Sep 17
Solving the Grind
There was a great roundtable today at AGDC addressing the grind in MMOs. That’ll make it up on Massively soon, early next week most likely. In the meantime it’s set me to thinking about solving player frustrations ala Cameron/Silentstephi’s race/class conversation. Combine that too with the other day’s discussion of the 1-60 game and this is what I come up with:
- Players are required to level a character class ONLY once. When you reach max-level with a class, you ‘unlock’ it across all servers, both factions. Have a max-level priest? Now you can roll a new priest on a new server at a higher level.
- ‘Instacharacters’ should have level-appropriate gear, ala the DK.
- I’d suggest starting that level at 55, ala the DK. This level should scale as the game does. IE: Whenever World of Warcraft: “The Emerald Dream” comes out and raises the cap to 90 ‘instacharacters’ should start at 65 instead of 55.
I remember a few years back when Luke Smith suggested Blizzard letting folks just buy 60s after they’d already maxed one out, and being all scoffish. Yeah … actually that sounds like a great idea now.
6 comments6 Comments so far
Those suggestions are fantastic. There would actually be a point to grinding up to max level on every class.
When the game “starts at the level cap,” as so many of these things seem to, you really need to let people start where the game starts (or at least get there REALLY quickly).
Of course, WoW has all those old newbie zones that would actually be fun for people who want to play them. In addition to your instacharacters, I’d personally try to “fix leveling” by removing the transportation timesinks for new characters (free epic mount, all flight points unlocked, skill training in the field, possibly even new teleportation options) and dramatically speeding up leveling.
The more people talk about how the endgame is the game (and it is, at this point), the more I wonder what the point of having a lengthy “pre-game” then is. Do devs consider the pre-cap gameplay to be a lengthy tutorial, then?
Why have leveling at all, if that’s the case? It’s an effective carrot, but it also locks off content after a certain level. If you could find a way to keep players motivated to advance but allow them to explore any zones in any order somehow, would that be more fun in the longterm?
It seems like that would almost take us towards and MTG or Guild Wars style design (like I explained in a post a month or so ago) where advancement offered a larger breadth of options but your power level was roughly analogous to any other player.
I like MMORPGs for the end game – raiding and instance runs. The lengthy pre-game isn’t difficult or challenging. There is no challenge to finding a ? mark on the ground, clicking on it, and returning to the quest giver. Combat in EQ2, WAR, WOW is trivial EXCEPT in raids/boss encounters and some high end instances (and the leveling mechanic obviates that… in fact, the end game is only the real game because that’s the only place where tactics becomes paramount, since you can’t simply outlevel the encounter.)
While you still have the choice to tackle old content when its level appropriate, for an old game its almost impossible to find the necessary group members when all your friends are at the max level.
That’s why I don’t like leveling and would prefer an MTG or Guild Wars style design. You can keep Achievers motivated with collection mechanics and achievement unlocks without obsoleting old content and creating barriers (level or gear disparity) that prevents newer and veteran players from grouping together. And, as you said, expanding the game by adding a larger breadth of options, could keep the game fresh.
A large part of what makes Guild Wars interesting is retrying the same content with different builds. That’s fun. Retrying the same content in EQ2 with different classes, but having to go through a 260-hour 1-80 leveling curve (http://forums.station.sony.com/eq2/posts/list.m?topic_id=429922) that you’ve done three times before, is not.
For me, the interest in any game with multiple classes or races and such is playing as each of them. A leveling grind is an obstacle to that desire. Even being able to change “spec” at will in WoW would be a great thing, allowing experimentation and increasing interest. Leveling and onerous experimentation costs are simply bad design.
I’ve mixed opinions. On the one hand, the grind is miserable. On the other, the effort of leveling makes me learn at least some of my skills before I jump into the end-game play. It doesn’t guarantee I’ll know how to play, but it helps make it more likely.