Basically I think levels and experience systems set up unduly artificial milestones for the player to reach and always end up as a grindfest.

The problem is, that there is not a problem at all.

The only problem I see is, that games try to satisfy everyone at once. But the truth is, there are lot of people who like unduly artifical milestones, level and exp, and there're lot of people who dislike it. The same can be said about grinding, class-vs-skill based system, gear-vs-attribute based system etc. etc.

My critique about this counter-design paradigma is, that people tend to design anti-pattern of existing design pattern, instead of designing something fresh, purely inspired. And yes, there's a difference between 'I want to design something which is a counter to something existing' and 'I want to design something which I really like to play', even if the latter comprised old design.

I think a game where players do not gain stats over time might be great for pvp and cooperative questing, because theoretically someone who had been playing a week could fight on equal footing against or beside someone who had been playing a year. But it's difficult to find replacement rewards to motivate players with if you can't give them gear with better stats or visible improvements in their fighting ability. Giving them a wider variety of fighting options is a possibility, but if the new options are too useful then pvp is again screwed up between new and old players, and if the options aren't useful, players won't care. If the game has a major non-combat side, such as a pet-breeding or crop-growing sim, players could be rewarded for their time with items and abilities related to that instead.

I don't think there would be much point in removing levels from a single player RPG, I don't see any benefit to not having levels in that kind of environment. It works ok in action-adventure games like some of the Zeldas and Okami, but that's because ability upgrades replace leveling.

Well the only argument I have here is that it wouldn't really be an RPG and that's allright.

Experience points do not make an RPG, role play does!!

I'm a big fan of Zelda: A Link to the Past, but it is not an RPG by any stretch.[/quote]In the telling of an epic story, you play the 'hero' role of Link. Your character progresses by obtaining new tools, relics and magic powers as you explore the open world of Hyrule, carry out quests, solve dungeon puzzles and engage in tactical combat. Sounds an awful lot like an RPG to me.

Imagine: characters with static skills, and the challenge is how best to use the skills they have to overcome what obstacles the game throws at them.

I have quite some difficulty in understanding how it could work. Last game with RPG elements I've played was Borderlands. Once you acquire your skills, it is possible to pay to shuffle them. I've never used this feature.

When it comes to RPGs, the GURPS ruleset is indeed The Right Way to do this in my opinion. It is still geared towards evolving players by increasing their skill points. Shuffling is not forbidden but I don't recall it being encouraged either.

Guild wars does the level system nicely, its easy to get to lvl 20 but then you need to learn your skills and professions to get good.

I think what most people are missing is that leveling up is "fun".
It has the psychological benefit that you "get better", "progressed", "grow stronger", "achieved something".
Also, it makes the game evolve: you discover new skills, have to make long term decisions, tweak your character, affects the gameplay, etc.

Without that, the game is more static and you know everything from the start.
Nevertheless, if the game is ok, it still can be fun, especially if it's a "casual game".
...but you know how people like upgrades ;)

Final Fantasy Tactics.

This is very much alike Final Fantasy 5 but more fleshed out. FF5 was a game that could work without leveling up, but it had jobs and gear which, although isn't said, is essentially leveling you up as you find it. The idea of character progression is inherent to RPG design, not just in the form of a progress bar, but in the sense that you unlock more content as you go, forcing you ever onwards through this exploration of game mechanics.
This is essentially the same formula as action-adventure (Zelda) applied differently.
A game with everything at the start would get somewhat boring. Technically, you start SOTN with everything, but are quickly stripped down to make everything fun again. You need to explore to recover lost powers to access new areas and so on and so forth. I doubt people would find the game appealing if you could skip to Dracula because you're strong enough and have all the necessary skills.
Character progression makes the game enjoyable and the journey meaningful.

The game where I first started thinking about this was Final Fantasy Tactics. For those of you unfamiliar with the system, you have a main job (skillset 1 + your char's stats) a sub-job (skillset 2) and a reacion ability, passive support ability, and a movement ability. I was thinking to myself, why not just unlock all skills from the beginning and let the player choose what he'd like the char to be good at. (all support abilities would be in the same group, ie, there would be 3 support slots for abilities). So for instance you could pick a main job that maybe didn't have the best stats or the most uber abilities but it has a wider range of equips. then you choose a sub-job that gives you a skillset that makes use of accurate attacks, sacrificing some power in order to hit more often. Then you'd choose your supports. Anyway, you could create a totally different character with, say a mainjob that isn't the best at melee but has good magic stats, making it a good "carrier" job for the sub-job, which would be whatever school of magic the player wanted that char to specialize in. Or you could create a wizard that has both a magic wielding main-job and for it's sub-job, a different school of magic.

The main issue is it will make it very hard for players to start the game. They will have tons of options thrown at them without knowing how things work and they will either feel crushed under the sheer number of options or pick whatever and never explore the other options. Imagine Diablo 3 gave you access to all skill and runes from the start. You would have skimmed through them, picked something and never looked back. By unlocking them over the levels, the player slowly learns about skills as he progresses and is encouraged to check other options at the same time.

It could work. RPGs, at the end of the day, are roleplaying games, not "level up and point spending games." The hard part, however, would be to have that sense of progression. If you have the sense of progression only within the story, then those not as interested in the story will not have much reason to play, and you've just essentially done a disservice to them.

So there would have to be some mechanical milestones for progression that the player could cling to. What you would do in that case instead of xp/levels isn't really something I've thought long and hard about, so it's not really something I could brainstorm right now.

Two types of games where I could imagine this system:

1) A JRPG or TRPG: There are multiple storylines, and depending on your choices and investigations, you gain access to certain pre-generated characters. For instance, you start the game as an imperial soldier, and do a quest as him. If you took a detour and talked to the imperial intelligence officer, you gain access to his storyline. Otherwise, and in addition, once you finish the imperial soldier's quest you have access to a noob rebel. So you look at the story from multiple points of view, and your progression is measured by how many optional sub-plots you take.

2) An MMO. Now what I'd really like to see in an MMO, and this is probably worthy of another thread entirely, is something like a 5:1 NPC:PC ratio. The NPC's are able to be manipulated beyond what any game has allowed. So one progress bar in the MMO is how you manipulate NPC's to do your bidding. For instance, if you have a quest to assassinate an NPC baron, you could round up a posse of PC's and do it yourself, or you could somehow acquire the gold necessary to hire an NPC assassin.