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The Daily Grind: Should MMOs offer respecs?
MMOs last for so long that you're almost guaranteed to get bored or make a mistake at some point during character development. Most games know this and allow you a do-over, be it through unlearning skills in sandboxes like Glitch and Ultima Online or respecing talent point choices in World of Warcraft. Lest your choices be trivialized, certain games insist on making respecs prohibitively expensive; City of Heroes and Champions Online even charge real money for respecs should you deplete your in-game allotment. But other MMOs simply provide no outlet for a do-over at all, like Star Wars: The Old Republic, which currently locks you into your advanced class choice at level 10, long before you're really capable of making that kind of decision. While the devs are still debating respecs as a post-launch addition, a surprising number of players are vehemently opposed to the entire concept on the grounds that it makes character choices irrelevant. What say you -- should all games have respecs, or are do-overs just another form of "easymode"? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
The Daily Grind: Ignorance is bliss
One of the most common MMO myths is that there are only two types of players: completely ignorant noobs and sagely wise veterans, the clueless and the all-knowing. The fact is that all of us are in varying stages of learning about specific titles and MMO gaming in general. It's a process in which we -- including the developers of these MMOs -- never quite know all there is. Today's question is in a complex two-part format, both dealing with ignorance in online gaming. First, what did you only recently learn about your favorite MMO that you never knew before, even if you've been playing for years, that rocked you back on your heels? And second, what did you learn about a game that you wish you could UN-learn, restoring your original state of ignorance, because that knowledge took some of the fun away from your experience? Maybe you found out something everyone else knew, but you were playing for years without the slightest hint that you were doing something wrong or the hard way. Maybe you thought the world was deeper or more complex, but a friend revealed the true secret behind some of the developers' tricks and enabled you to see "behind the curtain." What were you ignorant about for a long time, and what do you wish you could forget and be ignorant about once more?
