What is the best skill leveling system?

[Punisher106]

PSU. Nothing was better than safespotting hordes of Boomas in Sakura Blast S2 while training techs.

[schnee4]

best skill leveling?
hmm maybe leeching for american!

[milranduil]

PSU. Nothing was better than safespotting hordes of Boomas in Sakura Blast S2 while training techs.

i miss this i leveled FT/MF on my cast just for super leveling ease.

[Shinmarizu]

A combination of PSIV and PSU: unlocking skills by leveling, which could then be upgraded through repeated use. That would be grand.

Could lead into combination/hybrid skills depending on preferences.

[zandra117]

Some variation of Phantasy Star III's tech redistribution system might be neat for a future game
http://ps3.huguesjohnson.com/techniques.html

[PandaRehab]

Grindyness aside, my favorite skill leveling system on a conceptual level was Mabinogi's, as it encouraged you to use a skill in specific ways, as you could only gain a specific total amount of skill exp from a specific training method, instead of just spamming it on garbage mobs until it leveled. On top of that skills had an Ability point cost, that varied from skill to skill. This meant they could balance certain skills to have really grindy training but cost a negligible amount of skill points (most crafting), or have easy training with a high AP cost (lolmagic).

Unfortunately in practice most of the skill training for offensive skills ended up being pretty shallow, especially as they started adding new skills, and while crafting . 3:

EDIT: Also, yes I know Zorafim was talking about games in the PS series, but I really liked Mabi's skill system OK? ; w;

I really miss that system. Training windmill in Tir Na Nog with limited access was a really unique feeling especially. It was like actually becoming a hermit lol.

[Keilyn]

I miss PSU and PSO1

In PSO1 we had normal attack, heavy attack, and special attack. I liked that combination.
I loved PSU and felt its PAs were better than PSO2s....

In fact I miss the style of PSU.

PSU had weapons in which the photon blade color represented elements. It was also understood that the characters alone didn't have any real defense and that protection was provided by a pattern in their clothing filling itself to an elemental color. These were called Line-Shields.

I liked that each planet had a culture and that each race had an approach and their story....as well as the fact that EVENT maps were not about going in circles and actually were more thought out than PSO2.

Then came Guardians Cash and everything started going downhill......

[Serinah]

Grindyness aside, my favorite skill leveling system on a conceptual level was Mabinogi's, as it encouraged you to use a skill in specific ways, as you could only gain a specific total amount of skill exp from a specific training method, instead of just spamming it on garbage mobs until it leveled. On top of that skills had an Ability point cost, that varied from skill to skill. This meant they could balance certain skills to have really grindy training but cost a negligible amount of skill points (most crafting), or have easy training with a high AP cost (lolmagic).

Unfortunately in practice most of the skill training for offensive skills ended up being pretty shallow, especially as they started adding new skills, and while crafting . 3:

EDIT: Also, yes I know Zorafim was talking about games in the PS series, but I really liked Mabi's skill system OK? ; w;

Mabi's probably the MMO I've played with the most indepth character progression system, and I've never seen anything quite like it (unfortunately).

There did end up being some problems with the skill ranking system, however.
With AP becoming more and more superfluous, people began getting more and more stats. People with a lot of stats will have a hard time finding readily available enemies of the correct power level to grind on, and there are some skills that become next to impossible to rank.

devCAT's answer to this, was to release new skills without the combat power requirements, at the cost of making the skills a lot grindier. And thus they created skills like Smokescreen, which you have to use something like 10500 times to rank from 5 to 1 (before training bonuses).

It really is quite sad the direction that game has taken.

[Tunga]

Being able to buy every disk from shop at lvl 1 and grinding them to higher levels. Maybe 250K meseta total from lvl 1 to lvl 17. I mean it's not like the clerks from the disk shop starve to death everyday...

[isCasted]

I'd want a system akin to PSU, where:
- you buy rare disks with gathered materials (PA frags, Photon Spheres, badges...) in shops which you have to unlock;
- you level PAs by using them;
- levelling PA improves more than just damage;
- GAS-like customization.

But:
- attack PAs level up based on damage (not hit count) and support techs level based on efficiency of usage (for example, the EXP formula could account an actual stat gain and penalise for early recasts). This would make it easier for high-level players to level new PAs, and it wouldn't require nearly as much time dedicated solely to grind them;
- you can gain additional EXP and unlock customization options by using materials and/or other discs;
- discs of level higher than 1 may drop on higher difficulties (but not too high-level. For example, if PA level cap was 50, maximal level for a drop disc could be 20).