So, in full disclosure:
1) I haven't visited the forums in a bit
2) I haven't searched the forums to see if this is an idea that's already been discussed.
Here goes (and I'm going to keep this brief in order to not pollute the discussion too much with my own thoughts).
What if stats were EXCLUSIVELY on the character (not on gear), and there were ways within the game to gain those stats - while varied qualities of gear performed better (or worse) as your stats increased - with gear performance capping out (not performing better) at some stat level (varies, of course, by gear).
For example: You have a sword that continues to have improved performance as your strength or whatever increases from 1 to 50, but at 50 it will no longer improve - while there is another sword that you need to have 40 strength to even use, but then continues to improve until your strength increases to 100.
My thought here is that its sort of more in line with your avatar getting stronger / more powerful - rather than being more powerful because of your gear - while your gear works better not because it has better stats, but because YOU do.
Thoughts?
I think a lot more thought would have to be put into this. It would be an interesting idea, but there are problems you'd need to solve. Just in a few seconds of thinking, the following thoughts come to mind:
How would one improve their stats?
Where would people get the gear, because there would be very, very few items that were worth getting (since all you need is the next sword up). It would be like Legend of Zelda, except everyone would be after the wooden sword, then the white sword, then the magical sword. Once you have the sword (or other items) for your skill, there would be no need to get more, then it would just be a grind to level.
In MMOs traditionally the incentives to play (apart from the enjoyment of playing) are to increase your character's level and to improve its gear.
This idea would only work if there were just as many things to do to improve the character's statistics as there traditionally are to improve its gear.
While in theory going to a personal statistics based system from a gear based system could work I am having trouble coming up with a reason why it would be worth the effort to make this large change.
I personally like stats on gear. With creating your race/class combo you should have a different stat distribution than others with the same class and different race. This can be furthered by having points, like in EQ, where you can personally allocate some stats in your character. This leads to different gear you would be searching for than your counterparts. I don't see how this will be possible with your system. So I find this diversity much more fun imo. However, I do understand the whole gear dependent part, rather than just being naturally strong, aspect that isn't too fun either. It would be up to how the gear will be handled in Pantheon. I personally hope they start off with small AC items, then it works up into larder AC items, and then you start to see some magic gear and so forth. Starting small in stats is probably the best way to go about an MMO that I know of.
I think I know where you are going. I see that being made simplier in the nature of the weapon itself. It almost lends itself to weaponry specifically.
For instance, Axes are faster than short swords, short swords are faster than 2 handers. Rapiers are faster than axes and do less damage but damage more often than axes. daggers are faster than rapiers and do less damage more often. 2 handers are slowest but do alot of damage- when they hit.
Say you need Dex, Agi and Str for basic weaponry, if you are high in Dex and low in Str a dagger or short sword would be better until you skilled up that skill set. If you improved Str only, a short sword would become more powerful or an axe might be favored, as well as open up 1hb possibilities with Maces.
Likewise with agi being strong and and dex low, a rapier would be the stronger weapon and if improved, dual wielding axes can be a progression or an alternate, however you would be straining yourself to improve strength. However you want to play, you do you- if you wanted to lug around a 2 hander you could spend your time working Str to be able to use that 2 hander one day and because of your already high dex- you think it would hit all the time.
The weapons would have their skill modifiers innate in the nature of the weapons themselves: the rapier is more agile, the axes are more dextrous and slightly strong, the dagger is agile and dextrous, kind of thing. That way the only itemization needed on the weapons would be minimalist and could be drool worthy stuff like: able to hit magic/spectre things, or procs, or maybe some resists.
I see where Wandidar is going with this concept and I think it’s good to consider.
It is sort of the question what are stats and why are they on items?
Most character statistics are derivative of tabletop d20 roleplaying games. Those character statistics effected the statistical chance to succeed at tasks, added flat modifiers and gated certain abilities. Fully Min/maxing starting stats and bonuses on level-ups and gear a character could double its primary stat by dedicating a huge portion of characters wealth. Focusing on one stat both at character creation and through gearing will significantly cripple the other stats relative to the primary stat.
In modern MMOs these stats have become the primary measuring stick of character power. Most character abilities are heavily modified by the base statistics and as such raising them has a very strong response in the abilities. As the games progress the only way to make gear better is to keep raising the stats on them which in turn multiplies they base abilities by a small amount.
If we break away from the concept stats flat buffing ability magnitude we can add bonuses on items to an increased % chance to succeed at an ability. This inherently builds in a powerful diminishing returns when increasing % chances over 50%. The game mechanic powering up your character shifts from hitting harder to hitting more often.
Small increases in damage on weapons and increases in armor and elemental resistances become much more profound if they are the primary multipliers on abilities, mitigation and avoidance. I greatly favor a holistic system design that considers short term, long term, low gear, high gear, low level and high level. A designer should be able to predict a classes average abilities at any given point in the game and understand how it feeds into the overall game system.
Long post short if character power is not primarily based on stacking stat buffs on gear then not having stat buffs on gear is not really a problem.
I haven't thought that through yet - but at first blush, I think there should be a variety of ways in which you become more powerful so that people who dedicate themselves to it have ways to distinguish themselves. Some examples of ways I might see getting stats:
1) A nominal bump every level
2) Via skill usage sort of like leveling up "abjuration" or "sense heading" back in the older MMO's
3) Via rewards for doing things in game "Thank you hero. Please, take this bottle of wine. Legend says that a single sip grants wisdom."
4) Perhaps via killing things that are "better" than you in a given area by using the thing that they are better than you at. i.e. you have a chance to learn / gain some intelligence if you use intelligence based abilities as a component of besting a caster type that primarilly uses intelligence based skills.
To be honest, there's probably many ways to do it far better and more creative than I've listed here - as these are just "think them up in 30 seconds or less" ideas of how to do it.
I like the idea of having permanent stat buffs be the reward for extensive quests. The quests would be thematic to its reward. Each quest could be designed to take 10+ hours and only provide a small permanent buff and could require many zones.
I could see the quests having max levels to complete but if you mentor down you will be able to gain credit for completing objectives.
Additionally I would consider setting a maximum number of permanent buffs by level but with how long each one takes you will likely out level any limitation anyway.
Otherwise though I would keep stat buffs restricted to spells and consumables rather than static on gear. Let gear serve its purpose rather than as objects to hang stats on.
^ Disagree, I don't think any quest should be mandatory for your character. If you can make up those stat rewards by doing other stuff, and there is a max number of stats you can get on your character before you can't get any more, then I don't care.
Anyways,
This is fun and all going down this rabbit hole, but Pantheon is probably not going to go down this path. Seems interesting, but Diablo probably did it best with allocating stats per level, allowing you to meet the minimum requirements for certain pieces. In terms of gear, obviously Diablo gear wouldn't be the way to go in your vision. But I think if you went this route you should get stats based on leveling up and leave it up to the user to decide what type of stats he/she wants.
Quest was a general term. In my mind it was a combination of true story quests, super rare consumable items, collection quests, and WoW style achievements. I do not think Pantheon should be or will be based purely on mob grinding. If you do not participate in all aspects of content then you will not receive all the possible gains you could have. This would just be an expansion of that same as not expecting to have the best of the best gear without raiding
There can still be some effects on gear but the fewer static stats that are on gear then the less susceptible to mudflation the game is. I am also not a fan of getting a specific number of stats to allocate each level as that creates too powerful of a power growth curve and you end up with tons of trivial content at higher levels.
For that matter rather than +10 strength on gear I would rather see +2% chance to hit with swords. This would make items less universally useful and therefor would be required to be upgraded less often.
I think I'd actually have an overall stat cap on an avatar based upon their level, with the cap for max level being very difficult to attain - but with many ways to attain it. I would also allow players the option of changing themselves - so say you realize that you've severlely over allocated dex... I'd allow you to attain the stat you want - I GOT STRONGER! - while eliminating an equal amount of the stat you don't want - BUT I'M LESS DEXTEROUS!!.
As far as long involved quests, I could see awarding stat points as part of a reward, but with the real reward being something else (a piece of gear or whatever) - so that you would do the quest if you wanted the gear, but didn't have to do it - because you had plenty of other options to attain those stat points.
I think I'd like to see stats on character level up, whether that's every level, every third, fifth, tenth, etc. With items, I'd like to see bonuses to class specific skills rather than stats. For example, WAR, PAL, CLR can all wear plate, but don't all tank. So, a bracer drops that increases healing given/received by X%. That would be useable and beneficial by all three. However, there's another that drops that increases threat by X%. The cleric probably wouldn't want that one (although I have known clerics that played that way :p). In this example, both are nice for a warrior or paladin, but you only get one bracer slot.
You could also use this to give classes a bit of specialization flavor. Let's say there is a robe that drops and it's wearable by wizards. It could have several different possible bonuses. Maybe it adds X% damage to your fireball (or snowball or lightning ball), maybe it reduces mana costs of a specific school of magic, maybe it increases the threat reduction generated by your threat reducing spell(s), maybe it increases your carrying capacity, maybe it increases your dodge chance - lots of possibilities. This would also give people the freedom to make less than cookie-cutter or 'optimal' characters.
It might be a nightmare to code, just because of all the possible effects, but it would free us from being so gear dependent. Different bonuses wouldn't necessarily be better than others, just different.
Edit: The same bonus should not be on multiple gear pieces. You wouldn't want to see a set of gear for a wizard where every piece increased the damage of a spell by X% (or would you? hmm...)