Challenge as a Priority... Thanks to those who think so!

[GunnerX169]

cannabination wrote:

Read my next post, I realize the incongruity of some of my statements about this. I want the choices to be there, I'm just worried about the slippery slope. The difference between a character that can fulfill multiple roles and a character that can fill *every* role. You can say that he'll be a "jack-of-all-trades" so he'll be a "master of none" all you like, but given a year or two years or however long to level up, if there's no max level it's gonna happen unless something creative is done to prevent it. *That* is what I'm trying to get to, Scott... a solution.

Limited Ability Bars, like Guild Wars.

Equipment specializations like EVE (or even WoW: should I wear the caster plate or the DPS plate?)
You could even use something where you have to set maybe 10 primary abilities (all from a single skill tree), 5 secondary (any skill tree), and 4 passive abilities (from any tree, but you know, archery crit rate increase isn't going to help you with a greatsword).

So there are three off the top of my head. Granted some of them might not make that much a whole lot of sense in the lore, but I think the benefits of having just one character outweigh that.

[Daniel Powell 318]

cannabination wrote:

The difference between a character that can fulfill multiple roles and a character that can fill *every* role. You can say that he'll be a "jack-of-all-trades" so he'll be a "master of none" all you like, but given a year or two years or however long to level up, if there's no max level it's gonna happen unless something creative is done to prevent it. *That* is what I'm trying to get to, Scott... a solution.

Suppose there IS a cap. Let's say that cap is high enough that you can be fully trained in fighting, fully focused in swords, fully specialized in two-handed weapons, fully trained in defense, and fully focused on armor, but not fully specialized in plate mail. The only way to get better at wearing plate mail, or any other type of armor, is to become worse at hitting things with a two-handed sword. The only way to learn any magic is to lose an existing skill.

I think that the best 'sweet spot' allows full specialization in two related roles and partial specialization in another. A two-handed weapon specialist would probably be a damage role; he could also be a nimble mobility master as a tank role, OR a full-plate master as a tank role. Conversely, he could enter the dervish specialization and also be effective at crowd control.

Spellcasters would have an interesting choice: is it better to specialize in one or two schools, or to study broadly and be more versatile? The arcane archer would be less effective at mundane archery, and less effective at spellcasting, but have unique ways of delivering spells.

[cannabination]

A sort of Venn diagram of character aptitude? Would you then pick your "groups" upon creation? Seems like a cool idea.

[Daniel Powell 318]

cannabination wrote:

A sort of Venn diagram of character aptitude? Would you then pick your "groups" upon creation? Seems like a cool idea.

How about something like a Venn diagram, but with more dimensions and you pick your starting point at character creation, and playing determines how you move within those aptitudes.