Hello,
As this is my first post on this forum, I apologise if the title is unclear or if this is the incorrect place to post (in which case I request a mod to move it to the right place).
While reading an old research article/paper on how to build an MMO, using WoW as a case study, I stumbled across a part discussing player engagement and character abandonment w.r.t time spent leveling and how it is broken up. Fast in the early levels, linear for a good chunk of the medium levels, and then slowing down to a crawl at higher levels. Source: https://nideffer.net/classes/270-08/week_06_wow/buildinganmmo_wow_etal.pdf
Personally, I have always found that its good to be able to breeze through at least a few levels in the beginning to keep players interested. From my own experience, not having a variety of skills to use makes the task of leveling feel labrious and I end up dropping the game if the combat doesn't open up soon. Of course this isnt true for everyone and I understand that. Just that the Fast-Early, Linear-Mid, Slow-Late progression seems to make sense to me from a perspective of combat and immersion.
Is this the only approach to player level progression or are there other ways of designing the leveling experience which are also viable? What are your thoughts about it?
