Gaming the System

by P A Wikoff

  When I had first seen those attacks, I thought they seemed a little overpowered. I guess limiting their weapon abilities was a way to balance the system among the races. The room voice had flat-out stated that fact.

  Hybrids also had a second racial trait. “Primal Strength: Hybrids gain a 25% bonus to their Charm statistic.”

  Whereas each “instinct attack” differed from one Hybrid to another, this bonus trait stayed the same. Now it made sense as to why they had a lower overall starting stat—they could gain stat boosts based on a percentage.

  Depending on your character build, 25% more of one stat could be much more powerful than a couple bonus points early on. The only problem was that I didn’t know how many levels there were or how important stats were going to be for this particular game—especially Charm.

  I lingered on the Hybrid for a moment. They looked menacing and cool, despite my first impression. Though, in the long run, the human was seeming like a much better option…for me anyway. I was flying blind, and something safe felt like the right way to go, at least for now.

  I halfheartedly wanted to go over more options and pour over every detail to figure out the perfect character, like I had done when creating my hover bike. I mean, I could be stuck with this character anywhere from a long time to just short of forever. On the other hand, I was kind of ready to move on to the next part of this creation process.

  “Okay, let me peek at one more option before making my final decision.”

  This time, instead of picking the next race in line, I quickly went through each one until I found one that looked outside of my comfort zone.

  “You have selected the race: Construct,” the voice so elegantly reiterated to me what the prompt already read.

  I braced for a moment, waiting for the voice to continue with the race’s description. When it never came, I knew only an A.I. would have learned from my last scolding.

  Constructs were hulking creatures that looked like they could have quite a bit of trouble going through doorways and other tight spaces. Like how the Hybrid could pick different animal alterations, Constructs had many different “material options” to choose from. Each one changed its appearance drastically. There was fabric, wood, metal, tissue, and stone, to name a few. This race was a machine or enchanted being, of sorts. More like a magical robot, above all else. I was going to be open-minded, despite my knee-jerk reaction to the thought of playing a non-living creature.

  Its base stats were all ones, except it had three points in Health, with a whopping eight extra bonus points to distribute. That was a lot of points to play with. Which brought its stats to a total of eighteen, just like the Hybrids’. Now I was starting to get an idea of just how much better the human’s twenty points were in comparison. The first of its two racial traits was called “Upgrade: Constructs gain one attachment slot.” The other racial trait gave the Construct a 25% extra Health stat.

  What is an attachment? It might be something useful…or annoying.

  This was the kind of situation where people downloaded guides or played around with build generators before they started the game. But I didn’t have that luxury. I was supposed to be serving some “hard” time. So far, there wasn’t anything particularly hard about this, unless you found making trivial choices hard. Truth be told, I kind of did.

  After playing around with the Construct race for a while, I managed to figure out its whole deal. First, you picked a material that your character would be made out of. I picked wood. Then, based on your choice of material, you could add an attachment to yourself like an extra arm or wheel. In my case, I selected spear armor, which made me look spiky, like a cactus made of wooden spears. This attachment damaged melee targets when they attacked.

  As great as this option was, I didn’t want to play a robot, or any soulless entity, for that matter. I just couldn’t turn off that part of my brain. No, the Human was a better fit for me.

  I went back to the race rack.

  “You have selected the race: Human, again,” the voice said.

  I couldn’t help but take note on the “again” part. For something that had no expiration date, it was really acting impatient. I should have been the one trying to hurry things along. I had three years of boredom ahead of me.

  I raised a finger to take issue with the artificially snide remark, but instead, I paused for a moment. I’d spent enough hours debating and arguing with A.I. beings to know that you never start a fight you don’t plan on finishing…or rage-quitting. This was one comment I had to pretend I hadn’t heard. This was not the time nor the place for such things.

  Continuing on, I looked for the Human traits section, which I must have overlooked. Only, I found it was blank. No 25% bonus to any stat. No restrictions. Just simple and empty. It was like the vanilla ice cream of races. But in the end, everyone likes vanilla ice cream, right?

  As a Human, I didn’t have a lot of options, but I did have four points to assign. The only thing was that I didn’t know what kind of character I was going to end up playing. Which left me with another problem—I didn’t know what stats to put my bonus points into.

  My appearance still looked rough. I kept thinking about the version of myself that the game had designed. It was capable of creating beautiful things, and yet this is what it gave me?

  The voice stuttered and sputtered as I scrolled right past Strength, Health, Speed, and on down until I landed on the Charm stat.

  “Charm affects your superficial appearance, granting you lower merchant prices and higher selling rates on any goods and services. In addition, in a party raid, having a higher Charm reduces the chances that an enemy will attack you over another person.”

  “Hmm.” It didn’t sound super flashy, but not getting attacked as often would help with survival. That is, if someone with a lower Charm stat was around to attack. What would happen if an enemy attacked and killed the other person? Would they just come for me as dessert? This seemed like a raiding statistic, to say the least, although getting discounts and earning more online currency would prove useful, especially since I needed to earn 500 thousand O.G.C.

  “Well, call me vain, but I don’t think I could live with myself looking so hideous.”

  I assigned my first bonus point into Charm, raising it from a two to a three. Right away, my body looked less like I was terminally ill and more like I was on the road to recovery.

  Seeing as Humans already started out with two points as a base stat, I didn’t even want to think what grotesque monster one point in Charm would produce.

  What happened next, I wasn’t too proud of. But in my defense, I wasn’t thinking clearly. Like a gambler riding a hot streak, I dumped two more points into Charm, bringing it up to five.

  My posture was no longer like a question mark; skin tags and blemishes melted away; my wretched hair gained color and filled out with a nice sheen; and my skin was lightly tanned instead of pasty and gray. Most of all, all the strange things I had done to my forehead and nose were no more. It was an instant makeover.

  “Not too shabby.” I still needed a couple more points if I wanted to win any beauty pageants, though this was passable.

  “You have unlocked a new Charm-based perk: Safe Passage. While traveling on paths or roads, monsters won’t attack you unless engaged with,” the voice informed me.

  I must have unlocked that perk after getting to five Charm. Now, I wondered what perks the other stats would have if I had five points in them. Unfortunately, I only had one point left at my disposal.

  Continuing on with my streak, I was about to dump the last bonus point into Charm when I noticed that I was still pretty frail-looking.

  “Wait…”

  I had to pull the reins in on my obsessive nature to avoid putting everything into a single concept.

  “Better add some meat on those bones.” I decided.

  Without a second thought, I added my remaining bonus advancement point into Strength while staring at my reflection, not wanting to m
iss the transformation. Sure enough, small muscles filled out my arms, back, and calves, giving me a more normal look.

  “Strength adversely affects physical damage, as well as encumbrance,” the voice said, right on cue.

  Meaning I can hold more items, wear better protective armor, and take more hits? That’s helpful.

  These advancement points really went far. I wondered if I would ever have a chance to improve these stats later on. I may have been looking better now, but at what cost? I hoped I wouldn’t have a rough time actually playing the game with this allotment of stats. What was I thinking? Oh right, with a two in Intellect, I wasn’t.

  I thought about taking one point out of Charm and distributing it somewhere else. Maybe if I assigned Intellect first, I would make better, smarter choices with the rest of my points. That would also mean I would lose my Charm perk, which did sound useful.

  “Oh well, better just make the best of it.”

  Then I noticed a couple of gold sliders under appearance.

  “Those weren’t there before. They must have popped up after I increased my Charm.”

  Most of them were vanity options, like eye color and facial-hair styles. I spent a good while adjusting the glamor details on my character. In the end, I had a cool birthmark on my back and long black hair down to my shoulders.

  “You wouldn’t want to attack me, would you? No, I wouldn’t want to attack me, either,” I said to my reflection, with a smile and a clenched fist.

  After putting the finishing touches on my new, less cringey appearance, another selection rack appeared, crashing down from the ceiling. I fell to my knees and covered my head. It was unexpected and totally terrifying.

  After my heart stopped racing, I decided to browse through the new rack, which was filled with clothes of all different styles.

  “Actual clothes on a clothing rack. That’s a first.” Despite my sarcasm, I was happy this stuff wasn’t biological, like the previous racks.

  Based on the sign above the rack, this was the character class rack. I wondered why it hadn’t been available before I had chosen my stats. It would have been useful to know what type of attacks I was going to be using before picking my race or assigning stats. Maybe it was to prevent people from mid/maxing and over-strategizing their character too much.

  Nowadays, people would rather play a character that was overpowered and boring, over one that they actually wanted to play. The urge to be the best was much stronger than the enjoyment of playing for fun.

  This was one of the reasons why I hated video games so much. When my parents forced me to play video games with them as punishment, I tended to get hyperfixated on one single option, such as fishing or bird watching. I always built a character based on a fun theme, not really focusing on maximum damage or healing. The only problem was that everyone else just went along with cookie-cutter specs, or whatever was currently hot on the forums. There were hundreds, if not thousands, of options to choose from, yet everyone had the same exact statistics and gear. To their credit, it worked. Their characters were always superior to mine in every aspect.

  This was why I had picked something easy, before my obsessive nature could get the better of me and make me hate this game, too. It was almost like the more time I spent on something, the bigger my disappointment would be; but not today. I was on the home stretch, and I was just going to power through until the end.

  “Please select your character class. Some class options are unavailable to you, based on your racial choice and the class’s prerequisites,” the mystery voice said.

  My previous assumptions weren’t too far off base, but there was a very practical reason for the order in which you created your character. This could leave secret or rare character choices to further explore.

  Each section in the class rack was separated into three category dividers—melee, stealth, and spellcasting. The dividers looked like the sizing tabs you might find in a vintage clothing store.

  Between the dividers were several types of armor that went along with each corresponding class. I assumed this was going to be the starting gear. Pick the outfit, get the class. That seemed easy enough.

  In real life, I wasn’t into sword fighting or hunting. So the thought of an upfront melee character didn’t seem to be up my alley and neither did casting flashy fireball spells, if that was even a possibility. Who was I kidding? It was always a possibility.

  I decided to check out the stealth section first. It had only two options available to me. They both resembled studded leather. Surrounding them was a plethora of greyed-out equipment sets, which were unavailable to me. It was like a ghost of my bad decisions haunting me from the past.

  I let out a sigh.

  “What do you have here?” I said, trying to shake off the minor regret that was quickly developing in the pit of my stomach. When I touched each set, instead of coming off the rack, a prompt alerted me of the intended class associated with the gear.

  My two options here were a Bardic (SUPPORT) or a Trickster (PVP). The Bardic class sounded like a lot of singing songs and such; definitely not my thing. As for a player vs. player character, ganking wasn’t going to gain me any friends. If I was really going to find my parents, I needed all the help I could get.

  Maybe melee is a better fit for me, after all.

  I switched categories only to find that I had even fewer options in this area. Hanging in front of me was a lone plated-armor set.

  “Leader (SUPPORT): Based on your stat allocation, this special class is available to you,” the prompt read.

  I did like the idea of a special class. Then I remembered the time mother told me I could invite friends over for my eleventh birthday. All I had to do was plan the party and invite some people, and she would pay for it. I got so frustrated trying to sync up all my friends’ plans and arrange the venue that I ended up just booking myself a day at a garden museum. As enticing as it was, leader wasn’t for me. Also, I didn’t think my three Strength would allow me to wear such heavy-looking armor.

  Maybe I did have a playstyle. I just hadn’t put it in those simple terms.

  A little disappointed, I switched over to the third option—Spellcasting.

  In the spellcasting area, I had the option of a Fearmancer (CROWD CONTROL), a Summoner (SOLO), or a Cultist (FOLLOWER). These were much more interesting. Well, not the cultist, but the other two were better than a Leader or Bardic, for sure. I looked over the rough, dark robes and skull-staff, which hung in place as the Fearmancer’s garb. It had a cool aesthetic to it.

  “Fearmancers use fear-based spells to scare and manipulate their opponents into submission. Their advancement skill tree includes Dream Weaving, Mind Weaving, and Truth Weaving. Charm is the main stat for this class.”

  No wonder this option is available to me. I blew almost all my advancement points in Charm. I wonder if I’d make a decent Fearmancer. I’ll probably choose this if the Summoner doesn’t dazzle me in some way.

  Reaching out for the Summoner’s set, I felt the silky soft robes, and the voice began once more.

  “Summoners use spellcasting to transport objects into existence. This can include walls, items, portals, or creatures. Psionics is the main stat for this class.”

  “Hmmm. Well, I only have two points in Psionics. Who knows what kind of things I could summon—a ball of lint?”

  I glanced at the skill tree for this class—Monster Summoning, Item Summoning, and Chaos Summoning. Those seemed like fun options, and a perfect solo character type, but there was something about the Fearmancer that seemed interesting to me. Not the manipulation part, or scaring people, but maybe because it was the perfect choice for my stat allotment.

  No, I wasn’t going to make an optimized starting character. I just needed something that would get me through the three years uneventfully.

  As an act of defiance, I begrudgingly picked the class I thought would best keep me out of trouble.

  “You have selected the class: Summoner,” the voice
said.

  My wardrobe instantly changed from white undergarments to brightly colored robes, which seemed to illuminate against the shadows, as I turned to look at them from different angles. Resting on top of my head was a squat, yet pointy, hat.

  I could get used to this.

  Glowing and flashing, I had one advancement point available to assign. This time, however, I couldn’t use it on stats, since that area was greyed out.

  In the background, there was the image of a stark blue tree trunk with three intertwined boughs reaching outward. Each path was aligned with one of my skill options—Item Summoning, Monster Summoning, and Chaos Summoning. When I highlighted various advancement paths, an outline of a tree branch grew out of the corresponding trunk.

  The skills in Item Summoning that I could unlock were Summon Potion, Summon Weapon, or Summon Armor.

  Monster Summoning had six different monsters I could obtain at this tier. There was a blue and black checkered thing with a weaponized tail, a mini angel in battle armor, a skeleton with unnaturally large hands, a cute chibi-looking one, a floating animal head, and one called a clone which, based on the description, mimicked your character in different ways. Each one had different roles, attacks, and abilities.

  The Chaos Summoning path had three as well: Summon Barrier, Summon Trap or Summon Portal.

  Now it started to make sense to me. The Chaos Summoning was used for your larger environmental stuff, and the Item Summoning was for smaller inventory-type things.

  “I wonder which one I should put my point into.”

  To the right of the skill tree was something I had overlooked. A racial advancement tree grew next to it, and it had three bough paths of its own.

  This was way too many options for me. And here I thought I was almost done with this process.

  “I guess it’s an even split between your race and class, as far as customization goes.”

  I just had to glance over everything for a moment. My racial advancement branches were Human Greed, Human Versatility, and Human Faith. All three seemed just as bland as Humans generally are in real life and weren’t nearly as exciting as summoning items or monsters, so I didn’t delve into them any further.