposed to go to another spot or channel, if you keep on dying means you are karma bombing.

I think you completely misunderstand what we are complaining about, Was there a need to change aspects of the way the game operates? Sure, I think we are all or at least a majority of the player base PVP'rs and NON agree that the system was flawed.

The issue over all are what and how it was implemented and that reverting changes such as these are not in PA style.

Any single one of the options they had on the table would have pretty much done more than enough to affect the change they were after. I will give an example.

#1 Karma change from character to family wide is more or less the easiest but the most profound change.

Half the issue with true griefers were that players like Android18 from onelayerpancakes could run around on his multiple dream horses and his Tamer and kill traders,lifeskillers, fishers, gathers or anyone that would give them attention and they were VERY EFFECTIVE utilizing a doom with t10 krog gear and a cheat function of the tamer on a horse. unless you were lucky to knock 'em off you had about a 10% chance to kill them cuz they V and ran using every tamer movement skill possible to get back to their horse or back to town at night.

Then you would see them horse training in Heidel on a non red char zero punishment and literally laughing at you cuz you became content and there was nothing you can do to them.. they wouldn't leave any town until night to start harassments all over again... If you don't know android18 then you were never griefed in this game EVER..

So making Karma fam wide takes away the ability for true griefers to hide from their own behavior when in fact almost all of them would never be a full time Red player <--- these guys i don't consider griefers.. This change in itself would have fixed the entire issue.

#2 1 sided Dec changes are something that a lot of people are on board with just make it so Officer and up can accept Decs.... (currently we can not, only GM of the guild can accept)

The best option would be if a Dec goes out that if a player continues to fight PVP or responds to a flagged player that these Decs would go through immediately and have a time limit... If no PK happened within 60 mins the Dec is auto removed and has a cool down of 24 hours so guilds can't simply bully another.

There are many ways to handle the issue of PK and guild bullying. Literally this single change would have been enough to fix a majority of the issues.

#3 Marni Relm changes are probably the most undesirable in my book of the entire list of changes..

Marni came with 2 things they buffed the spawn time of the mobs making marni more profitable than Open World and increased the amount of time per day for its use from 1 hour per day to 12 hours per day this change by itself was more than enough to fix the entire problem on its own those that want to PVE only will never have to interact with anyone ever again. No more Griefers, just like telling me if I want to PVP goto arsha you can goto Marni if you don't like the Open world or interactions.

#4 NW Changes that were implemented without testing at almost the same time as the above... they increased Nodes but also increased player caps on all higher end less Gear capped nodes so if your in a guild or a alliance that can only produce 40 players then you can't do T4 or T5 that are literally 60-100 player cap your forced to fight in T1 or T2 were the newer guilds and alliances that are supposed to be breaking into the scene are at.. now you have top siege and NW guilds fighting baby seals because of the number restrictions. This is not fair for the entire community or is it fair for newer players to get steamrolled by 14 castles on a node.

#5 removal of seasonal Arena of Solaire, this content is one of the more premiere PVP content in BDO ran for 2 months then gone and won't return for 6 months or more...

the main issue with this is that this was the majority outlet for PVP in BDO they removed this content at almost the same time as all of the above changes leaving literally only 1 place to go besides NW and that is Red Battlefield granted cuz i have the gear its my 1st goto but the main issue is that anyone outside of 720+ GS literally can't go there without getting wrecked.. Some try for the daily pay out but do not enjoy it. 

It is the last and only remaining uncapped content in the game outside of this all other avenues have been removed in favor of Capped content.

Any one of the #1-#3 by itself would of been enough to fix your PVP issues but to do all 3 then add in #4 & #5.... this is were the problems are at to many changes taking away WAY to much at one time leave a major portion of the BDO community without direction and without content and then all you see PA doing is wanting to buff PVE grinding ?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?

It is very clear that PA doesnt even know who the player base is or what they want you have pretty much all the content creators and players complaining as well as literally 75% of current active threads are all bitching about the same thing Yet you have a large enough of people that hate PVP in the forums that it is drowning out the voices of those that want it... The main issue here is that the majoiryt of those that actually play BDO dont come to the forums leaving the current decisions that PA has made to benifit those that have cried about PVP non stop.

Resolution:

-Keep Karma changes

-Remove Dec changes or Allow officer and up to accept

-Nerf Marni relm in both spawn time and duration.. Allow a 2 full hours from start to finish then regen 15 mins per hour

-Bring back Solair as a practice maching system and add in a increase to a 5v5 option as well as let party members join it.

-Revise the current NW system to allow guilds and alliances to participate in better set up player caps as well as gear caps the current one is a mess.

I dwell in the forums and Reddit a lot, reading posts at work.  Makes time go by and I get paid, so it's whatever.  Never once -- NOT ONE TIME -- have a I seen someone complain about the changes because they can't abuse owpvp, bully people, stuff like that.  Instead, it's always people like you who put words in people's mouths and saying that's their complaint when it's actually not.  Putting words in people's mouths EXACTLY how you perfectly displayed in this thread.

Sure there are clowns who don't like the changes who act like clowns.  But I've seen WAY more people putting words into other's mouths like you did in this thread than those.  Usually, those against the changes bring up very logical, objective, and rational points, like ReconKangas did here.  Even ShakyBay brought up solid points regarding the state of PvP and progression in his thread here.  Hell -- even ImPansy, a dude who's hardcore into PvE can see the huge problems with the changes and the current state of end-game in his video titled "The Current State of End-game" on YouTube.

EDIT:  Here's the vid for anyone interested

ReconKangas brought up some major points perfectly above.  If you respond to him, try not to strawman / ad hom him, okay?  He's one of the level headed people in this forum who actually gives a sh about this game.  So if you respond to him, keep it 100.

I think that knee jerk reaction comes primarily from people who are PvP-averse, PvP-avoidant, or who just perform badly in PvP, due to lack of skill, gear, interest, or a combination.  I think it's when they hear or read the single word "PVP" their brains automatically go back to that time they got mopped, washed, bruised, and battered in an OWPVP scenario.  Or other bad experiences that included being wrecked, merked, sent to gray screen repeatedly.  This is why I sarcastically called it PTSD lol.  It's like, because of the Post Traumatic Stress, they can't speak in objective terms.

I agree, there seems to be less people actively grinding, at least in open world.  Others have noticed this too, I read that same sentiment all over Reddit -- OW feels empty.  Accessory prices are rising, too which, to me, feels like it indicates a drop in supply.  Other market trends can be seen too, like how you bring up with Frenzy's.  Not only that, but net income are down this quarter, which was the quarter LoML was released -- yeah, it costed money to develop the content, but to see a dip in net income with the bigest region release since Valencia?  No one can convince me that's intended.

Steam player counts are declining too.  There's a lot of gloom, and it sucks to be all doom and gloom, but I think this gloom is only really seen by veterans.  New players seem to love the changes, but will they stick around for 5, 6, 7 years like we vets have?  I don't think so.  Like you mentioned, they'll realize the empty shell of an MMO BDO is under the suface, and I think they'll leave in an instant.  They aren't emotionally invested into BDO, they have no deep ties to this game, not like vets do.  Their love of the game only goes so far as how the game can deliver a self-centered experience as opposed to a as-a-whole scope.  If not, then well -- they're not paying Pearl Abyss, looking at their recent financials.  Lol.  I can see why you say PA doesn't know who their target demographic is.  It just shows on so many levels.

So, Arsha is out of question since there's the 1% PvP players and idk how % are the total population of PvP let's just say 10% (5% each region) but the 4% can't beat the 1%. AoS is not permanent being that AoS is the only fair PvP in the whole game or the capped NW.

Then the only solution is to make Elvia PvP(also classes that are underperforming in PvP can have slight buffs but only applicable in Elvia PvP) on every NW channel or make it on 2nd channel of every group, make it permanent, give it the same treatment as Magnus (one gear set for PvP and only one so that everyone will have the same thing with crystals pre-inbued in items) so that PvP can be called fair. Add-ons will be different for every other player so except add-ons and skill everything else is fair and on the same level. But then again, "if they implement this then farming for gear will be pointless like how it is now" (or so every PvP post is all about the new recent changes and yes, they should make Officers and up able to accept/send war decs) so they should cap it at 720-740 gs. This is for OwPvP and guild wars cand also happen here or having the war on normal channels and then the war transfers to Elvia PvP, a glorified War of the Roses without the PvE mobs, small scale(of WoR) and on the whole map from Grana-Valencia. I think this would be the best solution for an OwPvP or just do this on normal servers and delete the evasion gear (or make the people who invested in evasion to change to the counterpart of the same level of DR for the PvE). Or, even better(if they dont want the Elvia PvP or you guys <PvPers> dont like what i wrote here),  nerf evasion gear (since 280AP with 1.1-1.2k evasion gear cand do significantly high damage while evading 70% of the skills) since that's what's OP and there will never be fair PvP in OwPvP (oh and yes, the tank build exists both for eva and DR but that's only 120-180 AP so no damage at all -- 1.4k eva and up and 500-550? DR) 

Right now there's DR, Eva, Acc and AP build where AP builds with some DR are being used in PvE and PvP and the PvP players are using Eva and there are the 1% players (most probably the 7 years vets) that have them all. Some people go DR with 3 Acc accessories while still having the AP to kill the DR players but will deal less damage, maybe some of the PvP players also have the full Acc build. A lot of classes are missing Acc in their skills and only one class has insane Acc and can go Eva and still hit the opponent rhat has Eva  *cough* sage *cough*. The 1k Acc build on PvE side is only usable on Crypt of Resting Thoughts and you can only hit 50% of the time lmao.

Wear 1,3k eva build and tell me it's OP. In 1v1 against some classes yes, but when u stay against DK, Ranger, Archers, Sorcs, Sages they will kill u on half combo, you are not even able to hold their dps on SA due to low dmg reduction also it's hard to kill good DR players because, you  sacrificed tons of AP for this 1,3k eva. ( I talk about average player with 705-710 GS). Maybe you are all talking about awa Striker then yes it's too tanky this class can build good eva build with high dmg reduction, CC monster with decent dmg. But Ninja ? Or Kuno ? With no high evasion you just instantly die and against capped gear DR zerker I struggled to take him 50% on one full combo in my evasion build..

I think your assumtion on numbers are way off, I realize this is a small part of your over all post so bear with me.

As it refers to Arsha, the issue becomes what is Arsha. I would say roughly 99% of the current players that are on Arsha are not there for PVP they are there for the drop rate and protection from negative Karma.

Arsha is now a PVE server given the 50% increase drop rate and the ability to protect your grind spot or just grind and move when attacked.

As far as the over all PVP community that goes to arsha yes I would guess it's around 1% or less given steam numbers rate at 14k avg at night in NA and roughly 50-60% of the 14k belong to EU leaving 7k ish... then guessing about BDO platform it's stated world wide there is roughly 240k daily players... NA/EU represents about 40% of over all 240k x 40% = 96k x 40% (for NA%) 38.4k <---- this is avg daily added to 7k from steam that's 45.4k and 1% is about 45 players in NA that pvp on arsha if we break it down like this I think that is prob close to the daily<----24 hour avg to who is on arsha at a given time.

Even then I think that number is high cuz I beleive you may have 10 ish players from 4pm est to 10pm est .

When you actually look at the numbers and the amount of players that are fishing in every city you start to understand just how Few players are actually ACTIVE within BDO.

Out of the 45.4k daily players I would guesstimate you have about 80% of the overall player base that are AFK between fishing/life skilling in houses. Which leaves roughly 9k active players within BDO now is the fun part.

You have 3 olvia 6 novice/season channels <---no pvp and 1 season arsha that I am guessing is about 10% of the 9k soo 900 players on 6 and those grinding on the season arsha would be a small part as well so let's say 1k total.

Leaving 8k players actively grinding or other NW and such on the remaining 34 channels not including Arsha. That is 8000/32= about 250 players per server actively moving outside of the city, grinding or NW/SIEGE.

Even this number of 250 people I think is too high that said of you look at one thing NW that has the largest nightly draw. Some nodes that are 40 man have 12 forts and generally 30-40 man has maxed every fort that is ~400 players per active node between T1 - T3 the T4 AND T5 represents only the top 5 guilds in BDO so we will set that aside.

So you ask why did I go thought the above numbers.. if you look at the numbers AND then walk around like in heidel or velia I am pretty sure my numbers line up with what we are actually seeing so it is a fair representation.

That said during peak NW times those that enjoy PVP on a nightly basis depending on the amount of nodes are roughly between 3.5k to 6k of the over all active player base within the BDO community. That is literally 50-75% of the overall active community that is involved in some way with PVP.

Took a while to get here but as I have stated there are a lot of PVP haters but if you want to be left with a community of about 4,000 active PVE players that don't won't any interaction outside of a blip before entering marni relm 4000/35 channels that's about 100 players per channel in a open world game...

Again the support for PVE may be out there but I would not call ~100 players active per server a healthy game all of which you can already see with no one visible anywhere.

The PVP players in the over all community represents about 75% of the ACTIVE player base within BDO. You may not like PVP but without the PVP players doing what we do to keep people active this game Dies... 

I promise you a majority of PVE only players do not want interactions and the only reason your in a guild is for guild buffs or the minor group content. 

If you have low DR on eva, then that is gear issue. Post loml eva palyers have the same (if not more) DR than regular "DR" players.

Altrough given your other post I hardly surprised that you don't even know how to build properly.

Also the gear range that you speak of (705-710gs) is way to low to make either eva or DR work. That is kinda gearlet nowdays.

The one commenting before you was wrong aswell, as with such low stats like 280AP you will be hard countered by every endgame player, and 1.1-1.2k evasion is literately nothing.

At the state of the game, both eva and DR can be built and both are viable(more viable than full AP builds). Altrough they are significantly worse or better depending on class and that is called a class balance issue. Different classes have different base stats which have heavy impact at endgame gear.

Jsut to make an example, a DK in full PEN FG have less DR than a Striker in full base FG. The difference is several TRILLION worth of silver and it still performs worse.

PA made all classes have same AP and accuracy, but some classes have free DR/eva added to them, efffectivelly giving some classes severe advantage overall.