I love pvp and have seen a lot of systems with a lot of great aspects to them but never one that seemed to get it right. The problem arises when you consider PvP for this game; is the underlying game universe. Constant War. What a great environment for PvP; now go implement it lol.

Devs turned to Realm vs. Realm in other games since it seems the obvious choice in an all out war setting. This is really just a fancy way of saying Good Vs Bad. Which is nothing different from any other games implementation of PvP. Nothing revolutionary, nothing new, nothing great. The teams are just larger. For the purpose of my post i want to consider the following: Player Motive, Type (world or instanced), Time constraint (constant 24 hour, or interval), Objectives, Rewards, Consequences.

1. Player Motive: Seems to be three types of players in PvP the ones who just want to jump in and kill other player characters and be the biggest billy bad ass they can be individually and all the accolades that go with it. The player who enjoys team based PvP whether its a random group of players thrown together for their 'side' to defend, attack, control, or just all out murder. The players who love it all (me.) For this reason you need to have multiple layers of depth on the offers of pvp. You need the 2 and 3 man arena style battles for rewards like uber pvp gear. You need the short skirmishes that offer simple rewards such as access to a particular instance that rewards special gear. You need the all out battles that fully immerse the player in the all out war feeling. They should all have specific rewards and be of consequence so that none fall by the way side and become immaterial to the game as a whole.

2. Type: We need layers of different types of PvP. We need the instanced PvP. We need the contested 'zones' where if you walk in to them you are flagged and its open season. And we need the personal territory where if you are from the other side you can definitely try but you will get your butt handed to you. And we need choice. If I'm not participating in instanced or contested territory pvp then i can choose whether to flag or not. But if i want to run around with that kill me flag at all times i should definitely be able to do so.

3. Time Constraint: I think this variable depends on the scope of the pvp being participated in. If its just an arena style match then they should be able to go down dynamically with a 'dungeon finder' style of opting in. If its a contested area then once every 1 to 2 hours a battle commences. If its a world level or galactic level event then every 3 to 4 hours a battle can occur. Something like that.

Objectives, Rewards, Consequences: I think when you deal with smaller scale PvP all three of these considerations are fairly simple to determine and implement. But how do you implement this on a global/sector scale? I think if you look at some of the core implementations of the battletech/mechwarrior paper and dice games dedicated to the Macro aspect of warfare it gives us a lot of great resources for the really large scale stuff. The concepts of resource control, area denial, strategic positioning, being on the offensive or the defensive and how that affects the ongoing war. I envision a large scale war where you have maybe 15 to 30 strategic locations(maps/instances) that are constantly being fought over. And depending on what combination of those locations your faction controls or fails to control lol, you have certain bonuses, buffs, rewards, and yes consequences. For example if you control less than a certain number of locations you are constantly on the offensive since its easier to spare forces for attack, unless perhaps because of strategic positioning you are 'surrounded' and only have certain avenues of attack and many avenues to defend. If you control many locations it becomes harder to be on offensive since your forces become spread out but if your faction is has become positioned to hold many locations but have a smaller front line that cuts off access to your other holdings allowing you to leave them relatively undefended you can still attack other locations in full force. An example of a few buffs could be 'Well Supplied: Because of your factions extensive resources your rate of fire is increased (i.e. haste = more damage)', or, 'Cornered: Your faction is surround on all fronts. You now fight with the ferocity of desperation'. Who can fight WHERE can also be decided by strategic positioning which adds another layer of variability into the model.

4. Notes: Real war is fought in brief flashes of intense action followed by dramatic pauses. I don't see that being any different here. I already talked about who can fight where. But who can fight when is another valid point. In the past i have seen setups where if i can just get 3 to 6 or 5 to 10 of my guys together we can queue and go fight 'their' guys whoever that may be. But if you think about the factions in 40k they are all very isolated in their behavior in many ways. While you may see multiple factions represented at the same battle they very rarely 'working together' even though their 'goals' may be somewhat the same. I think it would be nice to see a rotational system where certain races (man, tau, necron, and so on) could only fight so many times a day which could possibly scale with how much real estate (resources) they control. Lets say the standard is participation as a race in 3 battles a day. Also, lets say the eldar control resource locations that only border tau controlled locations but the eldar control a considerable number of locations behind their 'small front'. The eldar could then fight more than the 3 standard daily battles and only against the Tau which makes it highly likely they will take some Tau real estate. Lets say those same Tau only have the 3 daily battles to participate in because of their tactical situation, and are bordered on another front by the Empire. They can only defend three times a day so someone is going to attack them at a time they are unable to defend themselves. And to make it interesting since this is the Eye of Terror. Once a week warp storms shift and change causing the locations to get 'repositioned' in the sector completely changing the entire face of the war. Oh the agony!

There are a lot of spin off ideas this generates but it would be nice to see some real war like conditions and considerations brought into this.

Realm Vs Realm is great and total war sounds awesome if it is implemented with the same level of detail and grandeur such a concept truly deserves.

My main concern is faction balance.

If it really goes the way of 2 factions then balance could be in deep shit.

With the imperium being like, the most liked faction, I can see Order severely overpopulated therefore steamrolling over disorder every day of the week. (World PvP wise)

I agree which is why i think some kind of round table system like what i outlined is great for factions who have a significantly lower player base.

One of the things I have seen with WoW is the limitation of participants in say the battlegrounds that scale up to 40 players on each side. You can only field as many people as they do the way i understand it.

I think the perception often times with players new to the universe is you have all of the Empire on one side. Space marines, inquisition, imperial guard, etc etc etc. and the forces of Chaos all aligned on the other side. Those of us familiar with the universe know that is simply just not the case. It is the solidarity of the human race against many enemies who often fight among themselves. Eldar, Ork, Chaos SM, Warp Demons etc.

Initially you will find balance in DMO because the races may be limited to a handful. But I think if they start with the concept that each race is its own faction. Say Ork, Eldar, treat Chaos as a race and a few classes in each they would have great flexibility with pvp. Only problem like you say would be player counts for each group. Or they could treat the factions like meta races. Empire, Chaos, Heretic, Xeno but definately more than two.

If they go straight Empire vs Chaos then i actually think you will have alot of players going the route of chaos simply because of the greater diversity of having all the different races lumped into one faction.

It is going to be real interesting to see how they handle it.