@187 I have enjoyed reading your outside the box ideas as well over the time I have been on the boards so I appreciate the positive feedback, my wife thinks my profile picture is hilariously fitting too.
As far as a progeny system goes I have really only personally experienced DDOs reincarnation system, though I suppose the original 6 holycrons to unlock resetting your character to Jedi in SWG was a form of it but I never got past my second.
In DDO the reincarnation system was absolutely part of the progression of the character and the progression of the account.
There were character rewards:
- Increasing stat build points at character creation for 1st, and 2nd reincarnations (a character was not considered max level until they were on their third life)
- Passive bonuses that stacked up to 3 times per class, the bonus was around 5% of what the class did best.
- Access to special past life feats which ended up being mini multiclassing in a single feat
- Completionist feat if you had a past life in all classes that was tremendously powerful
There were account rewards:
- You gained points each time you completed a difficulty of a dungeon the first time in each life
- These points could be used to buy access to more dungeons, classes, races and cosmetics
- Certain thresh holds of points earned in one life also unlocked character options.
- Each life you could rerun old dungeons get more points to buy new dungeon packs.
These two sets of rewards were massive incentives to reincarnate your character from max level back to first level. For the progeny system to really take off it will need to reward players on a similar magnitude for doing so. The issue I have with a similar reward system in Pantheon is that the character rewards are so powerful that only multi-generational progeny will be considered “completed” characters and so it will become mandatory. Secondly the account rewards really tie into cash shops and incremental paid content rather than the subscription model.
For the progeny system to have such universal appeal to effect mid-level zone populations it would need to be a primary mechanic of the overall progression system. I am certain we could come up with something that didn’t require a cash shop but it would be hard to make it not feel mandatory if it was powerful enough to get people to continuously progeny out.
I could see the progeny system being incentivized by allowing class/race combinations that are not allowable normally based on the combination of the two parents. I could also see the size of your “family” having some effect on the size of player housing you could own/control. Thirdly I could see a host of achievements that reward titles and art objects for player housing based on multiple family members getting the same achievements. I could even see only allowing 1 or 2 characters per server until you progeny which will open up new character slots.
There are lots of ways to take it that could still be interesting without effecting the game balance much but would take a lot of thought and like was mentioned we are still missing a lot of details on where VR is planning on taking progression and game design concepts.
Trasak said: Secondly the account rewards really tie into cash shops and incremental paid content rather than the subscription model.
I agree 100% with your post except that I just want to point out that before DDO went free to play this ^ wasn't an issue. You could still unock both drow and higher point builds in a "progeny" type of reincarnation system and it didn't tie into cash shops.
There is no reason to think that there has to be a correlation between the 2.
philo said:Vandraad said:This topic of max level and the speed at which it should take for the average person to get there has been debated since the first days of these forums and no concensus was ever reached unfortunately.
Here is the official response we have received:
Q. What is your vision for typical time played to reach max level?
Chris (Joppa): At a highly aggressive/competitive pace, I’d like to see it take around 2.5 months, ~10 weeks. At a normal pace, around 4 months, ~16-18 weeks.Now we don't know if "highly aggressive/competitive pace" means 12 hours per day or 20 hours per day and that is a huge difference. At the very low end of competitive pace, 10 hours per day for 2.5 months is 750 hours minimum. Maybe as much as 1500 hours.
Just 2.5 months to max level? This game should be designed more as a long-term hobby. So my vote is max level taking many years. There should be so many different systems to work on and improve that really no one will have enough time to really ever be at max level. Is that not why Everquest was given its name?
Max level equals lots of complaints about boredom. I've seen it again and again.
Your point, Trustar, is exactly why I'd like to see progeny end up being a system that does, indeed, encourage the majority of players to use it. I know it's been dubbed as an "optional" feature ... just like crafting, harvesting, epic quests, awesome spells/abilities, etc. I understand the argument of "If you allow people to grow in power then people will feel compelled to do it!" I always thought it was a weak argument. If the goal behind the feature is to help deliver on:
- It helps keep lower/mid level zones populated
- It helps new players find their feet with level appropriate players
- It helps us with horizontal progression instead of capping out and only having bottlenecked raiding/end game content (then leaking subscriptions -our main form of revenue- years down the track, while they wait for an expansion, which is a common trend in these types of games)
- It helps us with balance
- It plays into the fine tuning of dungeons, quaternity and group availability in a group based game
- It helps stimulate the crafting and harvesting spheres by always having a supply/demand
- It helps by keeping the economy continuously ticking over with player driven items through 1-50 level ranges.
Then it probably does make sense to implement it in a way where a lot of players feel compelled to use it! Now keep in mind that even if implemented how I personally have imagined it working (ideally) -- players would still get to the point where they would reach the cap on progeny generations. The main point is that it's going to take a long time before people get there and it would extend the overall progression and add a ton of replay value to the game. I've been that max-level-bored-player countless times in past MMO games. I have also seen a world, that has incredible content in all level ranges, and where the above listed effects were considered strengths rather than weaknesses. I'm sure there are plenty of games, and style of games, that have utilized some sort of re-leveling feature in the past. The key is to find a way to make it work for a game like this ... an old-school MMO world where it's about the journey rather than the destination. It's been done before.
The progeny system is counter productive to almost everything that was listed. It is simply a stat reset pure and simple for the argument's of replayability and rehashing already completed content.
- It helps keep lower/mid level zones populated.
Yes and No. It's a gimick that trickles top end population back down to the bottom of the leveling pool. The main issue's for the person that did it, are now how to relevel or move through content that has already been completed as fast , as humanly doable. This is to either regain the ability to play current top end content with friends that are max level or retain a max level required raiding slot with the hope that doing the prog to level 1 will help perform at a higher level of playability.
- It helps new players find their feet with level appropriate players
No , If I have a already established character and go back to level 1. That toon will probably never or extreamly rarely interact with a truely new player. I will be getting power leveled to become viable for end game content as fast as it be accomplished or playing with already knowledgeable players to shorten the amount of time reliving already completed content.
- It helps us with horizontal progression instead of capping out and only having bottlenecked raiding/end game content (then leaking subscriptions -our main form of revenue- years down the track, while they wait for an expansion, which is a common trend in these types of games)
No , if anything it creates even more bottle knecks and highly disrupts raiding guilds and those that are pushing top tier content. ..... Oh , im sorry the MT this week is only level 10 now ... this weeks raids are canceled or the alternative is a requirement of it must be already completed on apping if the bonus are truely worth the reroll. Lets not even get into flagging or keying zones if it will be required again ........ guys! I need to be reflagged fully for Quarm this week so I can tank :(
- It helps us with balance
No , now you are trying to balance content based on multiple "base" stats and or ability's. Do not use the argument of balance , when in fact you are making it more complex. If anything balance needs to be established without prog even being considered for proper itemization and mob difficulty.
- It plays into the fine tuning of dungeons, quaternity and group availability in a group based game
No , rehashing content already completed has nothing to do with fine tuning content. As for group availability, this was addressed above in how a redone toon will be leveled.
- It helps stimulate the crafting and harvesting spheres by always having a supply/demand
No , if anything it will have little or no effect. A person will have ton's of mats or people backing them if they have already played to end game once then progged back down in level. If anything there probably sitting on entire bank full's of gear to use as the character gets marched back to top level.
- It helps by keeping the economy continuously ticking over with player driven items through 1-50 level ranges.
No, it creates a horder situation where I am now keeping pieces of gear for when im in the level 1- 10 range 11 - 20 range and so on. These pieces will be farmed before it's even considered , that or will be spoon feed to a person by there friends or guilds that a established character that starts over will already have in place.
Just a quick response to Xxar. It's way too early to say what progeny is. I'm not aware of anything really being set in stone. I am aware of what the goals are behind it so a better way to look at things, in my opinion, is asking what is the most realistic way of achieving these goals, and how impactful do we want them to be? I have done my research on various features that have been compared to progeny and at the end of the day, there are many different ways something like this could be implemented. The why has been established, not the how.
- It helps keep lower/mid level zones populated
This is a major factor here. Again, it really depends on how progeny is implemented, but if it encourages the "main-focused" players to re-level (when they otherwise would not have) then it will be a huge win. I know there are plenty of players out there just like me who prefer to dedicate themselves to their main character. A feature like progeny (depending on implementation) would allow us to re-level multiple times while still adhering to the "main-focused" ideology. I've seen it, I've done it, and will absolutely vouch that the impact is highly noticeable.
- It helps new players find their feet with level appropriate players
Similar to above ... seen it, done it, and will absolutely vouch that the impact is highly noticeable. I remember being in plenty of groups with seasoned veterans who were re-leveling. It's a night and day difference compared to someone who is instead rolling an alt. I specifically remember being a newbie and having the more tenured players going out of their way to show me the ropes of the game and help me perform to the best of my ability. The important distinction is that the "re-level phase" needs to be toggled some way, somehow. If players are forced to retire their main then Xxar would be correct in saying that those who participate will most likely be getting power-leveled in order to return to the higher tiers of content as fast as possible. It shouldn't be a "this or that" (end-game or progeny) choice. If it is then players will race through it because it would be highly inconvenient in respect to other agendas ... especially if they have a roster spot in any guild that raids.
- It helps us with horizontal progression instead of capping out and only having bottlenecked raiding/end game content (then leaking subscriptions -our main form of revenue- years down the track, while they wait for an expansion, which is a common trend in these types of games)
This is why progeny is the feature that I look forward to more than any other. The vast majority of my MMO experiences were similar to what is being described above. In many ways ... progeny (how I imagine it being implemented) is similar to AA's ... the big difference is that instead of just grinding for AA XP at max level, players can re-level while still feeling like they are advancing their character. This is what really reinforces the above two bullets. If the incentive to re-level is truly noticeable then players will absolutely do it. I understand that "some people" don't want to re-level. This is a situation where VR needs to determine what they prioritize. If you want people to continue replaying through the lower level tiers then you need to make it worth their time/effort. I have experience with a system where re-leveling was embraced across the board. It wasn't viewed as a chore or a timesink. It was an honor and privilege to be able to enjoy the game in it's entirety. People had better things to do than complain about a meaningful progression system that just so happened to boost the economy, community, replay value, and player reputation.
- It helps us with balance
The most obvious way this helps with balance, in my opinion, is that it allows the development team to implement a type of "diminishing returns" on progression. Leveling to max on your first go around is clearly going to offer you the most power/progression relative to the time invested. Re-leveling would still offer power/progression but it doesn't need to be so incredibly over-powered that it becomes "required by the players." If you consider the amount of time that it takes to re-level, and then imagine someone spending all of that time raiding, questing, grinding, whatever, instead ... I think it's fair to make the argument that in most cases you would be "more powerful" if you simply focused on end-game. If the path of least resistance to progression is centered completely around end-game content then that's where the majority of players will spend their time. Progeny could help balance zone populations and return on investment of time/effort.
- It plays into the fine tuning of dungeons, quaternity and group availability in a group based game
The group availability makes plenty of sense. The quaternity makes sense too, depending on implementation. As far as dungeons, a progeny-like feature can go a long way toward making lower-mid level dungeons desirable locations to play. The named bosses and their loot have more value when players continue to trickle into progeny. It affects supply/demand of players, loot, and trade in positive ways.
- It helps stimulate the crafting and harvesting spheres by always having a supply/demand
This one is also super obvious. Instead of players being congested toward end-game, there could be a consistent amount of activity in each and every sphere/level range. How much success this particular bullet sees (same with all, but this has a broader effect) is highly dependent on how many people participate. Again, both the supply and demand of crafted merchandise and harvestables are affected in a positive way. It's great!
- It helps by keeping the economy continuously ticking over with player driven items through 1-50 level ranges.
Yep. I feel like this one is a by-product of everything else but it feels really organic. There will be level 50 players who are in the market for a pair of level 10 boots. The level 10 player who gets these rare boots can actually sell them for a small fortune. This is because the "target market" for this item isn't soley based around brand new level 10 players who can't afford to pay the relative value of the item. It doesn't matter what level range we're talking about ... there are more buyers, more sellers, and that creates better competition in the market place. Items in general feel more valuable.
@oneAd
Not disagreeing with most your points but this one seems a bit away from the reality :
- It helps us with balance
The most obvious way this helps with balance, in my opinion, is that it allows the development team to implement a type of "diminishing returns" on progression. Leveling to max on your first go around is clearly going to offer you the most power/progression relative to the time invested. Re-leveling would still offer power/progression but it doesn't need to be so incredibly over-powered that it becomes "required by the players." If you consider the amount of time that it takes to re-level, and then imagine someone spending all of that time raiding, questing, grinding, whatever, instead ... I think it's fair to make the argument that in most cases you would be "more powerful" if you simply focused on end-game. If the path of least resistance to progression is centered completely around end-game content then that's where the majority of players will spend their time. Progeny could help balance zone populations and return on investment of time/effort.
It will break balance. By a way or another, maybe not enough to make it a problem at all. But a system allowing to relevel for bonuses is making the balance worse and cannot "help" with balance at all. All it allows, is two characters of the same level, same class, the same gear, but a different efficiency outside of sole gameplay. So no, it helps nothing in this way. What it does is rewarding the cost of loosing your level for a long term benefit, and rewarding players for single character investment, but not help balance at all.
I agree with Xxar that it might not solve much issues with levelling zones and such. I fear most of thoses who uses progeny on a regular basis are enough invested in the game to do it with premade parties and not benefit much to the lone players. Some will not, but when you reach max level and can affort doing everything again with the same toon, that usually means you've done everything you can at max level already.
Part of the reason why it is being considered optional is that all of those goals can also be covered by other types of systems.
For example, mentoring solves all of those problems as well, but it is good to have multiple options that are solutions to some of those issues.
MauvaisOeil said:
Not disagreeing with most your points but this one seems a bit away from the reality :
It will break balance. By a way or another, maybe not enough to make it a problem at all. But a system allowing to relevel for bonuses is making the balance worse and cannot "help" with balance at all. All it allows, is two characters of the same level, same class, the same gear, but a different efficiency outside of sole gameplay. So no, it helps nothing in this way. What it does is rewarding the cost of loosing your level for a long term benefit, and rewarding players for single character investment, but not help balance at all.
I agree with Xxar that it might not solve much issues with levelling zones and such. I fear most of thoses who uses progeny on a regular basis are enough invested in the game to do it with premade parties and not benefit much to the lone players. Some will not, but when you reach max level and can affort doing everything again with the same toon, that usually means you've done everything you can at max level already.
Again, it depends on implementation. So if we're talking about balance let's consider racial passives for a moment. I heard that in EQ there were "meta choices" for race/class combinations. You had to play X race if you wanted to be the best possible class Y. If you allow characters to unlock multiple racial passives as an incentive from progeny, it allows each of the racial passives to maintain their ability to be distinctive from others while simultaneously eliminating the "meta choice." Instead of players feeling forced to play a certain combination they can re-level multiple times and unlock a variety of passives that align with their playstyle. Instead of seeing bland racial passives in the name of "balance" you can make them meaningful without pigeonholing players into picking what's "best."
Trying to compare a stock game with min / max race combo's with 20 years of content has no bearing on the discussion of progeny at all.
The current situation with EQ is the ability to switch races on the fly based on the tier of progression . Ie it starts with ogres being the primary races and as the expansions unfold , the other races out perform after a certain point due to the initial over wealming OP racial abilitys are negated. This is all acomplished with the insert credit card number here scheme that eq is now.
To make it of any value , the racial modifiers in the long term need to be based and balanced to all the races being equal in a sense or the end game value is negated period . This means otherwise no matter how you want to slice it ... there will be a "best" race unless you have the above option of insert payment here to change the toon or ALL the viable races can compete on a equal footing from the start.
The entire problem I see is the loss of true progression via prog is , if a character is made to "restart" even for people that are dedicated to one character. It is counter productive , unless the accomplishments transfers to the prog and this is compounded by the fact the entire point is then negated when speaking of restarting.
Example ... you make a toon , bust balls to do achievements , flag for various zones and or bosses and do those 1000 AA., to then have them either no transfer over ? Unless the restarting value is equivalent to all the above time invested and real "progression" value wise. I do not see a viable reason or one that equates to a net bonus , so in effect you have a system that basicly will set you backwards unless the previous work carrries over defeating the entire concept.
This is even less desireable when you add in expansions and time investment , as new content is released the reality is the older content will be played less in general that makes the chances of accomplishing the already accomplished achievements that I lost just to get back to where you originally where before prog is even less realistic.
If someone loses all the above progression , the reality is it equates to a net loss not only in the aspect of time invested but real progression in the terms of accomplishments or flagging or whatever artifical gates that will be "reset" in essence. This almost counter productive to any future content developed or any long term development goals if it does reset.
I will answer some of the previous goals and give you realistic solutions , since that is the realistic goal of the discussion.
- It helps keep lower/mid level zones populated
There needs to be a leveling curve that pushes progression and the want to move forward into harder content. With that being said , that means a complete mastery and understanding of encounters and mechanics that scale with difficulty in the level various tier or level range of the content. I am a believer that not everyone should or is guarrenteed to see end game. If you suck and keep dying , then you deserve to be stuck in the level 30 range until you figure out what you are doing wrong , and improve performance. That means risk vs reward , and deleveling and harder content ... thats how you keep it populated ... not everyone gets out of this stage . The pro to this concept is the value to each class (res , mes , aggro control , cures etc.) and knowing this from a developers point of view that ... a player has the basic understanding of game mechanics and a certain level of content and can handle harder situations. That means the level 40 content , the person knows the above mechanics otherwise they have not or will not make it to the next tier of content.
- It helps new players find their feet with level appropriate players.
This simply has nothing to do with the system IMO. In fact there is other features that are better at this then prog. The ability to create quality content , and a mentoring system is all that is needed here. Anything more is basicly dillution of another base system in reality. To solve this issue , there needs to be a reason , incentive and not having a feeling of losing progression to make prog a viable system.
- It helps us with horizontal progression instead of capping out and only having bottlenecked raiding/end game content (then leaking subscriptions -our main form of revenue- years down the track, while they wait for an expansion, which is a common trend in these types of games)
I agree with the statment , it needs to be prioritized and have a real reason on why , it is worth while otherwise the reason's on why, it wont work will become glaring .
This also needs to be done from the start otherwise , it will impact all future content with all the reason's I am stating.
- It helps us with balance
Once again , this system and balance need to be entirely seperate conversations. The game needs to be balanced at the core level , and prog needs to be tweaked to fit into the established system .. not the other way around. The system really has nothing to do with balance , if anything it will and should skew balance making it easier the second time around since in essence the toon will have some sort of bonus.
- It plays into the fine tuning of dungeons, quaternity and group availability in a group based game
This realy has nothing to do with the system either , as stated a introductionary character trying to break content with someone that has already played the entire game will be in entirely diffrently leagues not only in gear , understanding of the game , ability to twink , and or available resources. This has nothing to do with tuning at all , if anything with most gear being tradeable ... it devalues high value items do to more of a influx in the market ... if they even hit the market and not horded with the first time I leveled to cap.
- Harvesting and economy
This has nothing to do with the system either. The same non prog player can harvest level 1 - 10 things as a progged level 1-10 . The only difference is more then likely the prog has a few thousand plat sitting in the bank and or 1000's of mats waiting to redo crafting ... instead of it going on the market in the first place. I won't sell things , if im going to need them knowing im going to prog. If anything I might skip crafting entirely until I no longer need to "reset" and start over so im not wasting time , that can be used in real progression.
- Market - Why does a person that has already done 50 levels of content once need a pair of level 10 boots ? I expect that person to already have BIS boots from the first time , they have done the content or took the hour and farmed it at level 50 for when there going to be setting themselfs up for the prog back to level 1.
There still going to have all the gear , they aquired the first time around and if anything better gear then when it was first accomplished. That or you are destroying the entire concept of twinking in the first place , because more then likely there going to have level 40 or 50 gear going on the prog if twinking is viable.
Xxar what are your thoughts on a system like this?
(Disclaimer: This is theory-crafting!)
Traits
I understand your points about losing progression and all that. I agree with them. If the feature requires you to truly "sacrifice" a max-level character just to start a new one, that would be very bad IMO. When I think of oldschool hardcore MMO's there is just way too much going on with our characters to ever consider sacrificing them. I would much prefer a system that allows you to keep your max level character and have the option to toggle back and forth between it and the younger generation at select locations. You retain everything you have worked for in the past but still have the option to continue advancing your character on future generations (re-leveling the progeny) in order to pass down traits when they are merged.
As far as Progeny/RoP being class abilities for the shaman, don't put too much emphasis on that. It's just an idea but you could just as easily implement this same exact system with NPC's. The main point is that players have flexibility in being able to rotate back and forth between the parent/progeny. It functions similar to an alt in the sense that it can be a new race/class but it shares most of the prior progression from the original character. This is what I meant earlier where a system like this could be used as a way to get "main-focused" players to re-level when they otherwise would not have. They are adding value to all of those bullets from the previous list because they are stimulating the lower tiers of content and the economy.
oneADseven said:Your point, Trustar, is exactly why I'd like to see progeny end up being a system that does, indeed, encourage the majority of players to use it. I know it's been dubbed as an "optional" feature ... just like crafting, harvesting, epic quests, awesome spells/abilities, etc. I understand the argument of "If you allow people to grow in power then people will feel compelled to do it!" I always thought it was a weak argument. If the goal behind the feature is to help deliver on:
- It helps keep lower/mid level zones populated
- It helps new players find their feet with level appropriate players
- It helps us with horizontal progression instead of capping out and only having bottlenecked raiding/end game content (then leaking subscriptions -our main form of revenue- years down the track, while they wait for an expansion, which is a common trend in these types of games)
- It helps us with balance
- It plays into the fine tuning of dungeons, quaternity and group availability in a group based game
- It helps stimulate the crafting and harvesting spheres by always having a supply/demand
- It helps by keeping the economy continuously ticking over with player driven items through 1-50 level ranges.
Then it probably does make sense to implement it in a way where a lot of players feel compelled to use it! Now keep in mind that even if implemented how I personally have imagined it working (ideally) -- players would still get to the point where they would reach the cap on progeny generations. The main point is that it's going to take a long time before people get there and it would extend the overall progression and add a ton of replay value to the game. I've been that max-level-bored-player countless times in past MMO games. I have also seen a world, that has incredible content in all level ranges, and where the above listed effects were considered strengths rather than weaknesses. I'm sure there are plenty of games, and style of games, that have utilized some sort of re-leveling feature in the past. The key is to find a way to make it work for a game like this ... an old-school MMO world where it's about the journey rather than the destination. It's been done before.
Will the progeny system be at all similar to the Reincarnation System in Dungeons & Dragons Online? That is a system that actually has worked very well.
Nobody knows how it's going to function, exactly. I have never heard it compared to reincarnation/ascension or any other feature from an actual MMO. Kilsin did once say that it would function similar to remort from MUD's. In any event, we're still a ways off yet before we know exactly how it's going to work. It was stated early on that we might have to retire a character, but it was never set in stone. It was later acknowledged that the retirement aspect was probably asking too much and alternatives were being considered. Anything you hear about progeny at this point in time is pretty much nothing but speculation.
Trustar said:Will the progeny system be at all similar to the Reincarnation System in Dungeons & Dragons Online? That is a system that actually has worked very well.
From the little bit of information we have been given, the Reincarnation system in DDO will likely be similar yes.
Here is a quote from Kilsin that 187 referenced about remort:
...we have shown a brief glimpse at what we want for the Progeny system but if you want details they will come much later when we fully implement the system.
If you want to get an idea of how this kind of system works and why it is used, feel free to - with an open mind - research into the old Remort system from MUDs, it has been around for years and can be tailored to fit into any game successfully.
DDOs reincarnation system is about the closest thing we have in current mmos to an old remort type of system. That is why I believe progeny will likely be similar.
I researched remort and found an article that Richard Bartle has referenced:
by Natalia
Remort is another one of those jargon words in the mudding community. This short article is of course intended for those who don't know what it means and to provide a short overview. We've had any number of people who have asked what the term refers to, and about 80% of the people who submit a new listing to our game list leave the remort question as "unknown", even though it should be a simple yes/no question.
Once your character has reached a certain level and often a certain experience point value, you can have the character "start over". For example, on muds with 50 levels they may require you to reach level 51 in order to be able to remort or they may require you to be 1 experience point away from level 51. Occasionally, the requirement is to reach a particular level (e.g. 50) and attain some additional experience point amount before you can remort. Finally, remort is sometimes given as a reward for winning a certain number of quests or as a purchase with a large amount of money.
There are many, many different ways that remort is implemented so I'm just going to cover some typical examples and ways it is used. Just to avoid confusion, perhaps 1 in 100 games refer to this process as "rerolling". Just about everybody else uses "rerolling" to mean a chance during character generation to change your starting stats or when a player suicides/deletes a character to "reroll" them with better stats. For the rare game that uses "rerolling" instead, you'll know that it's just a different name for remort.
Remort can occur at different times:
-a designated level, such as level 50 out of 100, where you have the chance to add a second class to your character to expand on his skills and spells
-at Hero or Adept level (that is, when you have gone as high as you can without becoming an immortal) you are often given the chance to start again
-or only after you have passed a designated quest point limit, or have earned enough money, or other similar systems
Remort affects your stats and equipment differently:
-you almost universally keep your money and equipment, even though you have started back at level 1 or 2
-sometimes you retain your current mana, hit points and movement
-at other times you only get to keep a percentage of your current values (e.g. 50% of your mana, hit points, movement)
-occasionally you start with your stats completely back to "raw" format, stripped of all level advantages
-almost universally you retain the skills and spells you have already learned, at the level you have learned them to
-on some games when you have reached a stage where you can remort, you are often asked by the game system ("You may remort now. Would you like to?") to remort; you can always say no and continue the way you are going currently
-on many games you have to type in a special command ("remort cleric") in order for it to take effect
-on a few games you have to ask a Wizard/God/Implementor to do the actual remort
-finally, on a few games remort is a reward earned through a certain number of quest points or as a reward for a particular kind of gameplay
Remort can offer certain advantages:
-maybe in choosing a second class you have retained all the skills and spells you learned and a portion of the hit points and mana goodies
-sometimes you gain access to special classes with different and unique skills and spells
-on some rare occasions you get to remort two or more times, and each different time through you have access to a different set of classes (all with their own skills, spells, and other advantages)
-from a player's viewpoint, you have a better idea of the world and now have the advantage of actual skills or better equipment than you had the last time through; you are less likely to die as often and better able to handle the game world.
There are many reasons for having remort, from an admin perspective. Most importantly (in my opinion) is that it gives your higher level players something to continue to work towards or for. It's frustrating having a bunch of really bored players who loved the game when they started (weeks or months ago) but now have nothing else to do. Obviously there are other things you can have them doing besides remort (special high-level quests, special areas just for those of that level, access to being guild leaders if they have made a certain level only and so forth), but it is another option you can offer them.
You can reward your long-term players with some nifty new classes or special skills and spells. Those that are willing to play your game long enough to earn the right of a remort will often continue playing longer and have more loyalty to your game. After all, they've worked hard to get where they are! These classes may be considered more powerful and hence more desired than the initial starting classes that everyone chooses from. They may have new spells or skills that are unique amongst the different classes. Finally, on games that use class-based equipment, adding equipment that only the remort classes can use is also a draw for players.
Finally, on some games the only way to have multiple classes is through the remort system. That is, you have to start over again if you want to have access to more than one class and one set of skills. On games that start out with multi-classing from the beginning this is probably no nearly as novel, but it can add some spice to those games that do not have multi-classing available any other way.
There are tons of games that have remort systems already in place. I highly encourage you to go check them out, if you've never seen such a system. I've had tons of fun actually getting a character to remort and enjoying some of the advantages of it! Obviously it works better on some games than others but there is a huge diversity in how the systems work so you're likely to find a game that is fun for you.
Keeping an open mind, here are my takeaways:
-There are many reasons to have a remort-like feature.
-There are many, many different ways that remort can be implemented.
-The "advantages" discussed in this article mostly revolve around multi-classing but I think "multi-racing" might make more sense in a game like Pantheon due to the emphasis on role interdependence and the quaternity.
-Allowing a parent/progeny toggle makes the feature more accessible to the high level players it's designed to keep engaged.
The entire point of the system is to trickle top end players in essence to reroll. There is no real need to make it a complex. This is my take on it and it gives incentive to everything you want as stated above ... also giving a true replay of rehashed content at the same time keeping it simple.
Paladin levels to 50 ... progs to level 1 Cavalier .... they retain all the paladin ability's and a handful of entirely new abilitys not available to a paladin. That or a entirely new skill set overall. This does a few things one it allows developers to have time to create and balance additional classes , limits the influx of those classes and also makes those classes sought after instead of a oh , you are a wizard with a + 10 int modifer.
This can be used for almost any future class Rog > Bard using one that is in the air as a example.
This concept can work on any additional class the dev's want to add at a later date , without destroying the already invested time into a toon also giving a true sense of accomplishment and at the same time a bit of that OOoo factor that is needed in the industry.
Now all those people waiting to roll bard , do not feel there simply waiting for bard to be released so they reroll ... now they have something to strive for.
There in essence playing a new character that is not available without the prog and restarting over making it a experience not a hassle.
Roenick said:I think there's a good reason to do it in that you're constantly refeshing lower level characters for influx of new players. I think to work, it would depend on the balance of benefits. Too much would make higher level characters over powered, too little and there's no real reason to it. What if it unlocked a series of AA type situations? Like an ancestory tree or something that added both small stat benefits as well as some sort of cosmetic or RP aspects (own a bigger piece of land/home or something of that nature).
Personally, even though the game had its faults I loved the way FF XI handled the issue of keeping things fresh, by allowing you to level mutliple classes but limited the ones you could use at one time and put level/ability resctrictions on the sub-class. For those who never played, each class had to also be leveled up separately. It was almost like leveling alts, but with same character. Never understood why no one else ever adapted that part of the game.
This is the first time I have seen this comment (from this thread: https://www.pantheonmmo.com/content/forums/topic/3056/the-progeny-system-what-say-you/view/page/1 ) but it's really nice to know that there is at least one person working for VR who has personal experience with the sub-class system from FFXI and understands how it could translate to something like progeny. (I don't think Roenick was officially with the team when he made that comment.) It's really not all that complicated of a feature. FFXI is an older game and it's my understanding that it was actually inspired by EQ. I feel the sub-class system in that game was Square Enix's attempt of tailoring remort for an old-school hardcore MMORPG. They nailed it.
I take any comment that Square Enix nailed *anything*other than very good story-driven cutscenes with a huge amount of scepticism. Of course you may be right I never played FFXI.
But it doesn't matter - the question is whether VR *will* nail it using past efforts like FFXI and DDO among others as things to improve upon.
This thread has turned into more about Progeny, and I think that’s appropriate as VR has said they are planning on some form of of it an Kilsin has directed us to the “Remort system from MUD’s” if Progeny makes it into game then I think it directly effects MAX Level.
Obviously we have little to no info on what they can or will allow players to keep, can they be the same class, same race, etc.? We really don’t know WHAT they keep once they Prog back to a beginning level.
In an earlier thread about Progeny I mentioned a Wizard and then Prog’ing back to a Warrior and being able to keep say a fireball spell from his time as a Wizard (sort of like a wanna-be War wizard) It was immediately pointed out that would be too OP (and some considered that making Progeny a requirement that VR has said Progeny won’t be… this one I disagree with but that’s for another post) so let's say for example..
Wizard--> Warrior you have a fireball throwing warrior
Monk--> Cleric and you get a Cleric that can FD
Cleric--> Warrior and you have a self healing Warrior
Etc..
Keep in mind VR can always scale these abilitys to what they think would balance things the way they want... the Warriors Fireball does not HAVE to be 100% of a Wizard's fireball.
Then let’s look at other games where MAX Level just keeps climbing. EQ or WOW now has level 100’s that can go back and easily solo any lower level Boss. This is indeed OP, but it’s also not for level appropriate content. So that’s a difference. But none the less OP happens in all games.
VR is making Pantheon with a focus on group content. There will be some Solo, as well as some raid, but the majority will be for group.
My question to you all, Is it really that game breaking or OP if the second time around a full group of first generation Progenies can do this 6 group content with a group of 5 or 4, Or even if a single 6 generation Progeny can now solo this group content? If a player is 6th generation that could be considered the equivalent of a level 300 (6 times he’s made it 50 levels) , he SHOULD be pretty OP .
Lower level Dungeons could be added during expansion that would simply not be manageable by groups with less than multiple generation players (for example a dungeon is tuned for not a group of 6 level 20’s players, but a group of 6 level 20”s with a total of 10 generations, 6 first generation level 20 chars would get owned, but if they had 5 first gen’s and one 5th generation character with them they might make it.
Zorkon said:This thread has turned into more about Progeny, and I think that’s appropriate as VR has said they are planning on some form of of it an Kilsin has directed us to the “Remort system from MUD’s”
My question to you all, Is it really that game breaking or OP if the second time around a full group of first generation Progenies can do this 6 group content with a group of 5 or 4, Or even if a single 6 generation Progeny can now solo this group content? If a player is 6th generation that could be considered the equivalent of a level 300 (6 times he’s made it 50 levels) , he SHOULD be pretty OP .
To directly answer your questions: it is not OP if a full group of first gen progeny characters can do content with 4 or 5 people that is tuned for a full group of 6.
It is completely OP if a single 6th gen progeny can do content that is tuned for a full group of standard players. I agree. It should be diminishing returns.
On e thing that should be mentioned is that one of the few bits of official info we have received pertaining to progeny is that there will be a limit to the amount of times a player can gain benefits by using the progeny system. I don't think a 6 x progeny character will be relevant.
philo said:Zorkon said:This thread has turned into more about Progeny, and I think that’s appropriate as VR has said they are planning on some form of of it an Kilsin has directed us to the “Remort system from MUD’s”
My question to you all, Is it really that game breaking or OP if the second time around a full group of first generation Progenies can do this 6 group content with a group of 5 or 4, Or even if a single 6 generation Progeny can now solo this group content? If a player is 6th generation that could be considered the equivalent of a level 300 (6 times he’s made it 50 levels) , he SHOULD be pretty OP .
To directly answer your questions: it is not OP if a full group of first gen progeny characters can do content with 4 or 5 people that is tuned for a full group of 6.
It is completely OP if a single 6th gen progeny can do content that is tuned for a full group of standard players. I agree. It should be diminishing returns.
On e thing that should be mentioned is that one of the few bits of official info we have received pertaining to progeny is that there will be a limit to the amount of times a player can gain benefits by using the progeny system. I don't think a 6 x progeny character will be relevant.
Yea the numbers I was giving (6th generation in perticular) were hypothetical extremes. And I think I recall them mentioning a limit to the number of times as you say.
So this poses another question. (New hypothetical senerio)
Max level is 50
You can Prog. At 50.
Fast players move through this,quickly and are now 3rd generation max level 50"s
10 years down the road I'm dilly Salling around skipping through the tulips and just coming up on level 50.. Max vertical game level has been moved to 90.
Would Progeny still be available to me at 50, or would that have been moved upto 90 as the game has expansions released.
If they increase the required level for Progeny with expansions it would have the adverse effect of promoting a rush to current Max level before,Progeny is moved out of one's reach.
No?
Zorkon said:Would Progeny still be available to me at 50, or would that have been moved upto 90 as the game has expansions released.
If they increase the required level for Progeny with expansions it would have the adverse effect of promoting a rush to current Max level before,Progeny is moved out of one's reach.
No?
Good question but I think that is getting a bit ahead of ourselves worrying about what it will look like once there are lvl cap increases.
(I started listing a few different alternatives but it is such speculation that it seems like kind of a waste. I'll just stick with the obvious one mentioned below.)
Simply always make progeny able to be used at max lvl is probably the way to go.
I don't think there would be any more of a "rush" to max lvl than normal before a cap increase as people want to be ready for the new higher lvl content anyway. A lvl cap increase is actually more likely to make people want to wait on progeny to not miss out on the new content by restarting. I think that might be a good choice for players to have to make.
Games progress. With higher lvl gear/exp/mobs available, keeping the ability to access progeny at lvl 50 might neuter the system.
Zorkon said:My question to you all, Is it really that game breaking or OP if the second time around a full group of first generation Progenies can do this 6 group content with a group of 5 or 4, Or even if a single 6 generation Progeny can now solo this group content? If a player is 6th generation that could be considered the equivalent of a level 300 (6 times he’s made it 50 levels) , he SHOULD be pretty OP .Lower level Dungeons could be added during expansion that would simply not be manageable by groups with less than multiple generation players (for example a dungeon is tuned for not a group of 6 level 20’s players, but a group of 6 level 20”s with a total of 10 generations, 6 first generation level 20 chars would get owned, but if they had 5 first gen’s and one 5th generation character with them they might make it.
I think this is getting dangerously close and probably crossing the line of making participating in the Progeny system mandatory.
I would prefer the progeny system not provide any power benefits to any character and instead provide only cosmetic achievements.