Level-up Bonus + Titles System?

[Anderson88 26]

Okay, so this is kind of a narrow question...

 

A system I'm using in my game involves the Titles system in Tales of Graces to give stat boosts and teach skills.

 

 

You earn SP from enemy mobs, which raise the "title level". Upon reaching the title level, you gain the specified bonus.

 

The issue is that it makes regular leveling somewhat awkward because they both should do the exact same thing--make a character stronger by giving them stats and skills.

 

How should I fix this problem? Tales of Graces also seemed to have this issue. 

 

Instead of having growth rates like this...

<mat growth: +0.400>
<mdf growth: +0.440>
<agi growth: +0.425>
<luk growth: +0.350>

Should I instead make it so that the player gets to choose one attribute point to increase every time someone levels up?

 

Or what if I took out Leveling Up entirely, and gave the Titles system top priority for increasing stats and teaching skills?

But if I did that, wouldn't it remove the game's sense of "progress" in leveling and promote grinding, as title levels are easier to get?

 

Need opinions.   

[amerk 1,122]

I've never played ToG so I can't really say anything about it. However, I'd say your concern is about right. A leveling system and title system would seem redundant. It worked for Faxanadu mainly as a sort of achievement, and if I remember correctly all the title ranking did for that is ensure you started from your last save at a fixed amount of EXP and gold.

 

For the most part though, I'd say keep leveling for base stats as it is, but allow your player to choose their path, sort of like Sword of Mana. Maybe some paths eventually cross. So you might start off with very basic titles, and let the player choose:

 

Soldier

Mage

Thief

Priest

 

Maybe a separate level up or AP feature for the titles, so they're not choosing them every level up. Each title offers different bonus stats and skills, and may eventually cross. So if they chose Mage and eventually meets the Priest path, they might be able to decide on becoming a Wizard (knowing both black and white skills), a Red Mage (able to use a sword and black magic), or a Paladin (able to use a sword and White Magic).

 

Or if they're a soldier and eventually meet up with the Mage class, maybe they can then decide to become a Warrior (no magic) or a Red Mage.