Raid changes (again)

[Splorf22]

Last october I posted the follow thread on raid changes:

So I had a chat with a friend last night about the Sleeper server. Now compared to P1999 the quality of the server and its approximation to classic are very low . . . . Nevertheless after chatting a while we both decided that if the Sleeper ever launched for real with a decent population we'd have to consider moving there . . . most of it is the tokens to spawn raid mobs. Think about this: the endgame scene on P1999 is so bad that we are seriously considering playing on a server that added relative level to damage calculations one month ago and has hundreds of other bugs.

There followed the usual huge thread with the usual consensus: simultaneous repops and FTE shouts would be a huge step towards improving the raid scene, and if that didn't work we could continue to experiment. Nilbog was on board, and eventually we got:

Here is what nilbog and I are currently planning/designing/brainstorming:

We will be cutting the variance in half on the existing raid spawns.

We will be implementing an FTE notice of some sort, whether this is an emote or some type of message.

We will be implementing a simulated patch day respawn. Here is how it will work.

The server will pick one day of each week (Random 1 to 7, Sunday through Saturday). It will then pick a random time. I will not disclose the range of the possible times, but it will only include afternoon and evening hours, so as to give the best chance for the most people to benefit from it.

A serverwide message will go off indicating that the simulated patch day respawn has or will be taking effect shortly. All raid mobs will (either immediately, delayed, or spanned, tbd) respawn.

What happened? The guild Forceful Entry was formed to compete with TMO. The peak server population went up 50% from 700 to 1050 (some of this was the winter of course). Casual guild membership swelled with all the new players who thought they might get to see Trakanon without sitting on his spawn point for days.

Five months later, the raid scene is worse than ever. With 50% more players the competition is even fiercer, and FE/TMO now sock VS for two days at a time and some people are now using autofire programs to get FTE. RnF erupts every other day with one guild accusing the other of cheating/kiting/stalling. It seems that now we have even MORE variance because of all the raid mobs that are missing their windows. Hell even the 'casual' zones like Sky are taken 5+ nights a week. I am seriously considering rerolling on red just because the raid scene on blue is so fucking bad, and I'm not really a fan of getting ganked while AFK.

TL;DR: As far as I'm concerned you guys owe us nothing. I have had large personal projects before so I know just how much time you guys put in. P1999 is great 1-59 and has allowed me to relive a lot of memories. But waving these raid changes in front of us and then not doing them is really frustrating.

[Nirgon]

You know what raid change would save a whole lot of coding?

Uthgaard being back. Lot of Velious content and other fixes done too I'd surmise.

Really though? No variance, whoever gets xp gets mob. Let the players come up with clever ways to manange, just enforce training.

[Autotune]

I'm just going to vote no, because there is no hope for change.

[Nirgon]

Variance (esp now) creates 10 hour poop socks which aren't classic. It makes any normal human being hate this. It's not like RNF's sewers won't be short of overflowing variance or no variance.

[RahlaeRuffian]

Rotations worked well on my server on live. I don't see why it wouldn't here.

[falkun]

Server Admins set the flags twice in less than a week for simulated respawns. TMO got most of the mobs still, I think that did not sit well with Server Staff. The other option is they are taking a note from EQMac: simulated patches every other week instead of every week. That would mean we are due for a simulated respawn next week, giving Server Staff the benefit of the doubt.

I would think this option should be vetted thoroughly (read: multiple months) before it is thrown out the window as a bad idea. We have had variance for years, simulated respawns are tried twice in less than a week and the "test" is complete? Sample size is too small.

I like the changes Rogean proposed, but they need time for the server to adjust to them if that's what the back-to-back respawns were testing out. Rome wasn't built in a day.

[oldschooltrader]

Variance (esp now) creates 10 hour poop socks which aren't classic. It makes any normal human being hate this. It's not like RNF's sewers won't be short of overflowing variance or no variance.


Incorrect. Pixel obessed greedy players create the poopsocks they dwell in. Poop has to b created by the player and then stored in the sock. Honestly the fact that a nostalgic server didnt start off with strict play nice rules and rotations boggles my mind. Whats the point of dominating a 13 year old game on an emulated server.

Oh wait..... makes sense now...

[LiQuid]

I don't know if variance is an issue that relates directly to me, but as a member of maybe the largest casual guild on the server it breaks my heart that a lot of our members that need these contested targets will likely have to quit and join a poopsock guild, or just never get their epics. I would love to roll a ranger and relive my "glory" days from Live on this server, but unless I join TMO or FE and the mess that is the end game on this server I'd never be able to get my lightning swords and that sucks.

I'm hoping Velious will help this. I'm not sure getting rid of variance will. Though I poked my head in the door at the latest VS poopsock and frankly I was grossed out by what I saw. Maybe it's rose tinted glasses, but back on Prexus server on live, even among the uber guilds there was a sense of honor and friendliness that doesn't seem to exist here. I didn't have any trouble getting a shot at VS back in the day and I was in a casual guild half the size of my current guild. Right now it seems like this server is run and played by Goons from Something Awful.

[Splorf22]

Server Admins set the flags twice in less than a week for simulated respawns. TMO got most of the mobs still, I think that did not sit well with Server Staff. The other option is they are taking a note from EQMac: simulated patches every other week instead of every week. That would mean we are due for a simulated respawn next week, giving Server Staff the benefit of the doubt.

I would think this option should be vetted thoroughly (read: multiple months) before it is thrown out the window as a bad idea. We have had variance for years, simulated respawns are tried twice in less than a week and the "test" is complete? Sample size is too small.

I like the changes Rogean proposed, but they need time for the server to adjust to them if that's what the back-to-back respawns were testing out. Rome wasn't built in a day.

Ah so you are saying he DID patch it in he just decided to ninja patch it? I don't see that.

As for the last two repops, they happened at 8AM sunday morning and 3PM Tuesday evening. Obviously casual guilds are not going to do well at those times. Plus, its going to take a while. We can see the process with FE: they started out missing everything and now they are basically going toe to toe with TMO. It just takes a while to get in practice and get resist gear and so on.

[Alarti0001]

You know what raid change would save a whole lot of coding?

Uthgaard being back. Lot of Velious content and other fixes done too I'd surmise.

Really though? No variance, whoever gets xp gets mob. Let the players come up with clever ways to manange, just enforce training.

[August]

I don't know what is good for the server but I can tell you what has happened for me.

I rolled here as my favorite class, enchanter, and was pretty optimistic about being able to enjoy the end game. I took my time leveling and had a lot of fun. When I first started here (ignore my join date - i expressed interest about 2 years ago and had a life event that prevented me from playing) there were about 500 people online at peak hours.

Roll forward 3 months and I'm level 54. There's about 1k people on, and I app to join FE. In my interview, I state that it is imperative for me that I am not involved in any poopsocking.

See, I played on Fippy (and Combine, and EQMac, and Live, but that's another story) - was, in fact, a personality there. I got to max level on Fippy and began to realize my only option was to poopsock. I couldn't justify to my wife the time I was spending on EQ when i was literally sitting in permafrost/seb/what have you waiting for a mob to spawn.

So I quit Fippy. I left behind an empire of platinum and tradeskill mastery because there wasn't anything for me to do - i didn't have the best gear, i hadn't hit all the raid targets, but it was so trivialized by 150 people sitting on spawn that it wasn't worth it.

Where was I? oh ya, in my FE interview I said I wouldn't participate in poopsocking and was told that that didn't happen on this server.

Two weeks later and all the guild messages were about parking your 'raiding alt' at one spot and parking your main somewhere else. We get to 12 hours and a sock starts - we're at Fippy Darkpaw level.

So I quit here, too. I'm not gone for good, but I haven't logged on in several weeks and feel no incentive to do so. I don't know what can fix the server, but I know that right now it feels unhealthy, and it felt like nothing was being done about it. I want Velious to come out as well but I'm not stupid enough to complain about it - it's a free service after all.

Also if you read this and you know me in game no you can't have my money cuz what's mines is mines.

-Tomtee

[Silo69]

fte shouts are NOT classic

if there gonna remove shit like target rings, and give you specific end game shit because the server is after 3 years saturated with lvl capped players... TOOO FUKING BAD

its not classic

go outside

[falkun]

fte shouts are NOT classic
Variance was put in supposedly to relieve stress on GMs. Right now, GMs raid disputes are mostly about "who got FTE?" If we can put in a system that removes GM requirements for the most common raid dispute to relieve stressed GMs, we are making a non-classic change that fulfills the initial intentions of variance.
Ah so you are saying he DID patch it in he just decided to ninja patch it? I don't see that.

As for the last two repops, they happened at 8AM sunday morning and 3PM Tuesday evening. Obviously casual guilds are not going to do well at those times. Plus, its going to take a while. We can see the process with FE: they started out missing everything and now they are basically going toe to toe with TMO. It just takes a while to get in practice and get resist gear and so on.
Full server respawns have to be initiated by Server staff, the database maintains an accurate "next spawn time", even when the server crashes. So when a full server respawn happens, someone either flipped a switch somewhere or added code to automatically flip the switch. Therefore we know the last two full respawns were intentional, and they were within a week of each other, at different times of day. My guess is they were testing the limits of the "reasonable hours" Rogean mentions. One of the respawns early afternoon for US weekday (3pm EST, noon PST), the other was 8:30AM EST on a US Sunday, 5:30AM PST. Assuming server staff haven't completely disregarded the system and are still pursuing it, I foresee tests on the other end of the spectrum as well in the future (sometime around 12AM EST US weeknight and 3AM EST US weekend). Or they may simply take population snapshots at these hours and forego actual respawn events.

I'd like a month period of testing out the FTE mechanic, that'd be a fantastic change. I personally think its easier to implement than full server respawns, but I know little about the server end of EQ.

[Waedawen]

fte shouts are NOT classic

if there gonna remove shit like target rings, and give you specific end game shit because the server is after 3 years saturated with lvl capped players... TOOO FUKING BAD

its not classic

go outside

implying variance is good for anyone besides the slackest of jaws

[melkezidek]

They should really make it so that on a FULL REPOP that its not everything at once. Say If server is reset it starts counters going with in a say 5 hours window? That way it forces people to move around and actually track mobs not just work down a list.

[skorge]

i don't get why people don't just share here, im not the hardcore raiding type but this is one of the reason's why...server would be much better if a rotation would be worked in and even guilds like Full Circle could get an occasional raid kill in....

oh yea, i do know why, its call GREED and it's a problem with this server

[melkezidek]

its call GREED and it's a problem with this server

Sadly this is the problem with the world today and not just the server.

[Karafa]

Velious + force /guildwar between the top 2-3 guilds.

[Waedawen]

Sadly this is the problem with the world today and not just the server.

You added nothing to what he said.

[Jokesteve]

Casuals bitched in 1999, and casuals will bitch here.

The only thing preventing your casual guilds from awesomeness is yourselves. You can point the finger at the staff, the players, the top guilds all you want it does not change the fact that if you want it bad enough, you'll do what it takes.

Socking, leapfrogging, contesting over raid targets happened in classic.

Shit is classic.

[Byrjun]

i don't get why people don't just share here, im not the hardcore raiding type but this is one of the reason's why...server would be much better if a rotation would be worked in and even guilds like Full Circle could get an occasional raid kill in....

oh yea, i do know why, its call GREED and it's a problem with this server

Because rotations aren't fun. Competition was a pretty big part of EverQuest, and rotations destroy that.

Of course, there's no competition with what we have now either. It's a bunch of people all attacking a mob as soon as it spawns (or using third party software to do it for them) and getting loot rewarded to them by a GM whether or not they would have successfully killed that mob on their own. By this system we might as well just remove the raid mobs in the game and hold a lottery each week for raid items, it's the same thing.

I don't know about Fippy, but I know on The Sleeper we never had any of this poopsocking stupidity. We would mobilize for a mob as soon as it spawned and would usually beat out a few other guilds in a race. That shit's fun, but it's up to the players to decide that's how they want to do things here. It looks like the players would rather stare at a wall for 16 hours as opposed to actually doing other things with their lives, so it's not looking good for anything changing soon. So it appears that P99 may never have a healthy and fun raid scene, by no fault of the game or the GMs or the devs, but of the players themselves who choose to play the game in such a way.

[Splorf22]

Casuals bitched in 1999, and casuals will bitch here.

The only thing preventing your casual guilds from awesomeness is yourselves. You can point the finger at the staff, the players, the top guilds all you want it does not change the fact that if you want it bad enough, you'll do what it takes.

Socking, leapfrogging, contesting over raid targets happened in classic.

Shit is classic.

Variance is not classic. And sitting on a spawn for hours is not awesomeness in my book.

[Kevynne]

You know what raid change would save a whole lot of coding?

Uthgaard being back. Lot of Velious content and other fixes done too I'd surmise.

Really though? No variance, whoever gets xp gets mob. Let the players come up with clever ways to manange, just enforce training.

[Splorf22]

Aren't you too busy bragging about yourself in the third person on the best players thread Zephany? :D

But yes, 95% so far. Need more votes though.

[Zallar]

Of course, there's no competition with what we have now either. It's a bunch of people all attacking a mob as soon as it spawns (or using third party software to do it for them) and getting loot rewarded to them by a GM whether or not they would have successfully killed that mob on their own. By this system we might as well just remove the raid mobs in the game and hold a lottery each week for raid items, it's the same thing.

So it appears that P99 may never have a healthy and fun raid scene, by no fault of the game or the GMs or the devs, but of the players themselves who choose to play the game in such a way.

I disagree, it is completely the fault of the devs. The majority of players will always choose the path of least resistance to their goals. It is the responsibility of the devs to design the path.

[Splorf22]

So far the vote is 62:4. At least among forum trolls I think it's safe to say we have a consensus.

[Leeford]

Why not give guilds the ability to spawn their raid mobs once a week?

Yeah, its not classic, but neither is a non-progression server where everyone is not moving past the same dozen raid mobs.

[Danth]

I won't vote since I don't partake in the high-end raid scene, but I figure the variance and multi-day camps help me indirectly. 100 people sitting on Venril Sathir's spawn point is 100 people who *aren't* claiming the stuff I want to do.

Danth