Might be a lot late for having this for Classic World Launch, but we can change the system in a future update.
I think we can make scrolls become a lot better of a system where we can greatly lower the floor for the barrier to entry into the game and massively raise the ceiling for mastery, and overall just make something more enjoyable to engage with.
A part of this is taking from "the joys of leveling" and make getting new equipment more exciting with seeing more of a power boost, but also allow for players that want to use the starting sword the whole time can do that as well (it would just be very grindy with this concept).
NEW SCROLL / PROGRESSION SYSTEM:
To start, the stats and attack portion will be linked to equipment levels.
So you would receive a special beginner passive for every single job that is a world passive.
This passive accumulates the total levels of your equipped equipment and grants you bonus stats and attack based on the value.
EXAMPLE: If you have a hat at level 30, overall at level 30, and shoes at level 40 you would have a total of 100 levels and gain a bonus of stats and attack on this passive.
As you level up, acquire, and able to equip the new equipment, you will receive more of a power boost than what you would initially get normally allowing for a fun journey of grinding out levels to be able to equip stronger equipment.
This essentially would be the straight replacement to how scrolls worked.
The fun angle to this system is the freedom to choose your equipment you want to wear and still feel the power!
Instead of having +1, +2, +3, etc. represent your scroll count, you instead simple pay a mesos fee to have a 100% chance to increase the equipment level by +1.
This system has no hard limit, so you can keep leveling your equipment as much as you like.
Now each time you increase the equipment level, the mesos cost is increased by a static 25-100% (undecided) than the previous cost. Same increasing fee regardless of the equipment, making it cheaper to level an equipment up to 200 that started at a high level than to bring a level 1 item to level 200, which is where the grind really comes in.
Now this increases the item level, but it also increases the level requirement to wear the item as well, so you got to be careful when leveling your equipment so you can still wear it!
MEET THE NEW SCROLLS!
The new scrolls will NOT be stat sticks and instead be fun and powerful 1 line potentials!
You find the different scrolls from drops from monsters and bosses.
Each scroll has a 100% chance to be applied when you consume it on to the selected equipment.
The potentials are NOT unique, meaning you can stack the same potential (as long as you find the scrolls to do this) to make one effect really strong or spread them out for a variety of effects among your equipment.
TO BE CLEAR: Stacking as in 3 different equipment have the same effect to 3x that effect as a result.
The other way to boost most of the potentials is that they scale based on THAT equipment's current level.
You can replace an existing potential with a new one by simply using a different scroll on that equipment.
EXAMPLE POTENTIALS:
~ Apply a weak healing aura, healing self and nearby party members in range for X HP every second. This can deal magical damage to Undead Monsters.
~ Apply a moderate healing aura, healing self and nearby party members in range for X x5 HP every 4 seconds. This can deal magical damage to Undead Monsters.
~ Apply a strong healing aura, healing self and nearby party members in range for X x12 every 8 seconds. This can deal magical damage to Undead Monsters.
~ Apply a weak fire aura, dealing X fire magical damage to nearby monsters every 2 seconds.
~ Apply a moderate fire aura, dealing X x4 fire magical damage to nearby monsters every 6 seconds.
~ Apply a strong fire aura, dealing X x10 fire magical damage to nearby monsters every 12 seconds.
~ When you attack, grant self a buff for 5 seconds granting X Accuracy. Cooldown 8 seconds.
~ When you get attacked, grant self a buff for 3 seconds granting X Avoidance. Cooldown 5 seconds.
~ When you get attacked, grant self a buff for 10 seconds, granting X% increased Weapon and Magic Defense. (No cooldown.)
~ When your HP drops below 30%, heal X% HP and gain X x0.67 Max HP for 25 seconds. Cooldown 30 seconds.
~ When your MP drops below 30%, restore X% MP and gain X 0.67x Max MP for 25 seconds. Cooldown 30 seconds.
~ When you deal damage, perform a chain lightning to up to 3 monsters for X% of the ability's damage as lightning magical damage. Cooldown 2 seconds.
~ When you move around, apply a poison trail behind you for 3 seconds, dealing X poison magical damage every 0.5 second to monsters within.
~ When you damage monsters, apply a stack of frost for 7 seconds, after 10 stacks of frost the monster is frozen for up to 5 seconds. Dealing damage to the frozen monster will shatter the effect and deal X ice physical damage. Boss monsters take X ice physical damage instead of being frozen.
~ Whenever you heal or apply a buff to a party member, create an explosion of holy magic around you, dealing X holy magical damage to up to 6 monsters. Cooldown 6 seconds.
~ Whenever you poison or debuff a monster, create an aura of darkness on the target for 2 seconds, dealing X dark magical damage every 0.1 second to monsters within and heal self for 25% of the damage dealt. Cooldown 4 seconds.
This is a system where more can be slowly added over time to create something more fun and experimental to keep players engaged in the system long term with trying out different type of build setups, and get away from trying to play the game like a calculator.
BONUS THAT CAN BE DONE BECAUSE OF THIS SYSTEM:
Something that can be done is also include special passive effects that are static for each specific equipment to consider even more build options than just you like the item or the item gives you the most damage the easiest way possible.
Since this system allows for every equipment to have similar power to each other if you are willing to grind out equipment levels, you can include fun passives for each different equipment as well to give the player even more gameplay expressive freedom!
Example: Work Gloves could be true to its name and have a passive like +1 STR for every additional level this item has.
If you are willing to do the grind for mesos to level it to 200 and yourself to 200, you can have a very powerful warrior gloves.
