The new upkeep system does a great job keeping the flamberge/sniperxbow/tincan/platedcharger main battle knights from dominating the field, but has reduced the ability to play a specialized character with one really good item and a lot of mediocre gear. For example, every time I take out my character in full kit (knightly arming sword, military hammer, knightly heater shield, great lance, courser, green tunic over mail, open salet, leather gloves) I brace myself for the nigh-inevitable thousand or so repair bill. Its pretty unprofitable unless I am running a multiplier, and if I'm playing Battle I might lose that horse right off the start to a lucky footman and be paying for pain. Its making my medium cavalry character not terribly fun to play. However the problem doesn't just affect me. Players in a team on a losing streak are forced to downscale their gear, sometimes making them ineffective at their intended role. Meanwhile the other team ramps up their hardware and with a good streak going it becomes hard to overcome them without autobalance intervening. And since this can turn matches into steamrollers, the problem becomes an overlooked team-level game-breaker.
Naturally I've considered a few solutions. I'm pretty lethal (if only because I'm opportunistic) with this build, but we seem to have moved away from kill-based rewards in favor of the multiplier. I can survive to the end of the round often enough, but repairs happen regardless of if I live or die, and become more likely if the game rolls on (even if I die in the first minute). I can grind up money and then take my horse out when the multiplier is high or the map is right, but I already ground for all the money to buy a courser and mail, and it just doesn't seem to pay off to grind to use what you grind to get. All my fellow cav players surely feel this pain, but making something that only helps cavalry isn't good for balance.
However I think I have reached a solution that favors no class specifically, encourages specialist players, yet keeps the abuse-limiting upkeep system. If players could designate one piece of gear, say my horse, or a plate wearer's armor, or a crossbowman's siege crossbow, to only incur half the usual upkeep when the dice choose it, players could use vanilla hardware save one nice piece of gear that defines their role without breaking the bank. Meanwhile since one pays 50% instead of no upkeep, the balancing effect of upkeep remains, since the best of the best (ex. plated chargers) will still cost a large amount of money. Players can economize around their chosen critical item to match their multiplier, but won't have to abandon the role they worked so hard to play when their team loses a round or two.
Implementation, at least to the user, can be quite simple. Already players set up a default inventory, which presumably saves some information on the character. On the c-rpg character sheet under "My Inventory", a new drop-down menu could let players choose their critial slot; body armor, horse, or first weapon. The player then can choose whatever they wish to fill those slots and the upkeep roll will check if the slot has the -50% modifier when checking how much gold to deduct. So I can designate my horse primary, select my courser mid game, and instead of a 990 repair bill, pay a 495. This brings the cost in line with the rest of my hardware so I can enjoy my vanilla character's one shining ability. Likewise, other players can save themselves nasty repair costs on high end weapons and armor. Plate-wearing infantry? Sniper crossbowmen able to wear more than cloth armor? Horse archers actually wearing shirts? Hey, I'm not going to judge how you choose to enjoy the feature. And that's how it keeps balance from breaking; incorporating freedom to choose your niche with embracing the main-battle-knight preventing upkeep system.
So what do you think?
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