I have played enough games to see that something like this could be what sets a game apart from others. What this idea does is provide a means for not just a few but almost everyone to attain glory and fame in the virtual worlds we so love. Elite power levelers can still be among the first to accomplish great deeds and obtain personal fortune but the rest of us can also do as much albeit more slowly.

What I am leading into is MULTIPLE ADVANCEMENT PATHS towards key quests and milestones in a character's life. Sounds simple I suppose but I'm not sure it is simple enough to implement here in Istaria any time soon. It would be nice in any case.

What I'm suggesting is that different quest lines can lead to very similar results. A solo player might take 200 hrs. to achieve something that others who group together can accomplish in 75 hrs. or less perhaps.

For example, there are some mobs like SoG that cannot be killed solo but are absolutely required to kill dozens and dozens of times in order to obtain drops which are required to complete certain quests. I cannot do this solo but if you spread around some tough mobs that can be killed solo with some luck and lot of skill and have them drop the same quest loot that those super mobs drop... well you have given your solo player another reason to stick around and go for the glory.

Call it grinding if you must but it doesn't have to be so repetitious either solo or in groups. Add mobs and make some of them tough to find and scattered far and wide. Throw in a few puzzles and you have a winner. Not that the devs of HZ have not done similar in the past; they have I think but just not taken it far enough with multiple means to the fame and fortune that has pretty much been relegated to the ranks of raid-like grouping and organization.

I don't know how much this helps our devs here but I wanted to share it in any case. Maybe a future project will benefit from this or similar thinking.