Description: I think that level spread reduces the interaction between players, making it harder to find party partner and hampers PK action.

Solution 1: Reduce the number of possible levels on Dune (for example, from 500 to 250), allowing other ways to gain power with experience (for example, stats won't be tied to much to levels).

Solution 2: Flex/fix level restriction on various player interactions, such as PK, party, pkrange etc.

— I would support a levelcap reduction. As it is there is neither purpose, besides the 'big number' incentive, nor content for huge levels. Of course anyone above the new levelcap would need to be compensated in some fashion. Anyway, I see this as a good possible fix with very few negative consequences. — luther 2010/04/06 19:48

— I also support the idea of a level cap reduction to 250 instead of 500. Of course it would take some scaling down on the character/guild stuff, but would save having to massively increase other pieces of the game. Also, scaling up areas to work all the way to 250 would be easier than scaling up to level 500… – — orbital 2010/04/07 15:11

—The fact that the level cap has been done away with brings back the need for a solution for this problem.– —greymtr 2014/08/08 20:36

it evolved into a rather long text so i made a special paragraph for it

— I support level cap reduction, but i would reduce the level cap to level 100. These are the reasons why only 100:

1. the amount of work required to reduce level cap to 100 is the same as it is to reduce it to lvl 250
2. Scaling of areas could be done simpler, using the percentage modifier that would correlate to players level without the unnecessary math work: you want an area that is non pk up to certain level, or auto-pk, or auto-pk with some mob, or auto-pk with aggro mobs, all based on the percentage of experience of certain player (e.g. their level).
3. Future upgrades and/or new areas would be easier to tweak for the specific level range.
4. Party exp percentages could be also correlated easily.
5. PK reward system could be based on the percentage scale also
6. mobs smaller than x levels from player give NO experience and reduced sum of money (preventing PKers from camping areas with smaller mobs, to capture a smaller PK player)
7. Don't discriminate solo-play but ENCOURAGE party-play — cens 2010/04/08 15:11

Bearing that in mind, i would remove party range bracket altogether. i would, on that note, enforce players to be in the same room or few adjacent room, while the fight lasts to be able to receive experience from the killed mob.

To improve and maybe even enforce interaction between players some monsters would require more than one player of certain level for a successful kill. Such a monster or monsters would give better loot, more experience, more solaris per kill.
Following that, and possible centralization of guilds (Paradox's letter-guilds section), i would introduce specializations for each and every guild: Damage dealers, damage takers, healers. using such a combination or combinations, it would be easier or more difficult do kill aforementioned monsters. That would also tap into Politics section, because not all guilds would have equally successful healers, damage takers, damage dealers, so to be able to more easily “advance” in content you would require a specific politic standing with other factions.
People would be REQUIRED to take care of each other in order to successfully overcome difficult obstacles. (aforementioned harder monsters, group of aiding monsters etc.)

That would also require a revision of aggro monsters and aggression as such. it is not logical that the last one in gets the beating if the monster is already engaged in combat with the first one entering the room. that would certainly help interaction between bigger and smaller players.

1. This “WoWization”(yes, I just made up that word) of dune would take a lot of planning ahead. — cens 2010/04/08 15:11

Also i would institute a fixed and automatic advancement of levels and base stats based on players level (help maxstats works for me). i would also remove glevels as such and link them into levels thus permanently enforcing “level/glevel ratio”. so levels would be more difficult to obtain, but with the certain level, you would obtain certain gskills.
That would also help tremendously with balance issue, and help balancing wizards. level camping would be more difficult, but also unnecessary.

1. Take everything, customization that little it has now away? All that dune is all about? — cens 2010/04/08 15:11

Introduction of “Crafts” stimulating economy and player to player relationship (if you're good with someone, he/she may let you have a certain crafted item for a discount). that would also introduce a need for a trading interface of some sort (e.g. trading agreement where you could see what items are being traded for which other items and/or solaris, before you close the agreement)

you can read the continuation of this text in PK section

— matas 2010/04/08 13:05

1. Like I said before, this whole WoWization of Dune would take A LOT of planning and implementation and I wouldn't support it at the current state of dune, why not try to fix the issues as they were reported here before this? I don't know if I'm alone in this, comments appreciated. — cens 2010/04/08 15:11

- I don't see that “WoWization” as you named it would necessarily be a bad thing. AFAIK WoW has a HUGE playerbase… i think there are things to be learned there. — matas 2010/04/08 16:47
- But if you're gonna do that, every guild needs a recode, that just isn't realistic.cens
- well, paradox did mention some tough choices, and hell, i'm willing to put manhours into it. — matas 2010/04/08 17:48

- You could start on the road to “WoWization” without adding the guild specialization. Just put in some sort of mud-wide aggro management skill and let players sort out roles for themselves. I'd rather see combat roles based on overall advancement and choice of stats/skills/gear than have it be based on guild. Otherwise you run into situations where you can't get a party going because you can't find a healer. — kosmos 2010/04/16

“Cycling”

The way some MUDs get around this is to have a “remort” system, where at the end of each cycle, they are sent back to level 1, but with additional powers. For instance, in a certain MUD, once you hit 201, you can “remort” and go back to level 1 with additional skills, etc. (“classes” there) Each 7 of these cycles, they can go back to the first and gain a “tier”, gaining additional powers, like a higher stat cap, earlier access to eq, etc. Each cycle (“mort”) increases the amount of exp needed to level, and so does each “tier”. This solves the problems of interaction between levels as well as the need to design more areas for more levels.

The way this could work here, perhaps, is to call it a “rebirth”. (X undergoes [some ritual depending on guild], emerging physically drained, but in some hidden respect, far stronger!) Each time you hit level 100, you can opt to be “reborn” at level 1, at double the exp to level and stat, with a stat cap increase of 2 to each stat and 10 to the total stats. Current level 200s could be sent to 50 of the second cycle, 300 to 100 of the second cycle, 400 to 25 of the third cycle, and 500 to 50 of the third cycle, etc. There would be no need to code levels for levels past a hundred, and there'll be plenty of people in range of each other.

There are disadvantages, of course. For one, the first 10-20 levels would be trivial for someone with glvl one bajillion. However, the doubling in exp would make the later levels exponentially harder. PK could be enabled for levels 1-20 once they are past the first cycle. Of course, one would note that someone on their 3rd cycle would have some insane glvl, thereby slaughtering any hapless 1st cycler in range. But insanely glvl-ed characters already exist, and it's always possible to kill yourself down to achieve an insane glvl to level ratio. PK might be limited to within 2 cycles or something if it turns out to be a problem. Also, ratio calculations for gexp would follow total levels. Maybe just to make it harder, have gskills reset each cycle. heh heh.

This being an open ended system, you could go on forever… But one notes that getting 64 times the exp is going to be very difficult. Of course, exp caps should increase accordingly. I believe this scheme would give exp greater meaning, so that gexp isn't the be all and end all of end game power. (or as far as PK is concerned, the be all and end all of power. Period.) -Sigh

Oh, and perhaps for each main character, any alt must be of a lower “cycle” - you get two alts capped at a cycle below your main, three more two cycles below, etc. For example, someone with a cycle 3 main could have 5 more alts, two capped at cycle 2, three capped at cycle 1. Preexisting alts above the cap will not be allowed to level until the main meets the requirements. This would help to promote guild loyalty, etc., at the same time being a perk of each cycle. -Sigh

Re: “Cycling”

In my opinion, this will actually be perfect for the MUD. I think that having these cycles should not be limited only to regular levels but for glvls as well. Many guilds today simply don't have anything new to offer or any way to grow in power significantly as you advance into the higher glvls.

Maybe a good idea is, having the same remort system for guilds. Whenever you decide to jump towards the next cycle, it resets both your lvl/stats and your glvl/gstats (including pk points). However, now, on the new cycle, your gskills have more power than before, yet you have to train them all again. This will both give players what to do with their xp and solaris and make advancement towards each cycle harder. (Let's say that the second cycle is 30% stronger than the first cycle, the costs would be 30% higher as well)

After all lots of players stopped playing because hey, they reached lvl 500, or lvl 300 or 400 or whatever and so that nothing ever changes and got bored and left.

Regarding PK, I think the same regarding the limitations of +-1 cycle, however with more limitations. Let's say you are at the 2nd cycle, you can PK ppl at your cycle according to a certain range rule and ppl at a lower cycle, that are significantly higher lvl than you and ppl at the next cycle that are significantly lower lvl than you. Ofc excluding ppl under lvl 20 as they cannot go pk. More over, I think that guilds with a PK points system should be modified into such a remort system so that in example, you killed someone from your cycle, you get X amount of points. You kill someone from a lower cycle, you get X/2 amount of points and the next cycle would worth 2x amount of points and ofc while considering lvls, anything in the middle according to a certain formula.

Back to the guild remorts, another idea that came up my mind was that every cycle gets one new guild ability at the higher glvls, moreover, make the available glvls pool and the glvl difference between each guild ability bigger, thus it will make it harder to advance upon each remort. When you finally hit the 4th remort for example (which would be equivalent for today's lvl range of 401-500) it will take you very very long to both lvl up and gain new gskilsl for this remort.

That's it more or less I think, if I have anything to contribute, I will do it later on. -Drill.