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What's a reasonable number of characters per player?  XML
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Mark Phillips


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Joined: 1969.12.31 00:00:00
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Location: Watsonville, CA
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We need to put a reasonable upper limit on the number of characters each player can own at any one time. What would a reasonable number be?

I'm thinking maybe 10. After that there'd be a subtle penalty which increases little by little with each additional character. By the time you reach maybe 20 the penalty will become less than subtle.

"Penalty" would mean some kind of diminution of something or other. Skills or attributes probably.

Bartle quotiet: E80, A67, S47, K7. TriadCity characters: Mark, Poobah, Occam, Abelard.
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Victor Nguyen


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Joined: 2011.08.18 00:00:00
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I'm going to make a wild guess.
Let's see um...
I'd say at least 2 characters for each role.
2 healers
2 warriors
2 thieves
2 malopaths

What else...
1 for the original character that I start off with horrible stats.
1 for an heir that would never die.

I hope dead characters aren't included because I have a lot of dead ones.

...I was also considering making a team of power rangers. Which is another 5.
...and of course I have to include a 6th ranger that shows up mid season.

Hmmm...if I can't find an antagonist to play off I'd have to make my own big boss. If that happens I'm going to need expendable redshirt minions too.

Mark Phillips


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Great, exactly 5 then. That settles that.

Bartle quotiet: E80, A67, S47, K7. TriadCity characters: Mark, Poobah, Occam, Abelard.
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Betsy G.



Joined: 2007.02.24 00:00:00
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I could see 10 as a reasonable limit - it would allow for a few "extras" at the moment or available slots when some other roles come online that we might want to play (that may or may not seem a good fit for any of our characters now). Honestly, even this limit would force me to rework some things (I have about 13 that I "play" though not consistently), but it does seem fair/reasonable to me.

I would like to note some things:
If dead characters count toward this if they are kept, this would probably encourage people to delete the characters they lose rather than holding onto them for the eventual afterlife.
I would, personally, hope that deleting a character would completely work for them not to count toward the number (I suspect that's intended). On a side-note, it'd be nice if deleting them freed the name up to be able to use again (still at level 1 with nothing, of course, but without needing a new name). Just a thought.
If someone reached a point where they have 10 high level characters (through whatever means), this would seem to discourage them from creating new ones to be a more appropriate level for certain areas.
This seems *easier* (to me at least) to do alongside a fresh slate/restart than in the place of it. Some of us already have and play (or at least wouldn't want to get rid of for one reason or another) more characters than this.
Betsy G.



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Hey! Some of us have things to say about the topic still... things besides "here's what I wanted to do so you need to allow at least enough for that." Please don't cut us all off just because one person wants to be ridiculous.
Mark Phillips


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Hey! It's ok for me to be ridiculous in return, yeh?

Bartle quotiet: E80, A67, S47, K7. TriadCity characters: Mark, Poobah, Occam, Abelard.
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Betsy G.



Joined: 2007.02.24 00:00:00
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LOL! Of course. Just figured it'd be ok for me to respond to that, too.
Mark Phillips


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Yep, what to do with the dead ones. I want to save mine for the legendary-one-day-to-come afterlife. Should they count against the limit?

Maybe the question should be, how many living characters before setting limits?

Bartle quotiet: E80, A67, S47, K7. TriadCity characters: Mark, Poobah, Occam, Abelard.
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Victor Nguyen


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Joined: 2011.08.18 00:00:00
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*peeks at character list*
Um...well I have 11 living characters right now. I still plan on making a Healer too at some point. I want to say somewhere around 15-20 living characters?

Soubi Kuk



Joined: 2011.10.31 00:00:00
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I think the question for this should really be, Is there a true reason to have more than 10 living characters? Why do you have so many? I never see you play more than 2 or 3 ~~ Then again, I do agree with keeping one as an Heir, but think of how many you actually play, not just how many you have
Soubi Kuk



Joined: 2011.10.31 00:00:00
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I think 10 sounds like an excellent number. It allows for enough characters to play the various roles, both good and evil aligned, maybe one for neutral in there also.
It would seem anything more than that would be 'dead characters' anyways, in the sense that the characters are taking up space and never played.
Mark Phillips


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Persons who shall remain anonymous accepted at face value the ironically-intended suggestion from a recent MOTD to create multiple characters purely to hold EQ, rather than leave it in player houses. So now we search for new rules to limit that.

Note to the persons who shall remain anonymous: don't sweat it, somebody woulda dunnit, you just got there first.

Bartle quotiet: E80, A67, S47, K7. TriadCity characters: Mark, Poobah, Occam, Abelard.
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Betsy G.



Joined: 2007.02.24 00:00:00
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Kinda figured that was (at least part of) what was going on. That's why I noted that I play about 13. How many a person is able, willing, or interested in playing seems likely to just depend on the player.

If it really is specifically to limit that, though, I have a thought (just an idea, of course): What if the limit, instead of being the number of characters, was a limit on how many living characters without roles? Sure, someone *could* go through the effort of getting to level 10 and getting a role without intending to play anymore, but it seems like a lot of work to evade maybe having to replace a few items (especially considering the money spent and also not likely to be collected in that time). Doing it that way would allow someone who actually was able (and interested) in playing 20 characters to do so, but still make it more difficult for someone to create characters just as storage. It would also allow those who may have high-level characters to still create new ones and play at a more reasonable level. It would also potentially discourage new players from creating a bunch of characters before they play and learn the game (not sure how much of an issue this is or if it matters, though I've seen it a couple times). Just thinking out loud, though; do with it what you will (if anything).
 
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