In an effort to keep force users much more powerful than the average clone I see 2 choices:
Like most MMORPGs, they could have the same level cap for all classes. Lets say there is a bounty hunter class and the level cap is 50. They would have to make sure that in a one-on-one fight, a level 50 Jedi should beat the same level bounty hunter 9 times out of 10. This is a simple balancing (or not in this case) issue. They just make the level 50 bounty hunter less powerful than a level 50 jedi. This might cause some problems with PvE levelling. Does that mean that a level 20 bounty hunter is killing mobs at level 20 whereas a level 20 Jedi is killing level 25 mobs? Or that the bounty hunter can only take on mobs of level 15 when they're level 20?
Balancing in WoW was always a hot topic and Blizzard is constantly shifting figures and abilities to attempt to make the classes perfectly balance. For a good long time, the Warlock was always known as one of the better (or should it be easier?) PvP classes. Even though all classes should be equal, inevitably not all are.
On the other hand, what if each class has a maximum level cap they can reach? Before you even pick your character at creation, it tells you what the level cap is for each one. For example, a Jedi or Sith might be level 50, a bounty hunter might be level 40 and other basic soldiers would be a mere level 20. This would make the game certainly interesting. Like I mentioned in a previous article, it would be great if regular soldiers could "blend in" to the thousands of other AI controlled soldiers. And having a level cap so much lower than the powerful classes may give players incentive to level up a couple of soldier classes for different gameplay. A player might spend 80% of their time on a Jedi getting to 50 and spend the other 20% reaching the level 20 cap for a soldier class. They may want a few different level 20 soldier classes for different things. One might be a sniper class, another might be an expert in engineering and another in rocket launchers. Then with your guild, you can do a soldier class raid an evening or two a week where you all jump on your alt classes and attempt to beat up a couple of Jedi "bosses". This could be a PvE raid or even a heavily weighted PvP scenario.
Level 50 Jedi on the other hand would find it extremely easy and rewarding to plow through masses of level 20 soldiers and may find that it takes 30 soldier classes to take them down. They also have to have a slower respawn time (in PvP) than solider classes to make it more fair.
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3 comments:
The issue with this solution is that ultimately, if Jedi has a higher level cap than any other profession (or class), there will be Jedi overpopulation. This is what happened in SWG. Higher level cap means more powerful characters. In the old SWG, there was no such thing as "levels", but Jedi were more powerful and more attractive to the audience playing to be "the strongest" (ie a lot of people, and not the most interesting people to play with in a MMO). Then they added levels. All professions could reach level 80, but a level 80 Jedi was on average stronger than a level 80 rifleman or level 80 bounty hunter. The problem remained.
The fact is that if there is an "alpha class", that is more powerful than the other ones, and if the incentives to play other classes are not strong enough, in the end too many people end up playing the alpha class. The game becomes boring (= too many people with same profession) and unrealistic (dozens of Jedi everywhere when they should be almost extinct).
Allowing people to have several characters and hoping that they will play both their jedi and, say, soldier characters could be an idea. The problem is that what needs to be taken in consideration is the number of hours played as jedi, and the number of hours played as the simple soldier. Then add up all the hours of all players. If Jedi are (1) more powerful and (2) longer to level up to max cap, I'm sure Jedi will be much more visible (much more total of hours) in game than any other profession. And this will suck.
They need other solutions :
- make Jedi a very difficult profession to play ; for example they could have permadeath, or huge penalties upon death (large amount of XP loss for example)
- have a hard cap on the number of Jedi per server (in that case they need to find ways to make the "Jedi slots" turn amongst players ; permadeath could be a way to do it)
- reduce the difference of power between Jedi and other profession (instead of Jedi beating the same level Bounty hunter 9 times out of 10, it could be 6 times out of 10) and give the other professions some really cool things that Jedi cant get
- have no playable Jedi
With this idea, it has to be appealing. If the developers can crack that, then it would work great. This could be done in all sorts of ways: Totally different story, different achievements, different raids, special equipment etc.
- make Jedi a very difficult profession to play ; for example they could have permadeath, or huge penalties upon death (large amount of XP loss for example)
- have a hard cap on the number of Jedi per server (in that case they need to find ways to make the "Jedi slots" turn amongst players ; permadeath could be a way to do it)
At the end of the day, the developers want to make a game this is fun, and my goodness I hope they dont do permadeath as it's a big game and fun killer.
- reduce the difference of power between Jedi and other profession (instead of Jedi beating the same level Bounty hunter 9 times out of 10, it could be 6 times out of 10) and give the other professions some really cool things that Jedi cant get
This is definitely your most appealing suggestion to me and sort of what I was getting at. If soldier classes got rocket boosters and other cool gadgets then it would definitely make them more appealing.
- have no playable Jedi
I really think that Jedi have to be playable someway or another in a KOTOR game
I really appreciate your comments though, together with the community, we can design the game for them!
There is a simple way to balance the Jedi against all other classes. Other classes may use whatever tool/equipment they find near. For example, killing a frenzied Rancor can prove equally difficult for a Jedi and a Bounty Hunter, if the BH is allowed to use that mounted blaster cannon over there.. something the Jedi can not, since the subset of his skills does not include handling such devices.
That much just for quests and quest goals. Generally speaking, the potential of a character is not in her raw power, but also in versatility of the character's skills.
Remember the KOTOR and the subsequent Star Wars SAGA edition RPG - a Soldier is quite equal in power to the Jedi, simply because whatever a Jedi can accomplish with the Force, the soldier can accomplish with other means - be it grenades, booby-traps, remotely controlled droids, cracking computer programs, etc.
To be honest, of all the screw-ups of SOE, the permadeath for the Jedi was the worst. When a random disconnect is likely to kill you and cause hours of the time you've invested into your character be blown to dust, you're going to delete the game and cancel subscription. Permadeath is a NO-NO principle in any MMO.
Another random idea - if I recall correctly, the Jedi never really earned any money. All they got was Republic funding. The Republic effectively paid their bills and often scrutinized every bill in question. Go ahead and play a Jedi, but while your pal is building his own financial empire, all you've got is a yellowish robe and a lightsaber.
Just my $.02
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