[MUD-Dev2] no levels / temporary levels

[Timothy Dang]

Hello all-

This is my first posting to the reincarnated list. I'm one of the
academics who is mostly interested in MUDs for research purposes, in
my case economics.

I've recently been trying to describe for my colleagues the advantages
and problems of using MUDs for research. I think most of the big
problems are on the research side rather than game design side. Two
biggies are (1) you can't isolate a game world for study, it always
interacts with other game worlds and the real world, and (2) it's
really easy to mis-interpret what happens in a MUD by mistaking game
metaphor for reality (the WoW plague being my prime example).

Anyway, those problems are mostly independent of design. But there are
design problems, and one of the biggest of those is character
advancement. It's just so weird and un-mappable to reality that it
shrinks what can be learned about reality from a MUD by a good bit.
So, it would be nice for us if we could get rid of it, but it's
obviously a very successful paradigm and there's no point in making a
game for research which nobody wants to play.

As I understand it, levels (which I'm just using as shorthand for any
kind of character advancement) are good for at least three reasons:
1) It provides for a real learning curve, by adding more options as
the character advances.
2) It creates clear-cut motivation, and regular positive feedback for
playing (in particular ways).
3) It rations content, making sure someone can't experience the whole
world in a week.

I'm wondering how to get advantages somewhat like this without the
level-advancement model. Here's one possibility I've come up with,
mostly thinking of it as a minimal tweak on the successful model:

*** Keep most of the mechanics of levels, and keep the game world
designed as if there are levels. But instead of making levels inherent
to the PC, make them temporary powers granted by (say) drinking
potions.

Actually, that's pretty much it; the rest is details. Instead of
awarding XP, the game would award either potions, the ingredients to
make potions, or the cash to buy potions from NPCs. Exponential
advancement could come from making 2 level-2 potions equivalent to a
level-3 potion, 2 level-3 potions to a level-4 potion, etc.

So, now I'm wondering if some variation on this idea could work,
keeping the successful part of levels while getting rid of the
weirdness which character advancement causes.

I can see some obvious problems with it:

a) It makes twinking, whether in-game or by RMT, a piece of cake.
b) It's hard to match with the learning-curve, since it would probably
be very awkward to have someone gain entirely new abilities for each
potion they drink.
c) Similarly, it reduces the effect of levels->specialization if
players can choose their abilities each time they drink a potion.

I'm sure there's other problems. Anyway, any sort of comments are
welcome, either on this proposed mechanic or on levellessness in
general. What kinds of level-less games have been successful?

Thanks, and Hi!

-Timothy

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Timothy O'Neill Dang / Cretog8
623-587-0532
One monkey don't stop no show.