Was forced PvP really ever needed for AO's survival?

The basic AI attacks with a similar amount of delay between attacks I feel. Very easy to parry many attacks (tbf, trying to react to npc enemies firing spells at you is kinda hard)

PVP is great, being unprepared isn’t. With the quality of people’s gear being able to vary so intensely it can be pretty impossible to win some fights. Like the average 600 efficiency build versus some MF that grinded for 300 hours to get a maxed out 900 efficiency build. Also you quite literally are never forced to PVP outside of protecting your clan save. Any reason to PVP outside clan gameplay is entirely for bragging rights. Even with clans you can just opt to not start any fights and instead get infamy via peaceful means more slowly.

Yes.