The problem that will occur with a standard level-based-on-xp rise is that people will either automatically be awarded it through post 70 xp earned on existing characters, which will lead to the level/equipment imbalance you mention. Or, everyone will have to start at L70+0xp to earn the new levels. And I wouldn't want to be on the help desk the day that happens.
The number of levels they increase by isn't relevant, no one would care about the levels between 70 and the new cap. The cap is the mantle people want. The balance would be in how far any new feats, powers and so on would extend the new cap above the current. If its too high, there would likely be some disgruntled 4k+ IL players disgruntled that the disparity between them and the 2-3.5 lot had been reduced which, obviously, it would. But either way, the more options you have with character stats, the less generic everything becomes, and given how pretty soon people will be able to switch from "Mob killer" to "Boss killer" before walking through the door, creating a balanced character appears to be less important than in the proper D&D game, which is a shame. "Builds" are soon going to based on bang for buck situational requirements, so to add variety to builds, there will need to be genuine options on the narrow build format loadouts is going to foster.
As with every update, change and improvement, there will always be people complaining that all the stuff they spent the past 6 months grinding for is "redundant"
But when the character advancement starts to boil down to spending months earning AD or XP to take a Utility slot enchantment up a couple of levels, people will lose interest. That's why Item Level being the big " I am" needs to be balanced with character advancement based on the actual character.
The time will come when the item disparity between new L70s and those who've been around since God was a boy will see mid tier game content skipped entirely, (SKT I'm looking at you..) because "what's the point?" The Boons are nothing special, and the grind interminable for something you won't need cos in six to twelve months from right now it will be surpassed.
Which is why Character advancement needs to be taken seriously.
Comments
The number of levels they increase by isn't relevant, no one would care about the levels between 70 and the new cap. The cap is the mantle people want. The balance would be in how far any new feats, powers and so on would extend the new cap above the current.
If its too high, there would likely be some disgruntled 4k+ IL players disgruntled that the disparity between them and the 2-3.5 lot had been reduced which, obviously, it would.
But either way, the more options you have with character stats, the less generic everything becomes, and given how pretty soon people will be able to switch from "Mob killer" to "Boss killer" before walking through the door, creating a balanced character appears to be less important than in the proper D&D game, which is a shame. "Builds" are soon going to based on bang for buck situational requirements, so to add variety to builds, there will need to be genuine options on the narrow build format loadouts is going to foster.
As with every update, change and improvement, there will always be people complaining that all the stuff they spent the past 6 months grinding for is "redundant"
But when the character advancement starts to boil down to spending months earning AD or XP to take a Utility slot enchantment up a couple of levels, people will lose interest. That's why Item Level being the big " I am" needs to be balanced with character advancement based on the actual character.
The time will come when the item disparity between new L70s and those who've been around since God was a boy will see mid tier game content skipped entirely, (SKT I'm looking at you..) because "what's the point?" The Boons are nothing special, and the grind interminable for something you won't need cos in six to twelve months from right now it will be surpassed.
Which is why Character advancement needs to be taken seriously.