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Couple of changes we're making in I5:
1) Instead of the first five levels being debt free, the first TEN levels will be debt free.
2) XP debt will be halved on mission maps (that includes outdoor mission maps, too).
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Low level debt has never truly bothered me, so whatever on that one... if anything, it will mean we never get to finish allof our level 5-10 contacts unless we solo or pair off only.
I believe the intent on the second is to put us in misisons more. This won't help much, and it will help the mission farmers (who keep the same mission and run it over and over and over) more than those who run missions normally.
The issue is, and continues to be, that the XP reward for the time travelled to get to/from a mission is disproprotionately low when compared to the same amount of time spent in one place (either circling a building while street sweeping or rerunning missions prior to the completion of the final goal).
The fix? Simple in my mind.
Option 1: Lower XP awards for street sweeps, make a corresponding increase in mission XP that's worth about half of what the entire map is worth. On missions which give XP and do not require 100% defeat rate, pro-rate the mission XP with how much was taken out in the mission... If you got half the mobs, you get half the experience. If you killed NO mobs, you get nothing as a bonus. There's a few missions this wouldn't work on, but generally it makes sense.
2) Make running missions a badge, and once you've run X number of missions where you were there long enough to get the bonus, you get progress (that functionality already exists). Then... each badge along the 'missions completed' track gives you bonus XP on top of everything else you have done. This system worked very well in Anarchy Online where the two factions had 'token boards' which gave XP bonuses. The XP bonus was level restricted (which could be done here too). In order to KEEP people in missions, you can further make the xp gains only on future missions completed.
Story wise, this would mean that players completing their missions would be more respected by the city for uncovering plots which could harm the city than those simply running around pummeling the bad guys on street corners.
This got long, I apologize... Summary:
1) No debt for 5-10 may permit players to outlevel story arcs in that range.
2) Debt reduction on missions is nice, but doesn't accomplish the seeming goal. Two options to meet this goal are:
2a) increase mission completion XP to be substantially more than when compared to the XP gained from minions in the mission
2b) reward mission completers with XP gains on future mission completion in the future (a positive feedback loop)
