Large division through equipment and levels is a mistake in game design in my opinion.

If one persons been playing the game for 3 days and the other 2 years, they should still be able to do stuff together that's on similar pages.

That was one of the strengths of Ultima Online, although I still think you could evolve a system much deeper.

One of the easiest logical fixes that comes to my mind is something similar to Counter-Strikes weapon and armor tier design. A 100$ handgun user could still stand his ground in a team fight with his partner using a 3000$ colt or 6000$ AWP, and can even put up a good fight and possibly defeat a player that he is fighting against with superior armor and weapon. You would possibly need a MMOFPS to support this design but It could even work in 3rd person MMORPG's of today.

What divides and spreads the community out is okay to have in some games, but when It's all games on the market, then It's quite a disaster in my opinion.



 

I agree 100%  

Originally posted by ShadowSaturn

Large division through equipment and levels is a mistake in game design in my opinion.

If one persons been playing the game for 3 days and the other 2 years, they should still be able to do stuff together that's on similar pages.

...

What divides and spreads the community out is okay to have in some games, but when It's all games on the market, then It's quite a disaster in my opinion.

It's not all games on the market.

But yes, bad design is a large part of the problem with reference to what you are talking about..

The only game that can be 'excused' for this is DDO... because D&D was designed that way to begin with and at the time there were good reasons for it (It was a PnP game and had to be set up with that in mind)

One more reason to keep an Eye on Guild Wars 2, they talked about a "side kick" system, where u could play with lol lvl characters and have equal benefits, not further details on it but its something to be watching =)

I disagree.

If the content I was playing through 3 days after I start a character is still even remotely challenging on the same character 3 years later it means my character has not advanced. He has stagnated. There is no growth.

Games that follow this format are FPS and RTS. They are NOT MMO's. Even in these games, if you think a person playing for 3 days is still going to be sepearted from a veteran player by a huge gulf. One of experiance.

A new player in an RTS is going to be absolutely decimated by the experianced player. Over, and over, and over. In skill based game without gear or levels the rift is, if anything, much larger. The learning curve tends to be much steeper in these games, with the new player little more than fresh meat.

Originally posted by Nightbringe1

Games that follow this format are FPS and RTS. They are NOT MMO's. Even in these games, if you think a person playing for 3 days is still going to be sepearted from a veteran player by a huge gulf. One of experiance.

A new player in an RTS is going to be absolutely decimated by the experianced player. Over, and over, and over. In skill based game without gear or levels the rift is, if anything, much larger. The learning curve tends to be much steeper in these games, with the new player little more than fresh meat.

MMORPG's these days are usually about PvE though

But even in regards to an open PvP game, a new player will still be mostly PvEing at first with the occasional PvP fight.

But your forgetting one important thing : They can still play together, especially in regards to PvE unlike a level or gear based game which highly discourages playing together with anyone even remotely out of your gear / level range.

I think your example only applies to the replay value of new characters and choices in where to apply effort.

It doesn't affect the community one bit since it was a wide open world where you were supposed to pick a hometown and venture out. If they put in some reliance to the hometown you would see an apparent social aspect... but all UO did was encourage good ol' sandboxy world exploration with cities as hubs instead of one-time only content. I personally hate the idea of games with levels simply because it funnels everyone to the same place and obsoletes soooo much. When I do design with levels in mind I try to leave old content as useful as I can.

The OP's idea works great in PVP-focused games, where loot doesn't really matter and the game is more about interesting gameplay fighting other players.  Both MMOFPSes (Planetside) and MMORPGs (Guild Wars) have already used this method of letting players freely group with each other.  It works and it's an awesome way of both letting the new player play alongside the expert as well as making battles more player skill than power accumulation.

For non-PVP-focused games, Sidekicking solves the problem perfectly.  The new player sidekicks up to the high level player's level, and both players fight high level content; they're both challenged, and they're both rewarded for their efforts.

I disagree with the OP.

I don't load up a single player RPG and except to kill the toughest boss monster right away at level 1.  RPGs are about progression, but they aren't (as of now) multiplayer skill contests like fighting games and shooters.

Now, while I disagree with the OP for the most part I do think that having mechanics like FFXI's level sync on AoC's apprenticeship should be in the game.  I should be able to bring my friends to my progression level (or mine to theirs).  Also I do think that current MMO RPGs need more skill oriented combat systems than the current hotkey rotation games out on the market right now, but that doesn't mean there shouldn't be progression.  I think the OP is mistaken that progression divides the community because it doesn't have to, you just need to give some way for friends and guilds to play on the same level without devoting the same amount of time.  I think a level sync features pretty much does this.

How was it a strength in UO?  There was still a huge division in terms of progression (more powerful items and spells).  "Sandbox" games aren't easier to get into and stay in line with power gamers in than "Themepark" games, in fact I find the opposite to be true because they are far more difficult and cutthroat (typically).

A MMOFPS based solely on skill with no progression (aside from maybe unlocking achievements/titles/cooler looking gear that has no effect on gameplay/etc. would be fine.

This is not a FPS idea that transfers well, so I would not see it as good game design.

Originally posted by ShadowSaturn

Large division through equipment and levels is a mistake in game design in my opinion.

If one persons been playing the game for 3 days and the other 2 years, they should still be able to do stuff together that's on similar pages.

That was one of the strengths of Ultima Online, although I still think you could evolve a system much deeper.

One of the easiest logical fixes that comes to my mind is something similar to Counter-Strikes weapon and armor tier design. A 100$ handgun user could still stand his ground in a team fight with his partner using a 3000$ colt or 6000$ AWP, and can even put up a good fight and possibly defeat a player that he is fighting against with superior armor and weapon. You would possibly need a MMOFPS to support this design but It could even work in 3rd person MMORPG's of today.

What divides and spreads the community out is okay to have in some games, but when It's all games on the market, then It's quite a disaster in my opinion.

I think this would be ok if you're going to do something besides PvE or PvP in the game. Otherwise, I prefer to progress  and to see real gains as my character gets stronger.

If I saw a newb could play with me and tackle the same content I could after playing the game 2 years, I'd cancel my sub because I'd feel like I'd made no progress in the game, which is the heart of an RPG.

The key to having enough people to play the game with an group is a level cap that does not get expanded.

you make the cap 50, 75, 100, whatever, and it never moves. Then you will meet up with all the other capped players at the end game, OR you will see them again as they roll alts.

The key is adding new content from level 1-cap, not raising the cap which most games do.

I'm definitely not playing an MMOFPS, if I want that I'll pick up the latest Battlefield or Call of Duty. Plus, aren't you just headed for a twinking game? Join my guild, and I'll out fit you with all the best gear, and it's like you join the game with a maxed character.

What are you going to do, just fight all day? In that case, Call of Duty works just fine for me.

Originally posted by Ihmotepp

Originally posted by ShadowSaturn

Large division through equipment and levels is a mistake in game design in my opinion.

If one persons been playing the game for 3 days and the other 2 years, they should still be able to do stuff together that's on similar pages.

That was one of the strengths of Ultima Online, although I still think you could evolve a system much deeper.

One of the easiest logical fixes that comes to my mind is something similar to Counter-Strikes weapon and armor tier design. A 100$ handgun user could still stand his ground in a team fight with his partner using a 3000$ colt or 6000$ AWP, and can even put up a good fight and possibly defeat a player that he is fighting against with superior armor and weapon. You would possibly need a MMOFPS to support this design but It could even work in 3rd person MMORPG's of today.

What divides and spreads the community out is okay to have in some games, but when It's all games on the market, then It's quite a disaster in my opinion.

 

I think this would be ok if you're going to do something besides PvE or PvP in the game. Otherwise, I prefer to progress  and to see real gains as my character gets stronger.

If I saw a newb could play with me and tackle the same content I could after playing the game 2 years, I'd cancel my sub because I'd feel like I'd made no progress in the game, which is the heart of an RPG.

The key to having enough people to play the game with an group is a level cap that does not get expanded.

you make the cap 50, 75, 100, whatever, and it never moves. Then you will meet up with all the other capped players at the end game, OR you will see them again as they roll alts.

The key is adding new content from level 1-cap, not raising the cap which most games do.

I'm definitely not playing an MMOFPS, if I want that I'll pick up the latest Battlefield or Call of Duty. Plus, aren't you just headed for a twinking game? Join my guild, and I'll out fit you with all the best gear, and it's like you join the game with a maxed character.

What are you going to do, just fight all day? In that case, Call of Duty works just fine for me.

The highlighted bit pretty much describes WoW as it is now, add to that the "RESET" made every single expansion, developers should really think about making the journey mor einteresting rather than just creating litle bits of content with an end date.

Originally posted by rav3n2  

The highlighted bit pretty much describes WoW as it is now, add to that the "RESET" made every single expansion, developers should really think about making the journey mor einteresting rather than just creating litle bits of content with an end date.

Hopefully you're not inferring that this is a bad trait of WOW.  It's mitigation against the community fragmentation that's the topic of this thread.

If my shaman, by right of having played 4+ years, had an insurmountably huge gear lead over new players (to the point where they would have to invest 4+ years to catch up) the resulting game would be terrible.  Especially as raid-heavy as endgame is currently?  I'd never find a raid because the 50% of players who have quit since I started playing wouldn't be around to play with and I'd still be waiting on the players with "only" 2 years of playtime to catch up to me.

What's worse is you'd need many times more content to support the 1-year players, the 2-year players, the 3-year players, and so on.  That's one of the crucial things behind WOW's success: they sneakily get players to very specific levels of progression so that they know how to perfectly (until WOTLK) balance the challenge.

Originally posted by Axehilt

Originally posted by rav3n2  

The highlighted bit pretty much describes WoW as it is now, add to that the "RESET" made every single expansion, developers should really think about making the journey mor einteresting rather than just creating litle bits of content with an end date.

 

Hopefully you're not inferring that this is a bad trait of WOW.  It's mitigation against the community fragmentation that's the topic of this thread.

If my shaman, by right of having played 4+ years, had an insurmountably huge gear lead over new players (to the point where they would have to invest 4+ years to catch up) the resulting game would be terrible.  Especially as raid-heavy as endgame is currently?  I'd never find a raid because the 50% of players who have quit since I started playing wouldn't be around to play with and I'd still be waiting on the players with "only" 2 years of playtime to catch up to me.

What's worse is you'd need many times more content to support the 1-year players, the 2-year players, the 3-year players, and so on.  That's one of the crucial things behind WOW's success: they sneakily get players to very specific levels of progression so that they know how to perfectly (until WOTLK) balance the challenge.

I didnt mean it that way, you have taken it to the other end of the spectrum I didnt mean someone would have to wait 4 years to catch up, but make all content meaningful to everyone, because all you have done before is meaningless, and they may as well turn WoW into a multiplayer co-op game, go into chat room, "hey guys lets do this instance", because the journey doesnt really matter anymore the game as a whole can be broken down into leveling -> end game, and leveling is really just a time sink until you can do the latter.

Maybe we are not reading into the same thread but I see the OP complaining about division through equipment and levels and I must be mistaken but unless you are the top level and have geared up properly you cannot interact with the community that is at the "end game"? I mean surely this is a major problem when anyone under the level cap is meaningless and cannot interact through game mechanics with ppl at the level cap.

Originally posted by Axehilt

Originally posted by rav3n2  

The highlighted bit pretty much describes WoW as it is now, add to that the "RESET" made every single expansion, developers should really think about making the journey mor einteresting rather than just creating litle bits of content with an end date.

 

Hopefully you're not inferring that this is a bad trait of WOW.  It's mitigation against the community fragmentation that's the topic of this thread.

If my shaman, by right of having played 4+ years, had an insurmountably huge gear lead over new players (to the point where they would have to invest 4+ years to catch up) the resulting game would be terrible.  Especially as raid-heavy as endgame is currently?  I'd never find a raid because the 50% of players who have quit since I started playing wouldn't be around to play with and I'd still be waiting on the players with "only" 2 years of playtime to catch up to me.

What's worse is you'd need many times more content to support the 1-year players, the 2-year players, the 3-year players, and so on.  That's one of the crucial things behind WOW's success: they sneakily get players to very specific levels of progression so that they know how to perfectly (until WOTLK) balance the challenge.

True, but no game I know of has a 4 year leveling curve, making the example moot.

Mitigating community fragmentation is good. Making progression in an RPG pointless, IMO, is bad.

If I log on to the game and day one I'm as good as some one that's been playing for a year, where's the progression? Might as well just play a first person shooter at that point.

Originally posted by ShadowSaturn

That was one of the strengths of Ultima Online, although I still think you could evolve a system much deeper.

No it wasn't.  This statement leads me to believe you didnt play UO.

Originally posted by Ihmotepp

Originally posted by Axehilt

Originally posted by rav3n2  

The highlighted bit pretty much describes WoW as it is now, add to that the "RESET" made every single expansion, developers should really think about making the journey mor einteresting rather than just creating litle bits of content with an end date.

 

Hopefully you're not inferring that this is a bad trait of WOW.  It's mitigation against the community fragmentation that's the topic of this thread.

If my shaman, by right of having played 4+ years, had an insurmountably huge gear lead over new players (to the point where they would have to invest 4+ years to catch up) the resulting game would be terrible.  Especially as raid-heavy as endgame is currently?  I'd never find a raid because the 50% of players who have quit since I started playing wouldn't be around to play with and I'd still be waiting on the players with "only" 2 years of playtime to catch up to me.

What's worse is you'd need many times more content to support the 1-year players, the 2-year players, the 3-year players, and so on.  That's one of the crucial things behind WOW's success: they sneakily get players to very specific levels of progression so that they know how to perfectly (until WOTLK) balance the challenge.

 

True, but no game I know of has a 4 year leveling curve, making the example moot.

Mitigating community fragmentation is good. Making progression in an RPG pointless, IMO, is bad.

If I log on to the game and day one I'm as good as some one that's been playing for a year, where's the progression? Might as well just play a first person shooter at that point.

You know what, Lineage 2 damn near did when it first came out.  One reason I quit that game is that after 6 months of pretty hardcore playing on my part (3-4 hrs a day) I was at level 52, while some players were at level 70 and I couldn't play with them either in PVE or PVP.  I calculated that at my present leveling rate, it would have been at least 2 years to reach 70. 

Then they raised the cap to 74 and added alternate skill trees and I'm not sure I would have ever reached the top, though they did eventually reduce the curve somewhat.

But I agree, better game design can bring new players and veterans together sooner and there is a variety of mechanics that people have mentioned that can be used to accomplish it.

Originally posted by Ihmotepp

Originally posted by ShadowSaturn

Large division through equipment and levels is a mistake in game design in my opinion.

If one persons been playing the game for 3 days and the other 2 years, they should still be able to do stuff together that's on similar pages.

That was one of the strengths of Ultima Online, although I still think you could evolve a system much deeper.

One of the easiest logical fixes that comes to my mind is something similar to Counter-Strikes weapon and armor tier design. A 100$ handgun user could still stand his ground in a team fight with his partner using a 3000$ colt or 6000$ AWP, and can even put up a good fight and possibly defeat a player that he is fighting against with superior armor and weapon. You would possibly need a MMOFPS to support this design but It could even work in 3rd person MMORPG's of today.

What divides and spreads the community out is okay to have in some games, but when It's all games on the market, then It's quite a disaster in my opinion.

 

I think this would be ok if you're going to do something besides PvE or PvP in the game. Otherwise, I prefer to progress  and to see real gains as my character gets stronger.

If I saw a newb could play with me and tackle the same content I could after playing the game 2 years, I'd cancel my sub because I'd feel like I'd made no progress in the game, which is the heart of an RPG.

The key to having enough people to play the game with an group is a level cap that does not get expanded.

you make the cap 50, 75, 100, whatever, and it never moves. Then you will meet up with all the other capped players at the end game, OR you will see them again as they roll alts.

The key is adding new content from level 1-cap, not raising the cap which most games do.

I'm definitely not playing an MMOFPS, if I want that I'll pick up the latest Battlefield or Call of Duty. Plus, aren't you just headed for a twinking game? Join my guild, and I'll out fit you with all the best gear, and it's like you join the game with a maxed character.

What are you going to do, just fight all day? In that case, Call of Duty works just fine for me.

- Yes, It doesn't have to be all PvE or PvP.

 - I'm not saying that exactly, just that there could be PvE content you and a newb could do together, not necessarily a newb tackling the most advanced content of a 2 + year player. At the same time, I'm also saying a newer player wouldn't be a total pain to bring along to some of the advanced content, he could be a small help, instead of a large detriment like in most MMORPG's.

Don't you care at all about the journey? Or is It all about seeing large divisions through stat and gear progression for you?

I personally don't believe Equipment / Gear should be a total worth determining factor, In all fantasy stories that were the foundation of RPG's, It was about How that main character / Hero wielded the sword, not the sword itself.

None of the Ideas I threw out there are set in stone, of course there could still be improvement to what I mentioned, It was just one idea one of many possibilities.

- No, you could have crafting, pet taming, city/house building etc



 

Originally posted by rav3n2 

I didnt mean it that way, you have taken it to the other end of the spectrum I didnt mean someone would have to wait 4 years to catch up, but make all content meaningful to everyone, because all you have done before is meaningless, and they may as well turn WoW into a multiplayer co-op game, go into chat room, "hey guys lets do this instance", because the journey doesnt really matter anymore the game as a whole can be broken down into leveling -> end game, and leveling is really just a time sink until you can do the latter.

 

Maybe we are not reading into the same thread but I see the OP complaining about division through equipment and levels and I must be mistaken but unless you are the top level and have geared up properly you cannot interact with the community that is at the "end game"? I mean surely this is a major problem when anyone under the level cap is meaningless and cannot interact through game mechanics with ppl at the level cap.

Comments like these make me think that you really do not care about the 'journey' but only about the epeen waving at endgame.

Everything I have done in WoW has meaning no matter how obsolete the content now might be.  That first Deadmines run had a ton of meaning as did those dozens of Mauradon runs.  The fact that I raided Molten Core in vanilla WoW and obtained those T1 and T2 items have meaning even if the stats on those items now are laughable in comparison to level 80 loot.  They have meaning because they were part of my journey through the game and they taught me a lot about playing the game, other players and myself. 

The past is the past and whether what you did has meaning depends on how you felt about it at the time it happened.  however, ultimately you have to move on and find new meaning in the present. That's what the 'journey' is about.  If you only define yourself by what you accomplished in the past you stop moving forward. 

Yesterday my WoW guild beat Hodir for the first time.  Many other players did it before us and in a year, it will be mostly obsolete content but at this particular place in time and for this particular group of people it has a lot of meaning.  We came together as a team and proved that we could attempt and beat this particular challenge.  We moved forward on our journey and we had fun doing it.

Originally posted by Cik_Asalin

Originally posted by ShadowSaturn

That was one of the strengths of Ultima Online, although I still think you could evolve a system much deeper.

No it wasn't.  This statement leads me to believe you didnt play UO.

 
I was a UO player, and the last time I was played was a good 8-9 years ago.

The community was no where near as divided as the level and equipment based games of today.

You were free to go anywhere and have access to nearly anywhere from day one, unlike a level based game. The gap between new and old players and what they could do together wasn't quite as dramatic as It is in many newer games today. And skilling up and playing catch up was quick and easy.

I don't know about the UO today or the UO of 4 or 5 years ago, because I hear It took a turn and became very gear based, but that's not the UO I was talking about.