TSW PvP Beginner’s Guide

TSW PvP Beginner’s Guide by grimjax

What is PvP and why should I PvP?

What is PvP? Short answer is Player versus Player, long answer is better described here “PvP: the Wikipedia entry” .

PvP allows players the chance to test their skills against other players. Every combat against another player becomes a unique experience that will change every time they fight. PvP also provides an alternative way to gear-up a character.

What types of PvP are in TSW?

Fight Clubs
Fight Clubs offer PvP but with no guidelines to follow and allow anything from duels to group battles. Unfortunately because of the current setup, few players use these areas. There are currently three fight clubs, one in each of the major cities.

Battlefields
Battlefields are a team based PvP game where the objective is to earn the most points during play. Each battlefield has a different set of rules. (Currently queues for battlefields seem to be broken.) There are currently two battlefields:

Stonehenge– “TSW PvP – PathLess goes to Stonehenge” video

• King-of-the-Hill rule set.
• Three teams of five players.
• Winner has the most points or reaches score cap of 750 first.
• Points are earned by staying alive inside the actual Stonehenge monument while trying to make sure your enemies are out of it or you can just kill the opposition.

El Dorado– “The Secret World: PVP Eldorado” video

• Capture-the-Flag ruleset.
• Three teams of ten players.
• Winner has the most points or maintains possession of all relics for 2 minutes.
• Points are earned by controling four legendary relics. Relics can be moved to more defensible positions. Grounded relics provide special benefits to teammates within close proximity:

Relic of the East heals you for 3% of your max health per second.
Relic of the West reduces incoming damage by 10%.
Relic of the North increases your health by 10%.
Relic of the South increases your damage and healing output by 10%.

Warzones
Warzones are persistent open PvP zones that can be joined at any time. The objectives in these zones are currently provided by missions that are available as soon as you enter the zone and at locations throughout the zone. There is currently one warzone:

Fusang Projects– “The Secret World: PVP Fusang 2 – Dragon Party”video

• Three factions limited to 10 players per faction more than the lowest populated faction (max. 75 each).
• Individuals receive experience points for completing PvE mission objectives based on killing other players, capturing an anima well, or capturing a facility/temple.
• Individuals receive White Mark rewards based off of how many objectives their faction has captured and held every 3 minutes.
• Factions fight to control four facilities/temples and multiple anima wells that are spread throughout the zone. Anima wells are used as resurrection points for the faction that owns them. Capturing a facility/temples usually involve defeating a defense turret to get through the front gate. Once the turret is taken down, the facility/temple guardian has to be subdued before the facility can be claimed.
• Fusang PvP Vendors are located inside each faction home base. At these vendors you can exchange your Black Marks of Venice into White Marks, and purchase various upgrades for turrets and custodians belonging to your faction.

What do you earn from PVP?

For those that like “Epeen” gauges or as others like to call them “aesthetic” rewards, the TSW chronicle has a PvP kill count and leaderboards for Stonehenge and El Dorado. You can gain experience by completing the missions in Fusang and earn two types of currency while doing PvP:

White Marks- You gain white marks by capturing and holding objectives in Fusang every 3 minutes. White Marks can be converted at Council of Venice Vendors into Black Marks to buy PvP gear from Council of Venice Vendors. They can also be used within Fusang to purchase a variety of upgrades for turrets and custodians.

Black Marks- These are earned by converting White Marks earned in Fusang and by participating in the battleground mini-games. Black Marks are the primary currency for PvP gear, and are usually earned at a much slower pace than White Marks.

While you can use the marks to purchase lower tiered (level) gear, it is advised that you save them to purchase your starter purple gear (10.0). If you start PvP early on, you could potentially have a set of starter purples by the time your skills are maxed at 10.

What are PvP Uniforms?

PvP Uniforms are Faction outfits based off the “Holy Trinity” of Roles in MMO’s: DPS, Healing, and Tanking. (Read more about roles in PvP, in the Builds section below.) While any role or hybrid can wear any of the uniforms, they give buffs and debuffs according to what base role they represent. Another reason TSW uses Uniforms is to cause less stress on video cards during large battles between players. You select your uniform type on the PvP screen when you queue for PvP. It is unable to be changed while in the PvP zones.

High Powered Weaponry (DPS)

• Damage done increased by 5%
• Critical chance increased by 3%
• Penetration chance increaded by 3%
• Chance to get glancing hits reduced by -2%
• Healing, barrier, and leech effects reduced by -5%
• Health increased by 5%
• Damage reduction increased by 2%

Reinforced Armor (Tank)

• Health increased by 15%
• Block chance increased by 5%
• Evade chance increaded by 4%
• Chance of enemies glancing you increased by 2%
• Healing, barrier, and leech effects reduced by -5%
• Damage done reduced by -5%
• Damage reduction increased by 5%

Integrated Anima Conduits (Healing)

• Healing, barrier, and leech effects increased by 12%
• Healing critical chance increased by 6%
• Crit power increased by 20%
• Health increased by 8%
• Damage done reduced by -6%
• Damage reduction increased by 4%

New to the game, how soon can/should I PvP? Wondering if I should wait? What kind of chance do I stand with my low level of gear? 

Originally Posted by zinny:
Jump right in! Yes, you’ll die a lot. However, even if you were to show up in full QL10.4 kit, you still need to learn things like situational awareness…how to use LOS to your advantage, how to pan your camera around so you don’t just run past people, etc. you’ll learn a lot from your combat log too so when you die, take a brief moment to see what exactly killed you. You might also discover some new, interesting abilities that way too!

Originally Posted by InfamousBrad:
….Show up. A warm body with only inner-ring abilities in QL3 greens is still one more person… Even if all you do is run around empty parts of Fusang closing off anima wells, you’re still making the enemy run farther after they fall down. Fusang is a numbers game; the only people who are completely useless are the ones who never show up or the ones who never leave the starting area.

Short answer is now! You are going to die, and die a lot, it’s a fact. How you deal with that (attitude wise) will determine your enjoyment and participation level. Think of dying as a learning experience.

Learn the maps; get to know the people that PvP with you and against you. You will gain valuable experience by just hanging around some of the veteran players while you PvP. Learn about your abilities and how they apply to PvP compared to PvE. The earlier you start, the less painful it gets later.

Another great reason to start as early as possible is that you can start collecting Black Marks for that purple 10.0 gear way before you can wear it. Also, in Fusang all gear is buffed up to a minumum of Green 10.0 equivalents. So don’t worry so much about the low level gear for now.

Where do I start? Should I go for one of the battlegrounds or go straight to Fusang?

Originally Posted by marthos:
… I would go with Fusang. You’ll have the opportunity to run around solo and test out your pvp builds. With a decent sized group you can flip a facility for 7 marks every 15 minutes… I was out in Fusang when I was in Kingsmouth (you get scaled up a bit) using an all inner-circle build….

Originally Posted by Iblis:
Start with fusang, and only do SH/ Ed if your better equipped.

I feel everyone should try all of them.

Start with Fusang, it is the most forgiving to players trying to learn how to PvP.

Battlegrounds currently use a tier system to match players to games. Also be aware that currently the tiers are based off of your skill ranking and not your gear (Might have changed, waiting for more info). So you could out skill your gear and have a very rough time in the battlegrounds. Another issue in battlegrounds are pre-mades vs. PUGs, at the lower tiers you will most likely be in PUGs. At the higher tiers you will be facing more pre-made groups. I advise that if you enjoy battlegrounds, find a good cabal that enjoys to PvP, and join a pre-made.

Originally Posted by RickyBilly:
I went straight from (mostly) green gear to purple gear by running Stonehenge. Made a video about it a few weeks ago. You can check it out here “TSW Purple Gearing Tips PvP builds“

This video has some info that is out of date but also shows why you might not want to PUG…

(Currently there are issues with queuing for Battlegrounds, so we kind of get defaulted back to Fusang being the best area to start PvPing.)

Is there any advice on how to behave in PvP or what type of behavior to expect? 

By default, always assume that anything with a red name will try to kill you. Some enemy players might not (I’ll explain in a second), but it’s best to not take a chance. Again if it has a red name, assume it is hostile and act accordingly. The reason is simply this, if they are in the zone they knew they were joining a PvP zone, and that part of the objective in all PvP zones is to kill enemy players. Other than that, follow the general rules of behavior in game.

Now to complicate matters! Because of the current population problems that we are having in Fusang, there are some players that have started following a “code of conduct”. This is completely voluntary and more specifically personal. The “code” is almost like a form of PvP etiquette if you will. The problem is that it differs from player to player. It is basically accepted that you don’t interfere while an “underdog” faction is trying to cap a facility. So what qualifies for an “underdog” status, 1-3 players, 4-5, less than 10 players in Fusang? I usually go with the 1-3 players, others might not. Some players will also duel enemy players when there is a huge difference in numbers. All of these are personal choices and are not enforceable by anyone, despite what might be said in chat…

If you wish to follow some form of etiquette or code of conduct, be aware that others might not, and even if they do their code might differ from yours. The best bet is to be ready for hostile actions at all times.

What is the “underdog” custodian and how do you activate it?

If a faction has not received a certain minimum amount of rewards within a certain period of time in Fusang, all players of that faction will gain access to a PvP mission called “The Underdogs”.

Originally Posted by Didek:
….The way it is currently setup is that if you don’t get any tokens for 5 ticks then you will be granted a custodian. This might be something we want to adjust with the new situation.

The mission has you collecting 10 anima shards (They look like tiny orange floating balls and are scattered around Fusang) and use them to recharge the shut down custodian near your faction HQ.

Here is how to activate a custodian and where the shards are ! Thread byrenzier

Once the custodian is recharged, it will activate and (Hopefully!) help your faction against enemy players and enemy NPCs inside Fusang. This type of custodian is much more powerful than the other custodians you find defending the facilities. Also, it has a healing aura around it that heals the 10 nearest friendly players towards it.

Disclaimer: For every piece of advice given, there will be exceptions. I will not be going into those; I will be focusing on the general concepts. Also, let me say what will not be in this section of the guide, there will be no actual builds. Why? The Builds & Decks section of the forums has a lot of great information that would be redundant to repost here. I’ll have links where appropriate.

I have split The build section into two seperate areas: Part 1 will deal with roles and builds in general, Part 2 will deal with abilities and gear.

Different Types of Players
There are three types of players in Secret World when it comes to using builds and gear…

The first is the player that believes one type of build set should be able to do all content. These players often do not last too long and usually quit the game in frustration by the time they hit the Blue Mountain zone. In construction work, a hammer is a vital tool but sucks when you have to cut something. Same thing with a saw, it can cut many materials but is horrible to use when trying to nail something together. Secret World was planned around you using the right tool for the job.

The second player has learned the concept of using the proper tool for the job. This group goes out to the internet and finds finished builds that others have used. Many of these builds are what we call cookie-cutter builds or flavor-of-the-month builds. Most players usually fall into this category, and there is nothing wrong with this approach. This is a good way to learn about synergies among abilities, and great weapon and gear combinations for specific build roles. Some players never advance beyond this stage…

The third player type is what I call “the researcher”. While the second type does research, a researcher takes it to a whole other level. A researcher might look at a preset build and then tear it apart looking at how it works and how it might be improved on. Others will use a deck builder program and build it from scratch trying combinations of abilities and weapons that others might never have even considered.

Some of the best PvP players fall into the last category and you should strive at a minimum to at least be somewhere in between the two of them. But, If you are going to use a preset build, you need to understand why it works and more importantly where it should be used.

Roles
Heard of the holy trinity of MMO’s? Well guess what, we play an MMO. That means we have DPS, Healers, Tanks, and hybrids of each. Determining what role you wish to play will be what guides you in how you setup your gear and combine that with your abilities to make your builds.
……… not even close to being done.

Builds
….
Where can I find more PvP Builder’s Tools and Info?

TSW’s Forums and Threads

• Builds & Decks: This section of the forum contains a lot of useful information about different builds that other players are using. Remember that most builds that are listed in this section are not necessarily built for PvP, but might be able to be modified.
• Character Build Guides: Sticky has a list of PvE builds and some links to some external web sites that I think have some great info on them, just remember that their advice or builds might not be focused on PvP.
• Gear Planner
• PVP Builds (Consolidated)
• Hit vs Defense – Something isn’t right…
• Tanking: Protection (Phys/Mag) vs Mitigation (Evade/Glance/Evade)
• Consolidating the new theories on stat #’s

Web Sites

• Yokai’s and Sarcan’s TSW Guides and FAQs
• TSW Guides – Build Listings

Deck Builders

• Drakkashi’s TSW Ability Wheel
• MMOZ TSW Deck Builder
• The Secret Sandbox by the9thcircle
• TSW Deck Builder by Pyrinoc