STO is clearly lacking in the PVP department. I personally don't have much experience with other MMOs, but I suspect there are other players with much more knowledge of what concepts work or don't work for PVP in MMOs.

Therefore I ask: Which MMOs have great PVP? Which aspect of their PVP is great? Could these concepts possibly be adapted for STO?

LOTRO (not great PvP... PvM stuff)

Incoming and Outgoing Heal Ratings (Sto needs something like this)
- Skill points and Engi / Sci consuls could modify numbers
- Escorts could have base +10% incoming on hull and shields -10% out on all outgoing
- Cruisers could have base +10% outgoing on hull Flat on Shields -10% on incoming hull flat on shield
- Sci could have +10% outgoing on shields Flat on hull -10% incoming on shield flat on hull

Legendary Item system. (Sounds like the New BOFF system might be along the same lines) Would be cool to have a leg warp core / engi, sci, tac boff / phaser array. It also adds some grind to end game. Leveling Leg items... then having to change them out when you decide to change builds and end up leveling new items all over again. lol

Then again scratch that second idea... Cryptic wouldn't test it well enough and it would a balance nightmare. lol

PotBS had/has great PvP, and since it involves ships it is more closely related to STO. However, PotBS lacks a good way to get INTO PvP - no queues, etc. (Although this maybe out-dated info - I think someone mentioned they had a 'dueling' feature now.)

I'm probably gonna get flamed for this, but I always liked the PvP in SWG.
The best part about it, PvP was open world and could happen anywhere at any time. There are spacific PvP zones, but they are not instanced and there are no q's, you are just flagged for PvP automaticaly while in the zone.
Unfortunatly with the way sector space is set up, open world PvP may not be possible. But a PvP zone would be nice. A spacific system open to both factions, anyone can warp in and join the fight. The sides may not be even often, but they naver usually are in war.

**** had a very good three faction mechanic. Warhammer for all its bugs the basic pvp was fairly good.

PoTBS or Pirates of The Burning Sea had a very good pvp system and RvR (Realm vs. Realm) element. It definitely had some issues but also some great examples of how "conquest" of the opposing factions territory can be implemented. Furthermore, I'd say it could provide a good example of how RvR can work with three factions (Romulans?) forming loose alliances on their own to further their war efforts.

Warhammer Online had some very good PvP/RvR elements as well. Also, had a very unique method of getting the PvE crowd to directly help with the PvP peoples war effort to take over enemy territory. Great game that people could gain a ton of useful ideas and lessons learned from. It honestly came out probably 6months to a year too early, suffered from server instability, and WoW simply was still too popular at the time imo. Nonetheless, I definitely recommend Cryptic doing some homework on at least the RvR elements of the game if they ever decide to let us out of our sandbox and actually fight for control over zones.

Dont think you get flamed for this, i liked PVP in SWG aswell.

Open PvP to fight for territorys would be nice but i doubt we will see this in the near future.

What could get implemented rather quickly would be new maps for Arena. Perhaps a Vault version for shuttle only pvp.

Kerrat could also be revamped to make it appeal more for players to load in. Perhaps different objectives with higher rewards for booth sides (like finish PVE Objective in x time to earn reward while team B gets the reward if they can stop you in x time to finish the objective.)

Automated Tournaments
Besides many fps games which track the scores of the players also Guild Wars comes in my mind since it had an system which generated tournaments for groups which had to sign up for it at an NPC in game.

Fleet Wars
A Option to declare war on another fleet (booth sides would have to accept to avoid griefing) which would make every member everywhere attackable for the opposing fleet. (booth space and ground)


System Control
Now that i think about it while a entire territoral PvP system is far away a small system controll pvp could be implemented.

A Station / Base which is in each of the designated system could be attacked at any time of the day to take it over for your faction (or even team/fleet perhaps).

This could include booth space and ground like first you would need to take out the stations defences, hack/scramble or whatever else comes into mind to gain access to the station (while the opposing faction/team can put up a defense in space to fight the aggressors back) Once they had been able to beam to the station a fight on the ground could continue where the attackers would need to finish certain tasks to switch the station over to your faction (NPC's in the station would depend on which faction owns it right now and help the current owners to defend) Booth Space and ground could be fought at the same time to include multiple teams.

The tasks needed to switch a base over could also be class dependend. Means that Tac/Sci/Eng are all needed to finish class specific tasks

Depending on how long a faction holds the station they could get some bonuses in game. Perhaps a discount for certain things, a XP boost or something else to make it interessting for everyone (PVE and PVP Players) to fight for the station.

LOTRO gives players a "Renown" bonus when ever they bag a living player. Players with higher renown are worth more renown bonus when you bag them. X amount of renown equals a new rank. There is gear in LOTRO you can only purchase when you get to which ever level. The gear is nice PvP gear, not over powered, but little bonuses with some trade offs that keep them balanced. A nice bonus to help get people into PvP.
Makes for a fun end game, game. Getting more renown and getting your name to the top of the leader board.

A system like that could be lots of fun. Could even give some renown type rewards for capturing points as well as getting killing blows on good players.

They actualy made a que system for what they call "battlefields" so it is there now, However, not that many used it, after the new shiney wore off, in favor of Restess open PVP and/or the new "city battle" system where PVE and PVP was both important to the cause.

But, I agree 110%. The old base battles of yesteryear (pre-CU and even CU) were very enjoyable. Was always fun to equip that saber and watch the scatter altho you pretty much ended up on the BH terms shortly thereafter. lol

Eve online has good pvp, a great deal technical and there are alot of attributes to marvel over. true its not for the faint at heart but it is something to look at and is growing