Could an action-RPG work without leveling up?

[renegade7]

Sure, Zelda and Metroid both do it. Just replace numerical levels with equipment upgrades.

Instead of "Get level X, it is now safe to enter location Y without fear of dying" it's "Acquire equipment X and now you can access location Y".

I actually think it's a slightly better system because it feels much more natural.

Captcha: Skynet is watching. Uh oh.

 

[SajuukKhar]

Yeah, sounds great but have you ever played FF2?

I played for a few hours just a few days ago and built up my stats pretty fast but I was still getting my ass kicked when I stepped into a different enemy zone. Normally I would look at my levels and say "I'll come back in 5 levels" but since there were no levels I had to just guess my way through it. Eventually, after 4 or 5 deaths I turned the PSP off. Levels are important because when a level rises, all stats rise with it. If I were only monitoring strength or HP, i I would still get my ass kicked often.

I never disagreed that levels aren't important?

I am very pro-level, and have been arguing against removing levels. Removing levels would be retarded.

I don't think we are having the same argument.

 

[Epona]

Yeah, sounds great but have you ever played FF2?

I played for a few hours just a few days ago and built up my stats pretty fast but I was still getting my ass kicked when I stepped into a different enemy zone. Normally I would look at my levels and say "I'll come back in 5 levels" but since there were no levels I had to just guess my way through it. Eventually, after 4 or 5 deaths I turned the PSP off. Levels are important because when a level rises, all stats rise with it. If I were only monitoring strength or HP, i I would still get my ass kicked often.

I never disagreed that levels aren't important?

I am very pro-level, and have been arguing against removing levels. Removing levels would be retarded.

I don't think we are having the same argument.

LOL, apparently not. Sorry.

 

[TehCookie]

Well if you dodge instead of being hit you'd get agility, or if there was a blocking mechanic points could go to that and such. Or it could have different melee weapons that require different stats like daggers inflict more damage with high agility and strength rather that it being based on strength alone. Or having an accuracy/critical stat where if every attack you make connects you get points towards that while if you just flail in combat you have a less change of a critical hit or maybe get stamina to be able to keep attacking or something or other...

Though I'd hate it because it would be impossible to level up a style you have no skill at. In skyrim I was never able to level up my melee since I am terrible at it. Not to mention with the level scaling made that even more difficult since there is no beginner/low level area I could train in. If you can't even pick your perks you couldn't change your playstyle either.

But there's nothing preventing you from taking a whole bunch of hits to gain health, then dodging everything later to gain a whole bunch of agility.

As it is in Skyrim, there's a maximum number of attribute raises you have, and that ensures there is balance and you don't get like 500 hp, 500 magicka, and 500 stamina.

Putting a cap on the system described by the OP would be kidna dicksih because you may want specific attribute levels, but have some ultimately wasted by being forced to dodge thus leveling up your agi, and wasting an attribute point that you may have wanted to spend on health.

In Skyrim there's nothing stopping you from have 100 in all the skills like archery, one handed etc. It could have a cap like that. Besides why would you hate the fact you can grind skills? If you don't like it you don't have to do it, in almost every game you never have to be max level to beat it. Some people just like to get to that level 100.

 

[Epona]

Sure, Zelda and Metroid both do it. Just replace numerical levels with equipment upgrades.

Instead of "Get level X, it is now safe to enter location Y without fear of dying" it's "Acquire equipment X and now you can access location Y".

I actually think it's a slightly better system because it feels much more natural.

Captcha: Skynet is watching. Uh oh.

It's also why Zelda and Metroid are action adventure games and not RPG's.

 

[SajuukKhar]

So only the end result matters and not how you got there ? Interesting.

So your argument is

"it doesn't matter that both let you define you character with equal depth, but that one is closer to D&D and thus inherently better"

interesting.

In Skyrim there's nothing stopping you from have 100 in all the skills like archery, one handed etc. It could have a cap like that. Besides why would you hate the fact you can grind skills? If you don't like it you don't have to do it, in almost every game you never have to be max level to beat it. Some people just like to get to that level 100.

We weren't talking about maxing skills, we were talking about maxing attributes, and Skyrim's system does prevent you from getting maxed attributes. The max amount of HP, Magicka, and Stamina one can get in Skyrim is 900, but its impossible to get maxed stats in all attributes.

Also what was with the "you don't have to max all your skills" thing anyways?

I have no problems with being able to get 100 in all skills, and don't care if people want to grind for them or not.

However, I don't support a system that would allow you to get maxed attributes, or every single perk in Skyrim.

A good skill system would let you max all your skills through work, but prevent you from getting max in all attributes, and getting all "perks" or whatever applicable substitute another game has, to prevent you from getting too godly. The actual skill level is somewhat meaningless considering most of the actual damage you do is via perks/attributes, so stopping people from maxing those is far more important to balance then preventing people from maxing all skills.

 

[kommando367]

To all who mentioned FF2 and similar games, thank you. I'll look into those.

 

[Epona]

To all who mentioned FF2 and similar games, thank you. I'll look into those.

For FF2, get either the GBA or the PSP version. PSP version is much cheaper I think.

 

[DoPo]

I am very pro-level, and have been arguing against removing levels. Removing levels would be retarded.

As in "completely ever" or in this case? Because I'm actually a big fan of systems without levelling and I feel they are at the very leas, on par with levelling. However, yes, I agree that this system would be better with levels, simply because basing everything on organic progression would lead to awkward character advancement. Or at least it's quite prone to having it.

 

[SajuukKhar]

As in "completely ever" or in this case? Because I'm actually a big fan of systems without levelling and I feel they are at the very leas, on par with levelling. However, yes, I agree that this system would be better with levels, simply because basing everything on organic progression would lead to awkward character advancement. Or at least it's quite prone to having it.

I have yet to see a RPG without a leveling system that felt like an RPG, or didn't break down in some way near the end.

If I were to have an example of one, that worked well, I would gladly accept it.

 

[SajuukKhar]

And yet, every single game that has used the D&D ruleset, has always had several highly exploitable uber-builds that broke the entire games balance.

Making your game based off of D&D in no way shape or form prevent exploitable, unbalanced build from showing up.

The ultimate end result of becoming super godlike or not is ultimately solely on the shoulders of the player, no matter if the game uses a D&D ruleset or not.

I always hear stuff like
"well in skyrim I can use this smithing+enchanting exploit to get gear that vastly overpowers anything normally fond in the game so exploring dungeons is pointless"

And all I can say is
"well I can make a uber-charatcer in NWN2 that basically unkillable through a series of stats/class/item combos and that makes every fight a faceroll"
but I don't complain about it because it is a choice.

 

[aguspal]

Why would you want to remove level ups?

Its like removing guns in a FPS game... Well not to that extend, but you get what I am trying to say. I guess they are really necesary... but it is pretty awesome to have one, so why not?

 

[Epona]

Of course you can break every RPG by exploiting it, isn't that part of the charm for some games? The best part of FF8 is that I can draw weak magic, card enemies to avoid leveling up but still gaining AP and then convert that weak magic and items into stronger magic that then makes me a god.

I do have to spend many hours doing that to be able to breeze through the game but it's that exploitation that makes the game worth playing. I could probably get through the game faster by not exploiting it but what the hell...

Other games, like Oblivion, were more fun before you knew how to exploit them.

 

[SajuukKhar]

I wouldn't even know because I'm not the type of player that looks to exploit and break the game like that. But I do know the d&d games I've played are much more challenging and thoughtful & rewarding than the Elder Turds (especially Oblivious & Skyrim) if you play it like a normal human being.

Bethesda should just fully concentrate on the combat system and streamline everything unnecessary (like skills) out of the game. It would be great if Bethesda just dropped their shitty RPG elements entirely and made an open-world action-adventure game with Blade of Darkness combat and maybe some magic. But we know they won't do that because they want to try and please everybody (more $$$) The 'RPG' fans, LOL, and the action crowd.

And when I play old school D&D games I see tons of needless barriers that only make the game harder, and more complex for complexities sake. A lot of what old school D&D based RPGs did is the same as making you have to do algebra problems after you hit the powern-on button on your pc to get it to turn on.

Yes it makes turning on the PC harder
Yes it does require you to think more
Yes you can consider turning on your PC more rewarding after doing that then doing it normally

But does it actually make turning on your PC better or genuinely more deep? Not really.

Complexity should come from boss fights that are well designed, not combat mechanics that are based around trying to screw with numbers in order to get your random chance dice-roll to land a favorable number.

Old school RPGs did make you think more, but not because the game itself had some harder challenge or puzzle that required you to take a moment to think through, it just made you think more because the game devs threw up as many barriers as possible to prevent you from doing anything, and forced you do a bunch of entirely unnecessary math in order to influence a random dice-roll.

Yeah you can add complexity by making if you hit or not a random number, but you can also add more complexity by giving bosses an attack that will always 1 hit kill you but they he used randomly and without warning also.
.
.
also blade of darkness had shitty combat, I wont deny ES has some bad combat, but BoD isn't better.

 

[DoPo]

As in "completely ever" or in this case? Because I'm actually a big fan of systems without levelling and I feel they are at the very leas, on par with levelling. However, yes, I agree that this system would be better with levels, simply because basing everything on organic progression would lead to awkward character advancement. Or at least it's quite prone to having it.

I have yet to see a RPG without a leveling system that felt like an RPG, or didn't break down in some way near the end.

If I were to have an example of one, that worked well, I would gladly accept it.

Bloodlines - point-buy system there. Fable also didn't have levels, per se - generally, punching stuff gets you Physical experience, using magic gives you Magical one and shooting/trading gave you Skill experience. They can be used to upgrade the skills that fall under them (Physical for Strength, Health and Toughness, for example). Kills and quests give you General experience, which you can spend on anything. Barring exploits, it isn't that easy to max everything. Moving away from cRPGs, GURPS is very fond of point buy and probably the best one there with it; FATE doesn't have levels, either; Shadowrun is another one; Dark Heresy is a hybrid, where characters have ranks but it's point buy in all other respects - ranks can only alter the cost for abilities or open up new ones, ranks don't make PCs any tougher or better in anything.

 

[SajuukKhar]

Bloodlines - point-buy system there. Fable also didn't have levels, per se - generally, punching stuff gets you Physical experience, using magic gives you Magical one and shooting/trading gave you Skill experience. They can be used to upgrade the skills that fall under them (Physical for Strength, Health and Toughness, for example). Kills and quests give you General experience, which you can spend on anything. Barring exploits, it isn't that easy to max everything. Moving away from cRPGs, GURPS is very fond of point buy and probably the best one there with it; FATE doesn't have levels, either; Shadowrun is another one; Dark Heresy is a hybrid, where characters have ranks but it's point buy in all other respects - ranks can only alter the cost for abilities or open up new ones, ranks don't make PCs any tougher or better in anything.

I never really enjoyed Fable's system. It felt really.... blegh.... I feel like I get far more choice with Skyrim then I do Fable.

As for Bloodlines, its been SO LONG since I played it I forgot how I felt about that.

I never played FATE, or Shadowrun, or Dark Heresy.