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It's amazing with all the games that have already been released and all the feedback that's been given by unhappy gamers that devs seem to keep doing the same thing over and over again. I've started researching a soon to be launched MMO that is highly anticipated. I won't say which one because I'm not here to single out any particular game (but you can probably narrow it down to about two possibilities).
There are some features of the game I think are really interesting and I am so starved to play a good MMO that I'm sure I'll give it a try. But there are also other things about it that already have me frustrated. Various requirements that your character has to abide by. To be more specific, I'm talking about class restrictions.
Now I'm already on record as being in favor of having classes. I refer you to the recently discussed thread on the subject:
http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/169643
What I'm not in favor of, however, is tying their hands so tight that they can't have any fun. Why do devs continually insist on limiting characters' options based on their class? I have no problem with limiting characters' abilities based on race because these are abilities they are born with. A human has no right to complain about a troll's ability to regenerate because that's what trolls do.
But who says just because a character is a wizard, he can't even pick up a sword. Do wizards lack the necessary opposable thumb to handle a sword or something? Gandalf wielded a sword in LoTR, why can't I in an MMO (I don't know if there are any MMOs out there that let you do this, but I haven't played one).
Instead of restricting classes in this way, why not just adjust their abilities accordingly? For example, if a rogue wants to go toe to toe with a mob, why not let him wear heavy armor to give him a better chance to survive? But, if he wishes to hide in the shadows and sneak up behind a mob, reduce his chance to almost zero if he tries to do it in cumbersome clanky plate mail.
Likewise, to return to the wizard example, suppose he wants to try his hand at sword fighting just to shake things up a bit. Let him do a little cross training and poke his sword at the enemy. Instead of automatically saying wizards can't do that, let him hold a sword, but if he does, make it impossible to cast certain spells, like say a fireball, because his hand is encumbered by a heavy sword.
Do you see devs, how this will create self-imposed or group-imposed restrictions on a character rather than you arbitrarily imposing them yourself? If a wizard is screwing around with a sword and is unable to cast a fireball, his group members are likely to get pissed off and say, "Put that damn sword away and throw fireballs at the monsters or we're all dead!"
It's time to get your heads out of the box and expand your minds a bit.
Comments
Interresting.
I would say your idea is valid in a PVE only game where class balance is not an issue.But being that would be Illogical to have no form of PVP in a MMO that brings out the need for class balance.A rogue wearing plate armor,sure why not.But they would have to make it where the rogue takes a huge penalty for damage output,and what good would a rogue be without his single target burst damage?A mage using melle?To me that makes no sense no matter how you look at it.A mage wants to stay away from his target because we all know mages have very low hit points and defense in any MMO.Why would he want to stand in melee range just to swing a sword.
What your looking for is class diversity.The ablity to make hybrid classes that a combination of multiple professions.Sadly to say the game that did it best Star wars galaxies,but after the CU they dropped that system.I think Everquest 2 tried a version of cross training diffrent classes,but scrapped the system pretty quickly.Guild wars i think (ive never played it) have a system somewhat what your talking about,which caused it to lose a lot of players from what i hear.Everyone ran around with the same cookie cuter build.
I would just suggest if you have a taste of being more than just a mage that spams fireballs,roll multiple classes.Max your mage and then start leveling up a warrior.
I think reducing class restrictions will work in a PvP game as well as PvE. It shouldn't make any difference who you're fighting, you should still be free to at least equip any item you want. How proficient you are with it is another matter. But I would add that characters are probably even less likely to try out items they are not proficient at in a PvP world because they're not going to do very well against their opponent.
But I'm curious as to why you think class balance is not an issue in a PvE world. I would agree with you that it is not AS important to balance the classes in PvE, but it is still very important imo. I don't know too many people who like to play a certain class in a PvE game that really struggles against mobs while another class they really hate can fell beasts in short order. Devs still need to do their best to balance classes whether it be PvP or PvE.
As to why a mage might want to fight with a sword, I was just using that as an example. I wouldn't expect to see it in too many cases. However, consider this. Suppose you differentiate a caster's spells between those that are cast using hand gestures and those that are spoken. If there's a chance that he might be attacked by a mob at close range, he might want to have a sword in his hand so he try to keep the mob off him and still use his verbal spells.
Finally, I'm not looking for class diversity, I'm looking for class expansion. Or realism to be more precise. Devs shouldn't be saying that a wizard can't at least pick up a sword and swing it. They have every right to say that if a wizard does swing a sword, he's just as likely to chop off a teammate's ear with it as he is to hit the enemy.
One overly-verbose thread asking for a skill-based character development system added to the pile.
You didn't need to write a thesis to make the point, by the way. The point has been made for you (and far more eloquently and succinctly, mind you) many times before.
That's funny, I can't find the phrase "skill-based" anywhere in my post. Although I am personally in favor of skill-based advancement, what I am saying can just as easily be implemented in a level-based game too.
Yes...you've gone out of your way to obfuscate your message. What's the point? Deliver the message crisp, clear statements...stop fighting your audience.
I agree with the OP in all respects. I personally don't like the whole "This class does this in combat" idealism either.
When I played SWG back in the day (before the CU mind you) I learned a lot about what made games (specifically MMO's) tick. That game was such an inspiration to what a game could accomplish... and it almost was. What made tha game great was the absolute potential it had behind it. It's downfall was that it basically got caught up in the tricial things, such as class balance.
Let us ponder for just a moment what a game would be like if there was something more to it than say... *gasp* combat. That's what SWG had going for it, or at least had the potential to get there. You look at all these MMOs out today, and what do you have? A bunch of Mob killing. It all boils down to what mobs you can and cannot kill, and what other classes you can and cannot kill in PvP. When you take a step back and really look at it for what it truely is, you start to wonder why you keep getting bored with every MMO that comes out, and why it all feels the same.
I think games need to incorporate something of a Job type system. A Job system is a system where you basically advance through levels to perform a certain function in the game world, but your entire identity as to how you go about performing that job is completely skill based.
Let's take SWG for example - the Commando. A Commando's job in SWG (the original) was to kill shit. That was his job. A Ranger's job was to find shit for Commando's to kill. What made the Ranger important wasn't that he could kill things efficiently, but that he could find the stuff to kill in the first place. I think that is the level of diversity games need - roles that are not balanced based on one function.
Now, in more diverse terms, some Jobs had functions outside of combat. Doctors for example, when outside of Combat, were best suited to be inside the Hospitals, mending the wounds and such of other players.
So you see... you have specific roles for each Job, that may or may not have anything to do with how well they perform in combat. I think the only way you will ever get a Mage weilding a sword in his hand in an MMO, is if someone figures out a way to build a game that gives purpose to these "Classes" outside of combat. A Mage isn't just a fireball casting maniac... in every single Fantasy based Lore - a Mage/Wizard has never just been that... they have always been something of a scholar or scientist. Find some way for a scholar or scientist to exist in a Gameworld, and you can have your sword toting, firball casting, badass who wears robes - and I'll play that game right along with you
"Freedom is just another name for nothing left to lose" - Janis Joplin
I'm with OP on this one....
Define 1000 skills. Let a user equip 20 of them. Then increase them as needed. This will actually lead to a more balanced PvP than a class system.
One might object: but wait, everyone will just pick the same 20 skills will they not?
Answer: create a vast number of skills, each skill / approach having multiple possible counters. Then it comes down to a rock-paper-scissors game, where the users explore the different combinations of skills. And given that, the variance in skillsets amongst players will be much greater than a choice from among 10 different classes. The actual discover of an optimal team (multiple players with different skill sets) is a form of exploration and discovery... one of the most fun parts of gaming.... a part that is left out from the simplistic MMOs we have today.
I agree with the OP here.
All the cries for "BALANCE!" over the past five years or so mean every race is now homogenized; their unique differences are mostly superficial and rarely matter past the very early game.
And every class, well... they're forced into very narrow and specific molds, because otherwise, balancing them would be too hard. It's almost an impossible task as it is, anyway... one day, people are going to figure out that you can't have classes that feel and play differently, but which can also have a 50/50 chance of defeating any other character of any other class, level and gear being equal.
So we get TANK | NUKER | DPS | HEALER | DEBUFFER | PET CLASS | HYBRID (<-- these are rarely done well), and they're limited to very specific equipment and abilities.
Unfortunately, people are obsessed with "WATS TEH BEST CLAS LOL!?!?!," plus the game mechanics punish you if your class is bad at PvP / soloing / whatever (insteading of having unique content for different playstyles, both in and out of a group).
Does anyone still choose a class because it's fun and they like the theme? Anyone? Bueller?
Currently Playing: EVE Online
Retired From: UO, FFXI, AO, SWG, Ryzom, GW, WoW, WAR
That's funny, I can't find the phrase "skill-based" anywhere in my post. Although I am personally in favor of skill-based advancement, what I am saying can just as easily be implemented in a level-based game too.
ROFL, your OP asked for a skill based game. You didn't say it outright, but you just described a skill based game nearly to the T. Perhaps you're not so dedicated to the stereotypical and arcane class system which, to be frank, needs to permanently die.
Zindaihas didnt ask for a skill based system. He asked for Anarchy Online. This is the only MMO game that had specific class system YET allowed each class to equip anything they could get their hands on. Most classes were fairly decent with all the weapons and armor.
An example is the pet class of the game. They were typically a Borg copycat race who wore armor that simulated the borg style suites. They equipped...heh heh....tear soaked pillows and focused psychic energies form the enmotion int he pillows (or something like that.)
However I made this same pet class as a huge hulking clone. HE wore a trenchcoat and used heavy machine guns. Ends up my character was a little weaker than the average but he made up for it by packing a punch in his guns.
Even though Anarchy Online is broken as all hell (in interface and mechanics) It managed to do something that not many other MMO games have done. The only other game that does this is Guild Wars, but they only did that for weapons.
I'm for no beginner classes. You do whatever you like. If you want to specialize then you can choose prestige classes (like dungeons and dragons) if you have certain skill requirements met and do a special quest or whatever.
It gives people the choice to customize their characters and gives people abilities to let the game mechanism customize it for them.
I'd also have unlimited ability to concentrate your skill points with diminishing returns for further customization.
Basically, you'd have to think to play this game, a novel concept apparently. Then again my game would suck because people are people.
Cryomatrix
You can see my sci-fi/WW2 book recommendations.
may i suggest you try DDO you can make a wizard that uses a sword in that game or a rogue with plate mail....it hinders you but you have abit of freedom in how you build your character.
Well now this thread is evoking some interesting discussion. In response to Geminiv, I did play DDO for a couple months when it launched and it came to mind when I posted this topic. It definitely does allow characters to expand their abilities beyond their stereotypical roles. But even DDO doesn't do quite what I'm talking about. They were skills you could acquire as you advanced in level. And as Urrelles has correctly observed, I'M NOT really talking about skills here. Although, it certainly may seem that way so I can forgive those who think I am. Just as a footnote, I left DDO because of its lack of an expansive world I could explore. I felt like a mouse in a maze running from one dungeon to the next in a laboratory setting.
Anyway, it has more to do than just what a character can and cannot equip. Although, I'm afraid if I go into further detail, I will reveal the MMO I was researching that lead me to make this post. Oh well, so be it. Equipable items was just one example. But it was a general example because it applies to almost every MMO. Let me give you another example. In this game I was studying, you choose to play one of two alignments and virtually every action you make affects the conflict that exists between the two sides. Every quest you undertake, every mob you fight, every meal you eat is geared towards advancing your side (I've revealed too much, sorry devs, like I said, I do not mean to single out one game). That bugs me because I feel like I am going to be pigeonholed into sacrificing some fun for the sake of "the empire" or whatever it is I am fighting for.
So now, with that being said, you could argue that this is one more overly-verbose thread asking for a sandbox game added to the pile. And it may be. The truth is that I can't really pin down exactly what this thread is about, except to reiterate what I said in the subject heading. It's about freeing the characters, devs. Freeing them to do what they want without it having some greater impact on the overall outcome of the world. Freeing them to wear what they want and wield what they want. And not after advancing to some level or acquiring some skill. I've never been a medieval knight, but I still know how to pick up a sword.
Btw, Urrelles, I've never played Anarchy Online, but I'll take your word for it. Sounds like it deserves a little investigation on my part.
I agree with the op. I have made several posts on this subject as well , and that is the primary reason I have stopped playing alot of these games, and refuse to start new ones that have the limited classes. I want to be able to max everything on one character though, I played a game for several years that had total freedom on your character to max everything in a pvp environment and it was the reason I played it for so long. I hate the classes all together. I am waiting until they make another game that gives the ability to train everything on one charcater. What makes a virtual environment so fake and boring is the limitations. Everything being so limited takes the excitemtn and drive out of the game for me. The fact that anyone can train anything to max they want on one character makes the game balanced in itself. I cannot understand why people seem to think that allowing everyone to do everything that throws balance off, the fact that anyone and everyone can do the same balances it out even more I would think, so you don;t have to focus on whether mage is stronger than range and all that as much. Then you would be able to focus on just making more super cool options for the players and spend less time over analizing it. If you have the ability to do anything in battle at any time and have it have nothing to do with the appearance of your character it brings a whole other level of excitement and unpredictability to combat. If someone mages you that doesn;t mean they are not going to melee you next in the same battle. That unpredictability would bring pvp as it now is in most mmorpgs right now out of their predictable slump of " see an elf, know their strengths and weaknesses and prepare to counter " type fighting. that is boring. It would be " be prepared for anything and may the best person win" With all players having the abilities to do anything they can do anything in battle making it alot more challenging to win, and not having the scapegoat that your character doesn;t have the ability to use that skill that you needed to counter the move they were using.
Great ideas. Sadly for you though, that is EXTREMELY difficult to program in as it is many parameters. If you want that, offer to give the studio the code to do it: otherwise it would cost them so much more money that could go to other stuff.
I bet studios wish they could do that-those that care about their games of course. But it simply won't be done until the next generation of MMORPGS...
Ok, that's interesting that you bring this up because I am not a programmer and it may be an opportunity for me to learn something. See from my way of thinking, I'm assuming that you could just write a simple code that would allow all characters to handle all items in the game. And if you want to restrict a class you have to write a code in the game preventing them from doing so. Therefore, it would actually save you programming time to just say, no class restrictions.
But the impression I'm getting from you is that to allow a character to use an item, you have to write that into the code. Is that the case? So say you have a sword, a staff and a hammer. If you want to allow a character to use all those items, you would have to write a code allowing him to use the sword, another code to allow him to use the staff and yet another code to allow him to use the hammer? Is that how it works? That would make things more daunting.
Ok, that's interesting that you bring this up because I am not a programmer and it may be an opportunity for me to learn something. See from my way of thinking, I'm assuming that you could just write a simple code that would allow all characters to handle all items in the game. And if you want to restrict a class you have to write a code in the game preventing them from doing so. Therefore, it would actually save you programming time to just say, no class restrictions.
But the impression I'm getting from you is that to allow a character to use an item, you have to write that into the code. Is that the case? So say you have a sword, a staff and a hammer. If you want to allow a character to use all those items, you would have to write a code allowing him to use the sword, another code to allow him to use the staff and yet another code to allow him to use the hammer? Is that how it works? That would make things more daunting.
Kind of. I imagine that a smart programmer would include in the hammer's code or whatever what class can't and can't use it like this:
mage_use=yes
warrior_use=no
WIth yes meaning he can use it and no meaning he can't use it.
No what would be complicated is writing that they can use it with restrictions.
Tell me a game where all the classes are balanced?
I'm so sick of hearing this bs! At least if you had a skill based system you could choose to further yourself in certain skills if you wanted to be more that way. In a class based game you are at the mercy of the devs to take their heads out of their butts and make a class more appealing. The thing is, what they may want the class to be and what you want it to be may be totally different. With skill based you can make it the way you want. Yea, the devs may have to add more stuff to certain skill sets to make things more appealing, but at least you have the choice of picking up a couple of healing spells and whatever if you like.
If you can tell me a class based game that is totally balanced I will keep my mouth shut and never bring this up again. Until then, come up with some good reasons besides the hard to balance crap.
Sorry for getting off on a tangent. I'm sure it did come off as a little hostile, but I'm kind of just fed up with these companies. Been wanting a really good game for a bit, been a long time. To bad I only seem to have much fun in MMO's these days, when I actually play games.
***Edited***
BTW, I realize you are talking about some kind of hybrid class system. The only thing I know like that is multi-classing like someone said about DDO. I'm not to fond of that, but at least you get to kind of make what you want(don't really know if it is worth it when multi-classing though).
The game you are looking for is UO
mage_use=yes
warrior_use=no
WIth yes meaning he can use it and no meaning he can't use it.
No what would be complicated is writing that they can use it with restrictions.
Ok, I think I have figured out now. If you are writing the code for a character to attack with a certain weapon, you have to write how proficient the character is going to be with that weapon, right? A mage may be able to attack with a sword, but he is not be very good with it. So you have to program it that way. If he can't use a sword in the first place, there's no code to write for a mage's sword proficiency. Not to mention writing the code for the graphic of a mage wielding a sword.
Well, that may take a long time, but my response to the devs is...suck it up. Do you want people to love your games or not? If so, it's going to require some work.
i think the keyword here is "MAINSTREAM"
many players have expectations which they want to see meet
warrior = meatshield
wizzard = glasscanon
priest = heal and buffbot
many get confused if it isnt like what they are used to
some even get angry
confused and angry customers = no profit
so gamedevelopers stick to systems that proved to work
i have no idea why so many players like to be limited in their gameoptions ... maybe it is just to comfortabe to live in the box instead of think outside of it
and btw. shadowbane starts new servers ... it has never been a beauty .... but it still has an unmatched character development system ( for a class based game )
Although there are some really good points in this thread, I truly believe some of you need to rediscouver the enter key. Not to mention the fad lately of inserting so much colourful language into the post that you need oxygen to swim that deep in.
Let me sum it up.
Problem with that?
sound familiar?
Yes, because players will simply just put themselves back into those roles when it comes to content. There will be a tank.. There were be healers, and their will be dps. Very few will willingly be mediocre at two things instead of focus on 1. You will be replaced by specialized people most of the time in a group situation.
The idea of a group is to compliment each other. People will strive to develop their specialized role in the group. Sure if you give them the freedom their might be a "priest DPS" or a "Scout Tank" but people will still find roles for themselves and work to fill those roles better.
EDIT: also as a note, to the difficulty of implementing any of the ideas said, restrictions or otherwise. The difficulty is no existant, its very basic.
after 6 or so years, I had to change it a little...
OP: you are an intelligent person.
95% of MMOG players are much much less intelligent than you (I am one of the 95%)
Developers try to get the maximum profit for the capital invested, and that happens to be doing the stupid MMOGS we have now.
95% of the players are happy with that crap.
Developers won't llisten to you.
I think the text MUD DragonRealms (play.net/dr) from Simutronics gives a format which would work. Everyone could use nearly every skill in the game, there were probably 60-65 different skills. Skills were divided up into 5 categories, Armor, Weapons, Lore, Magic and Survival. There were numerous skills in each category, but particularly for weapons (light edged, med edged, heavy edged, 2hand edge, same 4 blunts, couple staff types, bows, xbow etc), same for armor. How high of a skill you had in that weapon determined how effective you were with it. Some of the metal armors would impair magic skills but I think you could wear most of the armor regardless of what class you were and you could train just about any skill with a few limited exceptions (no magic for certain classes). The 'natural' weapon/armor for that class would give bonuses but if you were willing to forgoe the bonus and accept certain impairments on your skills from non-preferred armor, you were free to use them.
The classes were called guilds: 2 mage types, cleric, healer, paladin, barbarian, ranger, thief, trader, bard. Each guild would give different special abilities and spellbooks (no magic for barbs). Once you joined a guild, the 5 categories of skills were ranked as Primary skill (1); Secondary (2); Tertiary (2). DR used an experience system where you would have an available pool to fill up by doing various activities. Combat was only going to work your armor and weapon/magic skills. Other skills had to be trained using non-combat activity. The pool was bigger for Primary skills then secondary and smallest for Tertiary. How the pool drained into permanent skill was a bit funky but in effect, you learned your Primary skills much faster than any others and tertiary were pretty slow. In short you would fill up your tertiary pool quickly and it drained slowly (any excess xp into that pool was lost if it was full).
To advance levels in your guild, it wasn't exactly an earn X amount of XP and you magically level up. For each level up, you needed to check your skills with one of the guildmasters for your guild. You would have a set of specific requirements and then some general requirements. Once you meet all the requirements, you'd level up. But if you were short .01% on a single skill, even if other skills were well beyond the requirements, you weren't going to level up. I'll give an example. Barbs were weaponmasters, so they were required to have say lv 50 skill in a primary weapon for lv 20, lv 40 skill in a secondary weapon. It didn't matter which 2 weapons they used, as long as 2 weapons matched that requirement, they would meet it. If you switched weapons, you'd need to get your new primary up to say lv 55 for level 21. If you had 155 in your primary but 39 in your secondary....well you weren't going to level up until you satisfied all of the requirements. There typically would be a number of primary secondary and tertiary requirements for each level.
So how do I equate this to a methodology to do what you suggest? Well it's really fairly simple. You want to be a mage wielding a longsword? To obtain lv 20 skill with a longsword, you'd need say 500k xp into that skill. However a melee fighter would only need 250k xp for level 20. Each class would simply have a different set of skills that it learns faster.
If a graphical game came out using this type of system, I'd gladly play it. DR was an excellent game in many respects but it had a few flaws that I really disliked. I played it for a number of years regardless.