[MUD-Dev2] [DESIGN] Non level appropriate content (Was: Food in MMOs)

[Dana V. Baldwin]

Morris Cox wrote:
> On 6/6/07, Michael Hartman <mlist at thresholdrpg.com> wrote:
>   
>> In EQ2, I remember getting rocked by a super powerful naked mole rat in
>> a cave zone that was 5-10 times harder than everything else in there.
>> Man... that was no fun.
>>     
>
> I know which zone you're talking about (the Caves outside of Qeynos) and
> you're referring to Coldtooth on the 3rd floor. 
>
> [snip]
>
> I've been tempted to take my high
> level characters and just kill Coldtooth and the like over and over,
> just for revenge. 
>  
 
My boss used to do just that sort of thing and it made quite an 
impression on the younglings in the area. He'd be a bit of a hero in 
fact when it happened and it often resulted in gaining new members to 
our guild.

I think this ties in nicely with the discussion on end game. Here is a 
nice example of alternate endgame or continuing story outside the box, 
though I'm not certain the designers didn't put a mob like this in to 
encourage these young players to team up when they were out soloing as a
 lesson that in the future the game was largely designed to be played as
 a group.

Wandering boss mobs are a mechanic like anything else in the game. 
Chances are that when you didn't like it, that was on purpose, and the 
mechanic was trying to shape your play for a specific reason.

The content might not necessarily be non level dependent, it might be 
there for a very specific reason, such as teaching you to group or to in
 fact look for a mentor. Then again of course it could just be designer 
self-love which is more than equally plausible.