So, I'm obviously missing a decent game to play (xbox is getting old quickly) so, I've been trolling around the internet looking for MMO news. I came across an interesting post:
http://www.mmorpg.com/blogs/staffblog/052010/6134_Community-Spotlight- An-MMO-Without-Progression.html

It got me thinking. Wouldn't it be cool if someone made a game with endgame progression built into the leveling process? I picture it something like this: I roll Zeboe and play to level 80 as a hunter. I get to see all the standard dungeons and quests on the way up, but when I reach level 80, instead of starting on level 80 dungeons and raids, I have access to a new (better) talent tree with my next character.

I roll Hpgiver and start over at level 1 (with the tier 2 talent tree), and now I can steamroll all the old quests, or I could access new quests, dungeons, and mini-raids as I level up (they were impossible to beat with Zeboe).

Maybe your previous characters could still be playable by giving max level crafting the recipe's for the next tier of character progression.

Instead of expanding the game by adding new endgame content, they could expand it by adding new character abilities for use with a brand new character from level 1 and new content across the level range.

I kind of like this idea because the developers could probably provide the same amount of content overall for the same amount of work, but endgame content would involve more than just gear development.

I guess the downside is that it would be tough for a guild to function in that environment with everyone progressing at a different pace. I bet they could come up with some sort of "progression sharing" scheme that could work, though.

Man... I need Starwars to come out. I miss MMO's.

Maybe I should read the article before jumping in here, but this sounds similar to the method used by some old text based MUD's I've heard about. I was never able to get into the ones that I tried, but many had ways to 'reroll' a character after it hit max level into a newer, more powerful class. Some even had multiple levels of this I think, with characters 'Ascending' into more and more powerful classes.

It seems similar to what was done with death knights, though Blizz stated that they didn't want people powering a hunter, say, to 80 just so they could reroll a dk with it, so I doubt any such scheme would involve making a new character that you 'unlock' with an old one. Otherwise the game world would be full of the 'best' powerleveling class played by people sprinting to the next best thing.

A certain type of gamer will always want to min/max; to get as close as possible to 'winning' that type of mmo, so any system like you describe will have to be very carefully designed not only to appeal to that mentality, but to make sure that doing so doesn't break the experience for everyone else.


***edit***

Ok I did read through the article. It seems like the options boiled down to two ways to look at an MMO.

1. Unlimited levels: You keep leveling, (usually by grinding)either adding numbers almost infinitely, aka Tibia and probably some others I don't know about or

2. All content available off the bat, 'progression' is all about improving your gear and personal skill (monster hunter) or your characters skills/professions (Eve Online)

Personally I'd probably eventually burn out on number one, because there's no way you can keep doing that forever and not have things get repetitious. Number two for me is a better option, I've always been the type to try and get the most out of a character, rather than 'meh, it'll be enough to hit the next few levels with'

Wow seems to combine both pretty well, with new expansions letting us see the story, make an impact, and then get ready to take on the big bads via gear. Wow is also pretty good at keeping friends at a fairly equal level, letting them play together without having to wait for the 'slow' ones to catch up.