D&D Online

My biggest beef about MMORPGs is that they don't offer enough ways to customize your character's development. In most cases, once you reach your "level cap" you pretty much have the same abilities and spells, and eventually, the same equipment as all other people playing your class. /yawn.

This leads to my next thought ... why dp virtually all MMORPGs NOT take religious affiliation into consideration when planning for character advancement and development? EQ1 made a very small attempt, almost an afterthought, to incorporate religion into the game by allowing certain characters to make or wear certain types of armor, or to cast certain imbuement spells, but that's about as far as it went in terms of actual effect on gameplay.

I remember playing DnD and having a cleric who worshipped the God of War. My affiliation with my god allowed me to use different weapons than I was previously allowed, and enabled me to cast spells I'd otherwise not have access to. This was cool. This made me different from other clerics out there. It made my character unique.

So I ask, why not take religion a step further? Why not have affiliations with gods or religious groups open up entire skill trees? Your character progresses through these trees as they perform services, and/or donate time or money to the god's cause (in addition to gaining "normal" skills and abilities for your character through class progression). Your character can gain "levels" within the religious community of your choice, which opens up more skills and abilities from which you can choose. For example, if you worship the God of War, you gain abilities with new weapons, or improved weapon skills, or improved defensive skills, etc. If you worship the God of Stealth, you gain sneak abilities, or shadow melding, or an ability to move silently, etc. If you worhship the Goddess of Nature, you gain tracking abilities, or an abilities to enhance your natural regneration capabiliities, or abilities to talk with animals, etc. The options can be incredibly creative and interesting and would allow for charaters with an almost unlimited number of skill combinations: A wizard that could talk to animals ... a druid that could meld into the shadows, a theif that could perform simple manipulations of the elements ... How cool would that be? Think of EQ1's AA system or WoW's talent system, but expand it ... a lot. :) 

I can already hear people mumbling about "class balance" and grumbling about keeping class abilities unique unto themselves, and I do not disagree. The suggestions I made here in terms of the specific abilities are just that ... suggestions. The devs would know best what to offer people to keep classes unique and abilities balanced.

Thanks for listening. :)

Clerics will more likely than not, choose which diety or pantheon of Deities they follow in DDO,

These are as follows:
Church of the Silver Flame (lawful good)
The Sovereign Host (Pantheon of good/neutral gods)
-Arawai, God of Agriculture (NG)
-Aureon, God of Law and Knowledge (LN)
-Balinor, God of Beats and the Hunt (N)
-Boldrei, God of Community and Hearth (LG)
-Dol Arrah, God of Honor and Sacrifice (LG)
-Dol Dorn, God of Strenth at Arms (CG)
-Kol Korran, God of TRade and Wealth (N)
-Olladra, God of Feast and Good Fortune (NG)
-Onatar, God of Artifice and the Forge (NG)
The Dark Six(evil pantheon)
The Devourer (NE)
The Fury (NE)
The Keeper (NE)
The Mockery (NE)
The Shadow (NE)
The Traveler (CN)
The Blood of Vol Undead god (Lawful Evil)
The Cults of the Dragon Below
The Path of Light
The undying court (Neutral good) (Undead Elves pantheon)

Depending on which pantheon you choose to follow, will give you access to 2 domains, some domains are only accessable through a single Church.

Now in Eberron, you don't have to be the same alignment as your God, a Fanatical Zealot of The church of the Silver Flame, could be Lawful Evil...

For Example, if you follow the Blood of Vol, you gain acees to Deathless, Good & Protection Domains.

Each domain grants access to a special ability and a spell per level which is a domain spell, (a bonus spell set to choose from)

Hope this helps

Good to see the list of gods available, but I think the o.p. was thinking more along the lines of everyone else. Clerics, by rights, should gain access to specific spells and what not granted by the diety of thier choice, but what about serving a god when you're not a cleric? I could be off on my interepretation of the first post, but I think he was asking about allowing, say, warriors who openly choose to serve a god of war, gain anything nifty from doing so as he might in a TT game?

Lots of Feats have trees themselves, just having different feats will make nearly every level 20 different, Dragon marks will also lend a lot of difference to the other races... I'm interested in seeing which feats will be available at launch and those that will not be available.

Dragonmarks for those who don't know, are similar to tattoos, but they are magical in origin, and linked to the Dragons themselves, There are 4 levels of Dragon Marks, Least, Lesser, Greater, and Syberis. You can take a Least mark at 1st level if you're of the propoer race. Also there is an Aberrant Dragon Mark, which is left from a family which was destroyed int eh War of the Mark.

Least Dragonmarks:

Detection: Half-Elf, Detect Magic 2/day or Detect Poison 2/day, +2 bonus on spot checks

Finding: Half-orc/human, Identify 1/day or Know Direction 2/day or Locate Object 1/day, +2 bonus on search checks

Mark of HAndling: Human, Calm animals 1/day or charm animal 1/day or speak with animals 1/day, +2 bonus on Handle Animal Checks

Mark of Healing, Halfling, cure light wounds 1/day or restoration 1/day, +2 bonus on heal checks.

Mark of Hospitality, halfling, Purify food/drink 2/day or prestidigitation 2/day or unseen servant 1/day, +2 bonus on Diplomacy

Mark of Making, Human, Make whole 1/day, Mending 2/day or Repair light damage 1/day, +2 on craft checks

Mark of Passage,  Human, Expeditious retreat 1/day, or mount 1/day, or dimension leap 1/day, +2 bonus on Survival checks.

Mark of Scribing, Gnome, arcane mark 2/day, or comprehend language 1/day or whispering wind 1/day, +2 bonus on decipher script.

Mark of Sentinel, Human, mage armor 1/day or protection from arrows 1/day, or shield of faith 1/day, or shield other 1/day, +2 bonus on sense motive checks

Mark of Shadow, Elf, darkness 1/day or disguis self 1/day or mirror image 1/day, +2 bonus on gather information checks.

Mark of Storm, Half-elf, endure elements 1/day, fog cloud 1/day, or gust of wind 1/day, +2 bonus on balance checks

Mark of Warding, dwarf, alarm 1/day, arcane lock 1/day or firetrap 1/day or misdirection 1/day, +2 bonus on search checks....

obviously with half-elves and gnomes not being in at launch those marks won't be available,  Lesser marks will be availaible to those who have a Lesser Mark, and 2 skills at rank9 or better, by taking a feat of course. Greater Marks are available to the bearer of a Lesser Dragon mark with 2 skills at rank12.

Heir of Syberis is a Prestige Class:(thus not in at launch)  it requires the Heroic Spirit feat, 15 ranks in 2 skills, and be a Dragonmarked race (human, half-elf,elf,half-orc, gnome, or halfling) sample power for Mark of Healing : Syberis.... Mass Heal 1/day. An Heir of Syberis CAN NOT have any other dragonmark.

There are Druid special feats, that you can get with feats, like Ashbound, GReensinger etc, course those won't be in at launch since druids aren't also...

There should be some god specific Prestige Classes: Exorcist of the Silver Flame, Pretty nice Prestige class...we will have to see when they will put those in DDO...

in general between feats, and the ability to multiclass, There shouldn't be too many Flavors of the Month...