Free Form Archetypes

Has there been any discussion on the topic of opening up archetypes so you could choose powers over all the power sets of that archetype as long as you were limited to the maximum number of holds/AE damage/Defense/Resistance the archetype should have? With CO offering such an abundance of choices for any one character, and realizing that such a system wouldn't work for CoH/V, there is still a middle ground that could be explored by keeping things within the archetypes though more open than it is now. Granted it would be a huge undertaking to make sure that the system wasn't exploited but that should be able to be worked out in the long run and would open up themed characters to such new aspects as to make the proposal attractive in many ways. Just a thought I hadn't seen expressed here yet, though admittedly I could have missed it.

I keep hoping. One day. One day.

It's been bought up a few times. I would be VERY surprised if the devs decided to do something like that at this point in the game's lifecycle. It would be a fundamental change to how characters work which is the sort of thing you put in a sequel rather than trying to shoehorn it into the existing game.

I don't think i would like total freedom to choose from all the archetypes, cause the now-clear roles of every toon (and i mean each toon, not archetype) in the team will dissapear, and along with it, will dissapear the way good teaming that we have.

what i would like to see is a freedom to take whatever power within each archetype, but on the same tier (example : a blaster could choose any tier 9/nova, but only one.)

Free Form Archetypes would be a very bad thing because you either make it so everyone can be increadibly broken (the possibilities I could come up with would be mind shattering), or make it so that every power functions exactly the same but simply has different graphics (Champions Online). Either way the gameplay suffers, and when the gameplay suffers everything else becomes secondary in a hurry.

It never works. Not because of mechanics. Not because of the devs.

Because of the players.

Even in a game as diverse as this one already is, the game suffers substantially by players that attempt to pigeonhole all of the great diversity into 3 roles.

Players are the death of innovation.

I think what would happen if that went through, is that eventually the UBER BUILD would be found, and then we would see everyone using that and only that because it would simply be the best mix to use. It would potentially hurt the status quo. Not to mention that once the best set to use has been found, teaming would be pointless because the super awesomesauce nevahdie build would be soloing with no need for a team. All predictions, yes, but also very likely. that's what I hear went on in CO.

Obviously the real reason people would want this is to complete their roleplaying concept.

It would never occur to them the power combinations they chose would allow them to decimate all enemies in the game without any inherent risk to themselves.

No really, it's just that I have a rp concept in mind.

I think she meant ALL the pets.

I was thinking about a variation of this idea just yesterday... dunno why, maybe I ate some bad pizza before bed or something... but it went kind of like this:

You keep the power sets in tact, ie Super Strength, Invulnerability, etc. And you keep the AT Hit Points and Innate power based on the primary powerset you choose. However, you can then choose any secondary powerset that does not conflict with your primary.

So, you could choose to be a tanker and take Invulnerability. This would give you the tanker health and innate taunt. Then, as a secondary you could choose a tanker secondary(EM, SS, SM, etc) as normal, or you could choose from any of the other secondary attack based power sets, such as the defender or dominator attack powers(since a character would have to have some form of attack) barring any conflict(much like the limitations on Shield Defense with certain attack powers).

Obviously, some combinations would be better than others, but it would allow for a great deal of creativity.

Say you want to make an "Iron Man" style character, so, you take Blaster "Energy Blast", giving you blaster health and the "Defiance" innate ability, but then you take Scrapper "Invulnerability" secondary for the defenses/resists, thus making you a bit less offensive, but more rugged blaster.

Of course the way some of the AT sets are currently an imbalance could occur and would have to be worked out... such as blaster primary with corruptor secondaries... but the concept would be fun. Personally, I would love for my Energy/Thermal armored corruptor to be an Energy/Invuln(brute style), to fit the concept better and even while sacrificing heals/buffs/debuffs, allow me a bit more soloability.

Mainly I think it would add a lot of diversity into characters and concepts. Granted, I am sure there would be some "min/max" optimum builds that some would come up with for PvP/Farming/AV killing, it would still be fun.

I wonder how broken every character getting a signature power at say 35 would be. The signature power could be anyone one power from any powerset. This would allow your character to do something different from every other character in your Archetype. Maybe you could even keep certain powers like Fulcrem Shift off the table. But I think a broader single choice would create a lot of lot of stylization for toons.

I'm sure this could result in some level of brokenness, but not the absurd brokenness that some of the other suggestions would do.

I think we all have noticed that AE has a ton of good and bad associated with it. But overall its been a good choice for the game and doesn't have to ruin peoples experience. So too would a signature power not ruin people experiences.

The only conceivable way I could see this implemented is this new "AT" would have the following limits on them:

1. Obligate solo'ist - absolutely no teaming at all in the game and no PVP
2. Confined to AE for teaming- no badges, accolades, temps, nothing!!

Here you wanna be all powerful? Go do that in an alternate place and leave the game proper.

Would I like the option of unbridled creativite to min/max anything (damage/defence/recharge)- sure, but without some constraint the challenge and replayablility of a GAME is lost. Might as well load up a big, open space to your computer that says: Here, create! (course that wouldnt be "open" because of those 2 words, but...u know...)

It's far too late to make such a drastic change - but I think you could probably make something like this work, from a balance perspective, if you set it up properly. For instance - every ranged attack you take lowers your max hp. Every defense power you take reduces your ranged damage modifier. Set ceilings and floors for all numbers so you couldn't complete gimp your character. I think you'd still have the issue of creating a game where support toons/powers were unnecessary, and thus unplayed. (Which in turn effectively limits the content options for the developers.)