[MUD-Dev2] [DESIGN] Removing the almighty experience point...

[cruise]

Thus spake Travis Casey...
> On Jul 26, 2007, at 12:50 PM, Nicholas Koranda wrote:
> 
>> * Original Poster:  Vincent Archer
>> * archer at frmug.org

<snippage>

>> If you plan a level 40 cap, you have to come with at least
>> 780 different achievments, just to have at least enough to finish
>> each level in turn, and the amount you need to design grows with the
>> square of the level cap.
> 
> If you want every achievement to really be unique, then you'll probably 
> have to come up with a lot more than that, if you want the game to have 
> any replay value.  Further, if you want some achievements to be specific 
> to classes, races, professions, etc., then that will raise the number of 
> achievements needed even further.
> 
> Can you come up with 30 different achievements that are *really* 
> different, and don't just fall into a handful of patterns?  When you get 
> right down to it, "achievement" is nothing more than a broader term for 
> a quest... the "quest" may be more generic in some cases than we usually 
> see (e.g., "defeat a monster of level X+", or "create an item that 
> requires skill level Z"), but they're the same type of thing.  That 
> leads me to suspect that we'd see the same thing happen with 
> "achievements" that already happens with quests:  what's supposed to be 
> a unique and interesting experience becomes a pick from a grab-bag of a 
> few types.

This, I'm starting to think, is the bigger problem than the method of 
advancement. Not how you advance, but *what you have to do to advance*.

>> Some players will also find themselves locked out of higher levels.
>> Unless they manage to master enough aspects of the game, it is
>> physically impossible for them, no matter how long they can play per
>> week, to access the higher end of the game (the elite syndrome: only
>> "skilled" players can be of high level), which might discourage
>> players.
> 
> ... or get someone else to level their characters for them, or help them 
> level.  If you want to lock lesser-skilled players out of higher levels, 
> you'd need to either allow losing levels (so that poor play of a 
> high-level character would cause it to become lower level), or eliminate 
> character levels entirely and make the game rely purely on player skill 
> (so that in order to handle difficult areas, you have to have the skill 
> to do it yourself.)

Is this necessarily a bad thing? It would certainly be a very different 
type of game, but one that might well appeal to a different group of 
players. It's bassicaly how games like counter-strike work, and they are 
far from unpopular...