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> Ideas for a skill system with "soft classes"
Blacksmile
post Jan 23 2005, 12:16 PM
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Well i have thought about player-classes, skill systems and such stuff for quite some time and want to share my thoughts with the community now.

At first i dont like classes as they tend to be somehow narrowminded and restrict players from playing certain roles they want to play.
So i am all for a skill based system, but that has it's flaws as well. So if you just play long enough with the system wish had for example you could be able to do most things on a master or at least high level (except for some magical combinations)

So i thought about how one could support players to play believable roles while not giving them the ability to make a do-all character that would destroy immersion, ruin player based economy and so on... so here are some ideas dealing with that:

First the system has skills as wish had, but they were grouped into categories. Categories could be things like "armor usage", "cutting weapons", "positive(light) magic" and so on.
So whenever a skill gets raised the category it is in gets a fraction of the earned skillgain. So maybe if you get 0.04 points in "long swords" 0.01 would go on "cutting weapons" and the other 0.03 on "long swords". This would model the fact that if you know how to do certain tasks you will get some knowledge that is not just specialized on that task, but on the whole field that the task belongs to. This would also apply for crafting... and any other skill.

Extending this one could (and this is the point where it gets away from a cool system i would consider realistic towards some still believable balancing) add interaction between the different categories. So someone who trained with cutting weapons a lot could possibly use a morning star better than someone who concentrated on shooting with a bow or crafting armor. On the other side there could be negative interactions between certain categories, wich is the balancing point. So if you trained (one could make it dependend on absolute level or on the last X skill gains) on the dark magic paths you would get a malus on casting divine spells of any form. So a level 50 dark and light sorcerer would have an effective level in both (or one of the two magical arts depending if absolute levels or recent skill gain is considered) that is much lower than the level he trained up to. Let it be 25 in both arts then or something.

Set up and balanced correctly this system would allow all normal combinations that would otherwise be implemented in classes (which i would only use for giving the characters titles depending on their skills) to exist without negative interference. But it still allowed players who want to play exotic characters to play them, while well knowing that they would be much less effective in those fields interfering with each other.
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KallDrexx
post Jan 23 2005, 12:51 PM
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Actually Wish's system doens't have the flaws you are referring to. Yes, someone could get 50 in all skills but that doesn't matter. The game is on a flat curve and thus, what matters most is what feats and abilities you had. You would only have a limited number of ability points to spend and thus even though you saw people being jack of all trades in beta 2, we don't know how expensive the feats for master, grand master, and elder level stuff was. Since some apprentince feats costed 2-3 abilitiy points I can easily see the higher level stuff costing 10+ ability points, which is a really large chunk. So therefore by the time someone has apprentenced eveyr skill and got up to 50 they can either have some stuff from every skill or be heavily specialized.
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Blacksmile
post Jan 23 2005, 12:55 PM
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Hum, theres a point in what you say, KallDrexx... havent thought about that yet... but as you could choose new apprenticeships i assume you would get new abilitypoints when advancing further in the new apprenticeships, which would bring you more ability points or was there an abosolute maximum of ability points?

Edit: If theres an absolute maximum, then it would possibly kill the players motivation once you reached it... if there was not, then it would take loads of time to get high in everything, but it would still be possible.
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KallDrexx
post Jan 23 2005, 01:11 PM
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There was an absolute maximum (50 * # of skills). Even though that sounds like a lot we don't know how expensive later feats and spells were so we can't comment. Also for crafters, they were limited by the number of recipes they could learn (55 max due to insight).

*edit* though remember, Wish wasn't a grinding game. The point to play was to have fun and advance while having fun, not to get ot the highest you can (not to mention to get 50 in all skills would take a long time).
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silmaril
post Jan 23 2005, 01:32 PM
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Just commenting on this part, the rest is true.

MR could say that as much as they want, and others can say it too, but it doesn't make it a truth. A large part of the fun in a roleplaying game advancing your character. So the advancement part must be interesting, and you must take care that the end-game doesn't consist of characters that are all the same.

It's been proven again and again that people reach the end of the level/skill range very fast, so it must be thought through from the beginning.

Again, just to clarify, I am very aware that skills and recipes would have limited wish characters in the end-game.
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Lucky_Luciano
post Jan 23 2005, 02:03 PM
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So the advancement part must be interesting, and you must take care that the end-game doesn't consist of characters that are all the same.

Very true. That's why I still prefer the Lock-system from Beta 1.0: You could still train any skill you wanted but you could set a focus on some and the other skills drained away if you didn't use them enough (which makes a lot of sense to me).
Characters that became too alike was my only concern during Beta 2.0, I think we should avoid this in PW.
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Blacksmile
post Jan 23 2005, 02:20 PM
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I fully agree with lucky although i think it would hurt to see skills i trained for long time vanish because i cannot focus on all skills... but it would keep diversity of characters in the game, which would be really needed i think.
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Pashta
post Jan 23 2005, 04:41 PM
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Yeah.. I was wondering why they removed the skill locks from beta 1.0. I thought skill degradation was a good thing, preventing "super" characters.


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Chris
post Jan 23 2005, 05:56 PM
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Actually, I'm not sure if preventing people from making "super" characters is the way to go.

In the area of crafting/gathering, I don't see much difference between having a combined tailor/smith/lumberjack and having three different characters with the respective skills. If you restrict players from learning multiple skills (maybe in order to prevent self-sufficiency), they will simply create multiple characters/accounts.

Regarding fighting and PvP, having "super" characters might be more of a problem. One approach to balancing might be to design the skills in a way that not all of them can be used at the same time (e.g. someone wielding a sword or wearing armor cannot cast magic spells). This way characters who have trained multiple skill trees will be more versatile, but not necessarily more powerful.
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Elevano
post Jan 24 2005, 05:20 AM
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Let me add one thought of the degrading skill part of your post. I think the basic skills should not degrade. IE if you can swim, you can do it for the rest of your life. But being a high end swimmer at Olympia need a good portion of training.

Translated to game mechanics this should mean, as further up the 'tree' a skill is, the factor of degradation should be slightly higher up to the point where it is nearly impossible to keep the skill for multiple 'leaves' in the tree up.

But! The degradation should (IMHO) only take place during playtime not during offtime.
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Chris
post Jan 24 2005, 05:27 AM
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Degradation should definitely only occur during play time. I wouldn't like being punished for going on vacation, or having little time to play due to RL issues.
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Lasastard
post Jan 24 2005, 06:45 AM
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I played SWS for some time and I really liked the skill-/profession system they designed.
Being able to combine different skills freely is important, if you really want to create unique characters.

Still you have to be extra careful when designing such a system. Advancing skills for example was way to easy in SWG and combined with the old Jedi-System it automaticly lead to a boring grind.
But nevertheless I like the idea of getting XP only for things u do. Lets say you are a fighter, using a sword. That would mean you only get swordsman xp by using your weapon - porportional to the damage inflicted to the enemy.

The basic idea then would be to have different categories or skill trees (Swordsmanship, Bow, Spear but also Pathfinding, Survival, different Magic Skills and so on) which you can advance over time by practicing. There probalby has to be some sort of limit (maximum Skillpoints?) to prevent hardcore player from creating god-like characters.
And it should be possible to give up certain skill trees in favour of another - if you want to re-specialize. However, this would have to be combined with a difficult task - otherwise it would end up in people rerolling their characters every week.

I think it is important and a main goal of this project to create a fantasy world as vivid and complex as possible, were the player can find its own way and where every trip is a new, exciting adventure.
And one of the ways to achieve this is to provide a extremly flexible skill system, of course.
The one describe above could be something to work on.
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GageEndal
post Jan 24 2005, 08:29 AM
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Quick warning... this is going to just come rolling out ;)


Alright, the one thing that I always hated when I played UO was the fact that I would get a bunch of EBolts and then they would finish me off with their awe inspiring ability to use a sword. Now I may be mistaken in this but the last time I checked wasn't Magic supposed to be an immensely difficult thing to learn on any standard? My thought goes to two directions on this one.

1) Magery should be either greatly reduced at the lower levels making it hard to advance where only someone who is willing to spend a month of solid training to advance their mage to the higher levels through interesting quests that will keep the game play high instead of walk 8 spaces and cast firebolt. I never did like that about most games. Basically this idea would make it so that becoming a mage is a series of quests on the journey to the power that you are seeking. During this time you would have to devote yourself to Magery and you won't have time for silly things like swordplay. Not yet at least. You could do it later but I think that when you devote yourself to becoming a mage that you should get some negative buffers to hand to hand combat. Besides, what would a mage who can summon the powers of the elements need with a sword?

2) Option for solid fighter option in the player creation window. This is not a class, but a stat buffer. It would lower intelligence and wisdom and raise strength and constitution. It would also give you access to a wider variety of weaponry and armor that those who are a Jack-of-all-trades just aren't able to use. Well, perhaps if they were to train as if they were only fighters then they could, but anyways. The solid fighter would become what we all know as the Tank in the game. They are the ones who will rush into battle and take a lot of damage while the rest are doing some serious damage. Now here comes the part that sets it aside from EQ and UO tanks. No spell effect will take hold on the solid fighter. That means that if they want to heal, they are using first aid. If they are poisoned, they need an antidote, no shielding and no warding spells. Their weapons can be enchanted all they like, that's not them.

When you get right down to it, these are classes. But they have enough drawbacks that they are advanced options. No newbie should ever become a mage without knowing enough about the game to figure out where these quests are and no newbie would want to skip the option of getting spells cast upon them. I'm sure there would be the standard "PK Mages" who are going to try to fly through the quests. But with a buffer on it we can force them to wait at least one month (one moon) to get enough power within them to start being a threat to anyone. The longer you train with the quests without breaking the cycle the more powerful you can become. That might just discourage the obnoxious ones from becoming a mage since the ones that like to RP will probably be higher.

Anyhow, that's my rants for this subject. I always liked the idea of classes since they separate the way that people play and force us to establish groups and to role-play most of the time. I know that many think that classes are el Diablo, but they also have their high points IMO.


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Lasastard
post Jan 24 2005, 11:13 AM
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1) Magery should be either greatly reduced at the lower levels making it hard to advance where only someone who is willing to spend a month of solid training to advance their mage to the higher levels through interesting quests that will keep the game play high instead of walk 8 spaces and cast firebolt. I never did like that about most games. Basically this idea would make it so that becoming a mage is a series of quests on the journey to the power that you are seeking.



I really like this idea. I would also prefer to keep the number of mages low. In fact you don't find many mages in any kind of fantasy literature etc. There is always something special about them.
Make it a difficult profession - lots of quests, practicing and so on, BUT on the other hand dont make the mage class too powerfull. You can clearly see, what this can do to a game if you look to the jedi system in swg.

I dont say, that only special characters - randomly chosen - should become mages, but those, who are really determined to walk a long way until there class becomes attractive.
This could also ensure, that a more roleplay-like aspect is emphasized.
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Jerky
post Jan 24 2005, 12:22 PM
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A possibility for skill degradation. If we link some skills as opposites(ie. magic and fighting skills), then as you learn one, the other goes down and vice-versa. I believe UO did this to limit uber-characters. I do not necessarily agree or disagree with it, I just thought I would throw it out there for you all to chew on.


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Chris
post Jan 24 2005, 04:15 PM
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Personally, I don't like the approach "make it hard for the players to become x", or "make it so that only players who are willing to put in lots of time can become x". This only gives an advantage to powergamers and people with nothing else to do, while the normal, or even worse, "casual" gamer is left behind.

"Make it hard" is what brought us Everquest and similar games. I'm still waiting for a game where raw time investment is not necessarily proportional to progress/power in the game, and where knowledge and skill play a much larger role.
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GageEndal
post Jan 24 2005, 07:48 PM
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"Make it hard" is what brought us Everquest and similar games. I'm still waiting for a game where raw time investment is not necessarily proportional to progress/power in the game, and where knowledge and skill play a much larger role.


There you have it, that game will take you about two days to max all levels. If you don't want to invest a lot of time in a game to become all powerful than this is the game for you. I started this game last night and I am already getting ready to lead a clan (one out of the six) and have earned over 1m credits.


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"I am suddenly more and more glad that I am a big stupid warrior."
- Daniel Nicolai - 2006-10-18

"but other times I want to don a feathered cap and go prancing down the byways in pretty purple tights"
- Daniel Nicolai - 2006-09-20
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Lasastard
post Jan 26 2005, 03:46 AM
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But that is exactly my point.
There should be NO advantage for hardcore gamers to become a mage. This class should get no extrordinary features, should not be able to deal more damage then - lets say a warrior - at least not in the beginning, but instead should be attractive for roleplayers who want to spend a lot of time in character development. Quests should play an important role here - something like: Search for the lost scroll of xy in th Archives of Doom to get a new spell.

The only idea behind this is to prevent that more mages are runnin around then you would find in any fantasy literature, were this class is very rare.

I don't think that it should be the goal to keep each class equally in terms of character development . For each class there should be different requierements to the gamer. If you like a more fast and linear way of advancing, you probably start with a fighter, while those, who have fun doing lots of their XP by quests are better of with a mage.

But I agree that this system has to be designed and balanced carefully to prevent it from being to "elite-like".
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sblmnl
post Jan 26 2005, 05:35 AM
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Quick warning... this is going to just come rolling out ;)

Alright, the one thing that I always hated when I played UO was the fact that I would get a bunch of EBolts and then they would finish me off with their awe inspiring ability to use a sword...

Hmm, you actually can't be a fully fledged mage *and* fighter in UO as each major skill branch has one major damage-increase support skill, plus at least two other support skills which enhance various other aspects of the main skill and increases your choice enormously. UO's skill system works quite well and its flexibility is largely responsible for the game's longevity I think.

It's actually really elegant in its simplicity. Like Wish, you have a capped number of points that you can spend on any skill you want. But skills have synergysitc groupings, so that e-bolting mage could *either* have trained evaluating intelligence and possibly inscription to increase spell damage, *or* tactics/anatomy to increase his/her prowess with the sword. The really elegant part is that the basic skill cap is 700, with grand-mastery acheived at 100 points, so you are always having to sacrifice something. (Besides these days being able to pwn people in UO pvp has very little to do with skill, its all items/connection. Sigh)

So I think all we need is a skill cap, leaving the ability to combine skills as freely as we want. BUT there are obviously skills that work well together, so if you choose to decay one of these you just won't be as capable - taming and charisma spring to mind from Wish.



No disagreement essentially with what you say about the difficulty of training magery but - PW is all about choice and the freedom to develop individual characters (subject to the skill point cap constraints already discussed). So you have already "debuffed" yourself to some extent by deciding to either devote your time to the study of magery (thereby becoming completely helpless if deprived of your spell ingredients, runes etc) or being mediocre at both swords and spellcasting. The skill system should surely be kept as open and as simple as possible - once you get into making little compensatory tweaks and nerfs in a quest for balance, its never-ending.



Yep again I agree with you, classes. But as you can already play any number of other games that have classes, with or without fast character development - aren't we trying to do something different?

Actually, another way to look at your idea is, those can be attributes of a race not a class. Ie, if you like playing a tank, you might consider being a cyclops to get your attribute buffs. That's consistent with Wish's philosophy I think. Part of the pleasure in playing Wish was in discovering what strengths and weaknesses your chosen race had - with a "class" template you pretty much know it in advance, so it mitigates against the game's ability to sustain long-term interest. Fast-track, class based levelling games have their appeal but I doubt you'll be playing that other game a year from now.

One other thing mentioned that I'd like to support is the ability to decay skills once you've decided to train up in something else. However, unless some kind of control is introduced I can foresee an annoying problem when you are at your skill cap and inadvertently decay, say, swords because you have suddenly decided to, for example, pick some oak gall for your donkey :-) making your forage skill raise a little.

I can use the example of UO again, there the skills interface lets you indicate which skills you want to decay and which you are raising - solves the problem very simply but in PW we probably need a more rp-friendly way.. ideas?
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Jerky
post Jan 26 2005, 10:18 AM
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I am not sure how all of this will pan out, but I agree that UO did a lot of things right, and that is why Wish decided to try to pattern itself (to an extent) after UO. As far as races being how we deal with stat buffers/classes, I think a lot of people are not going to like that. Some people are going to want to be a gnome and a fighter, others are going to want to be a cyclops and a mage. If we limit what they can do based on races, then I think this will detract from the game. I could be wrong though. Personally I don't agree/disagree with it, I just think that there will be a lot who don't like this idea.

*edit, once again, I can't type on laptops. Plus I never proof read :( *


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