   Swords don't kill people... I do!
  Hi everyone,Just another tweak idea that I think might improve MMOs a little.  I don't care if it's been done before, just tell me your opinion.Now a big part of MMOs is the material goods that you obtain (or grind for).  Since the dawn of gaming, certain weapons allow you to do more damage than others.  Now I don't want to get into the whole sense behind why items have to be the way they are, I just want to see what you think about this:Should the weapons not have an effect, or have less of an effect on your damage done?I think that your skills in weapons (if it is a skill system) should have more impact, because it doesn't seem reasonable to be depending on a good sword in order to to good damage.  I'd personally like to see a game where if it's sharp and pointy, you can kill someone with it, so long as you're skillful enough.So, would this help?  Would this hurt?-Humble Hobo   
  That would remove a huge aspect of most, if not all, MMO games. I'm guessing the majority of players would not approve of such a change, although I personally share your opinion. So I'd say it's a very risky decision to make.EDIT: I like the idea of magic weapons giving various buffs and auras, but having the same base damage.   ;  Both the philosophies "better skill/talent = better fighter" and "better equipment = better fighter" are found all through fantasy literature, but stories differ on who wins out of the elite warrior with a toothpick versus the heavily armed newbie. For instance, cliched stories include a quest for a magic sword that enables the hero to beat the ultimate bad guy, and also where a bad guy searches for some ultimate magic item to enable them to rule the world, but the hero beats them anyway (either way, the hero usually wins; it is "fantasy" after all, eh?). Historically there is no decisive account of this, since if an army has superior equipment, it is usually because they come from a wealthier nation, and thus will have superior training also.More importantly, in terms of gameplay, skill and equipment are usually implemented slightly differently. Skill improves slowly and constantly through continuous play, whereas equipment upgrades happen in big jumps and often involve just being lucky (rare drops for instance). Since the RPG mentality is essentially based around rewarding a player for effort above all else, the first of these systems is usually considered the most important (so that a high level player with basic equipment will beat a low level player decked out in rares). These days I'm seeing an increase on the emphasis of crafted equipment. I guess this could be seen as trying to shift the equipment factor away from luck and more towards effort, which is probably a good thing.I wouldn't want to remove the equipment factor all together (it's a nice extra psychological element to have stuff to collect), but I would certainly like to see a system that more favours players who put more effort in rather that those that are just lucky. For instance, you could have weapons power up slightly each time they kill a specific enemy type, or permanant enchantments that in order to cast require you to perform specific goals such as killing a dragon and soaking your weapon in its blood or something. Anything that moves away from the "uber-rarez" culture would be a good thing.   ;  Fallout worked mostly along those lines. The weapons in that game never became obsolete. There were some that were better than others at specific tasks, but there was never just something that was a better version of another.It did all of this without sacrificing the material aspect of RPGing. If anything, it improved it. When you play a game where you can buy a new sword in every town, the most you're ever going to get is improved damage. That's not fun, it's just effectiveness.In Fallout, weapons all had very different characteristics, with range, rate of fire, critical hit chance, etc. And most weapons used different ammo, and since you're fighting in a wasteland where it isn't produced anymore, that was often the biggest factor in deciding which weapon you use next.And just a bonus to relate to your title, I once developed a character that could kill just about anything with one bare fisted punch to the eyes. And when it didn't kill them, it blinded them.   ;  I think it's a good idea.Maybe you can implement something like a "weapon potential system". An ordinary sword doesn't have a high "potential", so the maximum damage it can deal isn't really high but it also won't take much "sword skill" to make the sword does the maximum damage. A strong and rare sword will have a high "potential", it will be able to deal a relatively high damage but only if the user has a high amount of "sword skill" too. ;  I've always liked the idea of having an MMO, where a guy whose level 5 could beat someone who's level 80.  Of course the level 5 guy would have to have crazy awesome ass whooping skills, but you get the idea.  A game where some guy who's considerably weaker than his opponent still stands a chance of winning.   ;  Admittedly this might take away a lot from the enjoyment of a game but it would be interesting to have a game where your character is born with an awesome talent. Say when you create your character you have 20 skill areas, and you have one meesely point in each, but also get to choose an awesome raw talent in one skill. Play to your stengths, and don't allow your opponent to exploit your weaknesses and you have a chance.Finding an acceptable implementation of this would be worth something...   ;  I've always liked the idea of having three different 'skills' for weapons:FightingWeapon TypeThe Actual Weapon.What does this mean? You start off with base skill in all three. You pick up your Starter Noob Club of Noobness. You don't have much skill in anything, and you wander around the woods bashing things with your Club. You gain a minor bit of Fighting Skill, some skill with all Clubs, and quickly gain a lot of skill using THAT Club.however, Noob Club of Noobness isn't going to last all that long, and it will break sooner or later. So what happens when you pick up another Noob Club of Noobness? You still have some bonus from your club skill, and a very small amount of skill from your Fighting bonus, but you've lost the skill with the Actual Weapon.So, what happens? The player ends up being faced with more and harder choices: Do I keep this weapon I have built a lot of skill with (and skill with all others of this type), or do I pick up that shiny new pointy weapon, which I won't be as good with now, but I'll eventually get better with? Do I ditch a weapon as soon as I find a new one? But then I'll be stuck with low skill levels in a lot of weapon types. Will that newer player that hasn't bothered learning how to change his weapons be able to kill me with that Noob Club of Noobness because he has only used it for half the game and has insane skill with clubs and can wield that starter club like some mythic great sword of extra painful cleaving?   ;  IVAN has a system like that.  You get skills relative to weapon classes and specific items.  It gets to where you'll leave a glowing silver axe of pwnage laying in the dungeon and grab a wooden stick, because you know how to use the stick.In EvE, there are multiple levels.  There's the item, many of which come hierarchical variants, some have a %5 increase over the "base" version, others have 2% or 8% or whatever.  Then there's your skill level, which adds 2% per level or 4% etc.  Finally there's the fight itself, where a guy with the ability to put himself at an advantage relative to his adversary can prevail over a guy with better skills and gear, especially with teamwork.I think that a single-player game would favor a manifold increase in prowess over the course of the game, since it would maximize the sense of achievement and doesn't have to contend with balance issues.  A guy training until he can ram a spear through a tank is just as bizarre as a magic spear that can go through a tank, though.   ;  I think weapon-specific skill isn't a bad idea. Although I think it doesn't really solve the "swords don't kill people, I do" problem, since it doesn't really remove the dependency on strong weapons. Speaking of skill, if one want to make the "swords don't kill people, I do" aspect to be really fun, one has to design the skill system as creatively as possible. Say, instead of having just generic skills like "long sword skill" or "katana skill", one can also add non-generic ones like "sheated sword skill" or "heart-stabbing skill", or even some bizarre ones like "adamantium-cutting skill" or "soul-slashing skill". Adding non-generic skills can open ways for the designer to add non-generic weapons/equipments too, which can take advantages from certain skills (instead of generic uber weapons which can kill just about any monsters). So say, instead of providing just generic weapons like "long sword" or "axe" or "uber claymore of the dark lord xxx", the designer can also add non-generic ones like "spectral sword" or "hi-frequency sword" or "possessed katana of the master samurai xxx". Instead of providing the player with just generic equipments like "steel armor" or "fire-elemental ring", the designer can also add equipments like "magnetic armor" or "spirit-caller ring". 