Client design is very important not just so the server runs properly but also so that players can easily play the game and that it's easy enough for someone to figure out how to install and such. For the most part installation isn't really an issue. Most mmorpg's have this fine since all packages usually install automaticly and download without issues.
The client side issues usually either come from bad patches example the development team not pretesting patches before they release them to the users. A perfect example of this would be Tera Online now that it's free to play. With every patch release they usually make some client side mistake that makes it so more then half of the player base has an issue. And then usually it's the community which comes up with work arounds of how to fix these bugs. I know cause I've had to help friends with this. That is pretty bad for a mmorpg. You shouldn't have to have your player base figure out how to fix your bad patches.
But the client itself is important we've also seen some pretty bad clients that seem to be built very poorly. One of the worst ones was that of Star Wars: The Old Republic. If you had a operating system that was 64bit it would memory leak causing it to crash and unless you had like 10 or 20 gbs of ram it would be impossible to run on these systems. Very bad coding for a client which was sapposed to be able to run with very low requirements. 32bit systems had less problems but still had crashing and memory leak problems which would take away from the fun of PvP.
Now not to bash Tera Online cause I still play it but the client is very poorly designed as well. Only the issues are not memory leaks. The issues with the client are because they choose autodesk as a product. The issue with autodesk is that it's a flash based system. People who know me most likely have heard many times that flash is CPU heavy and the mix between GPU and CPU is a bad combo. The user interface basicly has this flash overlay working on it which causes the user to lag really bad. This also ends up allowing people to exploit the user interface. You ask how? it allows players to walk up walls just like World of Warcraft's wall climbing bug using levitate only its achived just by spaming jump and some user interface key. So flash designs should just be thrown away cause your causing many players issues. Yes you can reduce some of the issues by various changes with graphics, CPU, client modification. But in the end it fails cause you can't make it perfect its flash its very broken.
Speaking of World of Warcraft one feature which no game has really implemented quite like WoW was the LUA based UI system. Being able to create addons really improved on the game itself. So it would be nice to actually see this implemented cause I could totally see some really unique ways for people to make addons in a PvP mmorpg which would really improve the game play. Like for example being able to make an addon which tracks people you've killed and the locations you've found them as well this way you can also make maps for hunting for your guild and such. Of course you would need to be careful about how to implement it so that it wouldn't be exploitable. But I think for the most part this wasn't that much of an issue for World of Warcraft. And I believe with a strict banning policy for people breaking rules this would not be much of a concern either.
Using a user interface which allows modification usually also allows people to customize it in various ways which will make the player base more happy over the more standard can't change much type interface which people will either have to love or have to hate. This is where allowing a user to be able to change various things besides the normal font, color, and size. Users want to be able to customize skins and do more with it and show off the art that they can create.
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