After playing a slew of online MMORPGs, such as EQ, DaoC, AO etc, one thing that has remained a constant souce of annoyment for me, has been the player characters 'gimpness' at high levels. In many of these games, especially EQ, you really started to feel like you were going backwards at higher levels. Just one example. Soloing a 'blue' con mob in EQ. Much easier to do at character level 35, than character level 50. I really feel this is a major pyschological flaw in a game of this type, and one that seems to be repeated time after time. Balancing the need to make high end content challenging, while allowing the player to feel as if they are still 'making progress', is a nut that has yet to be cracked in online gaming. Very often in games like these, abilities that have become the staple of your class/character, are greatly reduced in effectiveness, and in some cases, completely nullified (eq enchanters ability to charm for instance). Once again, in EQ for example, I would much have prefered having more mobs thrown at me, rather than upping the difficulty of the individual mobs in the scenario. It also ties into the feeling of getting farther into a game (i.e. closer to the ultimate 'boss' mob), and having more minions to deal with, rather than making my character feel weaker against a specific 'con' of mob. Yes boss mobs should be tough, and should be immune to some forms of attack etc, but this needs to be spread around, so that every character class still has the ability to use their 'special' ability to favorably alter the outcome of the encounter. This was the single biggest issue that caused me to burn out on just about every MMORPG I've played. When you get across the board nerfs to character abilities above a certain level, it really leaves a bad taste in the players mouth. The MMORPG that can incorporate both the feeling of 'getting stronger', with more challenging content as you level, would certainly get my dollar as a gamer. To me, the way it's been handled to date, often leaves the player feeling cheated, rather than accomplished. Any thoughts? [edited by - Ultrazen on February 20, 2003 10:08:29 PM]

I for one would rather see the entire concept of the game getting harder as you level up done away with. I think that raising levels should have a less profound impact on your statistics, for one thing, and I also think that your abilities should be what makes you tougher. On level 50, you won''t have 578 STR and 9834 HP, but you''ll be better able to handle more powerful enemies and larger groups, because your skills will be higher and your spells more effective.

Sure, there will always be those things that can''t be hit by instadeath spells, but you should be able to find ways to beat them. A different approach, a new strategy, some new gear perhaps would make the crucial difference.

I am also a big fan of getting help from other players in MMORPG''s. A knight, a wizard, and a thief might have a devil of a time fending off a creature that a skilled archer could polish off in short order. They have the option of either training up their archery skill or going to a bar and finding someone who already did. Perfect strangers could meet, adventure, and form a team according to their needs and interests, as well as their common playing schedules.

Rather than having monsters get tougher as you do, there should be places that require certain abilities to survive. The axe-wielding minotaur might breeze through the forest of thorns, but when it comes time to burgle the dragon''s lair, a big blade is no substitute for quiet feet. There might be areas of the map that newbies can''t explore safely on their own. Stronger monsters, more cunning traps, or harsher environmental conditions should be a function of setting, not of the player''s experience level.

I''m with Iron Chef Carnage on this one - by all means have seriously hard encounters that level one million and two characters still get squashed by, but have them in an area where any character can go right from level 1, though probably make getting there difficult for low level characters - put some monsters you need to be level 30-some to handle in the way or something. Allow people a chance to run away if they hit something they can''t handle, and place really nasty things in a vaguely logical way, and then all you need to worry about is coming up with an appropriate rationale for the monster supply not drying up - the problem with drying up the monster supply in a hack&slash based advancement system is that newbies are stuck at low level (or get scraped off the walls after meeting one of the few surviving monsters...)

Maintaining monster populations is a serious concern. Mythical heroes are like grizzly bears: It takes hundreds of square miles of wilderness to support them. If you''ve got eighteen evil-stomping Paladins in one town, that becomes the most evil-free town in the entire damn universe. Then the Paladins have to either ride off into the sunset or start a softball league. On the other hand, if the woods abound with demons and werewolves, then a level 10 merchant is totally screwed.

Again, I think clever geography could sort this out. All the battle-hungry warriors can go live in Gondor, where there are orcs a''plenty and no shortage of carnage, and more relaxed players can chill in safer areas of the world. A skilled team might venture into really bad neighborhoods to get a rare commodity for sale or use, and then less impressive players would have to buy it from them.

That''s just how Escape Velocity worked. You always had a warp drive that was capable of blasting you to the farthest reaches of known space, but there were places no self-respecting starship pilot would go. More than once I went a few jumps farther than I really needed to, and was vaporized before I had fully dropped out of hyperspace. Once I got some money, a better ship, some fancy guns, and a few fighters on my wing, I''d take those tougher courier missions and salvage jobs, and rake in the dough.

So build a world that allows nearly limitless opportunity in exchange for nearly limitless risk. Everyone''s heard of RageFire from EQ, right? The poor bastard is supposed to be this great legendary monster, and he dies faster than he can respawn. Build a challenge that simply can''t be beaten. Monsters can be killed, and treasures can be found, but if you put a rare and amazing natural resource in a terrifically dangerous area and compell players to collect it, you''ve got a lasting challenge.

This would eliminate the sense of "Going backward" at high levels. You could just get better and better, and instead of either being bored by the existing challenges or having the whole world get sharp and mean toward you, just open up new possibilities. UberWarriors can live comfortably in areas that eat newbies for breakfast, but there''s a meaner, harsher section of the map that would still beat them down.

Or, of course, there's always the possibility of built in obsolescence - design the game so that the monsters will keep pouring out of the underworld, but if someone (or a lot of someones collectively) goes in and cleans up the underworld, then the entire game world depopulates...

[edit] interrupted so posted what I'd got to...

Obviously, that sort of kills the long term play value - and you'd probably have to either reset the world every so often, or open new servers for new players to join...

Another option could be to let characters improve without genocide - possibly not in combat skills, but in other areas... obviously, this sort of shift requires a fairly radical redesign...

Or, something else I thought of, is to have two factions in the world, let newbie characters decide which faction to join, and then pit the two factions against each other. To avoid everyone picking the same side, starting characters on the minority side should get significant advantages over their majority counterparts. More thought would have to go into some way of stopping people from harvesting enemy newbies as they appear, but it shouldn't be too hard to pull off. Harder is trying to give less experienced characters a chance to learn without getting killed - though maybe not essential...

[edited by - rmsgrey on February 22, 2003 6:21:50 AM]

Player vs. Player is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, it guarantees tough, smart, dynamic enemies, and on the other hand it guarantees freaking jerks. You could bribe or ransom or invade or repel, borders can shift and trade can flourish, but there needs to be a solid organization.

I think it''s been demonstrated that when a few hundred role-players get together, you wind up with twenty-five kings, thirty heroes, and forty-five pirates. Then the kings and heroes start killing each other, and it''s every man for himself. Maybe six or seven people get together and form a team, but no society forms. That needs to be given to players.

Different scoring systems based on affiliation, reward and growth systems based on a set of goals or duties, and some real incentive to serve rather than lead might work. IT would require a serious think-tank to design a world in which organization is encouraged but freedom isn''t compromised too much.

It''s tough work, but I think that Player vs. Player is the best way to guarantee a lastingly fun world.

But it doesn''t have to be the only option. Have that war between the factions, but don''t make it the end-all and be-all of the game. You can make a perfectly respectable living without ever seeing a flag from either faction. Fight the monsters, explore the caves, collect the gear and booty, and when you''ve grown tired of the monsters and trade routes, sign up for a tour with an army.

Or you could go right to the recruiter when you sign in, get your issued gear and serve a four-week (real time) term with them. You get out, take your pay (based on how much you did for them during that time) and start off down the road with some respectable gear and a pouch full of coins.

Or stay in, climb through the ranks and become an officer. Get battlefield experience, make a name for yourself, and then retire from service and set about making money as a bodyguard or crime lord.

DaoC did a nice job (on paper) of trying to combine PvE with PvP. Unfortunately, there are quite a few serious oversights/flaws with the implementation.

As far as content goes, Asherons Call has done the best job of keeping the game world interesting. They had some great patches to that game, and it seemed like there was always something new to do/see. The only reason I burnt out on AC, was the endless buffing/getting ready to fight. At the high end of the game, it took more time for a full round of buffing, than you ended up fighting. In many ways, DaoC suffered from the same problem, only not via buffing, there was just too much travel/downtime compared to fights in DaoC, and the pacing of combat was way off.

Anywhoo, this wasn''t really a beef about content, although that is certainly another good topic. This was really about game devs proclivity to neuter characters at higher levels, and take away core skills/abilities, in order to make the high end game ''more challenging''. Even in single player games.........the Final Fantasy series for example. They give you a host of spells/abilities to work with, which of course don''t work on any mob you would really want/need to use them on.

I''m saying, from a design standpoint, there needs to be a better way of making high end content more challenging, than reducing abilities that a character has poured countless hours to develop.
Nothing frustrated me more, than spending months levelling a character, only to find that my main ability/spell, was rendered completely useless in high end encounters. All of the current MMORPGs have the same end game philosophy...in order to win in these encounters...lot''s of tanks, lot''s of healers, and lot''s of lemming like deaths at the hands of the boss mobs. It becomes nothing but a zerg in the end. All of the tactics/strategies that players have spent months getting good at, are thrown out the window in the endgame, and you end up fighting like you did when you were level 5.

Why do you suppose developers do that? Is it to prevent players from attaining godhood? If that''s the case, then all you need to do is find a better way to prevent invincibility. Seriously, if a level 78 FF character could cast "death" on Kefka and actually kill him with it, then the game would suck.

I''d rather see a game that has a degree of specialization. Sure, for the first t wenty levels you''re beefing up all of your skills, but once you hit about level 25 or so, you start thinking about what you want your character to be. Do you want to be a great swordsman? A powerful magic-user? A master thief? A clever haggler?

Then you can set about attaining that goal at the expense of all othes. Maybe you''ll pick two or three skills to focus on, but there will not be any way to get good at absolutely everything. There won''t be any sword-swinging, spell-casting, wound-healing, money-making, marathon-running, bullseye-shooting, cardgame-winning, lady-wooing, touchdown-running, homerun-hitting, eclair-baking, horseshoe-forging, jitterbug-dancing superheroes. You might be a great archer, but if you find something that arrows can''t take care of, you are in a world of trouble.

This way, you can be so damn good at something that you can solve any problem that can be solved with that skill, but you can''t solve all the problems on your own. That would encourage cooperation, eliminate invincible characters, and get rid of the need to castrate the big guys.

There''s one problem with specialisation in MMORPGs as they stand. Who is going to choose to specialise as anything other than a human battle-tank when advancement depends directly on your ability to batter monsters?

Of course, as and when the paradigm shift to true next generation MMORPGs happens, specialisation may well be practical even with a majority of power-gamers.


On the topic of challenging high-level gamers in combat: I can think of four ways to do it.

1) Neutralise character strengths - the current method.
2) Exploit character weaknesses - not practical with characters that have no weakness, and tends to lead to a "first strike wins" situation.
3) Mirror character - guarantees a fair fight (if you ignore the AI/player) but if characters deal too much damage it becomes a first-strike situation again, and if they have too many hit points, it becomes a war of attrition
4) Swarm character under - sure, one goblin isn''t much threat, but 1000? You''d have to cut the character off from safety for this to be viable though, and even the most blood-thirsty of players may get a little bored after the first hundred or so.

Hmm... All good thoughts. There must be a way to get around it.

Okay, we need to get rid of the "human battle-tank" phenomenon. I''m loathe to get rid of the possibility of building a juggernaut character, but I''d like to see such characters less frequently. So we need to discourage players from just going balls-out on strength and axes.

Could the game be structured such that massive powerhouse characters are less versatile? If it could be made impractical to have a beast of a man, then players might favor more subtle approaches. More applications for stealth or lockpicking, maybe a greater demand for magic. Something that would keep players from spending all their time pumping iron and swinging a mace. If a hulk is good only for combat, then make combat less central. Offer other ways to pass doorkeepers and wild animals. Sure, Biff Rockthrower can power through a horde of minotaurs, but Spiffy Lightfoot doesn''t even have to fight them.

Now I''ve got all kinds of crazy ideas about specialization and faction and what-have-you, so I''m just going to shut up.