Do You Like Slow Or Fast Leveling ?

Ridelynn

I prefer the long haul, as long as I can perceive that I'm making progress in some way and it's not some seemingly endless slog to a step jump in progress.

Lots and lots of small baby steps.

And I agree with @Kyleran, progression isn't quite the same as leveling, I could care less about "level", I care about my character progression.

KenFisher

For F2P, it better be fast.  If it moves slowly I get bored and uninstall.

In thinking about it, I don't think I've ever level-capped a F2P game.  Very few do I even make it to mid-level.

Loke666

XAPKen said:

For F2P, it better be fast.  If it moves slowly I get bored and uninstall.

In thinking about it, I don't think I've ever level-capped a F2P game.  Very few do I even make it to mid-level.

But is the problem really how you pay or something else?

Some F2P games have a paywall, hitting that makes me quit as well.

Then there is of course the general quality of the game, and maybe something else for you?

unclemo

I would never play an MMO with traditional levels ever again.  It is an antiquated system.  

There will always be some for of character progression no matter what the label is, but there's better ways to do it than by offering the traditional grind before one can enjoy the content that they want to participate. 

Catibrie

For me MMOing is all about leveling. I kind of wish it would never end. So I voted slow.

SavageHorizon

unclemo said:

I would never play an MMO with traditional levels ever again.  It is an antiquated system.  

There will always be some for of character progression no matter what the label is, but there's better ways to do it than by offering the traditional grind before one can enjoy the content that they want to participate. 

That's your opinion of course but i enjoyed every level of EQ but i'll admit that going back to that slow leveling is to much. Vanguards was an mmo that was all about the journey, from day one you could enjoy all manner of content.

The game shipped with over 100 open dungeons (group dungeons) with some takings days if not a week to complete that doesn't include the 15 different starter hubs all with there own story spread over a vast world. After seven years of playing i still hadn't been to some quest hubs.

The leveling was slow, it could take months before you hit top level just in adventuring and not including crafting and diplomacy which took just as long.


The last of the truly epic mmo's no matter the problems the game had, it was never totally unplayable, eighteen races and 15 classes or there about's.


This was all before you actually got to raiding content.

Kaneth

Catibrie said:

For me MMOing is all about leveling. I kind of wish it would never end. So I voted slow.

Asheron's Call method is about as close to endless leveling that I've seen in a level based mmo. Even at max level which is 256, you can still dump pooled xps into skills and stats to further increase your characters abilities. There is a bit of diminishing returns with that type of a system, but I found it very fun, especially since levels were more of a guide rather than an absolute boundary of what your character can and cannot do.

Loke666

unclemo said:

I would never play an MMO with traditional levels ever again.  It is an antiquated system.  

There will always be some for of character progression no matter what the label is, but there's better ways to do it than by offering the traditional grind before one can enjoy the content that they want to participate. 

There are better ways to handle progression than levels, yes.  But that doesn't mean all games with levels are boring, don't get too stuck on a single mechanic. The same goes for trinity combat and many other features, it is the game s whole that matters, a fun game is still fun.

Or at least that is my opinion, but you might miss out on some good games just because they don't use the just right mechanics don't mean you can't enjoy playing. 

Shaigh

While I can enjoy some leveling I am primarily an endgame player. I like tough dungeons and raids, so if I can do interesting group content while leveling its fine, but most often levels are a burden instead of a blessing. That's why I generally prefer quick leveling so I can experience the real game without having to worry about levels.

Archlyte

Slow

BulletTooth

As much as I wish leveling didn't exist, I'd have to say slow leveling. I prefer to take my time and enjoy a game with other gamers. Hell I don't mind if I ever hit cap, as long as the adventure is fun and I get to spend it with some friends.

cameltosis

I voted fast leveling. 

I voted this way based on the way leveling is implemented in the majority of modern MMOs. I just find leveling really tedious. Quests are usually generic crap so I end up not caring one bit for the story. Combat is usually solo, which means its dumbed down so that the weakest class can still complete it, so there is hardly ever any challenge whilst leveling. Everything is usually quite unbalanced too as too many modern MMOs go for ridiculous vertical scaling whilst leveling, so the difference of a couple of levels can either completely trivialise content or make it near impossible. The balance issue also makes PvP pretty bad during the leveling process, so I'd rather reach endgame when the pvp becomes better. 

If I could skip leveling in modern MMOs, I would. 


However, if a dev ever manages to make leveling fun again then I'll be more than happy to have slow leveling. 

Robsolf

For me it's not so much about advancement speed as it is about what options I have as things to do that aren't overly repetitive.  Of course, in traditional MMO's, that means that at max level you will have the most options, so you'd think I'd like to level quickly. 

But I don't think it has to be that way.  If there's enough to do on the way up to where I don't feel like I'm doing the same thing in the same area for an excessively long time, and I feel like no matter what activity I choose I'm doing something (ingame) productive, then max level can take as long as the devs can keep me feeling that way.

A good comparison in my view would be LotRO vs. Tabula Rasa circa 2007-08.  LotRO was slower to level than TR, from my experience, but TR's gameplay options were only run and gun, or hold position and gun.  In LotRO there were so many different things I could do:  quests, deeds for traits, craft, seasonals, dungeons, music and RP, lots of class variety and overlapping zones, etc... and none of that was gated behind being max level.

IMO, TR should have been a 20 hour to max level (avg) game instead of whatever it was(I called it quits after 60+ hours), while my first character in LotRO took me about 6 months of moderate to heavy playing, as I enjoyed taking the long road to max level.

TL;DR-  I prefer a longer levelling process, so long as there are lots of options for gameplay throughout that process.

fivoroth

It really depends. There are games which are very fast and you keep over levelling everything, now that's too fast. But then there are other games which take way toooo long and running the same dungeon like 5 times to get enough experience is not exactly fun. Games like current wow where you level up every 10 minutes and you completely over level everything is not cool. But then again games like eq where you need to sell your life to the devil are also not good. So it's subjective and very relative. Also different people have different perception for what slow or fast levelling is.

E.g. I recently played on eq2 progression servers and the levelling speed was completely out of whack. I could go to a dungeon and get like 5 levels in like 5 hours. Doesn't sound slow right? If you run dungeons with rested XP, it doesn't. But if you decided to quest and kill some mobs by yourself then it's painfully slow. A mob my level at level 25 gives me0.1%. So it will take 1k mobs to level from 25 to 26. Quests give like 1% when completed. So that's painfully slow and I am guessing it gets much worse at lvl30-50 range.

So basically the 5 levels in 5 hours in a dungeon will probably take 30 hours questing so that's insane.

i know people will say the solution is to grind dungeons only but while that's fun, you don't get to experience any of the overland world and quests. 

Moirae

As long as I can do more than just theme park questing and pvp, I don't care about leveling. I'm much more of a crafter (something that hasn't been done right in many years) and house builder. 

fivoroth

mandragoa said:

I like funny leveling too. i know the slow leveling in DaoC as a Pet-Enchanter. Nobody likes him but he is strong class:)
10 days i have tested WoW and i asked as Level 14 priestess the community for a group for an instance or funny playing. the answer was make minimum level 20 as solo for group. Hey i am a DaoC-Classic-Player and we played in group as level 1 - collected in chat.
But in the new games u need fast leveling because they havent content for group - killquest 0/30 only.

Wows first dungeon starts at lvl15. So you could've started doing dungeons in one extra level. Also it depends on when you started. In the beginning people tend to group quite a bit but then the game became super top heavy like every other mmo.

 When I played wow for the first time there were tons of groups around. I think my first group was at like lvl5 to kill some elites etc. Then I grouped all the time and did a lot of dungeons.

ragz45

I prefer slower leveling, as long as I'm not stuck in one zone, area, or fighting the same mob for days or weeks on end.  There needs to be a plethera of content and new creatures & zones to accommodate slower levels.  ESO does this quite well, as did EQ2 (originally), and EQ1.

Loke666

ragz45 said:

I prefer slower leveling, as long as I'm not stuck in one zone, area, or fighting the same mob for days or weeks on end.  There needs to be a plethera of content and new creatures & zones to accommodate slower levels.  ESO does this quite well, as did EQ2 (originally), and EQ1.

I think most games have their zones made for slower leveling, you have 3-5 starting zones and a few less until you hit max level when you are stuck with fewer zones than the noobs, dungeons and raids. It is really fast levling that should require more at the last 10 levels and less on the journey there, since that journey is so fast today. 

Most games still have about the same setup levelwise as the early MMO even though any long term player will get stuck in a small place 1 month after launch and be there until the next expansion hits. 

Now, some people say this is right since far too many players quit before they hit max level but it obviously don't keep those players in the game so the game should focus on creating a better experience for the players who actually like it. It is really funny why it is this way, it is like the devs still use the same old model even if the gameplay is very different today.

Of course you could also just slow the speed people is leveling at...

jesteralways

I would prefer a pure DnD type leveling, maximum level of 10 and only after fulfilling certain criteria/achievement the game would allow player to level up and criteria would not be same for every player, meaning that if a group leveled up from 1 to 2 after killing a level 2 world boss, it would not mean that everyone else will be able to level up same way. Level up would provide huge boost to player stats but player can continue to raise stats without leveling from 1 to 2 and so forth, although they would not get specific boost/proc added to abilities that is gained from level up.

k61977

I like slow leveling.  I would love to see a MMO with no cap.  Could be as simple as not giving stat bonus or if they do only give .01 boost to a stat, think you could play a game for years and never stop getting stronger.  you couldn't have pvp in a game like this though.

Kyleran

Jean-Luc_Picard said:

It'd be amusing to know how many people who voted "slow leveling" actually play a game with slow leveling right now...

I'd vote "no leveling at all" if the option was available.

Well I agree, no leveling would be my choice, however I am playing EVE and currently several characters are training Exhumers 5 which will take 28 days. How's that for slow progression? Even better, that skill will give me a rocking 2% bonus to my mining yield.  Yeah, I'll be kicking it.

Reklaw

Missed the option: Meaningfull leveling.

Then again know I mean this in a niche way as most wouldn't consider my meaningfull to be theirs atleast that's what I think.

 But if I had to choose I would go for slow leveling and if the experiance of taking my time isn't what the game is offering I simply leave that game.

jesteralways

Kyleran said:

Jean-Luc_Picard said:

It'd be amusing to know how many people who voted "slow leveling" actually play a game with slow leveling right now...

I'd vote "no leveling at all" if the option was available.

Well I agree, no leveling would be my choice, however I am playing EVE and currently several characters are training Exhumers 5 which will take 28 days.  How's that for slow progression?

That IMO is not a progression, because it is being done by the game not you. I am sure here we are talking about progression in which players have to constantly do something, not just click a button to activate leveling process and go afk or logout..

immodium

With regard to PvE I vote fast. There hasn't been a game released with enough varied, entertaining content to warrant slow leveling.

SavageHorizon

Jean-Luc_Picard said:

It'd be amusing to know how many people who voted "slow leveling" actually play a game with slow leveling right now...

I'd vote "no leveling at all" if the option was available.

Problem with that is many are playing these modern games because there is nothing else to play that has that type of leveling unless you play old games. Just look at Daybreaks EQ2 time line server and how many people are enjoying that because it is a throw back to the pass.