We should make actionable list of features that client needs for PvP.
I meant to list other stuff as well, but the first part about drink button ballooned into this manifest, so I start by just posting it.
I doubt anyone taking PvP seriously will ever PvP with default client, but as long as the features are implemented in even somewhat acceptable way, public clients will have at least that and people aiming to create a "pvp client" willing to settle with it have less stuff to duct-tape on, similar to when Jorb relented and added Ctrl+G to the default client.
Disclaimer due to following issues with the game, I don't know how to PvP (at least nowhere on the level that people like Snail are able to) despite playing this game for 10 years:
SnuggleSnail wrote:[*] Lack of experience, and no reasonable way to gain it without basically asking somebody to mentor you
[*] Lack of guides / competent wiki
[*] Nothing to push average players into minor conflicts where they can gain experience / confidence
[*] No PVE encounters or similar that give experience that could transfer to PVP
I may miss something important or make other mistakes. I will mark parts where I particularly end up speculating/assuming with red.
Drink buttonAsking for this feature is quickly establishing itself as a meme, and while you can bind waterskins to the default hotbar, there are multiple issues with that compared to having "autodrink" -script:
-Amount of waterskins (or other water vessels) you can bind to default hotbar is limited, and you presumably want to bind other stuff into it as well.
-As waterskins run out of water, the button to press for drinking changes.
After we got that out of the way I will do my best to explain why drinking water is such a key component.
-PvP meta is that one of the sides decides they are the "Team with disadvantage" and starts running away from the another team.
Ultimately the goal is to drop aggro and Hearth back home, reach a safepali, or rendezvous with reinforcements.-Running consumes stamina.
-Stamina can be recovered by drinking water, at the cost of Energy.
This means that fights are often largely decided by the fact which side has more water (water quality acting as force multiplier.) Autodrink script helps you to make the most effective sips when you are at the stamina range between "too low to run" and "below 90%" (drinking with more than 90% stamina wastes both water
and energy as sip is always 0.05 liters and you don't get Energy discount from stamina overflow.
PvP fight has enough stuff going on that you really don't want to be forced to replace keybinds to empty waterskins with ones to filled one, all the while having to keep track which keybinds will actually make you drink.
Imagine if instead of simple WASD movement, Counter-Strike would require you to play a minigame of moving one foot and then another in sync. Of course you can argue that it would raise the game's skill ceiling. However the actual main method to win the match - shooting enemy players with a gun so that they die - already has a rather high skill ceiling. The minigame would just make the game harder to get into and learn properly.
Edit: some paraphrasing to make the post more readable.