[MUD-Dev] Level Grind - alternative

[Hans-Henrik Staerfeldt]

On Wednesday 28 July 2004 21:59, Brendan O'Brien wrote:

>   Non-active characters may be sent into marriage with other
>   families, allowing players to arrange marriages with families of
>   other players for a variety of reasons (forming alliances,
>   friendship, money, etc).

You forgot; breeding better characters :-) Read Frank Herberts
'Dune'.  I could imagine a 'bene-gesserit'-like guild forming in
such a game, heh.

>   4) Advancement part 2: While characters become combat-ready very
>   early, there are other types of advancement besides skills and
>   hit points.  Reputation and valor are significant goals in this
>   game design, as achievments by a given character are meant to be
>   very important.  Since all characters will die at some point,
>   what they do during their lives becomes more important.  Are you
>   Torrin the slayer of multiple dragons?  Perhaps Lourid, the
>   simple farmer?  How about Vayn, father of 3 who gave his life
>   protecting the town from an undead invasion.  Plaques, statues,
>   and family heirlooms are a small sample of ways you can enable
>   the legacy of the warriors to live on.  Instead of relying on a
>   boring treadmill to be the focus of the game, the purpose
>   instead is to have fun on dangerous adventures.

Perhaps we need to focus on events that does not involve fighting?
The big problem here is that replacing fighting with something else
is a hard task. You could set up feudal systems where your family
need to take care of a village, and try to make the whole
resource-puzzle work, or even go to other players/villages to ensure
extra supplies and trade routes once a particular event strikes
(floods/fires/ dragon attack/whathaveyou). Your status among the
peasants would be determined by how well you do.

This is just an example, but one that takes considerable resources
alone to implement. If you want out of the level grind you need some
whay to prove yourself _other_ than hack-and-slash, and you need
several challenges that are continual/replenishable in
content. Killing monsters should be only one of these.

What else could be done;

 - Magic research
 - Mundane research (engeneering to upgrade buildings?)
 - Exploration
 - Trade (fortunes earned?)
 - Building (the one with the nices keep gets a prize!)
 - Building (designing your village)

All of these need to be presented to the player in a fun way, that
is challenging, as well as easily mutable (higher level monsters -
harder spells to research - lots of world to explore and give name
to - cost/quests to upgrade buildings ).

Magic research could require rare materials that could be found on
monsters, or in remote locations. But should also require some kind
of puzzle solving game that gets harder the more powerful the spell
is researched.

>   5) Power gamer vs. casual gamer: The common complaint is today's
>   games is how to balance the level grind between players who
>   spend 8-10 hours a day playing the game, and the casual gamer
>   who has nowhere near as much time on his hands.  In this design,
>   there is very little difference in combat effectiveness between
>   the characters of either player. Without the treadmill, both
>   would be ready to go at a very young age, allowing the casual
>   gamer the opportunity to compete on a more even playing field.
>   Also, since characters age based on the time spent in-game, the
>   casual gamer would be able to enjoy his character for just as
>   much play time as a full time power-gamer.

But for reasons of logic, you need to have the main and secondary
characters of the casual player age the same speed as the power
players. It seems wierd that its the great great great great great
great grandson of the man who killed your wife, that youre speaking
to.

I think that having off-line growth for all characters truly level
the playing field between the power player and the casual player.

--
--Hans-Henrik Stærfeldt
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