Champions Online Developer Diary
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In Champions Online, we wanted really cool loot. We started with a basic system: Head, Body, Legs. People would pick up items that boosted a player's characteristics (damage, endurance, etc.). The loot would also unlock a costume piece, so that if a player wanted to show off what he got, he could. Here's where the beta players chimed in: this sort of scheme might work for fantasy, but not for superheroes. So we changed the system into Offense, Defense and Utility. Some players began commenting that getting gear was fine, but their character concept didn't have any equipment. They had made heroes that depended upon superior training or mutations.
We went back to the drawing board and recreated our rewards. Some would be gear, and it would degrade over time. But, other rewards would be intangible and wouldn't degrade. We threw in a little to balance the fact that the tangible stuff would occasionally need to be fixed, but we were happy that we could deliver to the customer something they requested.
