[Tritian]

OK, I vote that instead of experience points giving you levels, and levels giving you access to certain equipment/ships, that we do something similar to how PlanetSide handles their leveling.

Basically, when you start the game you get a set amount of certificate points, and each time you 'level' you get 1 more.

Here is a loose example of a skill tree. The first number indicates how many cert points are needed to achieve that cert. The things within each tree indicate that you need the parent cert as a pre-requisite of the certs within them. So far example, you'd need the Hauling cert in order to get the Heavy Hauling cert, which allows you access to the freighter and freighter equipment.

1. (2)-Combat: Allows access to Scout and Ranger ships by default
   1. (2)-Light Combat: Allows access to LF's and MF's
   2. (3)-Heavy Combat: Allows access to HFs and AF's
   3. (1)-Advanced Combat: Allows access to Bombers
2. (2)-Hauling: Allows access to shuttles by default
   1. (1)-Light Hauling: Allows access to FT's and MT's
   2. (2)-Medium Hauling: Allows access to Tow
   3. (4)-Heavy Hauling: Allows access to Freighter
3. (2)-Mining: ... etc
4. (4)-Other crap

And you could even have certificates for skills and other special things, such as:

1. (2)-Engineering: Allows access to engineering certs
   1. (1)-Repair: Allows access to repair your ship or other peoples ships from armor in cargo bay.
   2. (1)-Refueling: Allows access to refuel your ship or other peoples ship from fuel in cargo bay
   3. (3)-Wrench Jockey: Allows you to mod attributes of your ship such as armor and equipment.
2. (1)-Hacking: Launch/Repair/Refueling fees no longer apply to you.
   1. (2)-Base Hacking: You can take over defensive structures and command posts
   2. (3)-Droid Hacking: Defense Droids and Pirates nolonger bother you
3. (2)-Artifact Collecting
4. (4)-Extra Storage Space
5. (6)-Ship Hanger
6. etc...

[Tritian]

With this system, people can get into Jumpgate and start contributing in the way they want to relatively quickly. People who want to be a jack-of-all trades can do so, at higher levels when they have more cert points.

Ofcourse, there would also be a way of forgetting your certs so you can try something different. There might be some kind of time limit, so that you can forget a cert instantly, but it takes 3 hours or so before you can forget another one.

[project3wc]

all up for it. we'd have what other MMOs call player "classes"

[GrimGriz]

Ooooh and then we'd have a reason for the multiple characters per account. I WANNA BE THE WIZARD!!

@Trit
The first part I don't have a particular problem with (if there definitely will be leveling, no ifs, ands, or buts), particularly if that would mean that they'd balance the ships so that a level 4 guy taking the light hauling route would have an equal but different ship to the level 4 guy taking the heavy hauling route.

The second part starts to get dangerous, because the more skills you add, the less skill matters.

[project3wc]

...and shoot lasers from your head pew pew?, well they've already said you can have multiple characters so this isnt realy going to affect whether you're going to make a diff character or not. ( i think )

i just think it'd make people more 'unique' since theyll be specializing in certain things or whatever.

[GrimGriz]

Originally Posted by project3wc

i just think it'd make people more 'unique' since theyll be specializing in certain things or whatever.

It wouldn't really make the people more unique, it would just mean you had to level up a different character to do different things. In Jumpgate Classic 1 character can do everything, so having to level up different characters to do different things is just a fancy disquise for a timesink when compared to Jumpgate Classic.

[netburnr]

As long as it doesn't get like EvE.

This idea is as good as any for testing in Beta thats for sure, good suggestion Trit.

[Tritian]

i see this more as specialization early-on, so that people can get in and start contributing early. But by level 30 or 40, you'd have enough cert points to get almost everything. So it's really not that hardcore of specialization.

I feel this is a better system then the levels we currently have now, because it allows the end user to decide what he wants early on and at the pace he wants. Also, it allows people to be useful and access to good gear earlier, rather then having to deal with the tedious early levels when the player is basically worthless.

[Smegit]

Like it. It does away with the treadmill and rewards us for the things we are actually doing.

Smeg

[Ambrosius]

I personally LOVE the idea of a skill tree. I basically like the idea of "certification" -- but I believe that skill building needs to stay as skill-related as possible using combinations of flight hours, mission completion, etc. in order to certify you for the next level. This could work for gear as well. Getting top-of-line ships and top-of-line gear should be a special achievement (IMO), and it should be an incredible feat for someone to gain top qualifications in more than one branch of the tree: (Defense {Fluxers}, Exploration, Merchant, Military, Mining, Transport). So you would not be likely to have hot fighter jockeys stocking their own stations with their freighters -- which helps to drive more interdependence.

For example, you would have to put in [[80]] flight hours and successfully complete [[25]] level 2 cargo missions (with such missions requiring that you haul at least 40u of HEAVY stuff) in a Transport before you can be certified in a Tow.

[netburnr]

Originally Posted by Ambrosius

So you would not be likely to have hot fighter jockeys stocking their own stations with their freighters -- which helps to drive more interdependence.

Don't know if I like this part of it....

Sometimes there is noone around and you just have to do something yourself.

[Istanbul]

well net, it would just mean that instead of flying a frt, the hot fighter jock would be using a somewhat smaller cargo ship, either a tow, or a light-tow-esque (bigger than transport smaller than tow, similar to HM, but not used for mining) kind of ship. I am all for pilots licenses, combat certifactions, and all that jazz. That'd rock! (unless it sucked of course)