Development Cycle Archive

Ok, Thunderheart and the rest of the community, here are my ideas. Take from them what you will.

Regarding the "Jedi Titles"....

• There is no Jedi Academy therefore you are not Jedi unless trained by a Jedi Master.


• You are Force Sensitive and nothing more till you find your master who can train you.

• I am aware that the Jedi receive their current training from a Jedi Trainer that doubles as an NPC in some cities. This just plain doesn't make sense and seems to me to be a cop out. Here is my solution.


• Upon gaining your force sensitive abilities and before you are trained as an Initiate, you are given a message onscreen much like the one given by the Holocrons giving you the location of your Master. Example: "Luke! You will go to the Dagobah system. There you will learn from Yoda, the Jedi Master who instructed me." Upon receiving this information you must head to that location and meet with your Jedi Master who will instruct you in the ways of the force.


• Once you meet with this Master he asks you to complete a task which will prove your dedication and willingness to accept the ways of the force. At this point you have no lightsaber and no crafting tool. You must complete this mission on your own. After you complete this mission and return to him, he grants you the use of a lightsaber, a lightsaber crafting tool, and a communication device (see Regarding Communication Device for more info). He then gives you your next mission which is how you earn your XP to advance in skill.

• To gain XP to be able to advance in skill you must complete tasks set forth by your Jedi Master. These tasks are primarily missions that require not the use of your lightsaber, but your head. OH NO! GOD FORBID THE JEDI THINK!!!


• At first you are given simple missions and tasks to advance in skill and the higher you go the tougher they get obviously.


• To advance to the next skill box, you must complete a required amount of missions before your Master will agree to train you.


• XP can still be gained by killing NPC's and creatures, but here is the catch. If you attack a Yellow Mob (which is obviously peaceful) then you punished by having XP taken away from you. Example: You are attacked by a Hurrton that aggroed you and you manage to kill it . 3k of XP right there. However if you openly attack a hurrton that has not aggroed you, you will LOSE 3k of XP. Jedi following the lightside path SHOULD NOT be killing everything they come across. The Darkside however is a different matter.


• Halfway through your training to Jedi Padawan you are tempted by the Dark side of the force while on a mission from your Master. It is at this point (perhaps after you have mastered two of skill trees leading to Padawan) that you are given the choice to alter your destiny.


• Much like Knights of the Old Republic, you will now have the choice in conversations with your Master and in quests he gives you, to choose different things to say that will forever change your path as a Jedi.


• The mission that tempts you to the darkside can be one similiar to the mission Yoda gave Luke on Dagobah where he was sent into the swamp to confront the source of darkside energy. Should you fail, you will then be contacted, much the same way you were at the beginning of your training which led you to your current master, by a master of the dark side of the force. Your choices from here on out determine which Master you will continue to train with. Should you stay true to the lightside and deny the darkside then you will remain with your current master and take the long and arduous trek to becoming a Jedi Knight and then someday a Master yourself. Should you sway from that path and take the easier more seductive route then your path will lead to great power, but as we all know...power does not come without a price.


• Once you reach Jedi Padawan you then have a choice to make. Continue on with your master of the lightside or slay him and turn to the dark side. You will then advance to the rank of Jedi Apprentice and continue on with your training.


• Should you have chosen the path of the dark side, your powers grow in strength much quicker than that of a lightside user. Example: "The darkside is quicker, easier, more seductive." There must be a balance however and for every time you use your darkside powers you incur a TEF that enables anyone to attack you and you suffer incredible wounds to your health and mind.


• As a darkside user you have the chance of randomly causing the Berkerk ability to go into effect while fighting, granting you more strength and speed, but losing the ability to heal yourself and use specials for a period of time. The darkside is about anger and rage and thusly should suffer the effects of this uncontrolled anger at times.


• Also as a Darkside user, the negative XP no longer affects you. Slaughter to your hearts content, but to keep it balances the more senseless slaughter you partake in, the greater the chances you will activate your random berserk and lose total control.


• Darkside users should NOT be able to heal themselvs to the extent that a lightside user can.


• Lightside Jedi should not have the unbridled strength of a Darkside user. They do not incur the penalty of the Berserk status, but at the same time the raw physical strength of the Darkside user has them outclassed.

• In Episode One, Qui-Gonn used a machine to determine the Midichlorian count of Anakin's blood. Now what I am about to propose strays from this but I believe the idea to be sound


• You are given the Comm. Device by the Master upon meeting him and this device functions as a survey tool in essence.


• The Master never stays in the same location and to find him you must use this device which is only usable by the person it was awarded to. You can never trade it. So you activate the device after you have completed the mission and you follow the midichlorian tracker to his location. Once there you can then continue with your mission. The idea of a stationary Trainer that doubles as an NPC is just not right. A Jedi Master would hide in the wilderness or out of site of those looking for him. Take Yoda and Obi-wan for example. One hid on a planet full of life to better hide his own presence in the force and the other secluded himself in the wastelands of Tatooine.

• Jedi Knight Quests should consist of missions that involve more interaction with NPC's and players as opposed to simple search and destroy missions. Puzzles, riddles and thought provoking quests should be the norm for the Jedi. The path to becoming a master of the lightside is long but in the end your power is immense and not tainted like that of a Dark Jedi Master.


• Dark Jedi Knight Quests should involve more murderous plots and evil schemes.


• Both sides should quest for the Archives pertaining to their chosen side and unlock the history of their order. This in turn could lead to new missions and loot, including New Crafting Tools that allow you to place structures of your own like tents or huts for your jedi character, new lightsaber schematics (there are more designs available than just the ones in the movies ya know), rare items that can be places in the homes of these jedi, and the ability to craft clothing and items unique to their chosen Order.

• This should be extraordinarily hard to achieve from both sides. Harder even still for the lightside. No one wants to see huge numbers of Jedi wandering around in game.


• Once you gain the status of Jedi Master, to avoid having someone just cut loose and start killing everything in sight, you STILL incur a penalty for senseless killing. Just like faction rating, should you go so low in your Lightside points, you stripped of your Master Title and must either work to achieve it again or keep killing and continue to lose the skills you worked so hard to gain. This would be good for those who decide to embrace the dark side after having become a lightside master, but the process to do so would be lengthy. Not only would you have to gain enough negative Lightside points to lose skills, but you would then, after having lowered yourself back to the level of Jedi Apprentice, you will be contacted by a Darkside Master who will train you from there on out in the ways of the darkside.

Anyway, these are my ideas for now. I can't say that they are outstanding or even great or even whether or not anyone will pay any attention to them. But hopefully they will at least spur some ideas in someone and people can discuss them. Thanks for taking the time to read all this.