I am quite new here so most likely many will take this with a grain of salt, considering what I saw in game and within the forum I just had to post about it all.
Considering my own personal experience in game design and balancing in a few MMO projects which have similar obstacles to FOnline 2238.
When considering game projects without a subscription you simply have no hope at all to balance the game based on the idea that you can control multi-logins. It simply cannot be done because of the many ways to bypass any method of blocking and then abuse it for ill gain. Even if FOnline were subscription based these loopholes would still be available, it would just cost the user currency as a prevention for every multi-logged account which weeds out most people. But FOnline will never be subscription based unless the Developers someday break off and make their own completely independent project away from any IP concerns and that's a whole different discussion. Quite simply however nothing can be done about multi-logging so everyone might as well stop ranting and raving in most of the threads I've viewed and discussions within game thinking that something can be. You can only balance the game in the hope that you can reduce the effect in some fashion from multi-logging.
Considering the limited scope of FOnline 2238 in that it is primarily PvP oriented I would suggest the following.
Mercenaries and other NPCs:
- Every town in the game has a limited supply, with a ceiling cap along with a dynamic growth rate based on a variety of factors. For example you may only be able to get a handful of mutants out of a recruiting area every tick period if the town is in fairly ruddy shape. Cap cost would still fluctuate however there would only be a finite supply thus attributing to the true value of a NPC comrade. Not to mention the fact that it's illogical for there to be a unlimited supply of NPCs for hire, we are in a post apocalyptic world after all.
- All NPCs which are hired do not come with anything on them at all nor do they have infinite ammo. This means that you have to either purchase or make all of the gear and ammo the NPC is going to be using. It not only increases the work involved in having a standing army, it removes the rampant abuse of hiring mercenaries just to kill them for their gear and bypass crafting or trading for it.
- Requiring NPCs to be leveled up to be of much use, though the XP cap would be smaller than a normal character and you could also train them up in Base Facilities with time investment.
- Some changes along with the above may have to be made to Slaves as well.
Map & Gameplay changes:
- Adding many more spawn points to various towns and player bases, the Trapper base is a good example of having more spawn points however even then it is too small and clumped. There's no reason at all for there to be only a few spawn points per map, it leads to abuse and mass AoE spamming which is simply disgusting from a level design perspective. If you want to make maps harder to infiltrate then make it so that you have go through tunnels and other obstacles to reach an objective, do not allow spawn farming. For example enlarging the old bunker, adding in more ways to enter the base, and keeping spawn points far away. It doesn't need to be a one button click kill zone, a lot of the maps suffer from this. There should be strategy involved, not "Everyone the moment we enter you click click click before they click click click then we'll storm it again after gearing back up!
- Allow players to build fortifications within their bases such as gun points and place traps such as mines all with limited build placement zones positioned away from spawn points.
- When placing guards in bases you can only keep them in the main base scope you cannot bring them anywhere near spawn points.
This still does not solve the core issue of Grind versus Power however that simply is something that is never going to be satisfied among the player-base, in any MMO which has a lot of customization and PvP aspects that have to be balanced.
It does however make the possible abuses in the game much less likely to happen. NPCs for hire become much more rare and you have to outfit them all yourself, if someone kills one then that NPC takes a lot of time to recover along with limited supply and regrowth of NPC stocks you will easily begin to run out of them if you do not plan your strategy properly.
For those that simply have no hope of obtaining NPCs to help defend your bases, you still have the ability to defend your bases by properly developing your base and planning for possible attack approaches.
On both sides, offense and defense most of the harsh side of the matter can be prevented if maps are designed properly. The worst aspect of all of this that I have witnessed is the rampant abuse of spawn farming, some players hate it, some love it, from my perspective it's a very poor design and should be changed.
In the end the main point I want to get across is: Most players in every MMO hate the idea of losing their standing in a game especially if players grind very much to achieve that goal which I fully understand. However if you really love the game, FOnline you have to be open to look from the perspective of what is balanced to make the game fun and at the same time not abused. This is a hard line to cross for many MMO players but if you want your game to grow and have a strong community you have to be open to the possibility of a balance that both sides can agree on to some extent, and not just a "I Win!" button for either side.
