Goblin Squad Member
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Well, I've been playing MMO's for a VERY long time; paper and pencil games even longer. I've discovered an interesting format to encourage me to play with others... and that is to design for weakness not for strength.
Design for weakness, you might ask? But your character will get chomped/attacked/killed/destroyed through it's weakness! Well, not if you're with other people.
Sure, I have the occasional character for solo play who I attempt to make as well balanced as possible.. but they only occasionally get played because my fun comes from playing with others!
So an important point in an MMO that is skill/training based rather than class base is to design your character with a deliberate weakness that causes your character so seek out other characters with particular skills to play with.
Why do I mention this? Because oft times people design a character to have as little weakness as possible, spreading out their lower trained skills to keep them all on a par with each other. If your character is going to travel with others... say a group of like minded people who like to go on adventures together (to be called an adventuring party) then design your character to need to travel with others and you will seek out others to travel with whenever you are logged in as that character!
The side benefit is that you will find yourself spending more time on your characters personality and roleplaying with others.. at least that is the way it works for me. So my suggestion for group play is don't design for ballanced strength with little weakness. Embrace your weaknesses, design them for your character, be aware of them and use them to promote social gaming!
Boojum the brown bunny
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Goblin Squad Member
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Well, my first principal is to design my character with things he is interested in and things he isn't interested.. rather than using online guides to design for power. If I reference guides, I only use the parts that the character is interested in.
Once I have the characters personality and background worked out, I deliberately design area's where he will be weak. If he loves magic and spells.. then make him extremely weak in physical combat and rougish skills. If he loves weapons and armor, make him useless in spells and rougish skills.
Also, learn crafting associated with the characters likes and dislikes. This encourages you to work with OTHER crafters for things. So someone interested in arms and armor would craft arms and armor, not magic wands.
Once I have done that I list what strong weaknesses the character has and begin looking for OTHER players who are strong in those area's but who might be weak in where I specialize. Because my training has gone towards fewer things my skill in the things I LIKE tend to be higher, so I can be an asset to a group and stand out in my area of expertise.
As my character travels and works well with others, I make notes of their names for that character so that I can travel with them further in the future. Each character makes their own friends in the world based on who they are. Yes, this means more work and more tracking on my part, but I find I am much more likely to seek out and play with others if my character needs others to adventure. The problem with the all purpose everything is they have no need for anyone else to fill a weakness.... and tend to not excel at a particular thing.
So my main principal is to base my characters strength and weaknesses off of my characters personality and background... which I design even if the MMO doesn't require it. :D
Boojum the brown bunny
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Goblin Squad Member
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This sounds like a great approach for PFO. Unlike many other MMOs, PFO doesn't have a pre-scripted solo story at its heart. The game encourages cooperative play and community-building in most of its major systems.
By specializing, you can outpace the generalists in your areas of interest. By playing with other specialists, your party can bring more advanced capabilities to bear than a party of generalists.
One thing to note is that specializing and multi-classing are not mutually exclusive. It should be possible to train specific aspects of two or more roles without becoming a generalist. Focus on buffs to the exclusion of heals and attack orisons, on stealth but not fencing weapons or short bows, and you've got an odd but highly specialized Cleric/Rogue.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Absolutely! You can still multiclass AND specialize using the skill/training system. You just tighten your specialties up so that you have more weaknesses but are REALLY good at the area you specialize in.
Good examples of this are a Buffer Combat Rogue where you leave aside the lock picking, improve your multiple damage and stealth, don't learn healing, but learn Buffs. Thus you buff yourself up (and maybe your companions) and then pounce on your foes, destroying them utterly. Thus you don't spot traps, you can't remove them.. so there is someone else you need to find to travel with to handle those sorts of things! But your GREAT at sneaking, multiple damage, and high DPS because of your buff enhanced strikes.
In a game like this, class can be a trap. There are subspecialties in classes for a reason. An Evoker is certainly not the same as an Abjurer. If your going to multiclass, this is a perfect time to look at SUBclasses for inspiration on things that might work well together as a multiclass.
The other benefit of a classless system is that if you read of a combination you like in a book you can give it a try! Is the character you like an Arcane Rogue or an Archer Rogue? If the right skills are available to train then you should be able to make any sort of interesting character from a book as long as the characters are somewhat balanced. Your character won't be that kickass right at the start, but you can grow into it!
Boojum the brown bunny
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Goblin Squad Member
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I was a little disappointed we got roles in game as I had hoped for a totally classless system. It would also have avoided a lot of role based thread arguments that to be honest were rather irrelevant to actual PFO game mechanics and just got people upset.
I have ignored classes. My current Alpha main usually slots:
Cleric
Acolyte +3 Holy Symbol for cleric spells and heals.
(carries +3 battle and +3 occult focus)
Rogue
Nothing currently slotted but has Stealth and Perception very high
(carries +2 shortsword and +2 shortbow)
Wizard
+2 Diminishing Staff for Wraiths Cry and Wilting Surge.
(carries +2 charged staff and Wands and spellbooks)
Fighter
+2 Longsword for Lunge and Whirlwind
+2 Hide and Steel Armor and Dragoon level 5
Crit Reactives and Heavy Weapon Specialist
(carries a +2 longbow)
Generally he stealths about and uses the Diminishing staff for ranged the longsword or diminishing staff in melee and self buff/heals with the Holy Symbol.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Sounds like a lot of dropped weapons once PvP and loot drops are in place.
Who cares they are only T1 +2 weapons :D I can churn out 5 or 6 overnight.
Plus I am unlikely to carry all those spares now encumbrance is in. That character was designed to kill several hundred gobbos an hour collecting green for spellbooks, have not played it for a week.
TBH I think people are getting a bit obsessed with small gang EVE style PvP hoping to collect player tears by destroying and stealing "stuff".
I have played EVE for years and I fully understand the basic idea that EVE PvP is not an in-game activity at all - there is no role play and you are competing with and in some cases trying to upset the real person at the other end.
I do not see PFO going that way (do not really care either way) though a lot of the recent tantrums on the forums seem to be from people whose epeen depends on PvP leetness and are upset the game is not conducive to that.
Back on topic - how would it reduce encumbrance if instead of slotting a mix of weapons it was all from the same class ? Seems you are no better off though it MIGHT be a cool feature if slotting all the same role did reduce encumbrance.
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Goblin Squad Member
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...there is no role play...
I'm certainly hoping we'll have a significant crowd planning to ignore min/maxing in favour of hunting for characters we enjoy *being*. No plan survives contact with the enemy, of course, but it's still a pleasant dream, for a time, to look forward to buying Feats and skills that seem interesting, more so than vital.
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Goblin Squad Member
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TBH I think people are getting a bit obsessed with small gang EVE style PvP hoping to collect player tears by destroying and stealing "stuff".
My impression is that there's only a fairly small subset of folks who are actually interested in that, and I'm starting to wonder if we'll have a bit of a respite...
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Goblin Squad Member
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My impression is that there's only a fairly small subset of folks who are actually interested in that, and I'm starting to wonder if we'll have a bit of a respite...
We will see, not to worried either way.
So ...
... what if the slotted role bonuses included an encumbrance benefit when all slotted items are from that role (roleplay - they form a "kit" that is designed to be used together)?