I should put some caveats on this one:
1) There is extremely little inforrmation on the Progeny system
2) This thread is probably too early to discuss with detail and/or accuracy, so lets keep that in mind.
3) I think this will be a hot topic, but lets keep it logical and respectful.
For whatever reason I've been thinking about the progeny system lately. The more I think about it, the more I really don't understand the incentive behind it.
Let me divulge very little of what I know of Progeny. Essentially you role a character and level it up, assuming to max level. Play him a little while and then when you want to role a new character you "retire" your old character for good and now the new character has some sort of benefit.
That's about as detailed as we can get because those key points have not been discussed with any certainty. What exactly does "retire" mean, what exactly is the "benefit", etc etc?
Maybe you have heard more, or have more detail...feel free to let us know. Its hard to find good info on this topic as theres not a lot that is discussed as of now. Which is fair as I don't think that system is going to be implemented for a bit as there's more pressing things to accomplish in the game first.
Ok, so now...here are my concerns issues:
I just don't see the progeny being realistically used. I can certainly see a few people here and there, but generally I don't see 95% of people using it at all. The idea of "Retiring" a character you have dumped hundreds of hours into is just nott something that is realistic I don't think. And when I say "retire" Im assuming it means this character is no longer playable. That is the general vibe I have gotten.
The reason people would "retire" a character is because of the benefit or incentive to retire that much time put into a character. And they have said there certianly would be benefits. The character would be a little more stronger in some way, maybe more dps, maybe more hit points, etc.
The problem I have with this is that the "bonus" or benefit would have to be so large to be worthwhile to essentially "delete" your character that it would actually step over the line to being OP, over-powered. And once you start getting into the area of being OverPowered now the game becomes a "grind" to blast through throw away characters, get them to max level (or minimum level to start progeny), and then re-roll new toons. So the entire time you're playing that "throw-away" character youre not even enjoying it as you know its just cannon fodder for your next character.
Imagine taking a character you have played for 2 years, raided with, geared out, gotten several achievements....were looking forward to the next expansion and then deleting him? Wouldn't it require some "Over-the-top" bonus to the new character you rolled? I just don't see it happening without breaking the balance of things.
Imagine rolling a tank at launch and learning that class because you played it for 2 years and you were damn good at that class and one of the best tanks around. And then suddenly being replaced by a half-skilled tank because the progeny bonus gave him the edge even though he wasn't a skilled player? That is terrible design.
So to avoid those scenarios, the "bonus" from progeny would have to be scaled back...which takes away incentive or reason to actually use the progeny system and "retire" the character.
I think a better idea than a complete retire/delete of the character would be a temporary retirement. Maybe that character is unplayble for a month or two, or 6 months maybe. Something that isn't forever. At this point you can keep the added bonuses in a realistic level without making them OP. You also get to keep that class as an alt for whenever you need one. I generally like to roll a tank, then a dps, then a CC/support class. If we have too many tanks, I jump on my dps class or supportt. That way I'm always able to aid the group/raid. Taking away my versitility is another large negative that needs to be made up with incentive.
We could even go down the road of having bonuses not related to combat but different abilities. Such as an extra "call home" or being able to teleport, or getting more money from vendors you sell to, etc etc. But that starts to take away from the specialty that certain classes have and don't have (like druids and wizards being able to port and not others). I've thought it would have been a good idea if you progeny, then the new character would be able to wear all of the gear (Bind on pick up or not) from that old character...but I don't think this is much of a big deal either because SOO MUCH of the gear in the game is going to be tradeable anyways.
I'm just really confused on how popular this idea is actually going to be. It sounds good on paper, and I personally like the concept, but I hardly see anybody hitting that "delete" button. Maybe that is what VR wants. Maybe they want to have only 5% of the population progeny and get a very small bonus. Possibly have something else completely different in mind, who knows. Is there something I'm missing? What are yals thoughts on this?
Hoiyay, I'm in the same boat as you are and have thought the same things since progeny was introduced. I never wanted to be a debbie-downer until we knew more about how VR was going to handle this concept, so I've just kept my mouth shut. But as you've pointed out, I also have a hard time understanding how this system will benefit players in reality. I personally don't see myself using it because I almost always go back and play characters even if I "retire" them (I think that term is subjective). I almost always see value in a character that I've spent a siginificant amount of time playing, so progeny just doesn't seem like something I would take advantage of (unless the bonuses were really worth it, but if that's the case, then it's already out of balance!).
I always go back and play them too. If I happened to somehow have enough time on my hands that I had max level of every class (which in the future will be one or two more classes I'm sure), then I could see re-rolling and using progeny. Or possibly if I happened to play a class I thought I would like but ended up hating it, maybe...but I would have realized I hated it probably before level 20 right?
Generally you pick the class you want to play because you really enjoy that class. I know I will be rolling a warrior. So I get to max level with my warrior and hes a great, I enjoy it. But now I want to roll another character because of all the reasons people roll alt's. Granted, they are called "Alts" for "alternatives" because you still have your "main" because your "main" is what you enjoy most....why would I delete him to just roll him again or roll something I enjoy a little less?
Hoiyay said:
I think a better idea than a complete retire/delete of the character would be a temporary retirement. Maybe that character is unplayble for a month or two, or 6 months maybe. Something that isn't forever.
The above is indeed what I was thinking while reading your post. Maybe lock down the character until his progeny reaches certain mature level, rather than a fixed amount of time.
Regarding the rewards for the progeny, for sure I wouldn´t do anything with potential to unbalance the game, but instead to give a slight edge, perhaps a 0,75% more to score a critical hit, or to dodge a hit, or to runspeed, manapool or hitpoints. And I would also make these rewards stackable with diminishing returns (the more rewards, the less you get for each), so there is another way to reach a top tier character in terms of stats and mechanics and not just through putting two years of grouping and raiding into same character. I like this very much, but I can also see that someone would prefer to put two years into 4 or 5 high level characters and the progeny system would be a compensation for this.
What problem are they solving with the progeny system imho? Well, a fundamental question for any MMO that wants to last is how to get new blood into the game, and this is not always easy, especially after the boom launch, when new players enter the game and find no players of their level to play with. This can be particularly harsh in a group oriented game like Pantheon, so here the progeny system can fill a critical need. At some point, low level zones might be populated with new players and with progenies of elder players, and of course with some other elder players mentoring here and there. This should help to avoid relying only on new players to find each other and play together, and should be an incentive to for those new players to come over to Pantheon.
It is not precisely my style of playing, but I know some gaming friends playing DDO right now (with the past life system) that would certainly enjoy the progeny system as an incentive to level up a character up to (dunno, level 50?), then lock it down and raise up another character up to same level and unlock the first and the decide with which one to play. I know there is going to be a lot of work on the low levels, starting zones and origins, so why not to incentive replaybility and encourage players to roll up several characters through a long time and enjoy all that good work. I clearly see the point of the progeny system from enjoy the game perspective but also from business strategy.
- Elia
EliaDann you are spot on with what progeny attempts to solve in terms of problems. We know that the server size/population in pantheon is going to be small enough to have a reputation. That means after a year or two of launch most of the lower level starting areas, and even mid level zones, will be empty/emptier and making it harder to group with. Its great zones will include a large span of content for different levels, but it does no good if I need a lvl 15 group and I see a ton of lvl 40-50's; it does incite a lvl 50 to see a lowbie and offer help though.
I think the progeny is something that will help with that. I hope it does. I enjoy rolling alts and remembering all the lower level stuff. However, if the incentives are very low, like 1/2% crit chance or something, the only people that will do it will be the top 1% elitist who will be in too much of a rush to help with newbie players. Elitist aren't necessarily jerks, but generally in a rush to get to end game again. So that kind of defeats the purpose of progeny there as well.
Also, I believe we will have some type of mentoring system where a lvl 40 or 50 or so can "mentor down" into a lvl 15 or 20 and play and act (read power) like that level to allow grouping. I would imagine that will also come with its own incentives as well. Personally I would like to just be able to get experience pretty dang close to what I was getting if I was in my own level range dungeon while mentoring. That's enough incentive since I'm giving up my loot as a lvl 45 doesn't want lvl 20 loot.
I like the idea of keeping the lower level zones, or should I say the lower level populations...populated. I think that is a critical step to keeping an MMORPG alive. Once you start noticing the lower levels die off in population, the game will start going on life support.
IIRC, It's been said ~every time it's discussed, but it comes down to a knife-edge of tune-able surface. What does that mean?
It means if it's effective, everyone must use it, or the perception is, everyone must use it.
If it's not effective, no-one will use it, or the perception will be: it's pointless. So, why implement it?
The only public design goals that I've ever heard it tries to meet are to have players return to old zones, or to re-consume past content, or to keep all zones evenly populated over time.
There are many other ways to meet those goals, but, none of those have been discussed, approved, or even acknowledged by the devs (again, that I've seen) in the past 7 years. Could be they have a solution they're keeping to themselves?
Mentoring is apparently (possibly!) off the table/out the window, as well. Progeny, even if it provides as little as 1 additional equipment slot of player 'power' per run-through (1-50) would likely be seen as required by a subset of the target demographic. If it doesn't provide at least that? It would likely be seen as pointless by a subset of the target demographic.
Without knowing how many character slots are permitted per server by default, or how many additional character slots can be obtained/granted/bought, or knowing how many non-adventure-loop professions are permitted per character (like crafting, harvesting, and more) then we're missing the minimum information required to make an informed decision, imo. (we don't know any of those things, yet)
Ultimately, time is the most valuable commodity. The investment of time into another level 50 Alt, especially one on a second account, would be so incredibly valuable, that it would be a hard sell to justify re-investing another alts worth of time into the same character and not gain the power of another max-level Alt. Especially if there are box-friendly or multi-box friendly server rule sets, eventually.
Yet that's what Progeny is trying to 'sell' you, apparently, unless it would offer the (grossly overpowered) option to have an entirely separate, switchable player Adventure role or class, PLUS another crafting profession PLUS another gathering/harvesting profession. You get all that with an Alt, so if Progeny doesn't offer that.. meh?
@ hoiyay
Have you played games with a similar system? DDO likely being the most common but there are others.
It seems like you might not have because your post seems full of confusion?
There are dozens of other threads on progeny. Kilsin has locked multiple of them and told us not to discuss it until there is more info.
If you want to pm me I have played a few games with a system similar to progeny and I might be able to clear up some of the misconceptions about how/why these systems work ...remort, ascention, reincarnation etc (it goes by different names in different games)
Hoiyay said:I enjoy rolling alts and remembering all the lower level stuff. However, if the incentives are very low, like 1/2% crit chance or something, the only people that will do it will be the top 1% elitist who will be in too much of a rush to help with newbie players. Elitist aren't necessarily jerks, but generally in a rush to get to end game again. So that kind of defeats the purpose of progeny there as well.
Part of the community will want to roll alts now and then without any reward system in place. What I think Progeny should do is to bring more people into rolling new characters that wouldn´t do it without such an incentive, and with the advantage of timing. VR will give you an edge on a new character IF you take another character to top level first and IF you lock it down while playing the new one, which guarantees me that VR will have a character raising from scratch to top, thus helping out new players by giving them someone to play with. And talking about rewards. I agree with you, shouldn´t stick only with mechanics to talk to elitist, but all kind of players that could roll an alt on top of an incentive. This could be lore, cosmetics, unique abilites. The possibility of rewards-for-alts could be also something temporary, and therefor used as a strategy by VR to re-populate in waves the low level zones and incentive the joining of new players.
- Elia
... but not too OP.
Isn't there a mechanic in 5th edition or 7th edition (the one after hunters mark, the one Critical Role is playing now) DnD where you can assist another in perception or investigation or something by rolling a D4 that they can use/add to their roll?.
Doesn't seem like a game breaker but may just scootch over the edge at times. I could see progeny working like that, where you get an extra D4 RNG roll on all your modifiers or checks or resistances? if played like an instant. You have 50 fire resist, dragon breathes on you but because you are a progeny (whirr) you get 52 fire resist on the blast! then it goes back to 50. Or maybe a D5 with a 0-4 count you can get anywhere from 0 to a 4. A streak of 0 and you can RP that you must have annoyed your ancestor or something.
From an expansion/Dev perspective this would also allow for a faction/generational curse thing event lore whatever thing. Meaning the expansion is so...hard coded?...I know thats a bad word but to read the progenized- the old character- and depending on the choices of the progeny in the expansion will cause a negative roll of the 0-5 D5 against all modifiers, stats, and resistances. Again, not too - whats the opposite of OP- UP! lol underpowered.
Maybe the + or - could be dampened with religion? or a religious based quest to narrow the RNG to a 1-2 or a 0-1 or even make a permanent +/-1 to two things in keeping with the tennet that a +1 to a stat will be meaningful. This will appease the DPS counters that look for consistency and delay that permanent +1 to well into the characters span instead of right at the beginning.
To begin with - we know essentially nothing so it is essentially useless to discuss Progeny as a system in being - even in its early stages. The OP, of course, acknowledged this. And, as noted above, multiple threads have been shut down for trying to do this.
The more productive discussion is on a subtlely different topic. Not what do we think of VR's Progeny system but what would we like to see when they develop one. What do we NOT want to see. What could make the system interesting enough to be *used* but not so overpowered as to be *abused*. I agree with quite a few comments in this thread, not least vjek's.
What should the goal be? This is not especially controversal. Focus not on what we the players want but on what VR the developers want for the sake of the game. With high probability what they want, and should want, is a system that encourages people to stay interested in the game - that means keep paying every month - after they hit maximum level and run through some or all of the content intended for maximum level characters. Whether this works by having us create "alts" or redesign the original character is of no great concern to them. If it keeps us paying and doesn't have significant downsides for the game - they win. So do we.
What obstacles should be avoided, to the maximum extent possible? This too is not especially controversal. A character that is so overpowered that content becomes almost trivial is not very good for the game. Or for most players - it leads to boredom. A character that is so overpowered that serious guilds or groups will not want any non-Progenized characters doing raids or difficult dungeons is not very good for the game. It turns Progeny into a semi-mandatory process even for those that dislike it and find the many hours involved quite painful. Far better for the game and most of us is a system that we can use if we find it to be "fun" but equally can ignore if we do not.
It is probably fair to say that anything involving the virtual deletion or semi-permanent "camping" of the original character will draw two reactions. Those who focus on the building up and perfection of a single character are unlikely to be overjoyed. At best they will see Progeny as a necessary evil like doing dailies in some games to generate even small improvements in gear, reputation or other benefits. Those who love "alts" and will be happy to have any excuse to create another one will be happier. But these are the people who would create "alts" when they hit maximum level anyway (earlier in most cases) and so will keep playing and paying without Progeny. In other words, such a system will drive some paying customers away without necessarily serving as an incentive for other paying customers to stay. I say this a bit reluctantly because I personally would enjoy such a system.
What system would have some benefits but no major downsides? If it was easy to answer this question we would have the system already and so would most other MMOs. This is far from a new concept as philo quite accurately points out. Let me take a quick shot at some possibilities.
1. Progeny should require a character to hit maximum level. It should then require that character to do something significantly time-consuming. This maximizes the primary benefit to the game - keeping us playing and paying after we accomplish other objectives. Think of it as akin to a long epic quest series in EQ but for the right to Progenize not for gear.
2. Progeny should not require the deletion or "almost deletion" of the character. This will stick in the craw of too many players. It should either involve the same character temporarily regressing to a weaker state or some benefits to totally different characters. The former operates much the same as deletion and creation of a new character with attributes of the first one - but is far less upsetting to the player. Having Progeny benefits go to totally different characters has the plus that it will not upset those that want the original character to keep doing "endgame" without a long interruption. It has the minus that it will not benefit the original character and thus will be of no interest to those focusing on only a single character.
I thus see two alternatives that will not violate the First Law. To wit - any Progeny system should encourage us to keep playing and paying.
One is to have a system that gives some benefits to "alts" after the original character does whatever the system requires. A system that lets the original character continue as is. A system where the benefits are not so great that people will feel compelled to invest another 6 months in an "alt" merely to be considered qualified for a raid or dungeon group or guild. What benefits can these be? Cosmetics - pretty things only "alts" of Progenized characters can wear or use. Mounts only they can ride (not any faster just different looking). Houses only they can buy or build. Crafted items only they can make. A permitted change to another race that was not originally available to their class that does *not* offer combat benefits to that class. Or where the character gets only the appearance of the new race but not its attribute modifications.
Two is to have a system where the original character gets Progenized into something else but the benefits are similarly not such that the hypothetical but quite real raid or dungeon group or guild will insist that members have done it.
I had given some thought to benefits it could provide, and as you've noted, dorotea, it comes down to non-adventure loop benefits.
As long as it doesn't include that, then it (ideally) won't be seen as a must-have for the adventure loop (group/raid content).
To that end, it could be part of or related to:
- Deity (polytheism, active racials, passive racials, expanded selection/concurrency)
- NPC Guilds (multiple guild membership)
- NPC Faction (high caps, no-decay, amplifiers for change; +1 = +1 * $Progeny_Count )
- Racial Recipes (access is granted if you re-complete all that n-th race's content, visual styles)
- Crafting Professions (If normally you could have 3, now you can have 6, or +3 per $Progeny_Count)
- Harvesting Professions (Same deal, either bonuses of speed, quantity, or profession)
- Expanded features of all recipes, book recipe timers, recipe book entries
- Access to ambassadors earlier, for something like diplomacy, world plot, kingdom/in-game politics
Yet, I still have a hard time justifying any of it, in my own mind, when I consider the value in doing all the same thing on an alt.
I mean, I understand (and desire, personally) the convenience of having some of this on one character, but.. at the same time, it's more convenient having another alt on another account, too, given the adventure loop benefits that could bring, under some circumstances.
I guess what I'm dancing around is.. you could have all of this be possible on a single character WITHOUT progeny, simply by design with normal in-game mechanics. So to optionally create an entire mechanic for some implementation facets that are objectively fun on their own.. it's a hard sell, in my world.
Good thoughts vjek. And I agree you can do anything that Progeny could do in other ways. But Progeny to my mind gives a logical framework that ties in with the roleplaying aspects of a MMORPG.
Let us assume that a character qualified for Progeny is a hero - broadly defined. Not the center of the story or a close ally or antagonist of the center of the story - as in LOTRO or WoW or SWTOR etc. but an exceptionally accomplished and equipped individual who has done many things. This is based on my assumption that Progeny will require both hitting maximum level and doing a lot of other things. Obviously this could be a wrong assumption.
How likely is it that he or she will change race? Awfully low - that would require the act of a God or very powerful magic or technology indeed. How likely is it that he or she will change the class or profession that has proven so successful. Pretty low - people can suddenly go back and start over but they tend not to do so after being highly successful for a long time.
On the other hand - take the hero's son or daughter. Adopted son or daughter perhaps to accomodate race changes. New profession - normal for a child. New class - normal for a child. Improvements in some areas - normal for the child of a hero to have opportunities and advantages that the child of an average person did not have.
Maybe the new level 1 will not get anything from mom or dad than the character of a new player couldn't get simply by getting to maximum level. But the hero's child will get them sooner and more easily. Making the leveling experience different and perhaps leading to having things at maximum level that wouldn't have been available with a lower starting point.
By analogy - how many popular fantasy or science fiction series run out of steam piling responsibilities and abilities on the hero book after book. Having each crisis worse than the last to be more challenging? Altogether too many. It seems entirely illogical that the hero will go from protecting one planet to two galaxies in a few books (Lensman series). Or that one country or world will face invasion after invasion after invasion each from more powerful enemies whenever the author or publisher decide it is time for a new book (Midkemia series). We all could give many examples. A tried and true solution many authors use is to retire the original hero and substitute a new one. The challenges can be less ...Godlike .... because so is the protagonist. Honor Harrington gives way - partially - to Michelle Henke. Paksennarion gives way to Dorrin Verrakai. The analogy is far from precise especially since Pantheon will be more open-ended and not focusing on one overarching story line. But it does explain why I like the basic idea and hope it can be implemented in some manner.
So much confusion, as always it seems, in progeny threads. There is an overall misunderstanding of how/why these type of systems work from a development standpoint...and a lesser amount from a player perspective.
From a game development perspective, remort (Progeny) systems are instated for a reason. They are all similar regardless of the game. Here I go starting to discuss it when we have been told by kils to not discuss it until we have more information. I'm going to cut this off. Feel free to pm me if you want to discuss it. Understand that this type of system is not unique to pantheon.
Of course we don't know specific details to how it might work in pantheon but there are some constants for these type of systems to work that are clearly not being understood in this thread.
Acknowledging tho OP's caveats, and emphasizing we know nothing, I would like to point out we know little to nothing of their plans for overall leveling or expansions. We assume there going to be like all mmorpgs before them, but what if they arent?
I'm sure we have nearly ALL "retired" a character before, who all still plays the organal EQ or WOW character? Not I, I have access to both but also lost interest in both, and nether are at the max 100+ level for the game. I could call them "retired" as I haven't seen one of them in nearly 10 years.
What benifit could progeny have to a game? As mentioned one is keep the lower level zones populated. But not just with lvl 100 chars running through them but lower level progeny chars replaying those zones.
Nobody starts a new character on a new account on those servers loaded up with lvl 100+ chars unless
1) they have friends to PL them up
2) they buy a lvl boot to 85 or something.
NEATHER option that is desired for pantheon. But the only two solutions I have ever heard for the level bloat problem.
Most of the comments here are based on leveling and expansions as we're all accustomed to.
0-50
Then an Expansion comes out, it may or may not add levels but adds a new city, race and class or two.
Next expansion might add a new continent, new cities, new races and the next 5-10 levels.
This is what we're used to, this is where the level bloat comes from. This is where we get bored with our characters chasing that never obtainable carrot and move on to the next new game.
What if they did something different? What if expansions were always horizontal and never vertical, what if 20 years from now Pantheon was a world with dozens of races, hundreds of classes, hundreds of additional lvl 20 and 30 dungeons placed all over the zones you once knew as they are remade on expansions.
Progeny "might" be a little (if not a lot) more inviting.
Like they say, we don't know enough to speculate on progeny yet, I propose we don't know enough about a lot of things Pantheon to speculate on Progeny yet.
edit: typos (I can actually see it now I'm on my pc and not phone)
What if they did something different? What if expansions were always horizontal and never vertical, what if 20 years from now Pantheon was a world with dozens of races, hundreds of classes, hundreds of additional lvl 20 and 30 dungeons placed all over the zones you once new as they are remade on expansions.
Progeny "might" be a little (if not a lot) more inviting.
The way you describe it makes it sound amazing...
First off, I had no idea kils asked us not to talk about it. There's not really a big banner across the top of the screen declaring that...and given by my post count, I don't exactly live on these boards to have seen it. This post has been up a few days now, so I'm sure hes seen it and hasn't locked it down or said anything.
I don't see a problem with this discussion. I, nor anybody else, is bashing or complaining the progeny system. Most of us want the system in game. This is simply theory crafting what it could possibly be...feedback on what would make it turn into a negative, and positive feedback/ideas on what it could become.
I would much rather get ideas and player opinions available to the team now, before the team sinks a lot of time into the system to only get feedback that the players are not into it at all and it needs to be scrapped or reworked. I don't see anything wrong with that.
I've been reading the comments from you guys and appreciate the thoughts on display here. I am personally not very creative so I haven't posted much because I like your ideas. I really like Zorkon idea of continuously adding more and more zones during expansions that would encourage progeny and populating lower level zones. I still feel we need more for endgame as well. Or at least every other expansion was split between end game vertical expansions and then horizontal lower level expansions. Adding new raids to lvl 20, and more dungeons in the 30's and more epic quest lines in lvl 40 etc etc. That would be cool. People would specifically plan to just roll new alts with all their guildies and play different class roles in anticipation of a horizontal expansion to drop.
Back to progeny...any thoughs on allowing certain quest lines to open up only to progeny characters? I kind of think of the elder scrolls games that had the fighters guilds and mage guilds, theifs guilds etc. You could implement some kind of lore of your main character dropping a baby off at the mages guild, and then you roll your new character and now the mage guild quest line/story opens up. It could make an entire main story line all the way up to lvl 50. Possibly with a few special abilities available...maybe a cool hang out spot, a small bonus to magic type abilities or resistances. etc etc. And then you would have to progeny again to check out the fighters guild etc etc. Obviously pantheon wouldn't have the same mage/figher/theif guild as elder scrolls...but theres ALOT in pantheon you could do with it.
It would certainly open up replayability even more. Would give more player Identity to the game too I think. "Oh that sword is lvl 20, I can't use it for 2 more levels as Im lvl 18" "Oh, I can actually use it now at lvl 18 because I'm with these warrior type people in my progeny".
Thoughts? Keep them coming. Much appreciated.
I may be wrong - I am drawing a very fine distinction. But I think Kilson asked us not to talk about Pantheon's progeny system because we simply didn't know enough and it was too early for criticism (or praise) to be useful. This is a development forum after all.
I don't think he ever asked us not to talk about what a Progeny system *could* be. Why should he? We often talk about things that aren't in the game as of now and debate whether they should be. He didn't want us to talk about what Progeny *was* - because at this point it isn't yet.
Ultimately Progeny is a restart button. It is a way to get players who cluster at max level and to loop back through the primary adventuring loop. This takes load and focus off endgame content. Not having access to endgame content at during the period where a player is looping back through the leveling content is a critical aspect to a restart system. In order to validate the opportunity cost of not being able to do end game content for the releveling period there needs to be a significant vertical progression reward or people will not do it. At that point Progeny will become mandatory in order to reach “maximum meta”.
Rather than a restart system, Progeny could just be a way to give your alts some extra flavor or as Vjek said some other non-adventuring game play loop benefits (I would stay away from crafting benefits if crafting is a serious part of the economy.) If Progeny is just an alt fluff reward I am not really sure it is worth the development time to design and implement.
Perhaps you could do something like Progeny is a way to unlock other classes for your character. Each time you log in you pick which class you are logging in as but you are limited to your lowest level across your character classes. It’s a stretch and rewards the pain of releveling with versatility. Again though not a lot of gain over just having another alt, arguably worse if inventory slots are at a premium and the alt would have its own.
A good scaling mentor system and a set of achievements and rewards that can only be earned when bellow or mentored bellow a certain level could be a method to encourage playing across the level ranges. Again the rewards would need to be carefully tuned and the mentor system made abuse proof (something that will need constant monitoring.)
I am all for the idea of Progeny. I love the idea of retiring as an adventurer and letting my offspring carry on my legacy.
The how of this is crucial though. It cannot be something can be brute forced, and it cannot be something that will come easily. If it can be forced or is easy then the bonuses cannot be very good and it becomes a grind fest to get the bonuses racked up. As many have already stated.
There needs to be a gate. Yes, an artificial gate of some kind that will allow the bonus from progeny to be something truely worth the sacrifice. I think the answer to this can be found in Star Wars Galaxies.
When SWG was launched the option of making a Jedi was something that existed. thing is.... no one knew how to do it. The requirements were different for each account and there was no way to track progress. You just had to stumble into the achievement. Once you did whatever it was that you needed to do, you could create a Jedi character.
I would love to see something like this. A "hidden" requirement that was dynamic to each account that would ALLOW you to "retire" your character to roll a new one that was a fair bit more powerful. VR has said gear will mostly all be tradable, so if this holds true you can easily strip the old character and "pass down" your current gear. This means all of your prior progress isn't entirely lost.
Bonuses could come in the shape of a few bonus stat points at character creation along with a multi-class option of sorts. I would love to see an option to choose a new class from the retired character. VR could provide us with a selection of a few iconic abilities from the retired character's class we would "carry over". I mean, our retired father would have trained us and we might have learned a Warrior skill before we decided on becoming a Ranger. What skills would need to be balanced so as not to make any one character a god or able to fill multiple roles well, keeping the interdependance the game strives for. In the case we decide NOT to multi-class a bonus to a skill would be in order. Say, allow us to start the game with a single skill at mastery lvl 1 (the first bubble filled) on a specific skill. This would allow that character to gain a bit more power over time as they could branch out their end game skills a bit more than a non progeny character.
With this new character you'd have a small up front gain in power from the stat bonuses and you'd gain more power down the road. Adjusted for balance.
With this new character you'd start over with Progeny. The requirements change. Once you unlock again you can do the process over.
You can only choose abilities from your direct predecessor's main class. So you can't end up a Waridanchanter. Again, only select skills or you get another extra bonus mastery point to start with.
There would need to be some set minimum timer maybe.... but my vision is that it'd take many many months between progeny hits. The bonus could be rather nice if it were gated to some degree, and the gate would depend on your personal activity in game. If you are insanely active you might unlock progeny after a month or two. If not it may take longer.
I want alternate advancement to require actually advancing a character not just grinding some arbitray points at max lvl until the cap is increased. Once I hit max lvl and have all the goodies from group play, give me the chance to re-roll and re-lvl doing fun group content again. Make it noticable, but not something that is game breaking. Limit the amount of time it can be done per character maybe....
Been a while but I remember an old progeny discussion where someone brought up the idea that progeny could be a way to achieve unique class/race combinations, which I really like.
I could also see it giving fancy bonuses to QOL or looks. For example, new hair styles, experience bonuses, vendor/trainer price bonuses, better cards or tools for any minigames within Pantheon, and/or special emotes.
What I hope to not see is anything that actually effects gameplay. As is mentioned here, people will feel the need to require progeny for end game content.
Overall I would probably use the progeny system. I don't value my characters nearly as much as others do and honestly reach the point where I want to try something new pretty quick. If progeny was more beneficial or easier than making a new character, I could do it before max level, or I played on a server with only one character slot, that would further increase the chances of me using it.
BeaverBiscuit said:Been a while but I remember an old progeny discussion where someone brought up the idea that progeny could be a way to achieve unique class/race combinations, which I really like.
I could also see it giving fancy bonuses to QOL or looks. For example, new hair styles, experience bonuses, vendor/trainer price bonuses, better cards or tools for any minigames within Pantheon, and/or special emotes.
What I hope to not see is anything that actually effects gameplay. As is mentioned here, people will feel the need to require progeny for end game content.
Overall I would probably use the progeny system. I don't value my characters nearly as much as others do and honestly reach the point where I want to try something new pretty quick. If progeny was more beneficial or easier than making a new character, I could do it before max level, or I played on a server with only one character slot, that would further increase the chances of me using it.
I once mentioned it possably having the ability to mix up class/race combinations.
Is it that far fetched in Lore that an Elven Ranger, could mate with a Dark Myr and pass the ways of the Ranger down to it's Dark Myr offspring? Is it possable that this Dark Myr (Syronai's Rest born) Progeny had the appearance of it's Elvin Parent? Of course this would have to come with a cost, There are no Ranger Guild Masters or Spell Merchants in the Dark Myr city of Syronai's Rest. This Char being a half breed possably haveing less than Amiable faction in Starting City, but on the other hand he might also have better than KOS in the elvish city of Faerthale, perhaps just barely enough to enter and buy spells. Who knows where all they could take this.
I could see it effecting game play a "Little", without being game brakeing. In the example of my Dark Myr Ranger above, let's say I hit 50 again (Side Note: people were talking in this thread about Progeny being gated... reaching lvl50, is gated) and this time my Dark Myr Ranger progeny's to a Dark Myr (choose to switch Class instead of Race) Cleric, he could also choose to retain one allowed ability, hyoptothetically Bow Usage, Cleric's get Ranged spells so it's not like this cleric having Randed is going to break anything, He doesn't get all the Ranger Bow abilitys like Silent Arrow or Flare, ect... simply the novelty of using a bow.
Obviously they couldent have all abilitys, not even the med level spells, abilitys... just the low level ones that a lvl 30 never uses again.
Zorkon said:I once mentioned it possably having the ability to mix up class/race combinations.
In that case, thank you for the really cool idea!
Zorkon said:Is it that far fetched in Lore that an Elven Ranger, could mate with a Dark Myr and pass the ways of the Ranger down to it's Dark Myr offspring? Is it possable that this Dark Myr (Syronai's Rest born) Progeny had the appearance of it's Elvin Parent? Of course this would have to come with a cost, There are no Cleric Guild Masters or Spell Merchants in the Dark Myr city of Syronai's Rest. This Char being a half breed possably haveing less than Amiable faction in Starting City, but on the other hand he might also have better than KOS in the elvish city of Faerthale, perhaps just barely enough to enter and buy spells. Who knows where all they could take this.
I hadn't though of the unique problems you would run into being a halfy. Very interesting ideas and considering how someone who uses progeny is probably pretty familiar with the game, it would add unique and rewarding challenge, if your starting city didn't even have your class trainers or some such.
Progeny to unique class/races would ultimately result in very interesting and unique characters. Good backstories are important for any game that throws back even a little to DnD times.
As for balance, VR would have to put in some effort to make sure the class abilities and racial abilities don't make you stronger than the rest. However, I see no reason for a progeny-er being able to choose those challenging gimped combinations like 'meaty gnome', or 'intelligent ogre'.
The progeny screen could include all the normal class/race combinations, but anything weird like a half-race or an unusual class could be written in red and come with a clear warning that if you are weaker than everyone else you shouldn't expect buffs aimed at you. People who have made it to progeny level should be able to handle heavy decisions like this.
I would really like the option to make a half-myr who has some dwarven underground/cold weather bonuses but gimped underwater fighting capabilities.
Zorkon said:
I could see it effecting game play a "Little", without being game brakeing. In the example of my Dark Myr Ranger above, let's say I hit 50 again (Side Note: people were talking in this thread about Progeny being gated... reaching lvl50, is gated) and this time my Dark Myr Ranger progeny's to a Dark Myr (choose to switch Class instead of Race) Cleric, he could also choose to retain one allowed ability, hyoptothetically Bow Usage, Cleric's get Ranged spells so it's not like this cleric having Randed is going to break anything, He doesn't get all the Ranger Bow abilitys like Silent Arrow or Flare, ect... simply the novelty of using a bow.Obviously they couldent have all abilitys, not even the med level spells, abilitys... just the low level ones that a lvl 30 never uses again.
This is why I'd like to see progeny come in mainly with expansions. Expansions are when VR would most want people to start the game over again anyways-especially if the new content is truly horizontal as you have mentioned.
The first expansion could just include basic progeny, maybe with some unique class/race decisions for children. Second could include this highly unique idea of yours that makes me think of DnD. I never did anything like progeny in DnD but it was really cool when my class/race could steal a spell/ability/skill from another class or race. It made my character feel unique and special.
Third expansion could maybe take a stab at the OVER lvl 30 abilities (within reason) with all the money and time VR has for balance. So on so forth.
Hokanu said:Maybe the character you "lose" when you go for progeny remains as a trainer for you to use as you grow your new char and at a certain level you can bring them back into the game
This is an interesting compromise allowing you to still give something away for progeny without losing your character forever. VR seems to be aiming for a mostly hardcore experience that still allows a good deal of QOL and, again, this compromise seems to fit that. Many people who love their first character may be willing to give it up and try something new so long as they know that eventually they get their character back. Well thought sir.