MMORPG has a newish post up discussing the value of ‘Mentoring/Sidekick’ systems in some old MMOs and what kind of place a system like that could have in BioWare’s Star Wars: The Old Republic.
Discussing some of the older kids on the playground – City of Heroes/Villians and Everquest 2, the author takes a look at what these systems brought to the table in those games and what kind of impact they could have with SWTOR.
The sidekick/mentor system seems like it would mesh well with the story and Universe of SWTOR.
I’ve personally never played EQ2, but I do have experience with the Sidekick system in CoH/V and it was certainly an interesting feature. Basically these systems allow players who are far apart in levels to close that gap so they can quest/adventure on the same content together. The Sidekick system boosts the lower player up temporarily, so if you were 40 and sidekicked with a Level 50; the level 40 character would get rounded up closer to 50. The EQ2 Mentoring system is similar, but it rounds the higher player down to fit more closely with the lower level player.
SWTOR already has a slightly similar system, with the bolster system in PvP boosting up your power so you don’t get steamrolled by higher level players. With a vast amount of adventuring to be had on your way from 1-50, it certainly would fit in – especially with SWTOR’s strong narrative and story-focused content. It seems like a system like this would fit right in, engaging players to go back and do content they may have missed or passed over with a lower level friend.
You can check out the full write-up over at MMORPG here to get your brain boiling on the topic some more. What say you TORWarriors? Would you like to see a Sidekick/Mentoring system in SWTOR? Drop a line, let us know how you feel!
TORWars Podcast #77: The Big Subscribers Discussion
Galaxy of Guilds - Stellar Corsairs
Jedi Knight Weekly: Slaying the Dragon
James Ohlen Dishes Out Specific Expertise and PvP Damage Formulas
SWTOR Comic Strip: Fail Hunter Episode 35
Have never played EQ2 myself either, but I do like the idea better of reducing the higher level character’s stats so that the lower level guy doesn’t just sit back and watch the fireworks. It’s more fun when you play together.
It was great in EQ2. SWTOR could REALLY use it and it makes grouping with friends so much easier.
I loved the Sidekicking/Exemplar system in CoH. Specially after they did some tweaking to it. It actually went both ways, Sidekicking was for a lower level player to get kicked up to a higher, and Exemplar was when a higher player got lowered to a lower level. For the simple fact alone it allowed my husband and I to play more easily together. He has less time to play then me so I always get head of him. Yes I do hold characters to play with only him. Yet it restricts what I can play with him. If he decides to play something different my reserved class may not complement his as well.
Exemplaring had another function in CoH that not sure would translate well to TOR in that it reduced xp debt you garnered from death at twice the normal rate. So if you had bad run the night before lots wipes and stacked up xp debt it encouraged you to get out then and exemplar down for while.
TOR could take some ques from CoH in the department of ease of grouping far as encouraging teams to form. In no other game did I see group formation happen so fluidly as I did in CoH. Mentoring system was one reason. The lack of loot drama was another, since everyone got something at the end of big fights assigned by the RNG. And there was nothing that was bound, you could pretty much sell everything. No bind on pick up. No need for it. I hate looting bodies honestly, loved just beating stuff up and getting stuff no stopping to stoop. But I digress.
Some sort of mentoring system would certainly be step in the right direction for TOR.
Most of my guildmates have been steadily outleveling me pretty much since launch, so something like this would definitely be useful.
This Article/post is full of huffington
SWTOR could greatly benefit from EQ2′s style of mentoring the higher player down to run around with lower level toons. What needs to go along with this however is to allow the higher level toon to re-run the quests that the lower level toon is picking up (the lower level toon would need to be eligible to pick up the quest).
This would allow everyone to get social points for running the same quests and the higher level player wouldn’t have to sit there just watching a chat bubble over their friends head while they watched the quest cinematics. It would also allow the higher level toon to replay some of the quest lines they ran through on their way up to 50 and earn some comms for some appearance gear.
There are of course several heroic 2+ and heroic 4 repeatables but those aren’t enough to really support a mentor levelling experience.
I agree with you. I loved EQ2′s mentoring system because I usually played more than my wife and was always out leveling her. We used the mentoring system all the time. I like the idea of being able to pick up the lower level quests as well. Like EQ2, you wouldn’t get the usual amount of xp if you’re the higher level toon but at least you’d get something.
It’d definitely make heroics more popular, and especially help those that aren’t max level to do Flashpoints. Most of the time they turn down a level 50 because it becomes too easy or they don’t get enoug hXP for it, so you want to help – but can’t really.
I would love this. Right now, I have the toons I play, then the toons which are designated “only play when ‘s toon is on so we stay the same level.” It’s cool that I get to play so many different classes and specs, but it would be nice to reduce the number of characters who basically sit there but once or twice a week.
Every game needs this feature, if you ask me. It’s too easy to get out of sync with your friends/family, and quite frankly, bringing my lvl 50 tank out to Balmorra to help a buddy finish off some heroics was fun for about 5 minutes (you know, that “I AM THE POWER” feeling). After that, it was pretty lame. If I could have “exemplar-ed down” to his level, I’d have had a much better time.
In City of Heroes you earned no experience, but extra “influence” (their version of credits) when mentoring. I could always use extra cash at the expense of not leveling up for a short time.
I whole heartedly agree. It seems like this is an oversight at this point. A system like this should be added to ALL RPG games that has cooperative options. I ran into this on Borderlands all the time (even though that was not an MMO). There were times where we just couldn’t play the game b/c our toons were too far apart level wise. The level 40 would destroy everything at the 25 level, and the 25 level just gets slaughtered playing at the 40 level. We’d do our best to get as close as possible, but then you’re playing missions with a toon that you know the other character is missing. Why do developers skip out on this? Don’t they realize that getting 4 or more friends together at the same time every time is close to impossible?
I played EQ2 and mentoring was great. I had a friend who was level 70 and he was able to group with me when I couldn’t find anyone else even when I was level 15. His stats dropped to what would have been epic gear for a level 15.
This really needs to be added to SWTOR because I have a friend who is lower than me, but I can’t join him unless I start another character. Bummer.