What MMO elements are they trying to distance themselves from?

They have said that this will not be an MMO but will have MMO features. It may be easier to understand what they are trying to make if they told us what particular features or elements of an MMO are they looking to exclude from this game, or is it the fact that they have elements (such as the single player option) that make it more than an MMO?

 

The main difference between SotA and a true MMO is the dual-scale map system imo. A true MMO has a (mostly) seamless virtual world (mono-scale).

 

I believe they are trying to stay away from level grinding as most modern MMORPGs are atm. This will be skill based, as in the more you use certain skills, the more you improve in them.

They are staying away from LARGE groups which tend to become less personal and more about numbers/cannon fodder.

 

What RealExpo said + less quest hand holding. I am fascinated by the player interaction. In WoW I tend to do little more than /dance.

 

No level/Raid system which is a Good Thing?.

No forcing players who want to be pure crafters to run a combat based character. Dunno how/if this will effect playing the storyline portion of the game, but it seems like if you want to be just a crafter and not care about the storyline (unless your town comes under siege), you'll be able to do so.

Optional levels of interaction online.

Less hand-holding in general.

That's what I've seen so far, anyway.

 

No Gear Grubbing! By that I mean no 6 hour dungeon runs for a chance at a piece of gear that adds to yet another 'set'. That grew so boring, so quickly that I don't really play theme park MMOs anymore.

 

I believe they are trying to stay away from the overhead in networking.

A hybrid between a small group of friends on a LAN party and a full MMO seems like a good method.

When in a Open Play city the max amount of players are available. Several MMO's instance this as is. (IE Lord of the Rings online.)

If you leave the city and venture into an event you are going in solo or following someone. There is a limit to how many are in the event. Tons of MMO's do this. 8 man and 10 man raids are very common. (Think about why World of Warcraft no longer does 40 man raids)

I like to picture the over head map about the same as a flight path system. You take a flight path to the location you want to go to and then you start your event.

Seems to me that Open play and the traditional MMO are actually quite similar. The days of 200 people stuffed in Lord British's castle are gone. They will never design a game that allows population density to crash the servers. MMO's have addressed this in many ways.

Open play is using a system based on favoring players most important to you instead of arbitrary first come first visible the reset are instanced off.