Idea to improve gameplay for middle-game players.

[upwind48]

My account is a measly 53 days old and I am getting a little bored. I have tried many things in game to hold my interest, but it all just seems more tedious than entertaining and rewarding. All of the gold I farm goes right to some high-end player for some nobles, imps, oints, or a bio.

So anyways, I wont complain. We all know what it is like.

I have an idea that will give middle tier players like me something to do while they build up their bank accounts. In general, there would be a new/additional system where players could make middle-tier (to be defined later) armor and weapons to hold them over until "end-game" items. Personally, I think it is a little silly for a new player who just made his first profit to be sifting through 100s of vendors trying to find some good armor. And since there is really no standard for armor prices, a new player will find something he/she really likes, spend a good percentage of his hard-earned money on, only to something similar or better on another vendor 15 minutes later for a fraction of the price. doh! Players should be crafting their own armor to define their own playing style! The same way that all the heroic characters in fantasy movies always have unique armor that sets them apart from the soldiers.

So the system I am proposing could take many different forms.
-There could be a middle-tier GoC-type system. But that could be intensive to design. And it wouldn't be very unique if I could just buy the GoC-type items from someone's vendor.
- Lockpicking and/or treasure hunting could be improved such that players would want to seek out treasure to make their armor. All those wands I find could have special attributes that I could transfer to a piece of armor. The wands would be no-drop so a player couldn't just buy them from some high-end player that farms them. But a player who is under 60 days could turn them into an NPC for some gold.
- Crafting could be modified so that ores like copper, dull copper, shadow, ect actually have a purpose. Maybe you don't feel like hunting one day. That's fine. Mine 100 copper ingots and buy something for 500 tokens that lets you make an enchanted ingot. And that ingot gives +1 mana or something. or +2 HLD. Each item could only have a certain amount of enchantments. But when you enchant it, it becomes no-drop. Can't make a profit off of it.

The armor/weapons that would result from this system would not compare to a leveled weapon or a relayer. Hit-chance stats on a weapon could be capped at 20 or so, but you could have many of them. The point of the system being that a player can make a middle-quality, unique weapon/armor that fits their playing style.

So I know there are holes in the logic here. and plenty of balance issues to work out. But I feel that UO in general has an inherent issue when it comes to middle-tier players. When you start on this server, all anyone says is "run rat quest on as many toons as you can, as fast as you can." Pretty lame especially since the only people that can really use the organics are high-end players. Instead, go out and hunt for treasure to make your personalized armor. Hell, put the new system in the newb dungeon and put some organics in the chests. Or have the creatures in despise drop "newb treasure maps." The maps would be no-drop so high-end players cannot farm them and sell them. Treasures would have the same location system as regular treasure maps. Put some special stats on the wands. Add them to your weapon or armor. Or maybe the wands have "enchantment points" or something, and then it would be just like weapon leveling.

I'll just cut myself off here and see what you all think at this point. I would be happy to bounce some more ideas around if anyone is interested. If I had any idea how to script for UO, I would already be writing some code for this.

[anarchy]

i'm one of those high end players and i thank thee for thy business.

but really yeah i love the enchanted weapon thing, because that reminds me of rune crafting which is cool or socketing. <--also cool. i could enchant my Wrath of God weapon and make it even more powerful. keep the good ideas rolling.

[Noreastah]

this is also a good idea for the more casual player who doesnt play as much but wants "cool" gear. Stuff with stats and abilities. I like the ideas