Ok so further to that thread ( viewtopic.php?t=3039 )I posted about going to melbourne, where my key points posted & learned were:
- can't really have a set story in morpgs as there is no time - background story is ok
- this is ok as players make their own stories - the developer is there to make the playground
- grinding is bad - if not unethical under certain circumstances
- I think levels and levelling is OK with restrictions
- the restrictions should be: either a LOW cap or fast progression to the cap
- or of course you could just scrap levelling entirely and do it UO/NG style (I'm undecided on my preferred system and don't mind having two servers - they both have pros and cons)
- but why? Because I don't want EUO to be primarily about levelling - but why?? Because I believe that when the sole factor determining the difference in strength between two players is how long one has grinded more than the other is just naff - and of course in a pay to play scenario - this suits the developer, and could be deemed unethical
- with levels and NO cap (or even no cap on stats for NG) then this clearly tells the player - the more you play the stronger you get. I would like to avoid this. I know some people have said that they like the metered rewards from playing, rewards RL can't give them but I'm not quite comfortable with this unexpected community service I'm provinding
- EUO is already twitchy - a fast keyboard masher, some dexterity and practice required
- strategy: there is some already - much room for expansion
- combinations: further to strategy
- builds: classes on reg, skillsets on NG
- socialising, pking, story telling, RP
- how to fix players already over cap
- players under cap will want to redistribute stats
- need to provide new challenges for when you are at the cap
- lvl 200 cap is not a bad start but it is too high for various reasons .... i) sets a real "reach me" bar / goal to play for but takes too long to get there when I'm trying to make levelling NOT the main reason to play
- I think lvl 100 is more appropriate - though I think it may still be slow to get there - I think to fix this add more quest-content - so that quests make up 30-50% xp - currently they give 30% xp to lvl 50 approx
- once you get to 100 then there has to be something to do other than levelling - BUT this shouldn't be a problem since levelling was not what I wanted the main point of EUO to be, right?