vbGore Free Online RPG Engine

I am trying to decide a good way to come across making player classes. For my Post Apocolypitc ORPG There is either two way i wanna do this. One is of course the Player will get to choose there class. Which would allow them a set of specific Skills they can use.

Or have No classes and the player has to "train" in certain stats to learn skills. etc Fist/Blunt/Slash system combat then can train Medical/Chemical/Engineering skills.

Which the 2nd option would let player be able to fully customize there player, so no two heros would be the same. But then again this might make the game unbalanced for some people.

What are your thoughts?

Aleron is going for a mix...

Well, there are classes, but these classes are not real...

They are presets from what the player sees when he clicks "New Class"

we have pools of skills the player can learn, and with his own stats and a variety of items,
they can play any preferred style

PROBLEM: Inbalance.

We already KNOW that we will be sitting there, for months, with very experienced alpha testers.
And later again, for months, with chaotic betatesters.

You should calculate a 100% chance of some combinations being INVINCIBLE or worse.

With classes:
be sure to still leave your players freedom for any playstyle.

My Original idea for the player to choose a career, and while lvling with that career they need to train in certain stats/skill to improve there effectiveness. Once they lvl they can stay on the same career path or choose another one (2 max) just to help improve custom chars.

Classes are NOT simply "old" and "bad"

with a thought out class system you can help balance your game,
and keep things simple for the player

(thus we have many presets for inexperienced players)

Just my thought on this but why not do the hybrid with the classless character being able to use basic skills only and to be able to use more advanced skills you would need to become a classed character.

This would allow some players to customize all they want with the basic skill set and then move to the advanced skill set at a later time decided by them. hmm a few new thoughts coming together in my head will think more on this.

that seems more like this:

most games have 3 specs, and they build into many classes

in your version it all branches from 1 class, which CAN do all 3 specs (magic, range, war!)

but maybe you could change to a specced class at any time...

sounds very player friendly

This probably won't effect your game at all but it's a different thought around what you probably want to do.

In my game we have set classes, and the player can obtain new jobs frm within that class. they have branches into the light and dark sides with pros and cons but im not going into that.

in our black mage class, we have a job called the "bangle mage" (most likey going to be renamed). This jobs allows the user to obtain a gem (or create) for the character's bangle, the character will gain a different skill tree depending on the combination of elements that the gem contains. some element are denied from being together for obvious reasons... (fire/water) but we are developing our hybrid element status for the gem keeping the pokemon close in mind.

I "was" going to go for a classless system, but these days I just don't want to spend the time needed to balance out such a big feat. Going with classes is easier since you have about a billion examples to work from.

Class systems aren't so bad, its just that they are used with boring ass games. Most every online RPG goes for redundancy over content just since it is a hell of a lot cheaper and easier to have people do the same thing over and over. Classes are boring in that because the game itself is boring. Even with games full of more content, the classes become boring just since they do the same thing over and over because the game itself is predictable and redundant. I'm sure people will not find classes as boring if you add more variety in your battles, making fights more than just jamming on a sequence of skills in the same order every time.

true, true...

classes limit aplayer in 98% of the games...

offer a variety of styles within classes.

In aleron we have spell categories the player chooses from.

Each having:
1 target based (simple, has multi target spells)
1 area effect (explosions, tornados to go through the battle field etc)
2 effect (buffs/debuffs, special skills, and stuff...)

this is our minimum for variation.
applies mostly to spell based skill categories.
you chose 4 categories in total.
this way, we give the player freedom of chosing his playerstyle,
but also limit him slightly so balance issues cant skyrocket (it will already!)

our "hunter" for example has:
1 tree for damage traps
1 tree for special traps
1 tree for special skills (see enemy HP, track enemies, etc)
1 tree for specialisation (humanoid, dragon, insect, beast etc)

But theoretically if your game was completely balanced wouldn't that just make it boring to play?

I don't know, It bothers me when some guy has a one hit kill that he can use every 10 mins or something, because that's just overpowered. But I don't mind when some players are more powerfull then others, that kinda gives me something to be scared of, and something to look up to.

Oh nice thought, it would be awesome if there was a spell that increased your damage with every melee wep by 50% but decreases your health 60% for as long as you keep the spell active?

well nevermind

I think one of the reasons people demand balance is because they want to progress as fast as everyone else. Again, this comes down to boring gameplay. Most MMOs are boring as hell after the first few hours you start playing, and only get fun again after you've played for a good 1000+ hours. There is also the problem that they rarely have replay value among most players, so nobody wants to start over just because they learned they screwed up their build a little. I personally have never seen any problem with allowing stat reallocation as long as it comes with some penalty and restrictions, like -6 hours worth of experience and can only happen once every two weeks. Allows for stat correction without jumping between different builds all the time.

yeah,
and for replay value...

I really dont see why so many games let you start at ZERO kiling bunnies.

In Aleron your first opponents will be bandits and stuff, HUMANS.
not too well equipped, as you yourself are not uberequipped

The idea is to allow stuff like bandit hideouts and stuff, and also bring "some"
action to the player.

click and walk action to lvl 30 killing bunnis sucks.
Ragnarok Online takes FOREVER to "start"....

I think that to make the best class system it has to have both elements, balance, and freewill, but with some restrictions such as not being able to learn advance skills from all the classes your little character wants.

A well built hybrid system should saffice most players need to customize there character and characters battle style, but disallowing the ability to become a god among noobs

Runescape is a good example of a classless system gone bad, as im sure many ppl quit before they start, so whether or not you do a classless system, class system, or hybrid, just make it entertaining make players want to level through out there class and explore others, or with a classless allow some guidance and some restrictions, since in runescape players can be the best at everything if they play long enough.

Good luck.

I never understood the reason to leveling, stats, classes, corpses, losing exp, or any other restrictions / penalties. They should just be there for kudos, or gags, that's it.

UnRestricted games are what makes games unpredictable and therefore adds to gameplay dynamics and therefore fun.

Do you have an example of an unrestriced RPG? I wouldn't mind checking something like that out.