PvP will be good for business

A few days ago I was talking about Diablo 3's PvP controversy and my conclusion was that I don't care about PvP at all and wouldn't give a hoot if it wasn't included in the game, yet I wouldn't mind it as long as it didn't affect PvE due to balancing.

Now that I'm actually playing the beta, I've had a greater opportunity to see things in perspective. Part of the pleasure of playing Diablo 3 will be the Real Money-making aspect. Hey, why not make a quick buck while enjoying your favorite game, right? Nothing wrong with that.

Until now I was looking only at the PvE aspect of the game. I figured that people will buy better gear so that they can equip their characters in order to perform better in PvE. Because, after all, the Diablo series is built around the PvE aspect.

But then I realized that, in fact, there will be plenty of people for which Diablo 3 will be the next e-sport. For these people, PvE is just a stepping stone to the real meat of the game: Player versus Player combat. Maybe some of them will enjoy leveling their characters but I'm sure many more will see this as an annoying phase that must be done with as soon as possible.

What happens when these people reach level 60 and want to jump right into PvP arenas? If they don't spend significant time farming Hell and Inferno to gather powerful equipment, they'll get thrashed immediately. So a lot of them will be eager to spend their hard-earned dollars on the RMAH. From what I understand, e-sport fanatics tend to spend a lot of money on the stuff they like. I'm betting that Diablo 3 will be no exception.

This has made me change my stance a bit. I still don't care to participate in PvP but I welcome it wholeheartedly now. I'm also fairly certain that in a couple of months after the game is released, when the PvP patch is implemented, there will be a flurry of activity on the RMAH. Keep an eye out for that. I know I will.

The PvP controversy

Blizzard has cut PvP out of the Diablo 3 release so they could ship the game faster. We all know that. But how important is PvP to y'all? IncGamers is just having a poll to that effect, and the vast majority of voters either don't care about PvP or would much rather have it patched into the game later than wait who knows how many more months.

Personally I picked one of the most extreme options, namely "4) Great news. PvP sucks and would have distracted from PvE balancing." Before you hate me, hear me out and bear in mind that these are purely my own opinions.

As one commenter in that thread put it, "Diablo has PvP?" This tongue-in-cheek statement sums it up for me. Not only did I avoid any form of PvP completely in the previous two games, but I was scared of it, having heard horror stories of players being ganked while they were minding their own business.

I doubt many of you will dispute the fact that PvP was implemented as an afterthought in D1/D2. I have a feeling that the only ones who enjoyed it are the griefers, although that would be unfair because people did engage in legitimate dueling with willing opponents.

Here's the thing: Diablo isn't meant to be a PvP game. Yeah, there's no big deal in putting two characters together and allowing them to bash each other until one of them dies. But for that to work really well, classes would need to be balanced against each other. I would hate that even more than I hated it in WoW!

Diablo is primarily a PvE game and no amount of balancing should be made for the sake of PvP. If people want to fight each other, by all means, allow them to do it, but don't give it a second thought beyond creating a special venue for that, i.e. the Arena system that I've been hearing about.

I'm not opposed to PvP being in the game. But I strongly believe that it should always play second fiddle to the magnificence that is the PvE component, the heart and soul of the game, the bread and butter of the Diablo series.

If Blizzard announced tomorrow that they won't add PvP to Diablo 3 after all, I would be happy. Yes, I am selfish like that, sometimes. But that is a very unrealistic scenario. Instead, I will just settle for what they are doing now: patch it in later when everything is sorted out, BUT DON'T MESS WITH MY PVE JUST SO YOU CAN BALANCE PVP!