Massively OP’s Best of 2017 Awards: Best MMORPG PvP of 2017

By
Bree Royce
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44

Massively Overpowered’s end-of-the-year 2017 awards continue today with our award for Best MMORPG PvP, which was awarded to Black Desert and EVE Online in a tie last year, the first year we debuted this reader-proposed award. We’ve opted to include live, fully released MMORPGs launched in any year, as long as their 2017 PvP experience is what’s being judged. Don’t forget to cast your own vote in the just-for-fun reader poll at the very end!

The Massively OP staff pick for Best MMORPG PvP of 2017 is…

NOTHING

Brianna Royce (@nbrianna): I think I need to explain this one upfront, so I want to cut in front of my colleagues to do it. We debated genre PvP and were able to come up with some games that probably could have reasonably taken this award, though for every proposal there was someone opposed, and no consensus could be reached. Ultimately, we found that our nominations were lukewarm at best and we were far more excited about PvP implementations coming in MMORPGs on the horizon (Crowfall, Camelot Unchained, and WoW’s PvP overhaul have my attention), so ultimately we decided not to bestow this award this year and in doing so communicate our dissatisfaction — even from our dedicated PvP players — with the current state of PvP in the genre.

​Andrew Ross (@dengarsw): PvP was one of the things that really got me into MMOs, especially the social aspects. This year, the only one I was really active in was Pokemon Go, and that’s hardly the best. Elder Scrolls is more for the sandboxy-feel I was hoping to get from ArcheAge, Black Desert’s experiments sound nice on paper but I’ve failed to sell it to gamer friends, and even my old chestnut, PlanetSide 2, failed to click with people I actually convinced to download the game. These days, survival games, lobby shooters, MOBAs, and death-match arenas just seem to be getting the PvPers I knew, including myself. If pressed to choose, I’d go Black Desert just because it sounds interesting on paper, the platoons/squads thing sounds like a slow evolution to PvP-lite beyond Crowfall’s limited campaign seasons, and because we don’t have to post news articles about cyber-mafia heists in it and hey, we didn’t have anything like the ghillie suit pay-to-win controversy of last year. Yay for that.

​Brendan Drain (@nyphur): EVE Online. It added new moon mining gameplay that opened more opportunities for PvP.

Eliot Lefebvre (@Eliot_Lefebvre): World of Warcraft. The fact is that I haven’t done a lot of PvP this year, but the system for World of Warcraft’s PvP leveling and various Brawls has actually been a fun and cool way to keep players engaged. Sure, some of those Brawls have been kind of dumb, but both the instanced PvP and the open-world quests for PvP have gotten my attention. I’ll also nominate Final Fantasy XIV’s MOBA-fication of jobs.

Justin Olivetti (@Sypster): Albion Online. It should get the nod this year because it finally launched its PvP sandbox and gave the community a lot of pretend land to fight over. PvP isn’t my bag, but I got the feeling that this tight community does enjoy what’s on display here.

MJ Guthrie (@MJ_Guthrie): It isn’t an MMORPG, but I’d give this to SMITE for its Corrupted Arena adventure. I had a blast in there and I wanted to keep going back. I’d also say Amazing Eternals, but of course, that is also not an MMORPG — and it is no longer with us! Paladins is also more fun… you see the pattern? No MMORPG offers a decent PvP experience for me. What I can say is that I am anticipating PvP in an upcoming game! If we have a most anticipated PvP award, I totally vote for Rend. I am really looking forward to the three-faction warfare that is only at certain times at bases but whenever on outposts. I really like the premise and cannot wait to see how it works out in practice;

Tina Lauro Pollock (@purpletinabeans): PvP doesn’t appeal to me as a player in the slightest really, so I do struggle with this vote category. However, I’ll throw my hat at Black Desert for its attempt at creating PvP-for-the-masses, even though it doesn’t sway me to play.

Nothing won our award for Best MMORPG PvP OF 2017. What’s your pick?

Reader poll: Which MMORPG had the best PvP experience in 2017?

  • Albion Online (5%, 40 Votes)
  • Black Desert (9%, 76 Votes)
  • EVE Online (13%, 111 Votes)
  • World of Warcraft (10%, 81 Votes)
  • Final Fantasy XIV (2%, 21 Votes)
  • Guild Wars 2 (11%, 97 Votes)
  • Star Wars The Old Republic (2%, 21 Votes)
  • Blade and Soul (3%, 28 Votes)
  • Elder Scrolls Online (8%, 71 Votes)
  • ArcheAge (1%, 11 Votes)
  • RuneScape (1%, 7 Votes)
  • Darkfall (2%, 13 Votes)
  • Warframe (1%, 8 Votes)
  • PlanetSide 2 (2%, 15 Votes)
  • TERA (1%, 11 Votes)
  • Nothing (24%, 208 Votes)
  • Something else (tell us in the comments!) (4%, 30 Votes)

Total Voters: 849

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Poll options include all games nominated plus other games we opted to include.

MOP’S 2017 AWARDS (SO FAR)
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