Race Balancing And Character Balancing

[erwin]

How about an in-depth character customization / bonus / worshipping a particular god / etc at the end of tier 4, L50?

That should be enough time for a new player to get acquainted with the mud, and decide what he/she wants. And if he/she decides that his/her bonus is bad..he can remort again till T4L50 and choose, but with some penalities of course.

[Virisin]

Bleh to bonuses at the end of tier 4 level 50. I think Mord's idea = good. Worshiping a god somewhere, race gods to give you the benefits.

[erwin]

Ok, but when do new players get to decide? At level 50? Or by playing x number of hours?

Can they choose to worship a different god if they choose wrongly?

[Virisin]

I'd just add some altars to different race gods in the mud, much like the guilds now. You go there, you pray, you receive the bonus. If you pray to a different god, you swap bonuses.. Nothing so permanent, just a fun way to customise your character during the game, rather than on creation.

[Prometheus]

I noticed no one said anything about Nanukimo's suggestion to increase Cha max. What do other people think about this? What would be a reasonable Max? I know it would be a pain to go through an tweak down all of the cha items in the game. Ideas or tell me to go burn

Prometheus.

[nanukimo]

I kinda like mords idea about seeking out a god and praying to him but I'm not sure if I like the idea that you can go around swapping all the time. I think there should be some kind of penalty or make the character pay some kind of donation if they wish to switch to a differnt god to worhsip. You could have the penalty raise each time that you switch the god you worship.


On raising cha, it might be a pain in the but its so much easier to get caster equiment then it is melee equipment. Only bad thing about raising cha is there is not enough quests out there that give cha equipment. I know there is some zones in production that are going to be offering caster equipment.

But I think if you take some of the harder to get caster equipment and the few quests that give cha equipment and raise their cha, then raise the ammount of cha you get from devine mind. Just make 150 or 200 cha work how 100 cha does now. Its kinda ridciolous to see casters get the best cha equipment so easily when its a total 360 on melee equipment.

[erwin]

Perhaps we should see what's the max cha we can get with the best eq nowadays, and base it on that? I would guess it's around 4-5 cha for each slot, but I might be wrong.

However, I'm not sure how casters and non casters stand.

The way I see it, cha is capped. So if you got perhaps +5 cha equipment for each slot, you could hit 100 cha easily, and max out your casting potential.

But DR isn't capped (technically it is, capped at the very best eq).

If the situation as it stands now, casters are much better (read: overpowered) than melee classes (in terms of overall ability), by all means, raise the max cha vastly and have that maxed amount have the same effect as 100 cha.

But if melee classes are much better (read: overpowered) than caster classes, increase cha to 150 or 200, but leave damage formulaes unchanged.

But if they are roughly the same, then raise the max cha to the highest available cha possible via equipment, then have that maxed amount have the same effect as 100 cha.

For the above three situations, I'm assuming that the classes are decked out in their best eq, maxing their CHA / DR (and relevant stats) respectively.


The altar idea sounds fun though. Much better than the race bonus at the start.

[Virisin]

I don't like caps on anything, but currently casters are strong enough, so if you were to remove the cap, you'd have to change the forumla so cha had slightly less effect. So in the end it'd just weaken new casters..

I kinda like mords idea about seeking out a god and praying to him but I'm not sure if I like the idea that you can go around swapping all the time. I think there should be some kind of penalty or make the character pay some kind of donation if they wish to switch to a differnt god to worhsip. You could have the penalty raise each time that you switch the god you worship.

I just don't want to see it becoming too annoying to change your bonuses, because some bonuses might be better with certain classes..

[Fizban]

The altar idea isn't bad, but to make it still less of a try each out for a zone or two and/or change for the situation I'd make it be free to worship a god, but some sort of loss when changing from one god to another.

[Virisin]

Yeh, I agree.

[erwin]

New casters might get weakened slightly ; I spent my first three classes (Priest, Mage, Esper) with base CHA, and warrior hunter with minimal DR.

Shouldn't really affect much, really.

[Kvetch]

I agree with the altar thingy.. and.. I want an altar.  *mwahahaha*  WORSHIP ME OR DIE!!!!!!

Thank you,

Kvetch

[Mordecai]

I was actually thinking of more generic deities than Molly, Me and Shorty.

More like, dimensionally themed 'god's.
Perhaps in the future:
-space allegiance's

Medieval:
-Become a Knight, or a Barron

Prehistoric:
-Any number of actual gods.

Wild west:
-Deputy
-worshiper of Yocahu (the Native American supreme Creator)

Something along those lines, I think Molly will like this idea.
I can see her thoughts racing already.

[Fizban]

So not necessarily a god so much as something that one may religiously swear fealty to. (ie, knights, baron, deputys aren't gods, but that doesn't mean they can't have a religious following)

[Virisin]

I was actually thinking of more generic deities than Molly, Me and Shorty.

More like, dimensionally themed 'god's.
Perhaps in the future:
-space allegiance's

Medieval:
-Become a Knight, or a Barron

Prehistoric:
-Any number of actual gods.

Wild west:
-Deputy
-worshiper of Yocahu (the Native American supreme Creator)

Something along those lines, I think Molly will like this idea.
I can see her thoughts racing already.

Yeah, that's what I thought aswel. And it would be easy to start being faithful to them to aquire the bonus, but there'd be some sort of penalty to switch to another whatever.