Defining your look in RPGs and MMOs

I've been dabbling with Hellgate London recently. It's a good game, and has ironed out some of the issues Diablo had (which was still a good game).

My main beef with Diablo was the constant slay, pick up loot, play backpack tetris, head back to town, identify loot, still not find anything worth using, sell items, return to slay-loop. I recall; though it's some years ago, so my memory maybe somewhat erroneous here; that I could sometimes do this round trip a dozen or so times on some of the bigger levels. And this is the grind.

Hellgate London reduces this by the inclusion of several new features, most notably the ability to dismantle items you find in the field. Breaking items down means you can carry far more of their constituent components (scrap metal and tech parts and shards and the like) which take up far less space in your pack and which can later be re-forged along with your current equipment to improve said equipment. Thereby enabling you to subtly upgrade your weapons and armour on a fairly constant basis.

Another improvement is the delux demodifier, which for a cost strips your equipment of all the mods you placed in it earlier. The actual interface is a little annoying, as you have to remove all mods, even if you only want to swap one out with a new one you've acquired. But it is still a significant improvement on wasting goods mods that are stuck in an obsolete weapon a la Diablo 2.

The gimp - because there always is one - lies in the augmenter. A device which enables you to add enhanced, rare or legendary abilities to an item for a cost. Whilst this seems grand on face value I have tried it countless times and rarely get an ability which is of significant use to me.

So how to fix this problem? Well, my suggestion would be to allow users of the augmenter a lucky dip option (essentially as it operates now) far cheaper than the current price; and then a more expensive selection option, which enables you to select from an attribute pool that will be of some value to you. And then finally a very expensive option which enables players to select the exact ability they wish to add. Thus enabling players to effectively craft useful items which suit their play.

Reforging is indeed a feature I have used in several of my P&P role-playing games. It not only provides players with the opportunity to acquire great equipment fit for purpose, but also enables players to 'craft their look'.

This latter aspect should not be overlooked and although many MMOs give a nod in its direction thru the use of dyes etc. it seems all of them still fall short of the mark. Years of P&P gaming has taught me never to underestimate the desire of players to 'look a certain way'. And this may be contrary to the genre norms.

For example, as far as I am aware, in every fantasy-milieu MMO or computer RPG a warrior type character, typically a swordsman ends up dressing in chunky platemail armour. Platemail typically bestowing the most significant advantages in terms of armour. But what if you wanted to be a warrior with the best protection but without the chunky platemail look?

In my games, my solution to this has been through reforging and the inclusion of 'acts as' abilities. So you can reforge platemail into a linen shirt with the ability 'acts as +20 platemail'.

Through this technique, you can have knives that strike like broadswords and ultimately render all your enchanted items into a tattoo, if you so please.

Obviously game balancing needs to be taken into account, but that is essential in any game. Pay careful attention to it.

The great advantage of using a feature such as this is that it gives almost free reign to players to craft their own look. Knights no longer have to look like knights, wizards no longer have to look like wizards and much equipment can be distilled down into a single, awesome artefact. It's worked well in my P&P games, I'm sure it can be translated into MMOs too.