That''s basically going back to orionx103''s suggestion.

I got the impresion that his idea actually REQUIRED a certain level before the area could be entered. A sort of "**Access Denied: Level 43 Clearance Required**" sort of thing. I'd rather see places where it would just be stupid to go without proper badassitude, or maybe just sixteen guys.

Also, I'd want the game to be bound by areas that nobody could really hope to survive in for long, rather than by mountains or cliffs or something. Have the edges of the world be populated by "God Monsters" who could kill any player with one hit, and could never be harmed. If you were lucky, you'd be able to avoid them long enough to maybe grab one or more of the fabulous treasures they guarded, but gettin gout of there would be just stupid difficult.

If I had to divide it into strata, I'd do it something like this:

Nexus: No danger, fun filled fun for everyone. Commerce, chatting, etc.

1: Open fields. Good places for tournaments or other contests, the few critters you might encounter would run from a newb, and not be worth the effort to chase, unless they were leprechauns or something. Nothing of value. Good roads, some small towns and farms.

2: Farther out. Some enemies that you could convince to attack you if you dressed up as an old woman made out of candy, but nothing that a weak character can't handle. Roads are still pretty good, but only a few other man-made things. Get your first taste of fighting here, and you might find some common items (herbs, semi-precious stones) that may or may not be worth selling.

3: Weak enemy zone. Still some clear paths, and you can buy maps of this region, but merchants will want a few guards here. Weak predators and some bandits might be seen. Some levelling can be done here, and a handful of items can be collected.

4: Medium enemy zone. Get some friends or raise some levels, because there are scary things here. Wolves, brigands, the odd lizardman or giant crab. The top of the bell curve. Good opportunity for experience, and really about as far as anyone will go alone unless they are extremely powerful. A handful of caves or dungeons, but nothing complex and nothing too difficult. The caves will often have treasure.

5: Strong enemy zone. This place is patrolled by dangerous monsters who are out to get you. Dungeons and caves are here with giant monsters living in them. Dragons, chimeras, golems, and all kinds of other horrors await. If you're here, you're either maxxed out for fighting, really dumb, or surrounded by your friends. Rare and valuable things can be found here.

6: Incredible enemy zone. you only come here if you have a whole team of people who can handle level 5 on their own. The "boss" enemies from the dungeons in five roam wild here, and if you aren't careful, you'll be fighting multiple dragons or giants simultaneously. Stealth helps, but if you're spotted, you have to either run like your balls are on fire or know a really good spell. The items here are magnificent, and usually unique.

Outlands: God Monster zone. No matter how tough you are, you can't beat these things. These are too tough to be hurt, and too smart to be avoided. If you come here, you will die, unless you run like a sunuvabitch as soon as you think you might have heard something. If you find an item here and get it back to the nexus, you're a made man.

Or something to that effect. You try a little farther every time you go out, or else you put together a team (at a bar in the nexus) to try for that dungeon, and divvy up the spoils.

[edited by - Iron Chef Carnage on January 7, 2004 9:09:58 PM]

Early in the thread:

quote:

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(Wutalife37): Unfortunately the design of the game doesn''t allow for ganging up on people. It is impossible to make ganging up work, so it isn''t an option.
I want things to be as equal as possible between the two fighters.
[...]
The dueling idea also would not work.

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A few postings later, same poster says:

quote:

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We need to think outside the box. It can be done well, it''s just a matter of finding out how.

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You''ve given three arbitrary constraints, and a saying that isn''t quite compatible with them. Certainly, "time==power" is not the be-all of models. But if you''re under such strict constraints, what leeway do you actually have?

I agree with TechnoGoth. (and TG, if I''m misinterpreting you, feel free to berate me ;-)) If I''ve spent 200+hrs on this game, and a newbie can beat me 50/50, then I''m not going to waste any more time playing.

Outside the "box" is fine, but I''ve played numerous games where time==power, and as a user, you learn how that works. As a runner of servers, you also know that your revenue/popularity/whatever also comes from repeat players -- so why cater to the 15min quickie?

Another option would be to involve the community. Instead of limiting the game allow the communities to enforce the laws of the land, whatever they may be. This brings in the possibility of real clans/guilds, revolts, elections and a whole slew of other civic options. If someone is a tyrant, allow them to be hunted like the dog they are and if the people doing the hunting happen to get slaughtered, that is part of life and death in the big city. On the other hand, if the tyrant gets taken to the wood shed enough times they may change their ways. And even if they don''t, isn''t that what epic struggles are all about? Of course there are the grief players but they can be handled in the same manner. Just my opinion.

"If you are not willing to try, you will never succeed! If you never succeed, are you really trying?"

Grellin
~Global Developers Union~

Have any of you ever played Runescape? In it, you are only allowed to PK in the special "Wilderness" area. Also, who you can fight out there is dependent on how far out in the wilderness you are. For example, in level 5 wilderness, you can only attack someone within 5 levels of you. Also, it has a deuling system for outside the wilderness. There are killable NPCs though...

Hmm... Interesting. You could scale the "difficulty" of the game by controlling who can fight who. I remember learning in "The Duellists" that Napoleanic soldiers were only allowed to duel against other soldiers of equal rank. The two main characters meet from time to time, and one is always alarmed to discover that the other has been promoted to his rank, and that they will indeed have to fight again. Neat movie.

Maybe if you refined the "level" system into something that would "match" players, you''d have a good system. Either make a duel system that requires an agreement between the players, or else somehow prevent bullying. you''d have to strike a hard balance between over-regulating the game world and allowing jerks to run rampant, but there''s always version 1.7 to tweak those rules.

It might be worth it to create an ingame policing system that involves hiring players to act as enforcers. It doesn''t have to be a GM/DM staff, it could just be a Guild that tries to act like New York''s Guardian Angels. Though, you would need the guild leader to be the equivalent of Curtis Sliwia, and that might be a hard act to keep up. Anyways, the skills of the enforcer class (or gained through guild enrollment) involve accurately determining the strength of enemies and determining who is a PKer (or a turnstile jumper ).

quote:

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Original post by Wutalife37
It''s been done before.

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rock em sock em robots!

quote:

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Original post by Inmate2993
It might be worth it to create an ingame policing system that involves hiring players to act as enforcers. It doesn't have to be a GM/DM staff, it could just be a Guild that tries to act like New York's Guardian Angels. Though, you would need the guild leader to be the equivalent of Curtis Sliwia, and that might be a hard act to keep up. Anyways, the skills of the enforcer class (or gained through guild enrollment) involve accurately determining the strength of enemies and determining who is a PKer (or a turnstile jumper ).

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Exactly! Let the players have some control in the world they are playing in. That is the reason for a MMORPG, community involvement.


"If you are not willing to try, you will never succeed! If you never succeed, are you really trying?"

Grellin



[edited by - Grellin GDU on January 12, 2004 5:28:57 PM]

The only thing i would not want to see in a full pvp game is the high lvl player walking around killing low lvl players that never had a chance.

Not giving a reward for killing lows will not stop the bullies from going out and kill low players, it''s not the ingame rewards they look for, it''s the "wah ha ha i pwnd yoo* attitude.

So . give them a penatlty, if a player engages combat with a character more than X lvls below him he will actually loose exp or skills .. (can be explained in a way that if you constantly fight weak oponents you are getting *soft* *over confident* or alike .. they are no real match for you, so your high combat instincts are not trained anymore).

IF you get attacked by the low lvl then you will not loose any skills, again in an rpg aspect they tried to surprise you, because you would not expect them to attack a more skilled player, you had to react quickly, sharpening your reflexes ..

So if you want to go out and kill newbs just because you can, you will end up on they''re lvl sooner or later.

IF you don''t penalize someone for griefing low lvl players they won''t stop doing it.


(don''t mind my spelling please english is not my first language, so i end up using all lower case and hope to get the point allong. And sry for anonymous . wanted to post first, i''ll register in a sec)

Sombra