Reasons for a archmage to try for Lv 200?

You could use it to parent a Cygnus to give it 20 bonus weapon attack, or just wait until the new system of bless comes out to give any character on that account 20 bonus weapon attack.

I could instead level the other character to get more than 2 w.atk bonus.

Haha this thread is PERFECT right now! I've been talking with my friends on vent about these more rhetorical questions for a while now; things like, "Why play an AM" or "Why play MapleStory" in general.

Why am I going for 200? This game is so different from any other MMO that getting to 200 is not only an impressive accomplishment based on the enormous amount of time it takes, but a very individual and unique accomplishment since leveling is not such a large portion of the game with any other MMO.

That is quite true for a F/P, actually. I forgot about that. It is rather special to see a level 200 F/P, since they are one of the rarest classes. However, I am an I/L, and there are billions of Lv. 200 I/Ls. It just isn't anything out of the ordinary to see a 200 I/L. But yeah, I did forget about F/Ps in this aspect.

In Maple, there's a lot, but not plenty, to still do at Lv. 200. For me, I love the concept of attacking with magic; I made my character to be the strongest Magician it could be, thinking this game could create such revered legends like Gandalf or whatnot in terms of character progression and development. Now of course that's completely wrong; unlike in LoTR, where Gandalf can pretty much kill whatever he wants, an AM here is outshadowed by plenty of classes at bosses. However, that doesn't mean they can't be as strong as possible, and so the big thing to do at 200 is upgrade your gear to the best it can go. It's something I know players like silverbg2 have been doing for years now, and there are now some ridiculously strong individuals out there for investing such an amount of time.

I have never played LOTR, so I don't really understand that comparison...

There is a point when you hit a bottleneck with equips, though. Right now, even a 5m.atk increase would cost me multi-billions. It just isn't worth it to upgrade anymore, especially since I can already 1 hit skeles.

However, as my friends and I discussed, the sad con about Lv. 200 on MS compared to games like WoW is the new content that you can explore. When you hit 80 on WoW, the game is just beginning - you have days, weeks, months even of raids, dungeons, and bosses to complete, if you so desire. At 200, what is there for a Mapler to do in terms of fun, high level content? Zakum? You can Zakum decently at 120. Horntail? Again, one merely has to be 150 on average, 160-170 for AMs, to be a decent runner there. Pink Been seems to be the only place for the 180+ characters that would be a true challenge, something content-wise that's really fun for the higher level community. Of course, the requirements to get in are disgusting, and it's very hard to actually go due to 30 person requirements and a short timer, so for most that's not an option.

I don't really like big boss runs; that's why I made an AM in the first place. I would much rather solo bosses, which si not easy for an AM. I can't really even get into a HT run at 18x, hell, I can't even get into a zakum run. (Well, I don't try to find runs at all, but what I mean is that no one ever asks me to come.)

So what's the verdict? If you can't find an individual reason to play (merchanting, upgrading gears, etc.), find a social reason. Hang out with friends a lot more, forge better relationships, or if your social life here is fine take that time you used training to better your real life relationships. Social reasons not enough? Then my suggestion, in all honesty, is to become an extremely casual player, one kind of like people who read headline news: they stay in tune with the world and are up-to-date on the biggest stories, but don't really do much in terms of reading into the issues or collaborating with fellow peers about them. In the same sense, become a Maple "headliner": log on only for patches and server checks to try out and have fun with the new content, and as things come out that you want to do only do them. If you have HT every Thursday night, make it your fun thing to do every week and don't play past that.

Pretty much what I have already done. All I do these days is talk to people in guild, or just go afk if my guild is all off (as is usually the case). Broa is a rather boring server, imo. Broa has alot of annoying people; I hate almost all of the big guilds in the server. I considered switching servers a few times, but I doubt that any of the other servers are going to be any better.

It is almost a waste of time to even login any more, everyone I know has pretty much quit. Used to be fun to just login so that I could talk in guild, but now we are down to 4 members, with 2 of them considering to quit.

For us high levels, the only true bulk of the game is done once we hit 200. However, that doesn't mean the future cannot bring fun things to do. While new content doesn't look to bright for fun for high levels based on years of patterns, that never means Nexon can't release something truly challenging and awesome that brings us all back. If all else, play to stay in touch with the game's content and the people you've come to love and respect; make Maple your second Facebook, something you check periodically but aren't tied down to.

Hope that helps!

Ah, I doubt Nexon will add anything challenging. They direct this game too much towards the younger players. I can only wish that they could add something that requires intellegence and skill, instead of just luck and time. I actually find messing with DPS calculations more fun than most aspects of gameplay in MS. But I don't believe that Nexon will ever increase the complexity of this game.

Thank you for a well written reply.