Re: The Arena: What should be done with it?
The main thing I did in EQ1 when I didn't have anything else to do was screwed around in the Bazaar arena. EQ2 needs some way to capture that. It needs to be easily accessible to people and must allow you to do other things while you wait for a fight to come up, even if those other things are just chatting with your guild and seeking a group. In EQ1's bazaar arena you could browse the market while you meditated anywhere in the zone. EQ2's broker system kinda makes that less of an option unless you just put brokers at the arena entrances.
The arena needs to get, at the very least, everyone on the server into a single room. An arena in each city wouldn't draw enough players to be worth going to. Even better would be a cross server arena, but that is unlikely as it would apparently require redoing the way character data is handled by the backend.
Said arena zone should have a main arena in the center. It will be the basic FFA/screwing around area. Just walk in and you can attack anyone else in the area, walk out and you are immune. Same as EQ1's arenas, and uses the same pvp rules for your abilities as the EQ2 pvp servers do. If you want to challenge someone 1 on 1, or group on group, in a more controlled environment, there would be instances that would allow you to set parameters and participants. You choose the rules and the participants, everyone clicks accept and it ports you to a custom instance where you fight it out. Spectators can join and watch if they so choose and you wish to allow it, and the outcome is announced in the main arena zone. The arena champion games will also be accessible from the main arena zone.
I'd hold off on implementing leaderboards and rankings until the basic system is implemented and proven. People want, first and foremost, a place to have fun and test their mettle against real humans without having to roll up a character on pvp.
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