With a new update, Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen has received PvP servers for the first time. Many players of the MMORPG are not happy about this. The ratings on Steam are continuously dropping.
What is troubling about the new PvP servers? Already at the announcement of the PvP servers of Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen, there was some criticism from the community. Players criticized, for example, that the new worlds would shift the focus away from the previous PvE and that developer resources would be diverted to PvP, even though there are still many issues on the Early Access servers that should be resolved promptly.
If you look at current community discussions, it seems that the newly released PvP servers with update 0.16.217 have gone live in a rather frustrating state.
- bumblewacky writes on Reddit: “It’s not good. There is no protection within the cities, so people are attacked at the spawn, at the bank, while crafting, etc. The protection timer after death is also not long enough to heal and get out of the city before being caught again.”
- Madnessx9 complains on Reddit: “I’m not familiar with the game, I only got to level 5 in PvE so far, but I just started in PvP and see small gank groups roaming everywhere. It doesn’t look like PvP will be fun unless you started on day 1 and quickly made it to a high level.”
- Arel203 criticizes on Reddit: “The fact that they even spent time on this means the game has no clear vision, and at this point, they are just throwing crap at the wall.”
The early access trailer of Pantheon:
Early Access in free fall
How does the release of the PvP servers affect things? Part of the community finds the expansion of the game to PvP unfavorable. Another part is giving the new servers a chance and is primarily experiencing frustration. It is clear that this is reflected in the reviews on Steam.
As a reminder: They were sitting at an average of 80 percent shortly after the Early Access launch. Afterwards, the ratings increasingly turned negative as more and more issues and problems came to light. With the release of the new PvP servers, the previous low point has now been reached. The ratings from the last 30 days stand at only 64 percent positive (via Steam).
Notably, the new PvP servers also did not attract significantly more players to the MMORPG. During prime time in the evening, around 2,500 to 2,800 Steam users are still online in Pantheon (via steamdb.info).
What can I expect on the PvP servers? The rules of the new worlds are as follows:
- PvP is only available on PvP servers and will not be activated on the existing PvE servers.
- There is no class balancing for PvP. Some classes will feel more powerful in PvP than others. You decide how and what you want to play.
- This is a lawless land. There will be no GM support for contested content.
- You can only fight against player characters that are within your character level, plus or minus 5 levels. PvP battles can only be initiated from level 5 onwards.
- The general inventory can be looted by other players; equipped gear remains with your corpse.
- The combat state between players ends after 10 seconds if they do not take PvP damage. Damage and healing in PvP combat will be scaled differently than in PvE content. There is no friendly fire between players of the same group or guild.
- Players who are not in your group or guild will default to being attackable targets. You can press CTRL + left click to target them defensively.
- When players die in PvP combat, they receive a buff that makes them immune to PvP battles for 90 seconds.
- The choice of server shards is disabled on PvP servers.
What else do I need to know about Pantheon? When MeinMMO first reported on Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen in May 2016 it was already clear that the new online role-playing game from industry veteran Brad McQuaid (EverQuest, Vanguard: Saga of Heroes) was aimed at fans of classic MMO experiences for PC, with a focus on PvE group challenges.
The team at Visionary Realms has remained committed to this goal over the years, even after the leading industry veteran passed away in November 2019 at the young age of just 50. And this old-school approach was initially well received by many players in the early access version. By the way, there is already a plan for the upcoming content updates: PvE MMORPG started strong on Steam, is now struggling – Roadmap 2025 should fix it, players say, it won’t work
