Name of the mix of PvP and PvE

Some games, usually mobile, have different types of combat than the usual PvE and PvP. There are many popular games, like Clash of Clans, which include this unique type of combat. Since the gameplay is similar to PvE (because every player fights bots in these battles) and PvP (because players can improve their characters, bases, parties to make it harder for opponents to beat them, and players cannot directly affect the battle in other ways) we have a problem in naming this type of gameplay (combat). The point of this topic is to identify this new game type if it exists, or to create a new one to close the question (and deal with all the new questions that would appear in future, perhaps even creating a new term for the world). If there is a problem with creating a new term the question should be answered anyway in reference to the previous paragraph.

I know of 3 main game types that include this combat:

1. Castle defence/invade. A very popular genre of mobile online games. They call it strategy, and they are right. The goal for one player is to create the best defence for their base as possible, and prevent the opponent from making a successful invasion. The defending player is usually offline and does not participate in this action. To look at it another way - there is a bot on the defence, so it looks like PvE, but on the other side of the PvE is the bot progressing through the game itself, and this is a bit closer to PvP.

Popular games of this type include: Clash of Clans, Dominations, King of Thieves and others.

2. Party arena. These are another other type of game where you are not creating a castle or a base, but a squad. The squad contains several different heroes that have their own gear, abilities, and characteristics. When you battle in these type of games and encounter a bot, it is playing with a squad of another player, which the other player has chosen to defend with. Once more: bots fighting points to PvE, but fighting with a player's squad points to some PvP in this.

There are even more characteristics of this genre. Sometimes the bot plays for both sides (for the person that attacks and for those that defend), so it looks even more like PvE, though PvP may still be accurate, since players actually took some actions to win the battle (eg picked a party of certain heroes, equipped them in better equipment, buffs, runes etc) The bot also follows certain rules of action in certain situations, so players can predict the bot's behavior. In this sense the bot is actually one more rule for players to follow for victory, further pointing to classifying these types of games as PvP battles.

Popular games of this type include: King's Raid, Epic Seven, Brave Frontier, MOBIUS Final Fantasy, Monster Super League and others.

3. RPG-type games. Here players can improve their characters with items, equipment, magic, skills and many other features that are usually in all the good RPGs. The combat here is always against other player characters which are controlled by bots. Players can upgrade all the stuff needed to win, though the bot usually loses to opponents of the same rank since players are usually more skilled. Same as before, this game type could be called either PvE and PvP.

Popular games of this type include: Dark Sword and others.

Given the information above we can conclude that neither PvP nor PvE alone is sufficient to describe all the types of combat today, and as such we need an extension. There should be a term to describe this new type of game and close the topic for now. I am certain in the future there will be even more different types of combat that can't be described by deep-seated terms, so we should move forward and improve or expand our dictionary to avoid misunderstandings.

Solution 1:

I can't really provide sources because this is kind of an opinion-based question. And this is less of an answer and more of an explanation.

I would make the argument that in the end, they are all still PvP games. I think the important thing is that what you seem to be describing, is more automation than AI control.

In Clash of Clans you are picking your attackers/setting up your defenders, and then the battle automates. It's not an AI controlling your battle for you, it isn't some bot fighting back. The characters have behaviors and programmed functions that it automatically does.

It's not PvE unless you are in some way controlling your side of a battle and you are directly facing an AI that are performing actions in response to you. If you were fighting in a campaign mode of a game (which tend to be PvE), the AI would be fighting you, thus you are vs an environment/non-player.

I think the key component is that you are misinterpreting automation vs. bots. A player having an influence on what actions will be performed, such as setup, predetermined attacks, and base building, and then the actions being automated in a battle, does not make it controlled by a bot.

Solution 2:

Although the term doesn't seem to completely apply, as you note in your question, this type of gameplay is still currently referred to as PvP.

I've played several games that include this sort of combat, including Avengers Alliance 2, Final Fantasy Brave Exvius, DC Legends, and Galaxy of Heroes. All of them refer to this as player versus player.