The Theory Of

Here you'll find discussion of all manner of topics relating to the theory of multiplayer games. As I see it, anyway. A note to commentors: if you stray off-topic or if your reply contains ad hominem attacks, your comment will be deleted.

Author: JB47394

i agree with this wholeheartedly.  it looks like we have both been on the same quest.  i myself have signed up for every beta and trial i can find and always end up quitting soon after, very much feeling the wasted time slip away.  thats one reason i like EVE-Online so much.  in a sense, it is still the same, but they have made it unique.

Gilihad has made a couple good points as well.  players will want to distinguish themselves from others.  for that, i agree that equipment would be a good idea.  character creation would be good too.  in my opinion, the character creation would have to be seriously in depth and detailed to such an extent that it just was not possible to make 2 the same.  the equipment database should be vast, 100 times any current game's selection at the least, and not just variations of the same item with simply a different name.  Gilihad mentioned growth trees as well.  just cause you dont "level up" doesnt mean you couldnt still have skills and what not that you had to work towards, to give you new abilities.

god, i hate reading things like this and responding.  my mind just floods with so many ideas.  i keep going back and adding ideas, changing ideas, removing ideas, all the while dozens more race through my head, and i usually end up not even posting any of it cause it gets so jumbled. arrrr, why cant the game in my head just be made, and i get to play it?!?!

I can't remember the exact total, but it was at least 150 days played of Everquest.

How are you going to get me to play your game for 150 days (450 working days), if 95% of the content is accessible to me from day one?  Travel time excluded, you could visti every notable city, amuzement park, and museum in the known world in that time.  Seperating the exploring, and crafting elements from the fighting element is going to make the content too quick to move through to drive a long term revenue stream, which would fund the development of your MMO.

The other thing is that you will lose your sense of accomplishment if you take away levelling.  If I can join a group that kills the strongest dragon in the game my first day of playing, where's the sense of accomplishment?

Cant agree more that the level have to go if we want a new era of mmo's. Iw been thinking about this alot latley and a game without level would surley be a game alot of people out there would love to play.

Something else that have to go is the lie of classes couse atm you just choose a class and thats that.  no commitment to the work to get there or the faction that you really fit to.

For an example lets take the warrior in wow, you choose to play a warrior and poof your a warrior there is no training, no army to belong to, no real choises to make what part of that army you will take.

We need more time with charater creation but not at a screen but inside the game your actions should form you make you to what you want to become.

There is alot of factors in mmo's that could be done better to make the ultimet gaming experiance.

Sorry for the bad spelling spell program dident work within this small frame

ppetty, we definitely seem to be on the same page.  Many ideas, and we simply have to wait for the people with the money and the talents to get around to it.  One reason that I write about this stuff is to increase awareness about how it might be done.  You'll notice that grimfall doesn't believe it can work.  I attribute that to his not having seen anything even close to it, though your example of Eve Online is probably the best example that we have.

Gilihad, unique appearance would certainly be a goal.  The best equipment would not be predictably-obtained because there won't be static spawns where you go shopping for your equipment.  In any case, you're not overly interested in your equipment because it might give you a mild improvement over the normal stuff, but that's it.  Achievers  would never be given content that  forms its own little subculture because that would again stratify the game.  It would be a variation on levels.

Imagine no classes.  The system that I envision involves a skill tree that you put points into.  You can reallocate points at any time, but there is a time period during which the points are moved about.  I'd guess about a week elapsed time for a drastic alteration.  Eve Online implements a form of this with their skill system, but they disallow free reallocation of points and you never actually get all of your points.  You just keep adding skills for the rest of your character's lifetime.

Races could be implemented, but I'm leery of them because it is an irrevocable decision, and I despise irrevocable decisions.  I suspect that races should be relegated to cosmetic differences only.  Spider magic may ensnare with a web, while stone magic (imagine rock men) might ensnare by turning the ground to sticky mud.  The end result of all actions should be the same, but the fiction (appearance) would change.

Classes are another example of irrevocable choices.  They've gotta go.  Classes exist because of levels.  In a race to the maximum level, fairness is critically important to a certain vocal segment of the player population, and classes attempt to ensure fairness.  Without the goal of achieving the highest level, achievement-minded players will pursue other goals.  Which goals appeal to them will be dependent on their personalities.  Let those personalities be reflected in the skills that they choose, and player characters will be as varied as the players.

Fearion, you bring up a good point about classes.  I don't like classes for their inflexibility, but you point out that they are also falling well short of what they could be - career paths.  I can easily imagine that the first month or so of gameplay could encourage players to follow a career in the game world that is supported by the NPC society.  Just to get the player moving and comfortable with the way the game world operates.  That would be as close to a class as I'd want to go.  After that, I'd encourage players to use combinations of quests to let them pursue goals that they want to pursue.

I have read countless posts/blogs on this subject, and I will start off by saying I fullheartedly agree. This no level concept seems to be more and more popular now, and I think it is a concept. Except, in all of these posts that I have seen, they all seem to end the same way. A little something like this: "They should take out levels and implement something else." Well, what other system should they implement?!?!? If we can't think of it, I bet they developers aren't having an easy time either. When you take levels out of an MMORPG, you just lost an essential element to the gaming process. What else are we to strive for; why the hell should I play?!?! Like Grimfall said, if we can access everything from day one, why should I continue beyond that? Its like receiving a game that is already beaten. The fundamental aspect is gone. I don't have many answers to the question of "what else should we implement?" But, I think we should just all quit talking about how we should get rid of levels until that question is answered. Thats just IMHO.

----axehero

grimfall, getting rid of levels does not have to mean that all the content is accessable from the start.  there are other, much more creatve ways to make things hard to get.  perhaps if you were to try traveling across the world, you would be killed, because they dont like your kind over there.  perhaps you have chosen the life of a bandit and towns dont want you around, or you cant travel certain roads without a party because there are bandits along it.  perhaps your destination is across a desert and you dont yet have the money to finance an expedition.  there are countless possibilties.

on the subject of classes, it would probly be a good idea to have them, but in a different manner.  instead of selecting your class and attributes, they would be determined by your actions.  like if you are always in the fray attacking in combat, your strengh becomes your main attribute, but defense close behind.  if you are always long range, its your dexterity and strength.  if you are a blacksmith, strength, dexterity, intelligence.  things like that, but spread over everything you do.  your attributes would grow some, but mainly it would just be making some dominant over others.

axe_hero, Eve Online is an example of a game without levels.  Try it out sometime.  The reason that Eve Online works is because the players are busy having fun instead of leveling.  The key to the fun is having a reason for doing all the things that the players are doing.  In the case of Eve Online, that reason is galactic domination through PvP.  Lineage 2 has a similar structure.

I'm seeking something that might be considered the carebear version of Eve Online.  Instead of everyone PvPing over the galaxy, the players PvE against the NPCs, which are operated by the publisher.  Partly through AI and partly through a kind of herding control system for high level direction.

Combat becomes less a case of personal gain and more a case of community gain.  All combat-minded players converge on the front lines and attack an NPC stronghold.  Over the course of a week, the players succeed in taking it.   This pacifies an area around the stronghold that requires exploration, setting and exploitation of its resources for the war effort.

The players move on to the next battle site, which might be open plains, where the enemy has assembled armies, or guerilla resistance, or units in transport, or who knows what.  The monsters will vary, the terrain will vary and the challenges will vary.  And all the while, the gamemasters will be herding the monsters here and there to make sure that they give a good accounting of themselves.

All players, whether fighter, crafter, explorer or any other interest, then have a community reason to do what they're doing.  It works very well in Eve Online.  It appears to be the success behind Lineage 2 as well.  The asians don't appear to be as interested in individual achievement as they are in community achievement.

Lineage 2 and Eve Online share the PvP angle on things.  As I said, I want to pursue a carebear version, with the players pitted against the gamemasters that are controlling the monsters.

thank you soo much for posting this, i agree completely, skills should get better based on hp but not your health and all that, level system is dumb.

i meant xp not hp in my last post

dudemantg, I'm getting even more extreme than you think.  I don't want experience points either.  In the same spirit as Eve Online, I want skills to be handed out freely instead of being worked for.  You don't spend your time in the game building your skills.  Instead, you spend your time in the game using your skills.

To avoid people having all skills, each character has a limited number of skill points that are allocated across a tree of skills.  The points can be reallocated to a different skill emphasis, but the shift happens only at a certain number of points per hour.  So if you can reallocate 1000 points, they might shift at 2 points per hour, requiring 500 hours (or about three weeks) to complete a total redesign of a character's skills.  In the meantime, you have a hybrid of the original skill set and the target skill set.

I've been reading the last several comments regarding the No-level topic and I think a good option would be to replace it by a reputation system.  The way it would work would be the following way.   When you first start your character you are given certain guest or path to follow.  Finishing those quests will let you gain some reputation with the city guard, the thief guild or with a small village.  Once your reputation goes up you get the right to talk to other people in the area that will then offer you enough reputation to move further whiting the world.   Everyone would have the same amount of life point the only thing that would make a difference between you and someone else would be your equipment.  That would mean that anyone could wear any type of armor or weapons.   But you could only be wearing certain items if you have enough reputation.   As an example: You would not have the right to be wear a full plate suit of some prestigious knight guild if you don't have the reputation to wear it.    This way it would still be possible for a first day character to join a dragon hunt if the other party members are willing to give him a full suit of body armor.   Some of you would be asking how the newbie get access to one city to another.  The option would be to allow the group leader to share is reputation with the group he’s with.  This means that as long as the newbie is with the group leader he as the right to move from on section of world to another.  As well the same idea could be added for guild.  If you chose to join a guild the guild might have some privilege that other don’t. As well the opposite could also be in affect.  Choosing to ally yourself with a city could also affect your reputation with another negatively.    This means that certain quest will affect you reputation in both direction.   Your hit point would also be affected by the type of armor you are wearing the better the outfit the more hit point you have.  How do you acquire your equipment?  The same way as any other games, merchant, monster drop or crafting.  How do you get money?   By killing monster doing guest and more.      More to come…..

, Eve Online is an example of a game without levels.  Try it out sometime.  The reason that Eve Online works is because the players are busy having fun instead of leveling.  The key to the fun is having a reason for doing all the things that the players are doing.  In the case of Eve Online, that reason is galactic domination through PvP

Eve Online doesn't have levels?  That's an interesting thought.  But what does it have?  A 'skill based system".  How do you increase your skills?  By repetively doing some tasks. After you do a task a certain number of times, what happens?  You get another 'skill point' that unlocks more recipes or ships or guns or areas.  What's the difference between that and levelling? I could be wrong, I've only played it as a cure for insonmia, but that is my understanding of Even Online.

"When you first start your character you are given certain guest or path to follow.  Finishing those quests will let you gain some reputation with the city guard, the thief guild or with a small village.  Once your reputation goes up you get the right to talk to other people in the area that will then offer you enough reputation to move further whiting the world.   Everyone would have the same amount of life point the only thing that would make a difference between you and someone else would be your equipment.  "

1. This sounds a lot like World of Warcraft or Everquest

2. What's the advantage of taking the levels out?  Why can't you just give experience and adventuring levels as you go?

grimfall, Eve Online grants skill points automatically through time.  They still retain some aspects of leveling, but one that they drop is the act of spending all of one's time working to advance the level of a character.  Eve Online is only a step in the right direction because CCP still believes in the player working at dreary tasks in order to gain access to the entertainment that the players want to get into in the first place (players have to earn a lot of money).

World War II online also suffers from the "working" mindset, but only requires that you distinguish yourself in battle before you're permitted to use the better equipment.  You don't have to pay for your tank, or for the fuel or ammunition.  You just get out in the field and get into battle, which you can do on day one.  Again, this is a step in the right direction; instead of working/leveling so that the players can get to the entertainment of the game, they just get into the entertainment of the game.

Some have commented about how boring it would be to waltz into every area in the game.  That's only boring if you take current MMO content and walk right into it all.  There isn't any entertainment there except for the fact that you get to advance in levels by going to it.  Raiding is the closest that MMOs get to actual PvE entertainment.  PvP is almost always viable entertainment unto itself.  But take away the experience of killing monsters and the drive to get another level and MMO content is rarely entertaining.

So consider combat without leveling.  The actual process of combatting opponents must be entertaining.  This means the use of tactics more involved than walking up to a monster and beating on it until it falls over.

You're getting farther and farther off base here.

"There isn't any entertainment there except for the fact that you get to advance in levels by going to it."

You just got done telling me levels aren't entertaining.  Make up your mind.

"So consider combat without leveling.  The actual process of combatting opponents must be entertaining."

By this logic, if anyone maxed their character, they would quit doing combat.  I've max leveled characters and continued to do combat.  Your contention that levelling and entertaining combat are somehow linked is totally non-sensecal.  I've spent days soloing in dungeons in Everquest and WoW, just to see if i could do it.  You can have entertaining combat in games with levels, and you can have boring combat in games without levels.  What on Earth gave you the idea that they're linked in any way.  Levels and access to content are often linked, is that where you're getting confused?

The point of levels is multitiered :

1) to keep the player playing regardless of the lack of content in spots, sort of like the rat that gets rewarded for pressing the white button instead of the black 

2) It saves money on content development, you can control the pace at which players go through the games arc hence limiting how much new content must be developed on a regular basis

3) they are easily communicated, you know a lvl 15 player is less of an asset than a lvl 50 player in various instances

4) provides direction to the players, I mean the fact is, you can't go everywhere at any stage in your own life, so access limitation based on level isn't altogether crazy.

The issue here isn't levels, its content. Crap content sucks regardless of advancement matrix. The key is for the game to be fun and progressive in its level of play the higher you go.

I suspended leveling my WoW character at around level 40, because I got absolutly bored. I didn't stop playing at all, I still liked pushing my tradeskill as far as possible at that level :( or hanging around at town. I just resumed leveling when one of my friends had his second char at the same level and we continued together. It was fun then, because we were such a good team, it was thrilling to find the next challenge to meet.

You see, it was not a way of reaching the maximum level that got me going on, but the possibility to make a team with my friend and try to do some great things that some other teams needed twice as many people to do.

After reaching level 60 and doing some raiding i suspended playing again. Now, some time after the release of the addon I continued again, but again not simply to reach the max level, but to see the new world and the new quests. Since I am an engeneer I would like to have a flying machine one time, but for that I have to be level 70 and have lots of money. Fortunately it seems I won't have to do either by mindless grinding, because there are more than enough (entertaining) quests to do that give plenty of money and experience.

So, leveling was never my goal or in any way entertaining for me, It is just a requirement to do the things I really want to do.

I would just love a game where I can do the things I want to do without having to do mindless tasks or killing before I can even start to move toward my own goal. Of course it should still require hard work to reach that goal, but in a way that is connected to the goal.

Like crafting: Why do I have to kill thousands of monsters before I can be a master tailor? What is it that requires a tailor, enchanter, or even weapon smith to be combat level 50 to be a master at his arts? When I was playing Dark Age of Camelot I had a level 1 weaponsmith master. It was a little dangerous even to leave town to get resources from the village right out there, but there was nothing that ultimativly preventet a level 1 char to be a master crafter.

I like the concept of EVE Online very much, you just don't HAVE to go and kill anything if you don't want. But as I don't like PvP very much, unfortunately I couldn't find anything else interesting to do ether.

Like reborn said: The issue is content. I don't want to do mindless leveling, but there must be enough other things to do and goals one can set out to reach.

I totally agree on the level thing...
It`s extremely annoying if your musclebound Berserker can`t lift his Claymore, simply because he`s "not level 4 yet" -.- makes me want to shoot the makers...
All it takes to use it is some muscle... and well, some sword skill to actually hit something. 
Why couldn`t they put the constraints there instead???
But then the next thing comes in, "ok players, you`re right, we`ll put the constraints in stats, not in level". 
Great you might think, but now, my musclebound galloot can lift weights all he wants, but he`ll only get strong enough when he -.- yes u guessed right. -.-  becomes level 5.

So I`ve been playing around on the MUD clients recently, and one in particulair was pretty interesting because they don`t use leveling AT ALL.

Instead, you need x experience pts to raise statistics or skills, and actually, most skills simply evolve by using them enough. 
In addition, you have to actively roleplay with people, and for that you would get 'roleplay credits' to buy houses, special skills etc. as well as a bonus if you play a certain time.
For some reason they banned NPC trainers, and were hoping to ban shops as well, but hasn`t gotten that far because we don`t have enough players. Instead, you learn new skills from other players. And the economy is going to be player driven in exactly that context.

It`s kinda too bad most MUD`s are text based, because more of those are 'forcing' more and more active roleplay, to push away this taint called "grnd fr lvl" which simply doesn`t fit in a middle age fantasy landscape.  Because they have been busy for quite a while on this system.

The problem is, most people lack the imagination, visualisation and mostly reading and typing skills for these kind of games. A graphical interface is way better or at least easier to handle for everyone.
But if you look at ANY graphical interfaced RPG, it just HAS to have a leveling system, just to kill all the fun of gameplay... at least, that`s what I think of it.

And umm, just for the sake of good ol days, anyone remember Hero`s Quest, aka Quest for Glory? all the way from the DOS age.
Thát game had exactly this, no leveling system! you use the sword, and you learn to use it, your muscles are trained from the fight, your dexterity improved from evading blows, etc. Work in a stable to sweep the floors, and your stamina & strength increases from the smelly work all day.
Rather than saying you get x exp from the fight and soon you`ll be lvl 2 and be a better man.

Reborn17, the fact that we can understand why levels work a certain way doesn't mean that the resulting game is any kind of ideal.  Levels are overwhelmingly focused on achievement, and that skews the game so horrendously that other forms of entertainment cannot be presented in as nearly a pure manner as achievement is.

Once levels are gone, the design challenge is to introduce multiple forms of entertainment without any one form being forced on anyone who doesn't want it.  Achievement is currently forced on everyone, crippling the design potential of the genre.

Cheatmaster: Like reborn said: The issue is content. I don't want to do mindless leveling, but there must be enough other things to do and goals one can set out to reach.

It is true that a game needs to provide context for player actions.  Eve Online tackles this via a PvP game of galactic conquest.  That's why they don't need levels.  They actually have a means of entertaining players.  There is only one overarching goal.  Within that context, players can choose thier own path to entertainment.  Eve Online is also not ideal, but at least it illustrates how a game without levels can work.

Fantasy MMOs have taken to giving the same simple, personal goal to all player characters.  As a result, the players have no room for diversity of entertainment.  The leveling treadmill works like a straightjacket.  Eve Online's gamewide goal of galactic conquest gives players some leeway.  That's the next critical step in game design.

Well i can give another nice example and that is GuildWars. Yes there are levels. A total 20. If you play this game normally like 1 hour a day you can do those levels in a month i guess. Or you can create a lvl 20 character from start. But as everyone is capped on lvl 20 from the start there is a lot of things to do like item hunt or doin some quests you have never done. I could probably tell the same about WoW where a hardcore gamer can get to the top lvl in like 3 weeks or sooner. Still they increase the player max lvl to keep the player base they have. Content is the game driving mechanism.

Huli: "Content is the game driving mechanism."

And it's a shame that the content that is put in is so shallow.  Blizzard is in the unique position to create the Next Big Thing in gaming if they can transition the World of Warcaft crowd to a game system that is built to be expanded and fleshed out.  Where they can start with a deep fighting system and no levels.  Then they can add new entertainment one system at a time, always without levels and always deeply developed.  They could create the world's first virtual theme park.  Do it right, and the software for one theme becomes useful for another theme.  Or all the themes are integrated into one vast Blizzard Universe.

Well, what I see of lack in content, is you`re just thrown in a realm, but there`s absolutely no reason to be there, to be a part of anything, just actually to level up and see diffrent kinds of creatures to kill.
Whatever you do doesn`t make a difference anywhere, or any how.
you talk to an NPC that likes fluffy bunnies? heck you could chop some up in pieces and throw the bunny parts in front of their face and next thing they say is they like fluffy bunnies, oblivious to your actions. stuff like that... it`s just idiocracy. There`s yet to be a game where I can play with 1 class over again, level the same way, but play completely diffrent, because of the outcomes of my quests. Or maybe even because I said "I`m not gonna do that, that quest is stupid" pissing off the NPC, resulting in some trouble later on.

there`s never a waging war. 
*if there is, you won`t notice it, while killing mobs that are just a bit diffrent. 
Well, actually, ok, some games have this... players can join a certain country, when they see players from another country they`re either 'soldiers of the enemy'  or 'allies' 
But it`s pretty rare to have it that way, the waging war story`s there, but the war itself rarely is.

there`s never a town attack from the monsters. 
*why is there a programmed border around town? why not guard NPC`s that keep things out? and why don`t the monsters ever overrun a town?

there`s never a tale of big treasures buried somewhere.
*you just kill a certain mob, for a certain item.
no digging for treasures at X marks the spot, no shady figures you pay way too much money for a fake  chart... actually, there`s rarely ever a shady character that comes up to you -randomly-.

there`s never a choice between "special characters" with special treatment that could change the world trough special quests.
*ofcourse, this would probably become premium or low chance.
I probably watched hack//sign anime way too many times, but the idea still seems interesting.
Maybe GM`s could walk around being a sort of Avatar that needs to stay alive for a certain period of time... "good" players trying to help him, "evil" players trying to kill him for benefit of their alignment.

there`s never a GM with the idea to be an evil overlord (and gets his way to terrorise the lands, so players will have to kill him with an immense PC army)
*I know they`re here to keep the order, but sometimes you can get order by dirupting the daily grind. 
`t would be a nice event. ^^

I`m probably mostly talking about "events" rather than "quests".
but actually, quests are pretty much on the low side too... 
they should make (or steal, yes, steal from the old not-anymore-copywrited content) a thousand diffrent quests, heck, maybe even a million diffrent ones. And just seep them out, this day of the week, or that day, maybe even completely at random. And not lay out  the 100 quests they have, and after that it`s bye bye to questing, because you`ve done them all. 

About events, well there`s mostly only events for every event in this world. Something I don`t really get... Isn`t it supposed to be a fantasy world? At least DiscWorld has the Hogfather, instead of santa clause riding around. ok, so it`s also at the same time of the year, but heck, it`s Hogswatch, not christmas.
it just makes it look alot more... in place.

overall, I always miss dynamic enviroment. nothing is random.
And nothing is ever changed by your actions ingame. except for your own character. The game just stays the same.

I wrote something along these lines once.

Pingback: http://www.cyberkreations.com/kreationsedge/?p=32

Basically I wrote up something on pure 'no progression'. I also wrote another article on skill-based progression: http://www.cyberkreations.com/kreationsedge/?p=10

Note that progression is progression is progression.  The greatest flaw of levels is community stratification.  Any progression system that delineates the entertainment accessible to players will have that flaw.

If my character becomes configured to have a skill that permits it to cross a certain bridge and your character does not, then we have just been stratified into the Bridge Crossers and the non Bridge Crossers.  Given that we want players to be able to interact, that would seem a poor design.

I'm getting pretty close to claiming that online entertainment needs to be about user ability, while character 'ability' is a dead end.  Just as there is no spoon, my character has no strength.  It is simply a configurable game piece that frequently prevents me from enjoying the game with others.

Ah I see you are pushing for "no progression" altogether. Starport was pretty much this however players still pursued LAnd, Money, and items.

But a pure 'no progression' scheme is truly out-of-box thinking in which you seem to really excel at. It's a difficult concept to conceive. I wish I could peek into this mind of your and see all the details. I have not played a pure "no progression" type of game ever myself beyond FPS games if you follow. Those have kept my attention for many years

in my article I was trying to think about 'no progression' but then drifted off into 'linear progression'. Perhaps a few months from now I'll try to think of more ideas for 'no progression' scheme. Guess I'm really more of a proponent of linear progression though that you see in FPS titles like Battlefield 2142 whereas a Veteran isn;t more powrful then a newbie at all- he's simply more diverse

So, linear progression would also fully encompass Bartle's Four and infact- might possibly be stronger for Achievement. It all depends on what you had in mind for Achievers though

excellent article I'm not sure why I thought you were pushing up linear progression guess we all project our own ideas into content we read

Achievers can continue to achieve.  The difference is that the results of an achievement don't change the way the player's character operates under the rules of the game.  That, or the change is temporary or even just a point of vanity.

Eve Online.  Achievement without rule changes.  A victory is an achievement, but the characters remain as they were.  In truth, players even have a sense of progression towards a goal as systems are taken one after another.  But still no social stratification.

Somebody mentioned lending achievements to others.  That's a bit like Eve Online's technique.  If you are part of one side of a war, you inherit the resources of that side.  Of course, you're stratified out if you aren't accepted onto that side.

vajuras: "I'm not sure why I thought you were pushing up linear progression guess we all project our own ideas into content we read"

Indeed.  I despise language because it is impossibly imprecise.  A symbolic notation to communicate abstract concepts, similar to a mathematical notation would be wonderful.  Maybe in a few hundred years.