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Okay...I don't really know if this is a good idea.
Spiral Knights is built on the idea that one knight is the same as the next, and that only the weapons make a difference. But, I still feel like there should be one defining feature between knights. Wouldn't it be great if, right from the get go, you could choose to increase your knights sword speed at the cost of his gun speed? Or, increase his damage against slimes at the cost of damage against beast? Heck I know what I'd want to increase: movement speed. I suppose I don't really mean stats in the sense of ATK, DEF, and all that jazz. Just little bonuses. Take the armor and weapon bonuses and let people choose one or two strengths at the expense of one or two weaknesses; make them permanent, "natural" bonuses, as if they have that ability (or abilities) on all of their armor/weapons. And then you could add some other abilities as well, such as my suggested movement speed (why can't he go FAAASTEER!?!?!), or perhaps shield speed (why can't he shield FAAASTEER!?!?!).
OOH! And here's a royal idea: you could make the abilities and weaknesses level up! So when a character reaches tier 2 their Gun Damage Bonus goes up and their Weakness to Beasts increases. It'd be so cool to have a tier 3 character with insane speed but a crippling weakness to slimes!
Additionally, you could include elemental bonuses and weaknesses. I know this sounds depressingly like Pokemon, but hey - Pokemon was pretty good. It would add a whole new dimension to gameplay, as well. At one point, your whole team is trying to protect one water character from an electric mon, then you hit the next floor and you're all running while that same character fights off the fire mon!
I dunno, I just feel like the're should be more distinction between characters, not necessarily a distinction between different character levels. In fact, I hope Three Rings doesn't change the "level-up" mechanics; I like being able to think that on some level, my (noob) character is the same as the best character in the game (without all the armor).
What do you think?
http://forums.spiralknights.com/en/node/4049
just suggested some of what you said in this thread. mostly just a starting bonus, not necessarily an opposing weakness, but that might be a good tradeoff. almost wrote something about allowing you to level up the bonus when you tier-up or something, but i have a feeling that would make your too character too far off from being able to be a jack-of-all-trades (which we want players to still have that flexibility). so i'm less inclined to have the negatives, and nerf the positive bonus a bit.
but its not a bad suggestion. also i dont take credit for being the first to say what i've said, its nothing other people haven't asked for too. ie OP in the other thread. lol