I actually like this. Might not completely agree with everything, but this could work. Well, for the no upkeep thingy to work, heavier armors would need to be SEVERELY nerfed.
I agree, I don't want to see plate everywhere like it was pre upkeep patch.
Basically the whole idea is to let new players to play this mod without mindless grind. But the question remains, is this community playing this mod because of the grind or they genuinely like the game?
For last month and a half I have fully leveled and equipped char yet I play more than ever before. If majority ain't thinking the same as me, change I proposed might actually kill the mod.
Tbh I wouldn't remove grind completely, I would just remove it from public c-rpg and make it casual and fun. Grind can stay in Strategus for all I care.
Some probably don't like lvl 36 idea. I know most of you think that would create even bigger difference between veterans and new players. Yeah that would happen but only for first few weeks. After that others will catch-up with veterans because most of them wouldn't be interested in retirement just to get gold items in return. Currently there are many players who still retire regularly and that's why the difference in levels between average player and veteran is actually higher now than it would be after my proposal.
Also max level could be at 50 or even 25 mil XP, I would actually like it to be set lower but I'm not sure do devs like it (they love to torture us after all). And I think that my clone-alt idea is really awesome (no false modesty here). It will give people leveled and equipped high level free chars to mess around. I think that veteran players deserve that.
But why I'm proposing such high max lvls? It's simple, I want to see more different builds and faster game speed. But before that I fear STR/AGI balance have to be fixed by removing free wpf and buffing wm.
Pre upkeep patch difference between veterans and average players was actually more than 12 levels, please don't forget that ;)