When are they Implementing the Charm Nerf? [Archive]

Jimjam

01-20-2022, 06:54 AM

I'm a little confused here. Why do people think this will be charm boost? I know someone posted an anecdote about their time on TAKP, but still no one has explained how the mechanics are going to change, so this will boost charm abilities. They're going to remove the 3rd check on enchanter charms. Having higher charisma helps to boost charm duration by giving enchanters that 3rd extra saving roll to prevent charm from breaking earlier. How exactly will removing that make charms last longer?

The same discovery that showed there shouldn’t be a charisma check on breaks also discovered that charm is cast at level +4. This is big as level comparison is the predominant check as to whether a spell is resisted or not.

I don’t recall whether the level mod is only on the cast check or also on the break checks. I’m sure the links in this thread go into better and more accurate details than I can. Deffo treat anything from me on this with a pinch of salt.

-Catherin-

01-20-2022, 10:17 AM

I'm a little confused here. Why do people think this will be charm boost? I know someone posted an anecdote about their time on TAKP, but still no one has explained how the mechanics are going to change, so this will boost charm abilities. They're going to remove the 3rd check on enchanter charms. Having higher charisma helps to boost charm duration by giving enchanters that 3rd extra saving roll to prevent charm from breaking earlier. How exactly will removing that make charms last longer?

So basically once an NPC gets within a specific level range to you, the effectiveness of charm sharply drops and the difficulty and skill required to keep the mob under control sharply increases.

It's been awhile since I've done this, but for a level 60 chanter it's something like 53-54? Usually noticed it when the mob gets into the level range to summon.

So if I'm understanding this correctly, this would mean that those borderline mobs specifically suddenly become much easier to manage because of the +4 level modifier you get.

I believe CHA as a modifier has the least impact on charm, after that is MR, and finally Level being the largest factor.

This could potentially slightly impact blue cons that are not in that level range... but those are easy to handle regardless.

-Catherin-

01-20-2022, 10:32 AM

The fact that this would also allow enchanter's to dump CHA in charming situations may also make those slightly more difficult moments even easier... considering that CHA gear gets replaced with HP, resists, etc. A lot of the high end ToV north wing loot lacks any sort of CHA. I know I have a few pieces that would all of a sudden be coming out of retirement.

Tunabros

01-20-2022, 12:05 PM

enchanter not op at all

kek

loramin

01-20-2022, 12:37 PM

enchanter not op at all

kek

It doesn't matter if they are OP are not; what matters is that they weren't OP in classic. Anyone who played in classic remembers Enchanters as a grouping class: they cast haste and C2, they mezzed adds, and maybe (if they were bored) they got hit to have their animation attack (although honestly I don't even remember them doing that very often).

Maybe a few rare Enchanters (with good computers and T1 connections) were soloing ... very carefully ... but again it was rare, and charming in groups was all but non-existent.

The goal of P99 is prominently displayed in the upper-left corner, but as long as I've been here that goal has been ignored when it comes to Enchanter charming. The hope I had ... the same hope I'd like to think we all have, if we appreciate this place and its goals ... should be to make Enchanters like they were in '99-'01.

Tunabros

01-20-2022, 12:40 PM

didnt read lol

-Catherin-

01-20-2022, 07:13 PM

I am going to say though that im pretty confident the only thing that was really kneecapping enchanters back then was the internet connection, and probably less powerful computers. Graphic stuttering and bad frame rate was actually a thing for a lot of people back then. These things are game over for enchanters. It just simply was not possible to do the things you see now solely because of that.

I played an enchanter then too. With today's advancements to internet and general knowledge of the game, I'm confident I would have been able to pull off what I can do now. It's going to be pretty unrealistic to believe we can ever confidently prove this either way though. And changes tend to be made on extremely strong evidence.

It could be argued that the low quality internet and processing power of those times is exactly why things need to be made artificially harder to mimic those issues, but that also inherently goes against the "vision."

I'd argue myself that the wiki itself is a huge violation to the "vision" as well, but you can't really put the cat back into the bag with that one because you can just find the info somewhere else these days.

PatChapp

01-20-2022, 07:45 PM

sajbert

01-23-2022, 06:07 AM

I don't buy the internet connection argument. As an EU player latency on p99 is anything but good and back in 2000 I and many others here did have broadband connections.

I think it's fairly obvious that all the ins- and outs of charming weren't known about then. To look at a contemporary example, look at WoW Classic how people play the game today and how people played original WoW.

Thus whether or not it happened in original EQ isn't a relevant point to make, clearly the p99-team is not trying to simulate the first time experience. You'd have to remake the entire game.

Now as I understand the argument for the mechanics being wrong is rather weak. but perhaps I'm wrong. What I DO want to know is IF they're planning on making any MAJOR class change like this is that the P99 devs communicate with the players so that you know, maybe someone doesn't spend their hard earned plat on a chanter and whatever free time they have to level it up only to end up with something they didn't wish to play.

loramin

01-23-2022, 01:05 PM

Now as I understand the argument for the mechanics being wrong is rather weak. but perhaps I'm wrong.

Just look at the bug thread: Dolalin (classic researcher extraordinaire) did some amazing research to show very clearly that there are faults in our current system.

oldschoolguy

01-27-2022, 09:55 PM

Duik

01-27-2022, 10:13 PM

How come a charmed shammy or cleric doesnt heal charmer, if needed? Too OP then or something else. A bit OT sorry but kinda related..

Jimjam

01-28-2022, 04:07 AM

Man guys I just recently started EQ on this server and picked enchanter because of unique play style not available anywhere else. I already struggle now because of charm breaking often and that’s with good charisma hand me downs from friendly players.
Changes have me worried. Because I don’t know what it means.

Please don’t make it harder or I’ll just have to call it quits. There are no groups, everyone soloes or twinked. Enchanter pets are trash, charm is the only thing that works, but if it breaks a lot it’s an easy death sentence or 10 minute sitting waiting on hp to slowly regen because you took few hits and are now at 10% health.

Just my feedback

If you’re having a lot of breaks/resists even with good charisma that is either due to mob magic resist being too high (fixed with tash/mal/pet items) or you’re charming mobs too close to your level (which will be improved by this bug fix or you can target slightly lower level mobs).

You can also try to refine your procedure for charm breaks. Prerooting everything is a good contingency, as is keeping your defence maxed and gearing for tankiness.

Hope this helps.

derpcake2

01-28-2022, 05:17 AM

derpcake2

01-28-2022, 05:20 AM

ou’re charming mobs too close to your level (which will be improved by this bug fix or you can target slightly lower level mobs).

Where do you even get this drivel?

The nerf has less impact as level increases, since at higher level you have a far larger margin for charming blue mobs.

A 60 chanter can charm a mob 15 levels below them, and it will still contribute. A level 40 chanter charming a mob 15 levels below them isn't going to get any value out of that pet.

The system discourages charming mobs near your own level, and calculates in absolute values. It is easier for a level 60 chanter to charm a level 50 mob (10 level difference), then it is for for a level 19 chanter to charm a level 10 mob (9 level difference).

Charming under level 50 just won't happen anymore.

People are all giddy about nerfing level 60 enchanters, while they don't even understand what this "fix" encompasses. In a way it is hilarious to see how a few nerds whipped each other in a frenzy about this while not even having a clue on the actual effects.

MaCtastic

01-28-2022, 09:02 AM

PatChapp

01-28-2022, 10:22 AM

Man guys I just recently started EQ on this server and picked enchanter because of unique play style not available anywhere else. I already struggle now because of charm breaking often and that’s with good charisma hand me downs from friendly players.
Changes have me worried. Because I don’t know what it means.

Please don’t make it harder or I’ll just have to call it quits. There are no groups, everyone soloes or twinked. Enchanter pets are trash, charm is the only thing that works, but if it breaks a lot it’s an easy death sentence or 10 minute sitting waiting on hp to slowly regen because you took few hits and are now at 10% health.

Just my feedback
Are you playing on green or blue? I leveled my enchanter 10-50 recently 90% grouped. Just gotta make friends and hit the hotspots
Oasis in the teens, unrest 20s, highkeep. Their is groups out there.

loramin

01-28-2022, 01:24 PM

Isn't your highest level chanter level 17 or so?

Anyway, keep up the shitposts.

So I have to level every class to 60 to remember what Enchanters were like on live? :rolleyes:

loramin

01-28-2022, 01:25 PM

"Enchanter. The primary focus of this art can be summed up by the name of the arcane order to which it belongs - enchantment. Spells are crafted to enchant people, places and things. An Enchanter can charm beings and make them fight for a new master, or magically enhance the capabilities of a sword-welding warrior. She even has some proficiency in offensive spells." - players manual, Everquest Trilogy, printed in 2000.

Seems pretty odd that one of the three things highlighted about the class in the (classic) players manual is charming - yet people consider it not classic. It's starting to feel like a witch hunt..

Did you play in classic? Enchanters did charm: no one is saying otherwise. But they 100% did not charm in groups in any major capacity, and even when soloing it was a highly risky activity, not the safest/most efficient path to leveling.

Again, you don't have to have played an Enchanter on live to remember this: you just had to group with them. And if you grouped at all, you undoubtedly did, as they were still a highly desired class in groups even without charm.

P.S. And also, using the EQ manual as a basis for ... anything really, is a pretty terrible way to make an argument. Those things were rife with falsehoods.

DeathsSilkyMist

01-28-2022, 06:01 PM

P.S. And also, using the EQ manual as a basis for ... anything really, is a pretty terrible way to make an argument. Those things were rife with falsehoods.

Loramin's correct. I wouldn't trust the official printed material to be honest. I did a post a while ago showing just some of the mistakes in the Kunark Strategy Guide 1.0 I found in a box at home.

https://www.project1999.com/forums/showthread.php?t=361855

It's pretty bad.

Jibartik

01-28-2022, 06:12 PM

it was a highly risky activity, not the safest/most efficient path to leveling.

no people were just bad then it wasnt risky people just sucked.

DeathsSilkyMist

01-28-2022, 06:16 PM

no people were just bad then it wasnt risky people just sucked.

It probably was riskier back then. Not necessarily because of the game mechanics or player skill, but because of how flakey the internet was back then. I could easily see people dying from getting beaten to death by their pet after a lag spike or unexpected disconnect. I certainly remember getting disconnected decently often on live.

Jibartik

01-28-2022, 06:20 PM

DeathsSilkyMist

01-28-2022, 06:29 PM

TBH I dont buy the latency issue. I never remember latency ever being a problem for me. How it would affect charming ant not roots or pvp or using stuns to stunlock a train pull in lower guk (which was my favorite memory of the game of all time) I just cant figure out how charming is unique to any of that.

I remember getting disconnected quite often. The main problem with charm is if it breaks while you are disconnected but still logged in and waiting to be kicked, you would probably get murdered while you are standing there helplessly. Obviously it depended on if you had high class internet or not. I had 56k instead of DSL, so it was a much shoddier experience for me hehe.

Jibartik

01-28-2022, 06:51 PM

not if you had a group, which i was in all the time... so i didnt need pets but i did need to CC... knawhatiamen

I aint ever seen nobody solo tranix in 99

DeathsSilkyMist

01-28-2022, 06:59 PM

not if you had a group, which i was in all the time... so i didnt need pets but i did need to CC... knawhatiamen

I aint ever seen nobody solo tranix in 99

Don't get me wrong. I am not in the camp arguing Enchanters never charmed on live. I honestly don't remember much about playing with Enchanters on live. I didn't play one myself, and I mained a warrior so I didn't care about clarity. I only really remember the mezes and lulls lol.

I am just saying I do remember getting disconnected a lot (or almost disconnected where you would not get updates for seconds at a time before the game recovered). If I was playing an Enchanter at the time I would certainly think twice before charming when soloing, especially if you go balls to the wall and give your pet a torch + haste. You would get melted in seconds during a disconnect or almost disconnect if charm broke. You wouldn't be able to cast a stun, mez, etc. either.

But again, it depended on how often you got disconnected. DSL players might have had a much nicer time than us 56k folks.

Jibartik

01-28-2022, 07:13 PM

Yeah I remember the black screen with white text.

They should add random disconnects to p99

I think that is the most classic and low hanging fruit way to solve the issue.

DeathsSilkyMist

01-28-2022, 07:17 PM

Yeah I remember the black screen with white text.

Yup lol that black screen with white text was the worst! I have quite a few memories of just running through a zone and getting that message.

Jibartik

01-28-2022, 07:19 PM

https://i.imgur.com/hbhUe4Y.png

loramin

01-28-2022, 07:22 PM

They should add random disconnects to p99

I think that is the most classic and low hanging fruit way to solve the issue.

I agree. Leave blue (post-green merge) as the "for babies who can't take real EQ" server, and bring back random (but rare) disconnects for everyone on Green 2.0! :D

(Bonus points if they play a wav file of your mom telling you to get off the phone when they happen.)

Jibartik

01-28-2022, 07:25 PM

How funny would it be listening to people on discord rage when that image pops up.

Jimjam

01-28-2022, 07:46 PM

Where do you even get this drivel?

The nerf has less impact as level increases, since at higher level you have a far larger margin for charming blue mobs.

A 60 chanter can charm a mob 15 levels below them, and it will still contribute. A level 40 chanter charming a mob 15 levels below them isn't going to get any value out of that pet.

The system discourages charming mobs near your own level, and calculates in absolute values. It is easier for a level 60 chanter to charm a level 50 mob (10 level difference), then it is for for a level 19 chanter to charm a level 10 mob (9 level difference).

Charming under level 50 just won't happen anymore.

People are all giddy about nerfing level 60 enchanters, while they don't even understand what this "fix" encompasses. In a way it is hilarious to see how a few nerds whipped each other in a frenzy about this while not even having a clue on the actual effects.

I’m confused by which part you think is drivel. Oldschool is a new enchanter with good charisma but suffering early breaks. Lets assume they is telling the truth, so that isn’t drivel.

Are you saying it is drivel that targetting slightly lower level mobs (than he currently targets) to charm reduces resists? I don’t think you’re saying that - you seem to understand the role of level difference later in your post. So you’re saying the forthcoming/anticipated +4 to casting level on charm helping it stick is drivel? Again that doesn’t make sense as you seem to under stand the importance of level difference for resists.

If I understand right, level of 17 enc will be casting charm as level 21 after the change ... is that what you’re saying is drivel? If this is what you think is drivel, why? The research suggests it should be there ... do you think it is already implemented so there will be no further benefit after the change?

oldschoolguy

02-19-2022, 11:31 PM

I’m confused by which part you think is drivel. Oldschool is a new enchanter with good charisma but suffering early breaks. Lets assume they is telling the truth, so that isn’t drivel.

Are you saying it is drivel that targetting slightly lower level mobs (than he currently targets) to charm reduces resists? I don’t think you’re saying that - you seem to understand the role of level difference later in your post. So you’re saying the forthcoming/anticipated +4 to casting level on charm helping it stick is drivel? Again that doesn’t make sense as you seem to under stand the importance of level difference for resists.

If I understand right, level of 17 enc will be casting charm as level 21 after the change ... is that what you’re saying is drivel? If this is what you think is drivel, why? The research suggests it should be there ... do you think it is already implemented so there will be no further benefit after the change?

This is confusing me too, I don't know what it means. And I don't know why I even have Charisma or how it works now even. I wish they made it more clear, it's weird that on a fan server, how it works is a mystery and not open source. Not complaining, just pointing out the confusing part.

Duik

02-20-2022, 04:29 AM

This is confusing me too, I don't know what it means. And I don't know why I even have Charisma or how it works now even. I wish they made it more clear, it's weird that on a fan server, how it works is a mystery and not open source. Not complaining, just pointing out the confusing part.

Relive the Classic Everquest Experience as it was from 1999 to 2001.*Project 1999*is a free to play Classic Everquest Server, unaffiliated with Daybreak Game Company but*operating under legal permission. Our goal is to restore the magic and difficulty of the original Everquest game, including the mechanics, interface, and challenges of Original Content, Kunark, and Velious.*Project 1999*is the most popular and most accurate reincarnation of Old School Everquest.

That's what it says on home page of p1999, eqemu may be an opensource impementation of the original server software.

Rogean and such have spent signifgant time scraping and playing live, then tweaking the open source eqemu software (and other stuff i dont know about) to bring us what we have.
I loved/hated live , as we all did cuz "OMG why did that happen and what can i do to make it NOT happen next time..." not by asking someone or looking it up but just trying shit out.
You remind me of a rulebook reading AD&D player, to counter, an AD&D dm makes an Orc random encounter, look like an Orc but has double hitpoints and regens like a half Orc/Troll. Simple change (for dnd) but large impact.
Players like you sceam "Not in the rulebook..." Gold.

FYI the underlined part of the quote above is (what I believe is) the whole idea of this server.
By the sound of it, Your Mileage Does Vary.

long.liam

02-27-2022, 03:05 AM

I may have misunderstood the implications of this change, but I highly doubt they would implement something that would make an already OP class even more OP. To quote Nilbog who said:

"Will always choose to err on the side of underpowered rather than overpowered. Safest way to proceed until things are perfect, or near perfect."

https://www.project1999.com/forums/showpost.php?p=1327276&postcount=37

eisley

02-27-2022, 03:15 AM

While charm is obviously broken, from the duration to auto-quad to aggro to stopping summons - the real crux is the Channeling bug. On live, broken charms were dangerous because you needed help to recharm. You couldn't just cast with a mob beating you in the face. That along with the low duration making it a mana sink made it not very useful on live. It did have it uses - Dictate in SG and a few others. But there's a reason why Dire Charm was such a big deal on Live - it finally made Enchanters able to keep a pet.

Lich

02-27-2022, 03:59 AM

The server is a house of cards at this point. I enjoy the game as is and don't want to see any further nerfs or drastic changes to core mechanics. It's a handful of sadists that are calling for these changes. The only thing stopping someone from creating a similar project is motivation.

eisley

02-27-2022, 04:15 AM

I don't know, if we're going that route, I say revert the Monk Sneak "nerf" (fix) and push interrupt and Baton of Flame and so on.

Either go classic or not. Charm and Channeling alone prevent this game from being "classic." Just like FD Memblur did. Or Ivandyr's Hoop spam back in the day. Along the same lines, what did rooting NToV and removing FTE races accomplish?

Do we want classic, do we want fun, or do we want the wild west?

Lich

02-27-2022, 04:45 AM

I don't know how popular the server would be today if it was 100% classic from the beginning. It started off with lots of nice features like spell descriptions, spell timers and DoT damage messages. These things were slowly removed but I think they helped get people invested in the server while they were implemented. I'm still having fun for now.

eisley

02-27-2022, 04:57 AM

Yeah, we'll never know. We had so many things in beta/vanilla, all the things you listed plus maps, sneak pulling, Whirl Til U Hurl being perma-stun, no hybrid penalties, fire pet spam, Ivandyr's Hoop spam, cheap recharges, sneak pulling, etc. In Kunark, we had 55+ mobs able to be stunned, easy pushback interrupts, no NPC gating, and a zillion other things.

Blue was always 'beta' though. Green was the culmination. And it's pretty popular. Sadly, it still has these glaring bugs.

-Catherin-

02-27-2022, 12:38 PM

Whirl Til U Hurl being perma-stun

Forget about charm. Those were the days lol

ReoDobbs

02-28-2022, 09:30 PM

I love how it took 10 years for people on this server to "remember" how P99 charming was like classic charming.

No ulterior motives here folks

Neric

03-11-2022, 02:16 PM

On live server back in the day charisma had zero impact on charm. It was "broken" since day 1 and didn't get fixed until 2004 when I stopped playing.

Jimjam

03-11-2022, 02:22 PM

oldschoolguy

03-16-2022, 02:43 PM

Don't get me wrong. I am not in the camp arguing Enchanters never charmed on live. I honestly don't remember much about playing with Enchanters on live. I didn't play one myself, and I mained a warrior so I didn't care about clarity. I only really remember the mezes and lulls lol.

I do remember being able to charm yellow conned crocks in oasis to fight red con crocs in oasis, was wild fun and it was biggest highlight of that enchanters adventure. Not to mention charm other players and send them to fight Cazel. (I Played on Rallos Zek server)

I can't do that here, charm on p99 breaks a lot more often. Still fun though. It's as close to classic as we'll ever get imo anyway so making most of it with all it's blemishes. Alternative is TLP servers which unfortunately go all the way to PoP, 2 expansions too many imo.

ReoDobbs

03-16-2022, 06:18 PM

I do remember being able to charm yellow conned crocks in oasis to fight red con crocs in oasis, was wild fun and it was biggest highlight of that enchanters adventure. Not to mention charm other players and send them to fight Cazel. (I Played on Rallos Zek server)

I can't do that here, charm on p99 breaks a lot more often. Still fun though. It's as close to classic as we'll ever get imo anyway so making most of it with all it's blemishes. Alternative is TLP servers which unfortunately go all the way to PoP, 2 expansions too many imo.

Charming yellow mobs was always a rush, depending on break RNG it could be a nice PL session or a nice delevel session

socialist

04-29-2022, 01:52 AM

It doesn't matter if they are OP are not; what matters is that they weren't OP in classic. Anyone who played in classic remembers Enchanters as a grouping class: they cast haste and C2, they mezzed adds, and maybe (if they were bored) they got hit to have their animation attack (although honestly I don't even remember them doing that very often).

To be honest, that doesn't mean very much. People didn't know shit back then. It's very likely that the power of charm simply hadn't been widely discovered at the time. I remember many players believed that Harmony was a mana regeneration buff, and that sitting too close to a mob's spawning point would stop it from respawning. The fact that people weren't soloing much with enchanters in 1999 is not evidence of anything. Tons of things just weren't known, and this type of game was a brand new concept back then. The whole notion of soloing difficult stuff was something many players didn't even consider.

I remember that at the time, many thought shaman was a bad class because they didn't do much damage and didn't have particularly good heals, and damage shield was considered one of the most important buffs in the game which shamans didn't have. Few had figured out how much slows matter, or that canni-dancing can vastly increase your mana resources throughout a playsession. Things were just not known in 1999, and information wasn't widely available. Everyone was figuring it all out almost exclusively from personal experience and whatever their buddies told them, which was often hilariously incorrect.

loramin

04-29-2022, 12:12 PM

To be honest, that doesn't mean very much. People didn't know shit back then. It's very likely that the power of charm simply hadn't been widely discovered at the time. I remember many players believed that Harmony was a mana regeneration buff, and that sitting too close to a mob's spawning point would stop it from respawning. The fact that people weren't soloing much with enchanters in 1999 is not evidence of anything. Tons of things just weren't known, and this type of game was a brand new concept back then. The whole notion of soloing difficult stuff was something many players didn't even consider.

I remember that at the time, many thought shaman was a bad class because they didn't do much damage and didn't have particularly good heals, and damage shield was considered one of the most important buffs in the game which shamans didn't have. Few had figured out how much slows matter, or that canni-dancing can vastly increase your mana resources throughout a playsession. Things were just not known in 1999, and information wasn't widely available. Everyone was figuring it all out almost exclusively from personal experience and whatever their buddies told them, which was often hilariously incorrect.

Yeah, live had 20x players vs. what we have here, but none of them knew how to cast their character's spells :rolleyes:

mcoy

04-29-2022, 02:27 PM

and that sitting too close to a mob's spawning point would stop it from respawning

Wait, that's not true?

-Mcoy

socialist

04-30-2022, 12:45 AM

Yeah, live had 20x players vs. what we have here, but none of them knew how to cast their character's spells :rolleyes:

The global population in 1925 was about two billion. A few years later, penicillin was discovered. Two billion people (and all the human beings who ever lived before then) weren't able to figure out that mold cured infections until somebody worked it out on their own.

Tann

04-30-2022, 11:14 AM

Yeah, live had 20x players vs. what we have here, but none of them knew how to cast their character's spells :rolleyes:

I remember it was a must for shamans, enchanters, and me on bard if able, to use those enfeeble debuffs. We all thought it actually did something.

cannobeers3

05-01-2022, 12:52 PM

Anecdotes, individual recall from 23 years ago and confirmation bias. That some fantastic bird-lawyerin'.

Gustoo

05-02-2022, 02:58 PM

Give clarity to wizards

delete enchanter class

(since we're just saying stupid shit we would want)

Possibly the charm breaking here is classic

In that case, it is only the channeling that is not classic.

I remember having to cast between enemy attacks, or else it was almost guaranteed interrupt. Here I just expect the cast to go off, and am surprised when it doesn't.

Until not too long ago, pure melee classes had full channeling capabilities so rogue / monk / warrior could channel their clickies, when in reality those spells were 100% interrupted because of their lack of channeling.

When you have a charm break and no where to go and can't re cast without good chance of interrupt the enchanter class is a lot different, and that maybe what we're seeing here.

DMN

05-02-2022, 04:43 PM

if anything enchanters are ovely gimped on p99, with key aspects of their kit is entirely missing (like memory blurring your animation). Thats why i think its so hillarious when dumb and dumber always show up to these threads to deonstrate just how little know about actual classic EQ.

Gustoo

05-04-2022, 11:48 AM

I thought the first years of project 1999 are now considered equivilent to actual classic EQ since project 1999 has now gone more than 10 years longer than classic EQ ever did, officially re-writing history?

I think its possible that the way the spells work is classic

And it's just channeling that is ridiculous. When charm used to break and you couldn't channel like a mad dog, you died. Enchanter pets used to wipe out groups ALL THE TIME groups that didn't want to wipe told enchanters to use mez and keep everyone claritied and that was basically it.

bomaroast

05-04-2022, 12:00 PM

Charm 20 years ago broke regularly and often did not last very long at all, and this was when enchanters knew they needed lots of charisma. The P99 charm has always lasted too long, too regularly.

Eleandra

05-14-2022, 04:32 AM

When I last played TAKP, Enchanter pets were one of the most OP things on the server. I saw many trios with a max hasted fully decked out sebilite golem shredding camps in Seb.

I can say this was the case in ~2001, too (though I typically had a full group, not a trio).

-Catherin-

06-19-2022, 01:42 PM

Jimjam

06-19-2022, 02:30 PM

Gates of Discord i think is the (an?) era for charm nerf. Tanks were struggling to tank xp content without getting 1 rounded so people used pets instead, especially charm pets (which also could do enough damage a round to potentially kill an ornate geared 65 tank).

-Catherin-

06-19-2022, 04:33 PM

oh yikes i stand corrected

Nikkanu

06-21-2022, 10:54 PM

There is a reason why charm was nerfed in luclin. Or maybe it was PoP? for those who dont know, after the nerf, the moment you charmed an NPC it got weaker. when it broke it was back to full strength.

charming was becoming more stable to use as internet connections and computers got better. so around this time it started becoming apparent how OP it actually was. I still stand by primitive hardware and internet being the real issue in those days. If Tak does not have that nerf, its well within that timeline.

This really wasn't the issue you seem to recall it being. I had access to a T1 and T3 at different locations (one an ISP who I was friends with the owner, and other at the college library) and had 128k ISDN in 2000, which was more than enough bandwidth for EQ without bottlenecking and was extremely reliable compared to my old dialup service. I knew many of my guildmates (most real life friends) that had similar access to higher bandwidth connections for the time at local ISPs or college dorms and libraries.

My home computer (being a broke college kid at the time) wasn't spectacular however I regularly used charm to solo tough camps with my necro during classic, kunark, and velious. I also regularly charming mobs in xp groups in lguk during classic and city of mist in kunark because they did better dps. All without spending thousands on a high end pc.

I'd suggest that if a necro could do it during this era, an enchanter could do it even better. In fact I remember this being the case. Sadly I don't have any data or logs from 20+ years ago to demonstrate my claims to be true.

PatChapp

06-22-2022, 09:54 AM

This really wasn't the issue you seem to recall it being. I had access to a T1 and T3 at different locations (one an ISP who I was friends with the owner, and other at the college library) and had 128k ISDN in 2000, which was more than enough bandwidth for EQ without bottlenecking and was extremely reliable compared to my old dialup service. I knew many of my guildmates (most real life friends) that had similar access to higher bandwidth connections for the time at local ISPs or college dorms and libraries.

My home computer (being a broke college kid at the time) wasn't spectacular however I regularly used charm to solo tough camps with my necro during classic, kunark, and velious. I also regularly charming mobs in xp groups in lguk during classic and city of mist in kunark because they did better dps. All without spending thousands on a high end pc.

I'd suggest that if a necro could do it during this era, an enchanter could do it even better. In fact I remember this being the case. Sadly I don't have any data or logs from 20+ years ago to demonstrate my claims to be true.
Yeah I also had a primatuve form of cable internet in 1999, and it wasn't horribly expensive so was very common at least in my area

-Catherin-

06-22-2022, 10:49 AM

While I’m sure plenty of people had the hardware and connections to manage some things I’m extremely skeptical that this was the norm. But just like you, we are tossing around our own memories and experiences to try and back up our own opinion on things. I’ll add a couple more things though.

While enchanters can arguable take on a greater variety, as well as harder content. Failure or just pure bad luck was less forgiving due to the lack of a FD spell. Doing the hardest content you have room for one, two things at most going wrong to salvage the situation. Sometimes you don’t even have one chance. I’d imagine on live this was compounded.

Then there are instant click items and the knowledge we have. It creates a confidence factor that allows a lot more people to get into the charming game than was normal on live. I still think twice about doing higher end content if I don’t have my WC cap and Wand of Allure charged.

Which kind of comes back around to instant click items. They have been a problem and still are.

loramin

06-22-2022, 12:59 PM

Whenever these conversations come up, we always get these "I totally remember my character charm soloing Vox in classic" comments.

Meanwhile, everyone else who played in classic remembers the class very clearly, because we all grouped with them in classic. They were not charm soloing gods; in fact the vast majority didn't solo (even while Druids, Mages, Necros, etc. did): they grouped.

In groups they most certainly did not charm regularly in groups (as it was far too risky)! They mezzed, and hasted, and cast clarity, and the good ones would get hit from time to time to get their animation to give some tiny extra DPS. But most just did mez/clarity/haste.

If you ask random people (not P99 Enchanter players) who played EQ in 1999-2001 what Enchanters were like, I guarantee 90+% will give you something like the above, and not this unclassic P99 version where "Enchanters are the best soloing class and can charm solo anything with ease". And similarly if you look at objective evidence, like old forum posts or other Wayback Machine stuff from the era, they'll all describe the same classic enchanter, who was nothing like the P99 Enchanter, because in live ... to a far greater degree than here ... charm was risky and dangerous.

Muggens

06-22-2022, 03:00 PM

In classic enchanters were viewed as a weak class. Even into expansions.

Insaiyan

06-22-2022, 06:19 PM

Did anything actually change within the last year for the class?

Tann

06-22-2022, 07:06 PM

wooooords!!

I'm def in the boat of people who mostly saw enchanters in groups doing crowd control, buffs, debuffs, etc.. but that doesn't mean charm isn't functioning correctly here because we didn't see how it could be used back in the day.

why not argue that shaman dot's are way too strong on p99, because back in the day I only ever saw shamans in groups buffing, debuffing, and healing. :rolleyes:
^^^ this is meant as a joke.

cannobeers3

06-22-2022, 07:15 PM

This thread is mostly feelings and confirmation bias.

loramin

06-22-2022, 07:53 PM

This thread is mostly feelings and confirmation bias.

Isn't the point of this place to feel like the game we all (or at least many of us) played back in '99-'01? Not to be an exact replica (we all know it isn't) ... but again, to feel like one?

Zoolander

06-23-2022, 04:34 AM

with the recent surefall glade port patch (was introduced shortly before luclin was released) we could care less bout this patch.

just start a new chanter on the new server, problem solved.

commongood

06-23-2022, 12:36 PM

@Loramin

Did you play on a blue or pvp server back on live?

loramin

06-23-2022, 02:28 PM

@Loramin

Did you play on a blue or pvp server back on live?

Bristlebane (a "blue" server).

I had a toon on Sullon Zek, but I don't think I ever got him past 20.

commongood

06-24-2022, 02:59 AM

Bristlebane (a "blue" server).

I had a toon on Sullon Zek, but I don't think I ever got him past 20.

Fair. Reason I was asking was that red vs blue would have a pretty significant impact as to the frequency of casual charming in exp groups etc. I played a chanter on Tallon Zek from 2000 2006 and I don't remember charming at all for exp during my initial Kunark and Velious play time. However that was also very much to do with the risks of getting ganked by pvp'ers. It felt like in many scenarios it was just completely untennable.

Biggest memory I have of charming-soloing was much later (in PoP) where I would solo in Bastion of Thunder and Plane of Valor for exp and profits.

Though my memory is extremely hazy - which I suspect is the caze for many people replying to threads here :)

loramin

06-24-2022, 11:59 AM

Fair. Reason I was asking was that red vs blue would have a pretty significant impact as to the frequency of casual charming in exp groups etc. I played a chanter on Tallon Zek from 2000 2006 and I don't remember charming at all for exp during my initial Kunark and Velious play time. However that was also very much to do with the risks of getting ganked by pvp'ers. It felt like in many scenarios it was just completely untennable.

Biggest memory I have of charming-soloing was much later (in PoP) where I would solo in Bastion of Thunder and Plane of Valor for exp and profits.

Though my memory is extremely hazy - which I suspect is the caze for many people replying to threads here :)

My central argument in this fight has always been "what does everyone remember from classic ('99-'01)?" And again, if you ask anyone except a P99 Enchanter player, they'll tell you: Enchanters were a grouping class (even though there were plenty of soloing classes, like Necros or Druids; it's not like everyone in classic grouped exclusively or anything).

But also we have more objective sources than just people's memories. You can find Enchanter guides on Caster's Realm archives, Enchanter discussions on Allakhazam archives, and so on. And they'll say the same thing: charm soloing was a thing in classic! It was also super risky and dangerous ... and most preferred groups because that was the safer/faster-in-the-long-run way to get XP.

I'm not trying to get charm soloing removed from P99 :) Heck, I plan to play an Enchanter on Green 2.0.

I just want it to be classically hard like it should be. Smarter people than me have said the reason is that our resist rates are off, but I don't know if that's the issue or not: all I know is our Enchanters aren't classic.

-Catherin-

06-24-2022, 12:57 PM

Fair. Reason I was asking was that red vs blue would have a pretty significant impact as to the frequency of casual charming in exp groups etc. I played a chanter on Tallon Zek from 2000 2006 and I don't remember charming at all for exp during my initial Kunark and Velious play time. However that was also very much to do with the risks of getting ganked by pvp'ers. It felt like in many scenarios it was just completely untennable.

Biggest memory I have of charming-soloing was much later (in PoP) where I would solo in Bastion of Thunder and Plane of Valor for exp and profits.

Though my memory is extremely hazy - which I suspect is the caze for many people replying to threads here :)

I started using charm a lot more during PoP as well. charm never recieved any kind of buffs from vanilla to this period (unless you counted dire charm, but dire charm was close to useless imo, and not what this conversation is about anyways). I would duo things like Wuoshi with a Druid partner with their CH. (Giants were immune to fear so they could actually take down Wuoshi).

The assumptions that people with only P99 enchanter experience have these opinions is wrong. Enchanter was my main on live. While i did plenty of the group/animation role as mentioned, I also did plenty of the charming too.

Another one i had fun with was charming those frogs in the plane of storms. I think that was the name? the one outside bastion of thunder. You could use those frogs to take down the giants that dropped the pieces for the key quest to enter that bastion, and I made a TON of plat doing that. Getting entry that way did not count as one of the flags to access the higher planes, but a lot of people didnt care about that.

Again though, this is us just throwing around our "experiences" so its not going to change a thing. id personlly welcome the change though. It would actually make charming easier for the content that really counts.

-Catherin-

06-24-2022, 01:11 PM

Just to pre-emptively respond to what I know is coming. I know these examples are out of era. but the point is that charm still functioned roughly the same as it always had.

commongood

06-24-2022, 02:05 PM

My central argument in this fight has always been "what does everyone remember from classic ('99-'01)?" And again, if you ask anyone except a P99 Enchanter player, they'll tell you: Enchanters were a grouping class.

That’s a pretty big leap. I’m not a fan of arguments like “ask anyone, they’ll all confirm my point of view”.

I’m not saying I feel certain one way or another. I’m sure, if compelling evidence is found that things need changing it will happen eventually.

loramin

06-24-2022, 04:37 PM

That’s a pretty big leap. I’m not a fan of arguments like “ask anyone, they’ll all confirm my point of view”.

But also we have more objective sources than just people's memories. You can find Enchanter guides on Caster's Realm archives, Enchanter discussions on Allakhazam archives, and so on. And they'll say the same thing: charm soloing was a thing in classic! It was also super risky and dangerous ... and most preferred groups because that was the safer/faster-in-the-long-run way to get XP.

DMN

06-24-2022, 07:48 PM

if you want you have the real old school solo enchanter exprerience the early days, follow my handy guide;

1. You don't use tash, ever. cause it has high resist rates and you were usually better off using something else instead due to the opportuity cost of a free opening spel-- same reason even today many shamans will cast slow before they bother land a mal spell.

2. You use vpn and make sure it's a shitty one that gives you 300ish ms ping with frequent spikes into 400-500, and complety disconests your internet at least once an hour. or pay someone to sit next to you and randomly do the same.

3. you have to always stare at the spellbook when you mediate.

4. you have to set up your visual/windows so you can't see the charm break message since it didn't exist -- which is really fun when paired with 3 above.

5. No qcd clickie. these didnt catch on in any significant manner until near a year into vanilla and even then is wasn't common outside of shamans cannabalizing.

6. No clarity spells. granted this only lasted for a couple moths,but you wanna be OG don't ya?

Let us know how it all works out for ya.

loramin

06-24-2022, 08:26 PM

DMN

06-24-2022, 10:21 PM

I didn't know about the clarity thing, but as for stuff like having a crappy connection and staring at the spellbook ... magicians, necros and druids all faced those same challenges, and yet they were all known for being solo classes (who still grouped sometimes of course).

it's irrelevant to necros and mages, since the way they generally solo'd gave them a solid cushion in the case of a lag spike or even disconnect. You see, people actually played anticipationg the fact they would get massive lag spikes or even disconnects when they were soloing. It was a real thing you had to deal with or -- or delevel. Also a big part of the reason enchanter often opted to not solo charm even if they had the capabilities to do so.

Druids are a special case, in that if they were trying to charm or quad kite, they would indeed find themsleves in the same situtation as enchanters -- get a lag spike/disconnect and enjoy losing 8+ hours of experience loss. No level 49+ cleric was going to randomly trundle by and wipe your ass with exp rez. And thats why despite all the bullshit claims of druids quad kiting it was almost never done regularly for exp because the risk benefit ratio was complete dogshit for 95% of players. A similar throughline is found with the fairytale of "swarm kiting" bards in vanilla . It's just a fantasy that never happened.

Enchanters weren't: they were a majority grouping class, and in groups they were not charming because it was too risky. Here it's so safe Enchanters get yelled at if they don't charm a pet ... if you can find one who isn't soloing to group with ;)

Enchanters still charmed in groups but it was not done with any regularity. usually charming was done to try to break spawn in a difficult camp. But even if an enchanter was capable and wanted to keep a charm pet they would be scolded by the party into getting rid of it, because charm pets "Steal exp" and can make enemy corspes go "poof". I never saw any of that happen but because some idiot on the forums claimed it happens everyone believed it. there was also the reality that simply keeping a charm meant you were steaing a spawn spot for the group to gain more exp, and no one wanted that -- including the enchanter. lower guk with 200+ people in it ws not an oddity on fennin ro.

Again, I'm not saying Enchanter solo charming didn't happen, or shouldn't exist here: I'm just saying the numbers (as smarter people than me have suggested, the channeling numbers for instance) somehow need tweaking to make charming at least bit riskier again.

Fucking with channeling will just make enchanters stronger. Color flux is a thing -- a thing only enchanters have access to.

loramin

06-25-2022, 10:32 AM

Enchanters still charmed in groups but it was not done with any regularity. usually charming was done to try to break spawn in a difficult camp. But even if an enchanter was capable and wanted to keep a charm pet they would be scolded by the party into getting rid of it, because charm pets "Steal exp" and can make enemy corspes go "poof". I never saw any of that happen but because some idiot on the forums claimed it happens everyone believed it. there was also the reality that simply keeping a charm meant you were steaing a spawn spot for the group to gain more exp, and no one wanted that -- including the enchanter. lower guk with 200+ people in it ws not an oddity on fennin ro.

So you agree: in classic Enchanters didn't charm regularly, here's it's expected. And don't try to explain it with nonsense rumours: I've never once heard of charm pets poofing corpses and such, and neither did 90% of the servers players I'm sure.

There was lots of misinformation in classic, but it was dispersed. A comment on Allakhazam might say one thing, while one on Caster's Realm might say another, while a person in-game might tell you a third thing. People believed all sorts of different stupid things, and I'm sure someone (besides you) believed the "poof" thing ... but I never once heard anything about charm pets making corpses poof, nor have I seen any mention to it in any of the hundreds of guides/comments I've read trying to find proof that Enchanters aren't classic here ... so I highly doubt that's the reason groups didn't charm.

Again, the reason was that it was harder and more dangerous. It's probably a mix of hard-to-nail-down-exactly mechanics here being not quite classic, and yes also some of it also has to do with Internet connections being flaky. But ...

A) tons of people had good connections (eg. the bulk of the top guild on Bristlebane, Club Fu, used a T1 ... I know because we all played at a shared gaming center); connections can't explain everything, and ...

B) If the change in connection quality changes one class so much ... and again, every other class here fundamentally plays the way it did in classic: Enchanters are the only class played fundamentally differently on P99 (Druids and Necros still primarily solo here, Warriors and Clerics still primarily group, etc.)... and the goal of this place is to make things classic ... maybe we should tweak the one class that isn't classic to be more classic, regardless of the origin of the unclassicness.

commongood

06-25-2022, 12:19 PM

There either is or isn’t compelling evidence that the way the devs on p99 have designed and programmed the enchanter class for the past decade is wrong. If there is, I’m sure that will be the reason it gets changed. Not because people in threads like these argue “ask anyone they will all say the same thing” or “everyone who played on live remembers that…”

DMN

06-25-2022, 12:54 PM

So you agree: in classic Enchanters didn't charm regularly, here's it's expected. And don't try to explain it with nonsense rumours: I've never once heard of charm pets poofing corpses and such, and neither did 90% of the servers players I'm sure.

nonsense rumors? really? im pretty sure charm STILL make corpses poof on p99 even still today, just as they did back then. go charm a shaman/necro/druid or anything that can inflict a high damage DoT, have them fight another mob make sure you pet gets DoTs ticking. break the charm before the last few ticks kill the mob. Since you did no damage to it, and all the damage was inflicted by a mob, the corpse will simplt vanish, no different than a guard swatting a bat in a newb yard.

There was lots of misinformation in classic,

Some things never change....

but it was dispersed. A comment on Allakhazam might say one thing,

yes, and all it takes is someone to post about how an asp poofed his orcs corpse and everyone i suddely on the bandwagon.

so I highly doubt that's the reason groups didn't charm.

turns out i gave you multiple reasons, but you only bothered to focus on one, the one which you demostrate how little you know of the subject, both then and now. but yes it was a constellation of factors working against charming in groups, not just one.

A) tons of people had good connections (eg. the bulk of the top guild on Bristlebane, Club Fu, used a T1 ... I know because we all played at a shared gaming center); connections can't explain everything, and ...

the vast majority of peope still used dial up for the first year or so. now you are trying to find a person from a class thats is only 5% of the total server population, where only about 10-15% had cable or better. You see problem here with your "observations"? just like i've never seen a black person play a clarinet, surely black people just don't play clarinets.

B) If the change in connection quality changes one class so much ... and again, every other class here fundamentally plays the way it did in classic: Enchanters are the only class played fundamentally differently on P99

Swarm kitting bards? hmm? the masses of quad or more kiting druids and wizards?

loramin

06-25-2022, 01:08 PM

Swarm kitting bards? hmm? the masses of quad or more kiting druids and wizards?

We're just going in circles here, so I won't try to refute you point by point, but I had to say something about that last one ...

Have you not heard about the "unclassic" (and yet I would argue more classic) 25 mob AoE limit? It very much did address unclassic Bard behavior, and is a perfect example of doing exactly what I'm talking about.

DMN

06-25-2022, 01:26 PM

well, i wasn't around when that happened so i can't speak with any certianty on it but my loose grasp on it suggests it had more to do not just with bards swarming but mass aoe in dungeons, because both things lead to zone disruptions, not etirely because they are unclassic.

commongood

06-26-2022, 07:28 AM

Have you not heard about the "unclassic" (and yet I would argue more classic) 25 mob AoE limit? It very much did address unclassic Bard behavior, and is a perfect example of doing exactly what I'm talking about.

Just making sure I understand:

You refer to the case with bards where the mechanic was working as it had worked in classic but which lead to “unclassic” behavior where bards (and aoe groups in Chardok) were monopolizing content / gaining unreasonable exp.

How is this comparable to this issue raised on charm? I thought the argument on which side you stand is that the charm mechanic as it is implemented on p99 is incorrectly implemented?

Sorry, just trying to make sure I understand

loramin

06-26-2022, 11:43 AM

You refer to the case with bards where the mechanic was working as it had worked in classic but which lead to “unclassic” behavior where bards (and aoe groups in Chardok) were monopolizing content / gaining unreasonable exp.

How is this comparable to this issue raised on charm? I thought the argument on which side you stand is that the charm mechanic as it is implemented on p99 is incorrectly implemented?

Throughout this whole conversation (not just in this thread) I've asserted one thing, that I'm sure of because I played in classic: Enchanters here aren't classic!

What I haven't said is why: I leave that to smarter folks than myself, ie. the classic researchers here like Dolalin (who've suggested something about channeling and/or resists). "But how can you know if it's wrong if you don't know what's wrong?" I hear you ask.

Imagine your buddy made a Street Fighter 2 emulator, and he invites you over to play. Your other buddies are already playing, and you notice whenever anyone plays Ryu, they don't dragon punch. You ask why and everyones says "dragon punch sucks, so we're not using it."

Now, do you need to know the exact number of points of damage the original Ryu dragon punch did in the original code to say something's wrong? Do you need to know any other mechanics, like how hits and misses work? Or can you just say "in the original Street Fighter 2, dragon punching was good, and people used it: therefore, something isn't right about this emulator?"

DMN

06-26-2022, 02:46 PM

The rabbit hole rectifying "unclassicness", as a result of people simply playing the game differently in 2022 due to player knowledge/tecnhology improving, is bottomless.

loramin

06-26-2022, 02:59 PM

And if you can show me evidence that the Enchanters not playing anything like they did in classic is just a reflection of player knowledge, and not deficiencies in (a very difficult to get right) part of the emulator, I'd agree.

But you can't, and again smarter people than me have shown (with evidence, not just their "feels" like you and I) how factors like channeling in fact aren't classic here.

DMN

06-26-2022, 03:48 PM

unfortuntely the onus isn't on me to prove anything, it's on you/others to do so. Even more unfortunately, it will prove an impossibility since no one has the original source code. And for the trifecta of loramin sadness, even if you massivley nerf channeling it will only make enchanters that much more powerful(relatively speaking), as ive mentioned before: color flux.

loramin

06-26-2022, 04:13 PM

unfortuntely the onus isn't on me to prove anything, it's on you/others to do so.

That's why the people I keep referring to (eg. Dolalin) have posted evidence to the Bug forums.

Even more unfortunately, it will prove an impossibility since no one has the original source code.

But that doesn't mean there isn't evidence of how it worked. Also, it's like you're completely ignored my Street Fighter II example: you don't need to know exactly how the original worked to know the emulator isn't emulating it correctly.

And for the trifecta of loramin sadness, even if you massivley nerf channeling it will only make enchanters that much more powerful(relatively speaking), as ive mentioned before: color flux.

We'll have to wait for the fix to see, but here's why I think you're wrong: Enchanters in live were not soloing gods, or charmers in groups, on live during classic! So we have tons of historical evidence that color flux didn't make them so, because (for two years, across tens of servers) it didn't do that.

Eleandra

06-26-2022, 05:14 PM

One more anecdotal comment:

I don't find the mechanics of charm here different enough to detect compared to my memory of live EQ from the start of Velious (started playing either right before or right after the velious expansion) through Gates of Diiscord (I think I quit about the time they nerfed charmed mobs). I did contribute charm parse logs to castersrealm at the time, but can't seem to dig those up now. Not positive my username on castersrealm was the same as this, unfortunately (my Enchanter's name). I thiiiink I started on Luclin server, later switched to Stormhammer (after 60).

I did personally use charm solo and in groups -- but not as much as here. (I started playing with dedicated 6 person friend group, so did about 1-45 with a pretty steady group, before people drifted away).

I *do* think channeling is slightly different -- it seems easier. Not waaaay easier, but easier (PS: wedge yourself in a corner, so hits can't push you). This isn't enchanter specific, of course, but as the int caster most likely to melee mobs (probably?), it might affect us the most.

People at the time (maybe not original release, but certainly by the end of Kunark) knew how to play. No one didn't understand Tash. Xxorn's Enchanter guide should be clear enough proof (as well as evidence that charming was known to be important).

However, two huge things stand out to me as 'not classic': population and gearing.

As others have said, live population was high. I don't remember average player numbers, but I'm guessing at *least* triple. Solo camping was generally looked down on in busy places because people wanted those camps for exp -- and maybe even mobs otherwise used for charm. I too remember Guk/Seb/Etc *packed* with people. The other side of this: people really wanted enchanters for groups, and playing with others (at least for me) is more fun. I'm guessing age also plays in: I'm now 20 years older than I was, and have a family and a kid and a 'grown-up job'. So, hanging about solo now is often the better choice instead of hopping into a multi-hour group.

The other big change: gear. With fewer people, and longer lived servers, people just have better gear here (even on Green) than they did on live. This actually affects melees more than casters -- serious twinks were pretty rare on live, and you basically get handed that level of gear here; this is not 'classic behavior' either. More hp, more ac, more int, all make charming easier than it was on live. (Solo and group charming really started happening in PoP, and I think a big part of that was the increase in gear availability and quality).

And neither of the above are affected by code at all -- the code could be *Exactly* as it was on live, and still result in 'non-classic behavior' due to social changes.

Jibartik

06-26-2022, 05:43 PM

Swarm kitting bards? hmm?

We're just going in circles here.

Wait................................... this pun was accidental?

loramin

06-26-2022, 05:52 PM

Wait................................... this pun was accidental?

I swear, I did not make that on purpose ... but I'm so glad you caught it, and now I will pretend like it was entirely intentional ;)

DMN

06-27-2022, 10:13 AM

That's why the people I keep referring to (eg. Dolalin) have posted evidence to the Bug forums.

wow. look at those goal posts move. proof and evidence are not the same thing.

But that doesn't mean there isn't evidence of how it worked. Also, it's like you're completely ignored my Street Fighter II example: you don't need to know exactly how the original worked to know the emulator isn't emulating it correctly.

i didn't even read your analogy past streetfighter. it was dumb. analogies are incredibly poor ways to communicate ideas, and you only use them when someone lacks a frame of reference to understand something. if you can't properly comminucate ideas when we are all sitting here have decades of experience with this game, then there is something seriously wrong with your communication skills -- or, more likely, you are just blowing smoke because that's alll you've got.

We'll have to wait for the fix to see, but here's why I think you're wrong: Enchanters in live were not soloing gods, or charmers in groups, on live during classic! So we have tons of historical evidence that color flux didn't make them so, because (for two years, across tens of servers) it didn't do that.

*We* don't have to wait, though you might. Enchanters were the stongest dungeon solo'r recogized by everyone that was in the upper spectrum of players mid way through kunark. addditonally they would use charm pets until they had bokren and staggered the spawns in the camps they wanted to hold when in groups. then they would lose the pet as there was no real need to keep it. But you've never been in the upper spectrum of eq players, so your ignorance is understandable; your persistence in maintaining it is not.

loramin

06-27-2022, 11:27 AM

Loiterius

06-27-2022, 11:51 AM

I remember my time in Classic with my enchanter and Bard. I charmed more with my Bard because the risk of getting rocked only seemed manageable with my flimsy Bard plate mail.

I didn’t pet charm with my enchanter. I don’t remember if that was due to it being too dangerous or if I “didn’t know” to do so.

I just leveled a Magician to 48 and just swapped to play an Enchanter because I watched a buddy I was leveling with be a 1-man group to themselves. I am having a blast now with my enchanter, and although I had fun leveling my Magician, there is no contest on which class is the better pet/solo class right now.

DMN

06-27-2022, 01:18 PM

I'm done trying to debate this with you. Insulting me with this "goalpost moving" nonsense (when I've consistently said the same thing throughout this entire discussion) just shows you're not an honest debater, and are simply trying to make any claim you can to "win" (to what end, I honestly don't know).

it's not nonsense. i wanted proof, not evidence. your memory of classic is 'evidence' but what is it evidence of? Certain things not happening at all? Certain things you just never saw but were still happening? Certain things you saw but simply forgot? or even more cynical take: you are lying because of a weird nerf-enchanter fixation?

if you were truly concerned abuout things not being classic, on top of your list would shaman torpor tanking everything solo. there were 5 to 10 times as many enchnters doing the shit you claim they werent doing than were torpor shamans soloing high end mobs. So how could you possibly get it so wrong?

that said, itreally does make the cynical intepretaton of your 'evidence' quite compelling, if i do say.

cannobeers3

06-29-2022, 12:06 AM

-Catherin-

06-29-2022, 01:17 AM

The entire, "Nobody did it back then because internet connection" nonsense is almost appalling

Pretty sure what a lot of us are describing here is that it actually WAS happening for those who had the neccessary setup.

Sorry you were a teen in the sticks while many of us had plenty of bandwidth elsewhere. Confirmation bias and feelings are not conducive to pragmatic conversation.

Pretty sure it has also been recognized by most of us in this topic that all we really have to go off of is memories too. I don't think many of us really think that if changes happen, that they will have had anything to do with our feelings here. It is keeping the conversation going though. Maybe it will eventually lead to the smoking gun that is needed.

BTW, your call for pragmatism, while contributing nothing but your own feelings at the same time is pretty amusing as well. It doesnt make you look useful, or smart. Quite the opposite, actually. While I was that teen in the sticks that you descirbe, your education apparently never advanced beyond one. Learn some reading comprehension.

Jimjam

06-29-2022, 02:02 AM

DMN

06-29-2022, 09:10 AM

The entire, "Nobody did it back then because internet connection" nonsense is almost appalling. Sorry you were a teen in the sticks while many of us had plenty of bandwidth elsewhere.

Confirmation bias and feelings are not conducive to pragmatic conversation.

it must be sad to live in a world of so many splendid colors yet only see things in black and white.

Truth is, it wasn't as simple as people just didn't have access to cable. While it is true that a significant portion ofthe population could not actually get cable, "the sticks" as you say, i'd wager that the majority of people who didn't have cable or better COULD have had cable. The problem was having to convince mumsy and/or dadsy to shell out 150+ dollars a month so you can more effectively stare at elf tiddies all day, a habbit they are already increasingly concerned with. needless to say, many kids couldn't formulate the right pitch to sell their parent(s) on it, especially since they were already paying for a second phone line most likely. And ya 150ish is about right if they hadn't already been using cable(adjusted for inflation). Even as a young adullt having to shell at that kind of cash when you are just starting out in life is not particularly appealing.

-Catherin-

06-29-2022, 10:58 AM

loramin

06-29-2022, 11:32 AM

BTW, your call for pragmatism, while contributing nothing but your own feelings at the same time is pretty amusing as well. It doesnt make you look useful, or smart. Quite the opposite, actually. While I was that teen in the sticks that you descirbe, your education apparently never advanced beyond one. Learn some reading comprehension.

it must be sad to live in a world of so many splendid colors yet only see things in black and white.

You can always tell the people with the strong arguments: they're the ones that get personal with responses of insults and condescension :rolleyes:

-Catherin-

06-29-2022, 04:31 PM

You can always tell the people with the strong arguments: they're the ones that get personal with responses of insults and condescension :rolleyes:

He started it :D

Eleandra

06-29-2022, 08:04 PM

Now consider this:

As far as we know, charm itself had no fundamental changes from its inception right up to the point where it got nerfed around GoD. How is it exactly that something that was too risky and not worth using all of a sudden is considered way too powerful?

Keep in mind also, that by this point in EQ’s timeline, a caster in cloth was lucky to survive one round of NPC melee. The gap in power between an NPC and a player continued to widen as the game matured. The risk of charming was actually increasing.

The changes were new spells: charm was level capped at 51 (dictate aside; not typically used for regular play, though) through Luclin, so the increasing power gap with mobs didn't much matter. As well, PCs were still level-capped at 60 in luclin, so mobs didn't get much more powerful either, raid targets aside. (And please forgive me, I don't totally remember how AAs actually changed things. I know they affected duration, and maybe resists, but I don't recall they let you charm higher *level* mobs?).

Then came PoP and charm jumped to lvl 64. The difference between a level 51 mob, and a level 64 mob, is *enormous*. Additionally, PoP added an instant free 1500hp rune to enchanters, and much better gearing, lowering risk of charm. And this is when charm really got going widely (sooo much bastion of thunder ... or was it halls of Honor? IT's been a long time), as well as at least some designed raids in PoP which allowed the use of charmed mobs.

This is when people started really noticing the power of charming. Charm was nerfed as or just before Omens of War was coming out, I believe, when the level cap of mobs, characters, and charm would increase yet again. (and GoD generally did have much tougher exp mobs than PoP, iirc.).

It was hardware, internet, and general knowledge of the game that changed. It is a fact that these things took exponential leaps over the years. They became the norm rather than the exception. But I really am asking this question too. Something about charm itself may have actually been changed to suddenly make it OP that nobody has found or mentioned. I’m willing to concede when I’m wrong, and if someone can find some evidence of this it would go a long way towards this discussion.

Those things may have mattered too, but I think the level change with the resulting vast increase in charmed mob power was more important, and staring down yet *another* such increase caused the nerf.

Blah blah charm charm.

-Catherin-

06-29-2022, 08:50 PM

The changes were new spells: charm was level capped at 51

The issue here isnt the level cap of the charm, but rather how reliable charming was. essentially it didnt matter how strong the NPC was, because charm was so unreliable it was going to kill your enchanter and then probably your group. (or just the enchanter if solo).

The charming level cap continued to increase as the levels increased which is expected, but this is not what is being debated. The debate is that charm was too unreliable to use to the extent in which we do on P99. Basically it keeps breaking and you can't rely on it for anything worth relying on it for.

a 1200hp rune isn't really going to change how insane NPC damage output got. As well as the gear by the time charm got nerfed. unless you are talking about higher tier players (time geared etc.) but this once again was NOT the norm.

When we are talking about available gear, it also kind of negates your arguement because that kind of gear was not available on the velious timeline. I'm looking for changes in the reliablity of the spell itself. Out of era gear is irrelevant.

Show me AAs, or evidence that the spells themselves made it EASIER to charm mobs in later expansions, and then we are onto something.

-Catherin-

06-29-2022, 08:59 PM

apologies for bad grammar, or completely making a fool of myself etc. I'm a couple drinks in. :p Hopefully I don't come home tomorow and regreat this lol.

DMN

06-29-2022, 09:03 PM

i have zero exprience with anything luclin/beyond, but it was pretty obvious that charm was going to be getting increasingly poweerful because players ability/pets/stats etc. only increase in damage potential modest linear rate, whereas npcs stats/damage have closer to exponential scaling.

Danth

06-29-2022, 09:31 PM

it must be sad to live in a world of so many splendid colors yet only see things in black and white.

Truth is, it wasn't as simple as people just didn't have access to cable. While it is true that a significant portion ofthe population could not actually get cable, "the sticks" as you say, i'd wager that the majority of people who didn't have cable or better COULD have had cable. The problem was having to convince mumsy and/or dadsy to shell out 150+ dollars a month so you can more effectively stare at elf tiddies all day, a habbit they are already increasingly concerned with. needless to say, many kids couldn't formulate the right pitch to sell their parent(s) on it, especially since they were already paying for a second phone line most likely. And ya 150ish is about right if they hadn't already been using cable(adjusted for inflation). Even as a young adullt having to shell at that kind of cash when you are just starting out in life is not particularly appealing.

I wasn't paying any 150 bucks a month for cable in '99, even adjusting for inflation. I first got it in February '99. Neither was I a little kid. However, as you say, things aren't black and white. Having cable was only a partial help; EQ was still designed to run on a modem and had only a limited transfer rate from the host. Cable provided for a stable connection without the frequent disconnects so often suffered by modem users, but it did NOT match the ping and low latency of modern high-bandwidth services. The kids who only got broadband later on wouldn't remember that aspect, either. EQ was playable with a 300 ping, but I wouldn't have wanted to hold a charmed hasted pet with a 300 ping. Cable took that to usually about a 100 to 150 ping which is still slow enough I see millennials here on P99 call those ping times "unplayable" (hah!), which probably highlights the progression of technology. Either way you still had horrible lag and various wierdness in over-crowded zones because that was a function of the limited data rate from the host, independent of connection type.

I do not believe charm or lull mechanics on P99 perfectly replicate those of the original game (it's an emulator, of course it doesn't), but your own arguments also have truth behind them. Even with mechanics pulled straight out of a 2000-era host players aren't going to play the same way they did back then for a large variety of reasons, up to and including it's easy to be brave when you have pocket clerics always ready to login and there's zero threat from death. No single change would completely affect player behavior. If P99 players have proven anything, it's that they're a clever and resourceful bunch who'll adapt to nearly any change.

Danth

Eleandra

06-30-2022, 12:35 AM

... I'm looking for changes in the reliablity of the spell itself. Out of era gear is irrelevant.

Show me AAs, or evidence that the spells themselves made it EASIER to charm mobs in later expansions, and then we are onto something.

That's exactly the point though: there were no such changes; charm was *always* overpowered, and once the charmable mob levels caught up to content it needed to be nerfed.

People charmed less and grouped more, for sure, but it was known to be an effective tactic; specters in Oasis and OOT for 35+ or so, and Howling Stones ~50+ were well known and recommended solo charming spots for enchanters.

All of the behavior now can be explained with social reasons (fewer groups, more available mobs, solo-ing 'active content' therefore not looked down on), there's no need for the mechanics to be wrong too; what few parses people have found of charm duration (too bad there was no centralized enchanter board like druid's grove or safehouse to find old posts!) support them being *roughly the same*. My experience (granted, memory is fallible) also suggests it is roughly the same - with the caveat that I would believe channeling is slightly easier.

Eleandra

06-30-2022, 01:07 AM

WAIT! There was a change: one AA was 'total domination', which lowered the mob's chance to break charm.

But, I don't think this was a big change (certainly nowhere as big as charmable mob level), so I do stand by my points.

loramin

06-30-2022, 10:40 AM

WAIT! There was a change

There were lots of changes ... with everything, not just charm, made without any public announcement.

Thus, I don't think it's safe to assume that because Verant never announced "we're changing charm" that charm hadn't changed since '99 (and the same could be said of Feign Death, or Sneak, or whatever else in EQ).

bilirubin

06-30-2022, 11:29 AM

People arguing with Loramin should realize he's only making a fuss because he's had his a4 camp stolen one too many times by pesky gnome enchanters. As an aside, let's not ignore the fact that shamans greatly outnumber enchanters at those camps in PoM (as well as many other "cash camps" since charming can be so incredibly tedious).

Back on topic, there is no in-era evidence that the charisma stat was not used in the calculation for charm duration. In fact, we have evidence of the contrary from comments made by the developers themselves. The EQemu guy argued that Zatkin, the spell designer, was somehow mistaken about the charm spell, but there's a recent interview with Zatkin on youtube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gqW42BFqVjo) that I think shows how conscientious and meticulous he was working on EQ. He even speaks to how from the very beginning, McQuaid and Zatkin had envisioned enchanter's charm spell to be especially powerful in the game. I think that's quite telling.

-Catherin-

06-30-2022, 06:10 PM

WAIT! There was a change: one AA was 'total domination', which lowered the mob's chance to break charm.

THIS is the kind of stuff I am looking for. Good stuff

-Catherin-

06-30-2022, 06:10 PM

There were lots of changes ... with everything, not just charm, made without any public announcement.

Doesn't hold water in elf court.

-Catherin-

06-30-2022, 11:21 PM

Total domination AA does lead to some credible info that charm became more powerful later on which led to the nerf. But is charm as it currently stands OP, and should CHA not impact it?

Did a little research on the total domination AA.

https://forums.daybreakgames.com/eq/index.php?threads/enchanter-charming-post-pop.230860/page-3

A few interesting bits in here. It is out of era of course. But the major thing I picked out of the posts is that seems like it's pretty common knowledge that CHA has always been included in the charming formula for enchanters.

loramin

06-30-2022, 11:38 PM

People arguing with Loramin should realize he's only making a fuss because he's had his a4 camp stolen one too many times by pesky gnome enchanters. As an aside, let's not ignore the fact that shamans greatly outnumber enchanters at those camps in PoM (as well as many other "cash camps" since charming can be so incredibly tedious).

I haven't played on Loramin/Blue, let alone in A4 specifically, for months ... but ok :rolleyes:

Also, when Green 2.0 comes out I'm rolling an Enchanter main: so any "nerf" would hurt me. I want to play the classic Enchanter, not the easy-mode one. That class was still a great class that was totally worth playing.

He even speaks to how from the very beginning, McQuaid and Zatkin had envisioned enchanter's charm spell to be especially powerful in the game. I think that's quite telling.

No one is saying charm shouldn't be powerful: of course it should be, because the point of this place is to emulate EQ in '99- '01, and charm was powerful back then.

All I'm saying is that there was a trade-off for that power back in '99, and that trade-off is that it was risky. It should be risky here too.

Vormotus

07-02-2022, 01:10 AM

I haven't played on Loramin/Blue, let alone in A4 specifically, for months ... but ok :rolleyes:

Also, when Green 2.0 comes out I'm rolling an Enchanter main: so any "nerf" would hurt me. I want to play the classic Enchanter, not the easy-mode one. That class was still a great class that was totally worth playing.

When is that?:eek:

Zuranthium

07-02-2022, 03:19 AM

1.) Charm during the first year+ of EQ was just used to Charm an NPC and throw it into another so they fight each other. It was Velious era when Enchanters were starting to Charm more long term, but that wasn't totally common, still something that braver Enchanters were doing rather than being the norm.

2.) Regardless of what the exact Charm mechanics were back then, it absolutely would have been nerfed if people back then were using it has they have been on p99.

loramin

07-02-2022, 12:02 PM

When is that?:eek:

No official announcement yet, but the whole point of this place is to keep producing Green servers, so ...

https://i.imgur.com/HVVndwv.gif?1

1.) Charm during the first year+ of EQ was just used to Charm an NPC and throw it into another so they fight each other. It was Velious era when Enchanters were starting to Charm more long term, but that wasn't totally common, still something that braver Enchanters were doing rather than being the norm.

2.) Regardless of what the exact Charm mechanics were back then, it absolutely would have been nerfed if people back then were using it has they have been on p99.

Agreed ... although I do think all classes were experimenting with all their spells from day one, because no one knew any better. I remember wasting lots of time experimenting with the Shaman Rain line of spells, for instance ;)

So I don't think it's that no one tried charming: they totally did! And some surely tried (say) charming in groups. The reason you didn't see Enchanters charming in group in classic wasn't that no one thought to try ... it's that they did try, and it was too risky, so they stopped doing it.

bilirubin

07-06-2022, 03:13 PM

2.) Regardless of what the exact Charm mechanics were back then, it absolutely would have been nerfed if people back then were using it has they have been on p99.

Irrelevant.

commongood

07-08-2022, 05:13 AM

I've kind of lost track of the different directions this debate is going.

Are the pro-nerf people saying that the effect of (or even existence of) a charisma check on charm break should be reduced or removed?

Or is it that channelling doesn't work correctly? (this would affect all classes I suppose)

I have both a 60 chanter and a 60 shaman and I frequently farm in places like PoM (both), OT (both) and Velketor (chanter).

Soloing with chanter is much faster. Soloing with shaman is much safer. People saying it's "god-mode" or "fool-proof" to charm solo as chanter are incorrect in my opinion. The ceiling for charming is obviously ultra high in terms of what you can do, but you have to be ready to soak up deaths. If you have good gear this can off-set the number of death's but there will still be many more death's than if you are on the shaman.

So I suppose people wanting a chanter nerf either want it to be impossible to charm solo stuff beyond a certain threshold or for it to be much riskier than it already is?

And this is because it may or may not have been different back in actual 1999-2001? But the evidence is not completely compelling? Or it would have already happened?

PatChapp

07-08-2022, 12:50 PM

-Catherin-

07-09-2022, 05:14 PM

Thing is, the side effect of "nerfing" charm to remove CHA would actually make it more powerful. The reason is because that "nerf" also includes a change to the enchanter charm spell that gives it a +4 level modifer. Basically if you are level 60, its like you are casting with the resist check of a level 64. Your level far outweighs CHA when it comes to charming. Chanters would also be able to dump all of their CHA gear for gear with HP and resists, making it easier from that aspect too. So the "nerf" would actually be a buff.

And here I am arguing against it lol.

loramin

07-10-2022, 10:22 AM

So I suppose people wanting a chanter nerf either want it to be impossible to charm solo stuff beyond a certain threshold or for it to be much riskier than it already is?

And this is because it may or may not have been different back in actual 1999-2001? But the evidence is not completely compelling? Or it would have already happened?

People want classic EverQuest: the thing in the upper-left corner of this site.

Classic evidence is hard to find: we've had things unclassic here for over a decade though, which finally got fixed ... because again, the goal of this place is to make it classic.

Enchanters are clearly not classic here. Simple proof: go to a CT raid. On P99 it's all about charm pets, with guilds racing to collect the most pets when CT is contested ... but then go look at the Wayback archive of CT's page on Allakhazam. Even in 2003 (https://web.archive.org/web/20031002112128/http://eqbeastiary.allakhazam.com/search.shtml?id=736) you won't find a single mention of charming.

Here's how people fought CT in classic (https://web.archive.org/web/20011222070239/http://www.xegonyalliance.com/guides/pofguide.html#13):

To prepare, cancel all the buffs you have on and, when given the signal, place 4 disposable buffs (or "crap buffs") on yourself. My personal preference is to use J-Boots first, as you can quickly reactivate them after they are debuffed. At the command, begin normal buffs. Put Dead Man Floating or Levitate on as the final buff, as this negates his Gravity Flux damage. Wait for the call, and charge him and kill him. Not really much to it. Like dragons, casters want to wait until the halfway mark to begin casting on Cazic Thule while the tanks work it down for the first half. Cazic isn't very magic resistant, so casters are going to do really well here. He hits for 400 sometimes so he's a pretty rough melee MOB. He also death touches people every 30 seconds. If you have a lot of magic resistance, they're a slim chance you could survive this, but it's not bloody likely. Tanks are essential. They MUST interrupt him using bash, stun, etc. Casters, when not casting, have to stay out of melee range. Healers are an absolute must considering how much damage Cazic will do to the tanks and how long they have to fight him. He has the ability to dispell buffs as well, but the worst part of this is the MOBs in the zone running at you. That's right. The moment he's attacked, he will summon everything left in the zone at you. This is why you want to do Cazic last. You want to clear all the MOBs in the zone that you can away before taking him on. There's a big trick to doing Cazic though, and that's Fear. Cazic is extremely susceptible to Fear spells. If you keep him Feared and just plow him with large scale DoTs and such, you can't fail.

Now I know the excuses: "Enchanters didn't try using their spells back then". Not true. Everyone had terrible Internet connections. Also not true: the top guild on my server (Club Fu of Bristlebane) mostly played out of a cyber cafe with a T1 connection.

People could have charmed tons of mobs for the CT fight ... and for lots of other fights (eg. in every group they were in) ... but they didn't because charm was dangerous in classic.

Whatever the fix, whether it's with channeling, charisma, or whatever ... something needs to be done to make the Enchanter class classic here. Otherwise it's like we're playing a completely different game from the '99-'01 one.

loramin

07-10-2022, 10:27 AM

So I suppose people wanting a chanter nerf either want it to be impossible to charm solo stuff beyond a certain threshold or for it to be much riskier than it already is?

No, people just want classic EverQuest: the thing promised in the upper-left corner of this site.

And this is because it may or may not have been different back in actual 1999-2001? But the evidence is not completely compelling? Or it would have already happened?

Classic evidence is hard to find, and that means things can go for years here before they finally get fixed. But even if it does take years, as many things have, they do get fixed! Because (again) ... the whole goal of this place is classic EQ.

Charming is clearly not classic here. Simple proof: go to a CT raid. On P99 it's all about charm pets, and I can't even imagine a guild fighting CT here without an army of pets ... but then go look at the Wayback archive of CT's page on Allakhazam. Even in 2003 (https://web.archive.org/web/20031002112128/http://eqbeastiary.allakhazam.com/search.shtml?id=736) you won't find a single mention of charming.

Here's how people fought CT in classic (https://web.archive.org/web/20011222070239/http://www.xegonyalliance.com/guides/pofguide.html#13):

To prepare, cancel all the buffs you have on and, when given the signal, place 4 disposable buffs (or "crap buffs") on yourself. My personal preference is to use J-Boots first, as you can quickly reactivate them after they are debuffed. At the command, begin normal buffs. Put Dead Man Floating or Levitate on as the final buff, as this negates his Gravity Flux damage. Wait for the call, and charge him and kill him. Not really much to it. Like dragons, casters want to wait until the halfway mark to begin casting on Cazic Thule while the tanks work it down for the first half. Cazic isn't very magic resistant, so casters are going to do really well here. He hits for 400 sometimes so he's a pretty rough melee MOB. He also death touches people every 30 seconds. If you have a lot of magic resistance, they're a slim chance you could survive this, but it's not bloody likely. Tanks are essential. They MUST interrupt him using bash, stun, etc. Casters, when not casting, have to stay out of melee range. Healers are an absolute must considering how much damage Cazic will do to the tanks and how long they have to fight him. He has the ability to dispell buffs as well, but the worst part of this is the MOBs in the zone running at you. That's right. The moment he's attacked, he will summon everything left in the zone at you. This is why you want to do Cazic last. You want to clear all the MOBs in the zone that you can away before taking him on. There's a big trick to doing Cazic though, and that's Fear. Cazic is extremely susceptible to Fear spells. If you keep him Feared and just plow him with large scale DoTs and such, you can't fail.

Now I know the excuses: "Enchanters/Druids/Necros didn't try using their spells back then". Not true: of course they did. "Everyone had terrible Internet connections." Also not true: the top guild on my server (Club Fu of Bristlebane) mostly played out of a cyber cafe with a T1 connection.

People could have charmed tons of mobs for the CT fight ... and for lots of other fights (eg. in every group they were in) ... but they didn't because charm was more risky and dangerous in classic.

The fix might be to change channeling, or charisma, or it may be to add something like the 25 mob AoE limit (ie. an "unclassic to make things more classic" change): I don't know. But something needs to be done to make charming classic here: otherwise it's like we're playing a completely different game from the '99-'01 one.

commongood

07-10-2022, 10:43 AM

So you want “classic” but when it’s impossible to prove you want an interpretation of classic that matches what you remember?

Using examples of how raiding is done on p99 and comparing it to descriptions of raiding from the early 2000s seems of very little use. Each player in 2000 didn’t have access to 2-6 lvl 60s. Raiding guilds didn’t have access to an army of cleric bots. Using a description of a CT raid which doesn’t entail 5-10 encs, druids and necros charming doesn’t prove much.

DMN

07-10-2022, 12:18 PM

iterestingly enough, the general guide provided from that exact link says this about druids:

"Druids are essential for the raiding party. They can charm animal MOBs that enter the camp without invitation, turning a foe into a nice level 50 pet."

thats all they say, which is to say that they were essential but seemingly only essential for one reason alone -- because they could charm.

Giant swing and a miss on this one loramin. Kek.

Loramin's concerns about enchanters and how they play on p99 being "non-classic" is of course a giant crock of shit. as ive already mentioned if someone was concerened about "classic" and actually played in the period considered "classic' on p99, shaman would be at the very top of the list of non-classicness, bards would be next with bullsht swrm kiting that never existed in "classic" time period. even having a good connection you still you get dc'ed frequently and still get the occasional server hiccups that would destroy any bard dumb enough to spend 15 ius rounding up 40+ mobs to kill. which is why none of them did.

eisley

07-11-2022, 12:08 AM

dire charm was added for a reason

-Catherin-

07-11-2022, 11:53 AM

I mean if we are talking about CT literally everything on that encounter on P99 is done in a not classic way. And on that same subject, player hardware limitations aside, the SOE servers themselves could not handle that amount of stuff going on.

There is a lot more going on than charming there, and it’s all driven by the envelope being pushed to the very limit to defeat the competition. You are just cherry picking charming to suit your narrative without even really understanding what it’s actually like having to use it there.

I’ve been on a lot of these CT raids you speak of. Every single one of them are absolute chaos. And those charmed pets are not a free ride. They are breaking all over the place and it can get to the point where they will wipe your own raid if there is not a coordinated efforts from others to support the charmers.

Your idea of these kind of things trivializing content couldn’t be more false. If we could just casually clear the entire zone and then take down CT without any of that and be able to prep it would be SO much easier.

But in the competitive environment that we are on, we are all forced to go as hard as we can and take major risks to win. CT isn’t easy CT is a shitshow.

Edit: when I think about it now. I did a lot of CT in classic too. It was actually a lot easier back then than it is now. It’s quicker here. Because we have no choice

whydothis

07-25-2022, 10:48 AM

This poh guide from 2000 literally talks about charming
https://thesafehouse.org/forums/forum/everquest-wing/library-read-only/2968-book-of-knowledge-guide-to-the-plane-of-hate
Very low magic resists - enchanters favorite target for charming.
Just because you didn't see enchanters charming, or don't remember, doesn't mean they didn't.

loramin

07-25-2022, 11:34 AM

This poh guide from 2000 literally talks about charming
https://thesafehouse.org/forums/forum/everquest-wing/library-read-only/2968-book-of-knowledge-guide-to-the-plane-of-hate

Just because you didn't see enchanters charming, or don't remember, doesn't mean they didn't.

Like I keep repeating, over and over, I'm not saying Enchanters didn't charm in classic! My argument is that the degree of charming, the relative lack of risk in charming, is not classic.

Again, every Fear raid here is accomplished through pets (unless like two guilds are fighting and one kills all the others' pets first or something). But I have little doubt that you can find some rare evidence of charming by some Enchanters, on some Fear raids. What you won't find is evidence in the vast majority of sources ... because (again) charming was rare in classic.

Like I keep saying, it would absolutely be unclassic to remove charming ... but making it just a little harder, just a little riskier, 100% would be. Keeping it as easy and as safe as it is here, while ignoring the fact that the safety is making people play the class vastly differently from how it was played in classic ... well, that's like making a Street Fighter II emulator, and maintaining that it's an accurate emulator ... while ignoring the fact that no one is dragon punching with Ryu.

whydothis

07-25-2022, 12:03 PM

What you won't find is evidence in the vast majority of sources ... because (again) charming was rare in classic.

Like I keep saying, it would absolutely be unclassic to remove charming ... but making it just a little harder, just a little riskier, 100% would be.

You say this but you have no evidence of the actual charming rates back then. There are in era guides where people talk about charming pets for various encounters. Do you have proof of enchanters in 99-01 saying how they never charm? Or how rarely they do it?

You want to make it riskier? How exactly? And to what end - until you feel it's ok? There's no way to change it and be sure it's accurate. If there's no explicit evidence of charming working differently than what we have then this doesn't even deserve discussion.

Since you mentioned it, people play street fighter 2 differently now than they did in 1992. Given time, strategies change. People have figured out how to charm optimally. Gotta just accept it.

commongood

07-25-2022, 12:07 PM

Like I keep saying, it would absolutely be unclassic to remove charming ... but making it just a little harder, just a little riskier, 100% would be. Keeping it as easy and as safe as it is here, while ignoring the fact that the safety is making people play the class vastly differently from how it was played in classic ... well, that's like making a Street Fighter II emulator, and maintaining that it's an accurate emulator ... while ignoring the fact that no one is dragon punching with Ryu.

It feels like you aren’t talking from experience. Charming isn’t “safe” by a long shot. Charming, at least soloing, involves dying quite often.

Also, what is your proof that charming was more risky and happened less? Cause it sounds like it’s strictly anecdotal. If I missed it and you already posted a link to said proof then apologies

loramin

07-25-2022, 12:41 PM

You say this but you have no evidence of the actual charming rates back then. There are in era guides where people talk about charming pets for various encounters. Do you have proof of enchanters in 99-01 saying how they never charm? Or how rarely they do it?

You want to make it riskier? How exactly? And to what end - until you feel it's ok? There's no way to change it and be sure it's accurate. If there's no explicit evidence of charming working differently than what we have then this doesn't even deserve discussion.

The whole problem with recreating classic is that it happened over two decades ago, and much of the Internet from that time is lost. I (and I think most people who played in classic) remember Enchanters mezzing in groups, not charming, but we don't have solid evidence one way or the other.

For instance, if you look at the Wayback archive of Caster's Realm strategy guides for Enchanters (https://web.archive.org/web/20020625043023/http://eq.castersrealm.com/playguides/default.asp?Category=7&Class=enchanter) you'll find:

just one out of six is an (unfortunately lost) guide called "CHARM SOLOING - ITS TRUE POWER."
"CLERICS, SHAMANS AND STUNS" - another lost guide, presumably about grouping and not charming
HOW TO MAKE YOUR HIGH LEVEL ENCHANTER SMILE - a detailed guide on how to mez in groups (ie. what most classic Enchanters actually did), which mentions charming only "If add is unmezzable then enchanter has two choices: charm if possible ..."
another lost one ("INFORMATION ON ENCHANTING AFTER LVL 51")
"ENCHANTER 51+" - not lost, and again the only mention of charm is ... about bards doing it: "Bards also do a large amount of damage and can debuff mobs some, and they can charm a mob!"
another lost one ("A THEORYON SOLOING THE ARCH GHOUL MAGI")

And if you look at other guide sections on Caster's Realm or Allakhazam or similar old sites, you'll find the same: there's absolutely evidence some Enchanters charmed, but in aggregate the charm stuff is the minority.

Now, compare that to here, where we have eight Enchanter guides (https://wiki.project1999.com/Players:Adventure) ... and seven of them are huge on charming (the only one that isn't is a guide for "Enchanter Newbie Gear").

Since you mentioned it, people play street fighter 2 differently now than they did in 1992. Given time, strategies change. People have figured out how to charm optimally. Gotta just accept it.

People said the same thing about Chardok AoE, and about Bard swarm kiting: "it was totally possible in classic, it should be possible here". But the devs decided it wasn't classic, and now just I think most would agree that the 25 mob AoE limit makes this place more classic, not less.

P.S. Just to be clear, this is about wanting P99 to be more classic, not about class hate, and everything I'm saying applies to charm in general (ie. Bard/Druid/Necro charming also).

I also have no dog in this fight (unlike all the Enchanter players here who will have a vested interest in keeping their class more powerful). But I do have a 60 Druid (that I leveled mainly through charming, so I'm well aware of how broken it is here), and I plan to main an Enchanter in Green 2.0 ... it's just that I want to play the Enchanter from 1999, not the overpowered P99 version.

Danth

07-25-2022, 06:01 PM

Like I keep repeating, over and over, I'm not saying Enchanters didn't charm in classic! My argument is that the degree of charming, the relative lack of risk in charming, is not classic..

Isn't it frustrating trying to carry on conversation with folks who apparently want to think only in binary terms? My own take is that probably *all* random duration-type spells, not just charm but certainly including it, are probably "friendlier" on P1999 than they were in the original game. Mez was preferred because it was fixed duration, same reason why it was preferred over root. Proving the above is problematic at best for the reasons you brought up, and I wouldn't want to see anything implemented via guesswork due to the tendency to over-tune it and make it harsher than it ought to be.

Danth

Treefall

07-27-2022, 09:47 AM

Isn't it frustrating trying to carry on conversation with folks who apparently want to think only in binary terms? My own take is that probably *all* random duration-type spells, not just charm but certainly including it, are probably "friendlier" on P1999 than they were in the original game. Mez was preferred because it was fixed duration, same reason why it was preferred over root. Proving the above is problematic at best for the reasons you brought up, and I wouldn't want to see anything implemented via guesswork due to the tendency to over-tune it and make it harsher than it ought to be.

Danth

Things must change for Enchanters when they are CHA capped or something (my buddy is having a lot of random breaks and dying quite often doing it). As a druid if I am not charming things like 2-3 levels or lower below me the breaks are unmanageable as it is. Maybe that changes for me too, later on? Seems to be the case even with tash up for me. Also tried charming a white mammoth two days ago, 5 resists in a row leading to my death.

PatChapp

07-27-2022, 07:05 PM

Things must change for Enchanters when they are CHA capped or something (my buddy is having a lot of random breaks and dying quite often doing it). As a druid if I am not charming things like 2-3 levels or lower below me the breaks are unmanageable as it is. Maybe that changes for me too, later on? Seems to be the case even with tash up for me. Also tried charming a white mammoth two days ago, 5 resists in a row leading to my death.

As you get higher lvl, the mobs you'll be charming are much lower lvl in relation to your lvl. Levels and magic resist make the biggest difference in charm durations.

At lvl 60, most mobs you would charm are high 40s to max lvl 53. The lvl 53 mobs will be very hard to manage.

Nikkanu

07-29-2022, 12:04 PM

People said the same thing about Chardok AoE, and about Bard swarm kiting: "it was totally possible in classic, it should be possible here". But the devs decided it wasn't classic, and now just I think most would agree that the 25 mob AoE limit makes this place more classic, not less.

From a long list of bad arguments and highly subjective takes on unverifiable anecdotal evidence you've presented to support those bad arguments this one takes the cake.

These nerfs as as well as many others (Ivandyr's Hoop/Lifetap , Midnight Mallets, Puppet Strings, the list goes on and on) where not made because they were deemed more "classic" but because the the devs arbitrarily chose to make these changes to effect the meta on p99 only.

At this point you are stomping the life out of your own credibility. I'm not sure why anyone would take anything you've posted here seriously. If you want anyone to take you seriously I'd suggest you come up with evidence that demonstrates your claim that is better than "I can't find guides made by players from 22+ years ago for charming in raids" or "some players thought charm was too risky to use" because we can all agree that's an asinine argument based on a tiny fraction of the data that what was preserved from that era which you vehemently defend like it's some sort of conclusive proof that charm worked vastly different on live, when it's not... as has been explained to you by a number of people already.

loramin

07-29-2022, 12:06 PM

From a long list of bad arguments and highly subjective takes on unverifiable anecdotal evidence you've presented to support those bad arguments this one takes the cake.

These nerfs as as well as many others (Ivandyr's Hoop/Lifetap , Midnight Mallets, Puppet Strings, the list goes on and on) where not made because they were deemed more "classic" but because the the devs arbitrarily chose to make these changes to effect the meta on p99 only.

At this point you are stomping the life out of your own credibility. I'm not sure why anyone would take anything you've posted here seriously. If you want anyone to take you seriously I'd suggest you come up with evidence that demonstrates your claim that is better than "I can't find guides made by players from 22+ years ago for charming in raids" or "some players thought charm was too risky to use" because we can all agree that's an asinine argument based on a tiny fraction of the data that what was preserved from that era which you vehemently defend like it's some sort of conclusive proof that charm worked vastly different on live, when it's not... as has been explained to you by a number of people already.

Did you play in classic? If so, how would you say the "meta" was for Enchanters: what percentage would you say spent their time grouping vs. soloing?

Now, same question, for any other class. If you answer honestly I think you'll say that every class soloes a bit more on P99 vs. live ... but only one class (Enchanter) has a dramatically different "meta" (of almost exclusively soloing here vs. majority grouping in classic) ... although you'll also find Druids, while still soloing about as much as they did on live, do a whole lot more charm soloing here, vs. more root/rotting or quad/kiting on live. (I suspect you'd find the same is true of Necros/Bards, but I don't know them as well.)

Finally, I'll just remind you that the goal of this place is to recreate EQ as it was in 1999 ... including, at least to some extent, the meta. Maybe that means fixing channeling, maybe that means raising the failure rate of charm slightly, or maybe it means somehow nerfing the Goblin Ghazughi Ring: I don't know. I just know our server doesn't look like the classic one I played on, where virtually every group had an Enchanter (just as virtually every group had a Cleric).

(But if you didn't play in classic, and have no objective evidence about what classic was like ... what exactly are you contributing here?)

Vivitron

07-29-2022, 01:36 PM

Like I keep repeating, over and over, I'm not saying Enchanters didn't charm in classic! My argument is that the degree of charming, the relative lack of risk in charming, is not classic.

Again, every Fear raid here is accomplished through pets (unless like two guilds are fighting and one kills all the others' pets first or something). But I have little doubt that you can find some rare evidence of charming by some Enchanters, on some Fear raids. What you won't find is evidence in the vast majority of sources ... because (again) charming was rare in classic.

Like I keep saying, it would absolutely be unclassic to remove charming ... but making it just a little harder, just a little riskier, 100% would be. Keeping it as easy and as safe as it is here, while ignoring the fact that the safety is making people play the class vastly differently from how it was played in classic ... well, that's like making a Street Fighter II emulator, and maintaining that it's an accurate emulator ... while ignoring the fact that no one is dragon punching with Ryu.

I am glad there are some velious era raid encounters like CT where charming is worth the risk; the enchanter class loses some of its pizzazz when you strip charm/mez/stun/root/pacify like in most of ToV.

But worth the risk doesn't mean no risk; a few days before you made this post my alliance's pet pile got AoE dispelled, contributing to a wipe.

[enchanters] almost exclusively [solo] here

Reflect on the last few times you were in an xp zone. It immediately becomes clear that enchanters frequently group, right? I think you're building up charm to be even better in your mind than it really is on p99.

enjchanter

08-05-2022, 03:32 PM

If youre not charm soloing as an enchanter, then thats just ape behavior tbf

Botten

08-05-2022, 04:32 PM

The real problem is Enchanters are soloing a high stat gear drop dungeon like Chardok.

While it is great to get an item for CHEAP on the market from this dungeon; it absolutely sucks to take a group here with their trains, their claim to pit for KM and the zone picked dry of named by this type of toxic soloing (often take multiple camps).

Duo enchanters shouldn't be able to take King after illusion bugging through the door.

Charm on live was nerfed after Legacy of Steel managed to take down Avatar easily sending wave after wave of charmed mobs. Pretty much trivializing it. They got a warning for that and Charm was changed.

I don't see any reason charm can not be fine tuned again for P99.

loramin

08-05-2022, 05:06 PM

If youre not charm soloing as an enchanter, then thats just ape behavior tbf

I agree. So either the vast majority of Enchanter players on live were apes (but players of every other class knew how to play that class just as well as they do on P99), or ... our emulator isn't emulating charm properly.

Tann

08-05-2022, 10:02 PM

Elizondo

08-06-2022, 01:47 AM

I agree. So either the vast majority of Enchanter players on live were apes (but players of every other class knew how to play that class just as well as they do on P99), or ... our emulator isn't emulating charm properly.

They just didn't play the class back then the way they are played now

Good enchanters back then could lock down trains. They mezed and buffed.

Charming wasn't a thing back in Classic Era. At least it wasn't how the class was generally played. Sure, there may have been a few one offs here and there but chanters back then stacked INT. Not CHA.

Chanter play on P99 was a revolution that completely changed the way the class is played. It amazes me nobody understands this. Look at the way good chanters play. You're endlessly swapping out multiple spells per fight. The way the class is played has simply evolved. It's tools have been maximized. It's not easy though. It's a chore. A lazy enchanter is a dead enchanter.

I see a lot of players dump coin into gearing chanters thinking they are going to walk into a dungeon God Mode. They get wrecked and lose interest because they read the forums and thought they could solo insane mobs with ease. It's a slog. You don't even feel like a chanter until level 29. 1-12 is absolutely horrible. You get your first charm at 12 and besides a few select camps where you pull pairs it's not great.

I dunno, the people in this thread calling for chanters to be nerfed don't seem like they've ever played the class at a high level. Charm is not the only reason chanters can take out tough mobs. It's also rune and slow. They can rune their pet and slow it's target. No other class has anything close to that.

Charm shouldn't be nerfed. Players just got better and more clever.

I prefer necro charming anyways. Way more fun.

Jimjam

08-06-2022, 02:28 AM

I think the prevalence of shared cleric bots and community ports makes a difference. Very easy to 96% rez and move on.

An enchanter pays for its own slot through the dps increase of haste.

Even today I’d rather an underlevelled or unmotivated enc focuses on buffs than overstretches themself and die repeatedly. That attitude was way more common back in 99. These days there is a lot of pressure to maintain full buffs, slow, cc and keep a charm pet and that is certainly an unclassic social pressure.

Troxx

08-06-2022, 10:40 AM

You mostly didn’t see enchanters charming a lot on classic because we didn’t have 5-10 years of kunark followed by velious forever more there after. Expansions rolled out quickly, charming did eventually get nerfed and EQ moved on. There were a few places where ench charm (albeit super dangerous) made otherwise brutal encounters doable. I can’t remember the name of the trial but think that run in Gates of Discord you has to do with a single group with the ass-beater mob that could and would trash a defensive warrior that wasn’t raid geared to the 9s. Having a charmed dog thingy meant you only had to survive the brutality for a few short seconds because the hasted dog would rip it in half.

But a fair bit of the time the dog would break charm and eat the ench before anyone in the group could react. Winning combo was a Ranger (am3/EQ, trueshot, snare and harmony), an ench, a cleric, a defensive warrior … and then you could help carry 2 guild mates through each run for their one time win..

Remember that on classic timeline less than 1/5 or 1/6 of any given server’s population had a single level 60 main character halfway through Luclin. Not only were we all relative noobs but less was known about game mechanics or games at large. I played in highschool on a dial up and we only had one phone line so we’re talking an hour here vs there. I think my highest was maybe 20 before I went off to college in 2001 and had broadband. I played a Ranger then and remember not getting to 60 and having TS/AM3 until at least halfway through the Luclin timeline.

Charming was possible in this era on live but you never saw people doing it much because
-we were all noobs who didn’t know better
-most had bad connections
-the vast majority of any given server was low level
-expansions dropped routinely that eventually pulled the plug on the mechanic

Had it been known or widely used, I’m confident Verant would have nerfed it.

I’m NOT advocating a nerf mind you, but thems the facts

loramin

08-06-2022, 11:30 AM

They just didn't play the class back then the way they are played now

Good enchanters back then could lock down trains. They mezed and buffed.

Charming wasn't a thing back in Classic Era. At least it wasn't how the class was generally played. Sure, there may have been a few one offs here and there but chanters back then stacked INT. Not CHA.

100% agree, except I've dug into classic sources and Enchanters absolutely did charm back in classic ... they were just the very clear minority. Plenty of others tried charming, but found that it was too risky, and grouping was much faster XP.

Chanter play on P99 was a revolution that completely changed the way the class is played.

See, this is where I get lost. If this was the same game as back in '99 it'd be impossible to "change how the class is played". Literally more than ten times as many Enchanters played on live as do here. It makes zero logical sense that ten times as many players wouldn't figure out how to play the class, but a few geniuses at P99 would.

The "Occam's razor" (ie. simplest) answer isn't that 1/10th of the players magically learned how to play better than 10x that number on live, playing for two years ... it's that the emulator's rules changed from live. And again, no other class magically changed how it's played the way Enchanters (and to a lesser extent other charm classes) have.

pasi

08-06-2022, 12:34 PM

I can’t remember the name of the trial but think that run in Gates of Discord you has to do with a single group with the ass-beater mob that could and would trash a defensive warrior that wasn’t raid geared to the 9s. Having a charmed dog thingy meant you only had to survive the brutality for a few short seconds because the hasted dog would rip it in half.

Probably talking about Tipt or Vxed. Though charm was certainly abused in other zones, those two had a big safety net.

To piggyback on the rest of your points, the majority of even the raiding playerbase was not 60 / level-capped until Luclin. Even the hardcore guilds were mostly composed of sub60s in Velious. Let alone 60s with their rare Kunark spells. Level differences make a huge difference in terms of landing spells, attacks, etc.

Take a look at the original casters realm epic guides, you'll see guides recommending multiple groups of players for low to mid 50s epic mobs that easily are soloable/duoable/trioable in Kunark era.

Project1999 is going on 13 years old. To put that into the timeline of EQ Live, EQ would be well into it's 18th expansion: Veil of Alaris. And even with P1999, there was years of optimization/metagaming that carried into 2009. We knew bards could AE kite and outlevel anyone despite a large exp penalty. We knew 3 50 mages and a cleric could kill Nagafen. We knew whirl was broken. We knew you could just use hoops to trivialize any 32K HP mob. We knew you could use mallets in lieu of waiting for a tank to establish aggro. Take all that and add 13 more years of people figuring shit out.

1999-2001 was a completely different era of gaming. The vast majority of players were terrible in comparison to private servers. You won't get the genie back in the bottle here. You're playing an emulator of something 20 years old with mostly people who have a decade or more experience. Give these same people countless guides, videos, wikis/spoilers, whatever. Contrast that with a player base of varying levels of engagement (i.e. more casuals checking out what their friends are playing), a max of 1-2 years experience, and prima strategy guides.

This isn't anything unique to P99/Everquest. The same shit occurred with World of Warcraft. You had optimized players doing 300% of what they were doing in 2004-2006. Several years past the infamous Science of War (~2003) rant expressing nostalgia for the era of EQ before the powergaming/optimization.

loramin

08-06-2022, 03:45 PM

Look, I totally understand (and agree with!) the argument that we play differently than live players did. The thing about us being stuck at level 60, while Live had Luclin and future expansions, is absolutely true, and does make us more "top heavy".

Likewise, our wiki is better than Allakhazam, Caster's Realm, etc. ... but really, not by that much, and certainly not in relevant ways for this dicussion. Like yes, our wiki has the exact mob loc, and will even show you with a red x on a map where that loc is; Allakhazam didn't have such data for most mobs. But every class had their own forum, with tons of people (again, live had more than 10x the players we have) discussing every last detail of their class, so it's 100% false to say "oh no one in live knew what they were doing".

Enchanters on live knew about levels and charisma. They may not have been as certain of their exact effects, but they absolutely understood how to charm (and I can point you toward a wealth of evidence ... just the Caster's Realm guides on the Wayback Machine alone should be enough). They chose not too (or at least most did; again some did solo charm). And what no one has been able to explain is why only Enchanters (and to a lesser extent Druids/Necros/Bards) make different choices here.

No one is saying "oh those live Warriors didn't know how to solo" ... or well, actually, they did :) There were long, passionate arguments about how binding wounds in combat was totally classic, and people just didn't know how to play their class on live ... until it was proven that combat bind wounds was nonsense, and removed from here.

But with stuff like 25+ mob kites and combat bind wounds being removed here, every class plays fundamentally the same as they did on live. Warriors group, or solo poorly. Same for Clerics. Necromancers and Mages solo (or group, if they feel like it). All just like live.

Charming is the only thing fundamentally different from Live here: Enchanters are the only class that was predominantly a group class on Live, but is now predominantly a solo class here.

So, I'm not saying to remove charm: if no one could charm solo here, we wouldn't have a good emulator either! All I'm saying is, somehow, some way (and there are much smarter people than me with more details to offer) charm should be somewhat more risky ... like it was on Live.

Troxx

08-06-2022, 03:45 PM

Yeah tipt sounds right.

Toxigen

08-06-2022, 04:16 PM

loramin you really just need to make an enc twink on p99 and get it over with

Jibartik

08-06-2022, 04:38 PM

I agree. So either the vast majority of Enchanter players on live were apes (but players of every other class knew how to play that class just as well as they do on P99), or ... our emulator isn't emulating charm properly.

Well, keep in mind the first EQ expansion came what, 11 months after launch? The next 6 after that?

we're talking 1-2 years for players to learn this game from the ground up.

By the time velious ended, I might believe a few players knew how to solo charm with an enchanter, but I wouldn't believe that it was well known because I distinctly remember them being friendly wizards basically that just kept the adds mezed and played by people who had no aggressive tendencies whatsoever during the time that I played live.

loramin

08-06-2022, 04:42 PM

loramin you really just need to make an enc twink on p99 and get it over with

I have one as an alt on Blue, but I'm waiting to make one my main on Green 2.0 ... with the hope that charming gets made more classic before then.

Now you might say "Loramin you're full of shit, no one wants to play a nerfed class". But the thing is, the Live Enchanter was not "nerfed": they were still a great and popular class! I just want to play that class, not the "easy mode" P99 version.

DMN

08-06-2022, 04:53 PM

But with stuff like 25+ mob kites and combat bind wounds being removed here, every class plays fundamentally the same as they did on live.

And thats why we have bards kiting, what, just 24? Very fundamentally classic. Druids soloing king tranix? clerics soloing the chardok royalty? monks soloing shroom king? i'm sure you don't want me to bring up shaman again, am i right or am i right?

-Catherin-

08-06-2022, 04:58 PM

This thread now has the #2 most replies in the caster's subforum, only behind Necro, how do you not choose Iksar? (https://www.project1999.com/forums/showthread.php?t=200861) Which was created in 2015.

Let's go for Gold, guys.

loramin

08-06-2022, 07:06 PM

And thats why we have bards kiting, what, just 24? Very fundamentally classic. Druids soloing king tranix? clerics soloing the chardok royalty? monks soloing shroom king? i'm sure you don't want me to bring up shaman again, am i right or am i right?

Bards did swarm kite in classic: I know, because I had a friend who played a bard and learned how to do it :) As for the rest, those are all extreme examples, that simply show what others have been saying about playing an emulator years after the original. Yes, a handful of dedicated players, pushing a game to the limit, can do a few things (eg. solo something hard) that hadn't been done before on live.

But none of your examples is anything like a class being played fundamentally differently by virtually everyone who plays that class. Most Enchanters grouped on live, but most Enchanters solo here: that's not true of any other class (again, you don't see Warriors or Clerics mass soloing here, or Necros deciding to group most of the time ... they all play fundamentally the same as they did on live).

When something so basic is different from the original, it strongly suggests the emulator isn't emulating well.

Troxx

08-06-2022, 09:56 PM

I saw bards “swarm” on classic.

Like aoe dotting a whopping 4 mobs at a time.

loramin

08-06-2022, 10:17 PM

I saw bards “swarm” on classic.

Like aoe dotting a whopping 4 mobs at a time.

I never played a Bard, but I assure you I watched (over his shoulder as he played) Enderii of Bristlebane learn to swarm kite with ... a lot of (I didn't count exactly how many) mobs in The Overthere, in 2001 or 2002. I was quite jealous :)

I believe it was still in Velious, but it's possible it wasn't until Luclin (these are twenty-plus-year-old memories after all). Still, I don't think anything fundamentally changed between Velious and Luclin, to enable swarm kiting for non-AA characters (we must have been in our 20's-40's when this happened, so AAs weren't a factor).

P.S. And he just had a normal residential Internet connection (we lived off campus) ... I can't remember for sure, but it was almost certainly DSL.

Jibartik

08-06-2022, 10:20 PM

you're like the mick west of p99 loramin :o

https://twitter.com/MickWest/status/1555647029824458753?s=20&t=sLqnnFSkqklrCC433vcYdw

loramin

08-06-2022, 10:24 PM

you're like the mick west of p99 loramin :o

https://twitter.com/MickWest/status/1555647029824458753?s=20&t=sLqnnFSkqklrCC433vcYdw

Never heard of him, but he seems like a good dude, and I am a skeptic and a programmer (plus I make lots of typos), so I'll take that as a compliment :)

Fammaden

08-06-2022, 10:29 PM

Loramin continually fails to consider the bigger elephant in the room than "something about the code is different", the hardware and bandwith was so inferior and bogged down that charming was a deathwish. Lagspikes were a complete fact of life for nearly everyone. Servers weren't as inherently stable and reliable themselves. Your ISP wasn't as stable and reliable.

Most people's machines struggled to run the graphics and had shit ping by even the worst P99 standards, reacting to a charm break even without weapons and haste would be swift oblivion and your groups deaths likely next. Players were incredibly risk averse and demanded the same of their party.

Then along came Luclin >>> PoP and everyone was forced to upgrade their PC's more, and better broadband became more the norm across the country. Next thing you know charming was on the menu as well as the advent of widespread bard swarming.

GINA is also a massive advantage we didn't have then. Even if channeling or some other aspect of P99 is a bit overpowered that's not the biggest reason for the dearth of charm back in the old days.

Troxx

08-06-2022, 11:43 PM

If I had a nickel for every time I died to a lag spike while not playing a charming enchanter while on dial up in 2000 …

Dems be a lot of nickels.

Elizondo

08-07-2022, 12:11 AM

100% agree, except I've dug into classic sources and Enchanters absolutely did charm back in classic ... they were just the very clear minority. Plenty of others tried charming, but found that it was too risky, and grouping was much faster XP.

They didn't charm back then the way they do now. You don't keep the pet charmed for long when reverse charming. Charming (the few who did) was done to keep the pet as long as possible until it broke then everyone beat it down.

Strategies like reverse charming, stacking CHA (INT is an afterthought for chanters on P99) carrying around -MR gear, runing pet and slowing your target, clumping/conga lines ect. were all play styles developed by players on P99

See, this is where I get lost. If this was the same game as back in '99 it'd be impossible to "change how the class is played". Literally more than ten times as many Enchanters played on live as do here. It makes zero logical sense that ten times as many players wouldn't figure out how to play the class, but a few geniuses at P99 would.

Not everyone approaches the game the same way and utilizes the tools the exact same way. I've already explained how players on P99 maximized the class strengths by creating tactics that maximizes charm's effectiveness. You're giving way too much credit to people that played back then. Most were barely average players who mostly socialized in the game. 90% of the P99 population are hardcore players who have been playing the game for 20 years. The skill gap is a canyon.

The "Occam's razor" (ie. simplest) answer isn't that 1/10th of the players magically learned how to play better than 10x that number on live, playing for two years ... it's that the emulator's rules changed from live. And again, no other class magically changed how it's played the way Enchanters (and to a lesser extent other charm classes) have.

Completely disagree. Chanters sacrifice a lot of their potential mana pool to charm and most of their sanity hot swapping spells during routine fights. It's simply a different play style maximizing mechanics that have always been there but not thoroughly explored like they been on P99

loramin

08-07-2022, 11:46 AM

They didn't charm back then the way they do now. You don't keep the pet charmed for long when reverse charming. Charming (the few who did) was done to keep the pet as long as possible until it broke then everyone beat it down.

Dec 20th 2:51 PM 2001 (https://web.archive.org/web/20011224191752/http://eqdb.allakhazam.com/strategy/classes.html?class=13):

If you charm a yellow con and fight a just-red con, you can debuff the mob (I recommend not buffing your pet) and ensure the mob dies with your pet nearly dead (nuke if necessary). Then you can invis and take your pet down with 1 nuke and reap double xp.

But all means, keep telling me how P99 invented the Enchanter class :rolleyes:

(And BTW, I am a terrible classic researcher: I can't touch Rygar or Dolalin with a ten foot pole ... and I found that in < 10 min. If Caster's Realm still had much of an archive left, I probably could have found it it in 2 min.)

Vivitron

08-07-2022, 03:12 PM

If you charm a yellow con and fight a just-red con, you can debuff the mob (I recommend not buffing your pet) and ensure the mob dies with your pet nearly dead (nuke if necessary). Then you can invis and take your pet down with 1 nuke and reap double xp.

Haha, that's almost exactly what I tried on my level 12 enchanter on live. I didn't have a gcd either so I tried to deal with charm breaks by color flux, then *running during gcd* to try to make enough time to recast a charm without getting interrupted. I knew about gcd reset but not about cheap insta clicks. (Edit: or if I knew about cheap insta clicks I didn't sufficiently value them to track one down for such a low level alt, it's been a while.)

Of course, it didn't take many attempts at charming yellow/red mobs especially without an sow before I gave up. That strategy was a failure on live and it would be a failure on p99 too; you get resisted then they kill you.

Here, though, I had Tecmos' videos to teach me a mindset of minimizing risk while charming instead of biting off more than I could chew, and the cultural knowledge that it would pay off if I pushed on learning & optimizing for it, e.g. getting a gcd item and hp gear.

loramin

08-07-2022, 03:25 PM

Haha, that's almost exactly what I tried on my level 12 enchanter on live. I didn't have a gcd either so I tried to deal with charm breaks by color flux, then *running during gcd* to try to make enough time to recast a charm without getting interrupted. I knew about gcd reset but not about cheap insta clicks. (Edit: or if I knew about cheap insta clicks I didn't sufficiently value them to track one down for such a low level alt, it's been a while.)

Of course, it didn't take many attempts at charming yellow/red mobs especially without an sow before I gave up. That strategy was a failure on live and it would be a failure on p99 too; you get resisted then they kill you.

Here, though, I had Tecmos' videos to teach me a mindset of minimizing risk while charming instead of biting off more than I could chew, and the cultural knowledge that it would pay off if I pushed on learning & optimizing for it, e.g. getting a gcd item and hp gear.

GCD reset is nice, but not at all necessary to charm fight. As for SoW, the guy I was quoting mentions the following (I just left it out as it wasn't relevant):

- Save up for tboots if you don't have jboots (soloing is soloing right?)

and:

- Practice charm soloing in wide open places on non-sow mobs, until you get your timing vs distance down.

Also (contrary to the common claim here that Live Enchanters didn't know about Charisma):

- Get the cha gear up there to 185-200 (probly done that already for mez)

And this is just one random poster; if I could find an archive of the Enchanters forum we'd undoubtedly find a wealth of info. And as for it being a "failed strategy" ... it seemed to work out pretty well for him (he wrote a nice long post about it, clearly from experience).

Look, again, I'm not discounting that we have more knowledge here. 100%, we agree on that. But the same thing is true of every class ... and yet we don't have any other class played fundamentally differently here (except when we've had clearly unclassic things, like Bards AoEing 100 mobs, or Warriors binding wounds in combat).

Vivitron

08-07-2022, 04:25 PM

Also (contrary to the common claim here that Live Enchanters didn't know about Charisma):

The topic of this thread is that our best evidence suggests cha didn't affect charm durations on live (and the level based resist adjustments worked slightly differently), and we're expecting that to be fixed, right? ;)

Jibartik

08-07-2022, 04:54 PM

Never heard of him, but he seems like a good dude, and I am a skeptic and a programmer (plus I make lots of typos), so I'll take that as a compliment :)

everything needs its mick west - and he's a good dude.

but he is known for ignoring peoples accounts in favor of his analysis :D

PatChapp

08-07-2022, 05:25 PM

GCD reset is nice, but not at all necessary to charm fight. As for SoW, the guy I was quoting mentions the following (I just left it out as it wasn't relevant):

and:

Also (contrary to the common claim here that Live Enchanters didn't know about Charisma):

And this is just one random poster; if I could find an archive of the Enchanters forum we'd undoubtedly find a wealth of info. And as for it being a "failed strategy" ... it seemed to work out pretty well for him (he wrote a nice long post about it, clearly from experience).

Look, again, I'm not discounting that we have more knowledge here. 100%, we agree on that. But the same thing is true of every class ... and yet we don't have any other class played fundamentally differently here (except when we've had clearly unclassic things, like Bards AoEing 100 mobs, or Warriors binding wounds in combat).
I mean it sure sounds like some people knew how to charm and mitigate the risk in classic, per your own findings.
It seems like your asking for the class to be changed,to change players. Player knowledge base cannot be changed, people on p99 like to push things to their limits.
I would love to go back to eq when noone knew anything,but it's not realistic with 20+ years of knowledge readily available

loramin

08-07-2022, 06:15 PM

I mean it sure sounds like some people knew how to charm and mitigate the risk in classic, per your own findings.
It seems like your asking for the class to be changed,to change players. Player knowledge base cannot be changed, people on p99 like to push things to their limits.
I would love to go back to eq when noone knew anything,but it's not realistic with 20+ years of knowledge readily available

Yes, as I keep repeating, they did know how to charm! And yet ... most Enchanters grouped. If you played on live (and played in groups), you know this to be true, and that it was also true for tanks and clerics, which formed the "holy trinity" of grouping back then.

Now, one can argue about minutiae, eg. "they weren't aware of GCD resets, that's why they didn't charm", but I find that a weak argument. GCD resets don't make or break charming, they just make it a little more convenient.

So again, I'm not arguing classic players never charmed. What I'm arguing is, charm was more risky in classic, and as a result far fewer charmed. The fact that so many here charm, and so few charmed on live (or, again, that the Enchanter class is played differently here ... while every other class is played the same) is evidence our emulator isn't as risky as the original game was.

Jibartik

08-07-2022, 06:28 PM

So again, I'm not arguing classic players never charmed. What I'm arguing is, charm was more risky in classic, and as a result far fewer charmed. The fact that so many here charm, and so few charmed on live (or, again, that the Enchanter class is played differently here ... while every other class is played the same) is evidence our emulator isn't as risky as the original game was.

Your conclusion is sound, but your logic is flawed.

Again, this theory of yours that it was different then than now, does not explain that well after three years of p99 classic, and well into 3 years of kunark, is when players started charming on p99

it was not widly done, there were not enchanters on every account, it was tecmos, me and triangles for a long time and like tecmos says he learned everythign from triangles, we all learned from tecmos.

The reason people didnt charm back o nlive, was because we were on the moon in 2.8 years after launch - they were learning how to raid.

Edit: I mean lets be fair here: straight up nobody soloing the creatures we solo on this server with shamans during live velious, so what is torp totally fake?

loramin

08-07-2022, 06:28 PM

The topic of this thread is that our best evidence suggests cha didn't affect charm durations on live (and the level based resist adjustments worked slightly differently), and we're expecting that to be fixed, right? ;)

If there's evidence, I believe it :) But there's also clearly evidence that people in classic thought it helped (people like the guy I quoted). Honestly, I truly don't know what's "wrong" here specifically. Smarter people than me have suggested Charisma, channeling, or various other factors.

All I know is that a Street Fighter II emulator where no one wants to Dragon Punch with Ryu is not a good emulator. You don't have to know anything about how damage works in Street Fighter II to know that: if you played the arcade game back in the day, you know Ryu players want to Dragon Punch.

Similarly here, if every class plays like they did in '99 ... except for one class that doesn't ... something smells funny.

loramin

08-07-2022, 06:30 PM

Your conclusion is sound, but your logic is flawed.

Again, this theory of yours that it was different then than now, does not explain that well after three years of p99 classic, and well into 3 years of kunark, is when players started charming on p99

it was not widly done, there were not enchanters on every account, it was tecmos, me and triangles for a long time and like tecmos says he learned everythign from triangles, we all learned from tecmos.

The reason people didnt charm back o nlive, was because we were on the moon in 2.8 years after launch - they were learning how to raid.

So why just Enchanters? If our knowledge gap vs. live is so huge, why don't Necromancers, or Warriors, or any other class play fundamentally differently here then?

Warriors in '99 were a group-dominant class. Here they are group-dominant.

Necromancers in '99 were a solo-dominant class. Here they are solo-dominant.

You can repeat this pattern for every class in the game ... except Enchanters.

Jibartik

08-07-2022, 06:33 PM

So why just Enchanters? If our knowledge gap vs. live is so huge, why don't Necromancers, or Warriors, or any other class play fundamentally differently here then?

They do!

They do by a large margine!

Aint nobody soloing tranix and ragefire with any class on live before velious!

loramin

08-07-2022, 06:36 PM

They do!

They do by a large margine!

Aint nobody soloing tranix and ragefire with any class on live before velious!

Again, extreme cases like someone soloing something (at the very end of the game), that they couldn't solo on live, is very different from core aspects of the game (from 1-60) not being the same. Several classes can do cool/unclassic stuff at the end, but no one here except Enchanters plays fundamentally differently from how they did in '99, because we have a very good emulator, which emulates almost everything from '99 very well.

For every other class, P99 is like EQ '99. It's just Enchanters that fundamentally aren't like they were in '99:

Warriors in '99 were a group-dominant class. Here they are group-dominant.

Necromancers in '99 were a solo-dominant class. Here they are solo-dominant.

You can repeat this pattern for every class in the game ... except Enchanters.

Jibartik

08-07-2022, 06:58 PM

I disagree, I think the way p99 players play is fundamentally different than the way people did on live even up to p99s launch let alone compared to live.

Lets take a look at the frog king for example. This mob is soloable, even if you nerfed charm like crazy because the start just involves you suiciding mobs into each other and one easy fight after that.

So why was it not known until well into p99? Why didn't someone figure this out? I will tell you why: because nobody in their right mind 9 months after the launch of everquesrt would be like, "I'm gonna go solo the king!" That's insane.

The sound of a zombie made me pee my pants back then. Imagine the idea of getting killed alone at the bottom of a dungeon. F that you'd assume you may as well be dead irl before you're gonna get that corpse back.

we just play more confidently, when we have all these strategy guides, youtube videos, and confident playerbase.

You meet anyone now and its like, lets talk about all the most insane meta shit we know about EQ!

back then it was like, "WOW i aint ever seen nuffin like dis befurrrr!"

If there was one spell I am dubious of being less pwoerful it'd be the Lull lines, I aint ever seen anyone use those to any value on live, but I think that was because we were D-U-M-B dumb! (newbies)

loramin

08-07-2022, 07:03 PM

Look, we all agree: Blue has been up and at Kunark for nearly a decade longer than Live was (and half a decade or so vs. Velious). As a result, we have some differences from live.

But, all those differences can be explained by the extra time. Doing crazy solos at max level, with gear live people never had time to get? That's totally explained by our server unclassically running longer.

On the other hand, Enchanters deciding, from their earliest levels, "solo charming is way easier and faster XP than joining a group"? Look, if I gave you a hundred years, Rogues would still be a grouping class: even a century of unclassic time won't change that fact, because it has nothing to do with player knowledge, and everything to do with how the game works.

Jibartik

08-07-2022, 07:03 PM

Then why were they not doing it day one of the server launch, loramin?

Why was it not until the advent of tecmos's youtues did the number of enchanters begin to appear?

Why were we learning how to do it for years together on p99?

Why are shamans not buff bots on p99?

loramin

08-07-2022, 07:12 PM

Shaman weren't buff bots in '01 either: I played one :p

As for Tecmos ... well first off, I wasn't around for the earliest days of P99, so I can't say anything with certainty. But I do know lots of stuff wasn't classic in the early days here. Forget about combat bind wounds: they had Whirl Til You Hurl letting you kill mobs 20 levels higher and crap like that back then.

So, it seems to me that "stuff was crazy in the early days of our emulator" just shows our dev team was still working on said server in those days. But my point is, our "complete" (or at least, ten-plus-years-closer) emulator emulates every class in the game perfectly (when it comes to the fundamentals; again not talking about crazy high-end solos) ... except Enchanters.

Jibartik

08-07-2022, 07:21 PM

Ok so you are saying you could solo clear and camp tranix on your shaman?

Why is there not one person in history that did that on during p99s timeline on live?

PatChapp

08-07-2022, 07:30 PM

I played on rallos so my memory is going to be skewed. I was regularly ganked on my human sk by charm pets,or shaman and their op dots on classic
. I really don't think this box emulates every class perfectly other than enchanters.
Druids could dot kite, necros would dot kite with a pet chasing the mob. Lots of examples of things that are different on p99 than classic eq, if that's your current argument.

loramin

08-07-2022, 08:11 PM

Ok so you are saying you could solo clear and camp tranix on your shaman?

Why is there not one person in history that did that on during p99s timeline on live?

No I am not. Loramin started in Velious, so he wasn't even 60 back then.

But again, people doing crazy stuff at the end of the game (when we have way more time than live people did) is very different from one class (and only one class) being played differently their entire leveling life.

I played on rallos so my memory is going to be skewed. I was regularly ganked on my human sk by charm pets,or shaman and their op dots on classic
. I really don't think this box emulates every class perfectly other than enchanters.
Druids could dot kite, necros would dot kite with a pet chasing the mob. Lots of examples of things that are different on p99 than classic eq, if that's your current argument.

I'm not talking about any of the https://wiki.project1999.com/Non-Classic_Compendium stuff (ie. the known/acknowledged unclassic stuff) or stuff like mobs taking full damage from DoTs while moving ... for the first X months of the server.

I'm talking about the game overall. We have a really, really good emulator: it feel just like the original in almost every way. There are undoubtedly some minor details off, but for the most part the game plays the same as it did over 20 years ago ... except with charm (and the one class most heavily tied to it in particular, although again Druids, Necros and Bard are impacted too).

DMN

08-07-2022, 11:13 PM

No I am not. Loramin started in Velious, so he wasn't even 60 back then.

are you saying you started playing EQ during velious?

Jibartik

08-08-2022, 12:05 AM

well once again loramin you have outlasted me and I shall return to my own lands ive given it all i got.

loramin

08-08-2022, 01:16 AM

are you saying you started playing EQ during velious?

Yes, right at the start.

Danth

08-08-2022, 07:46 AM

Did you play in classic?

Remember how not so long ago we had numerous folks swearing up and down that combat bind wound was totally legit and people didn't use it back in the day only because everyone back then were morons who couldn't play? They kept up those claims--vehemently, at times--'till irrefutable proof was found. I don't know we'll find the sort of proof we want with charm because I don't know anyone was doing extensive parsing of average durations during that period. Whether something works or not, like bind, is a lot more black and white than nit-picking over average durations of random-duration spells.

Danth

DMN

08-08-2022, 07:58 AM

Yes, right at the start.

Do you have any idea of how much this damages your credibility when you make such broad sweeping claims about "how things were in classic" when you knew virtually nothing about it?

commongood

08-08-2022, 08:57 AM

Jimjam

08-08-2022, 10:27 AM

Remember how not so long ago we had numerous folks swearing up and down that combat bind wound was totally legit and people didn't use it back in the day only because everyone back then were morons who couldn't play? They kept up those claims--vehemently, at times--'till irrefutable proof was found. I don't know we'll find the sort of proof we want with charm because I don't know anyone was doing extensive parsing of average durations during that period. Whether something works or not, like bind, is a lot more black and white than nit-picking over average durations of random-duration spells.

Danth

Discovering, popularising and bug reporting battle bandaging are my three greatest achievements. They’re on my portfolio.

loramin

08-08-2022, 11:23 AM

Do you have any idea of how much this damages your credibility when you make such broad sweeping claims about "how things were in classic" when you knew virtually nothing about it?

Velious lasted a year, and I started right when it started. Plus, even after Velious,the game remained largely the same in Luclin, especially if you weren't 60 and working on AA's yet. All the classic/Kunark/Velious zones played just about identically in both eras (no one was, say, dire charming in Velious, or at least not for months after Luclin's release).

So yes, I played for a year in the classic era, and I have plenty of memories from that year. Plus, I have plenty of memories from the Luclin era after that are "almost classic".

But a year (plus Luclin) isn't enough to have memories of classic because ...?

loramin

08-08-2022, 11:35 AM

Remember how not so long ago we had numerous folks swearing up and down that combat bind wound was totally legit and people didn't use it back in the day only because everyone back then were morons who couldn't play? They kept up those claims--vehemently, at times--'till irrefutable proof was found.

https://i.imgur.com/f12IRCi.gif

But seriously, yes I do! And combat bind wound is just one of the most obvious cases: there's been lots of things like that here over the years (emulating a 20+ year old game is hard) ... but most players don't realize it because Nilbog and company have done an awesome job of correcting them, and most of that stuff is now far in the project's past.

-Catherin-

08-08-2022, 12:29 PM

But a year (plus Luclin) isn't enough to have memories of classic because ...?

I'll bite.

Because even though Velious was still considered classic, it really was the beggining of the end of an era. A lot of changes had been made (not charm) where things were the furtherst from classic that you can get while still being called classic. Twinks were becoming a much bigger thing at this point. Melee were beggining to overtake cloth casters in usefulness. More than just the top guilds were getting ahold of epics (got mine during Velious). There was a noticeable magic resistance spike across most mobs, For Druids in particular, the writing was on the wall.

You got a third of the experience, and that third was exponentially different from the rest. The spike from vanilla to Kunark was nowhere near as extreme. So yeah, you really don't have the proper experience on this subject.

DMN

08-08-2022, 12:35 PM

Velious lasted a year, and I started right when it started. Plus, even after Velious,the game remained largely the same in Luclin, especially if you weren't 60 and working on AA's yet. All the classic/Kunark/Velious zones played just about identically in both eras (no one was, say, dire charming in Velious, or at least not for months after Luclin's release).

And you likely spent the entirety of that year playing with largely clueless newbs who just started in velious as well, not people who spent 2+ years mastering their class and increasing general gameplay knowledge.

I think it's safe to say at this point that one could describe your knowledge of "classic" at best as pathetic, or at worst fictional.

loramin

08-08-2022, 01:54 PM

So you're saying that in this thread I'm talking about Enchanters grouping, but my experience with that subject is invalid because ... I only spent a year grouping with Enchanters in classic? :rolleyes:

Meanwhile, my own personal experience has nothing to do with the wealth of classic evidence that also shows Enchanters were considered a group class in classic. You don't like my message, so you're shooting the messenger ... but it doesn't change the veracity of that message.

If you want to attack the message, post classic evidence that shows most Enchanters were charm soloers ... don't shoot the messenger for "only" playing a year of classic, and remembering how Enchanters were back then.

-Catherin-

08-08-2022, 04:07 PM

my own personal experience has nothing to do with the wealth of classic evidence that also shows Enchanters were considered a group class in classic.

Except it's been made pretty clear that your evidence is not actually evidence. You put yourself out there as a pretty knowledgeable guy, so surely you understand what evidence actually is. You have also implied time and time again that your own experiences validate your arguement. They don't.

Jibartik

08-08-2022, 04:40 PM

I still stand by the idea that the reason people were not charm soloing for 3 years when the game first came out, is the same reason they were not until like 6 years after p99 came out.

Anyone like catherin want to school me on how charm soloing was something that the server did from day one?

Danth

08-08-2022, 04:45 PM

Anyone like catherin want to school me on how charm soloing was something that the server did from day one?

Charm solo'ing on P99 was very much done right off the bat. You had enchanters charming red-con dars and solo'ing lower guk because things like high-con resist rates weren't implemented and charm lasted full duration every time (you could and they did set their clocks by it). Whatever tuning it might need at present, charm is MUCH better than the absurdly broken mess it was at P99 launch!

And yes, there were people who pinky-swore that even that level of brokenness was totally classic and legit. Funny stuff.

EDIT: Let's not forget how silly whirl till you hurl was, that also made crowd control and damage mitigation a breeze.

loramin

08-08-2022, 05:27 PM

Except it's been made pretty clear that your evidence is not actually evidence. You put yourself out there as a pretty knowledgeable guy, so surely you understand what evidence actually is. You have also implied time and time again that your own experiences validate your arguement. They don't.

I consider both my year of playing during the classic era and the various guides and Allakhazam posts I've listed to be relevant, yes.

If you don't, well ... I'd just point out that you have a dog in this fight (you don't want your class to get less powerful), whereas I don't: I'm purely arguing for the point of this place, ie. to make it as classic as possible. But look, if all I provided was a single Caster's Realm guide with a single player saying anything to the effect "you should group because charm is risky solo" ... I'd still have provided more evidence than you have to this conversation.

But I would love to see you provide some! If I'm wrong, it should be easy to find tons of posts of Enchanters (and Druids/Bards/Necros) shouting from the rooftops "hey, charm is easy and safe, it's the way to level in this game". You can absolutely find tons posts for Necros saying "soloing beats grouping" right? Because Necros did solo a ton in classic! If Enchanter solo charming (or even group charming) was such a common thing in '99-'01, there should be lots of people saying as much back then.

And yet ... I expect you won't (just like you won't find people talking about combat bind wounds in classic). You'll certainly find examples of Enchanters charming, but not that that most Enchanters in classic thought charm soloing was the fast way to level, or that charming in groups was a reliable thing you could do all the time ... because (again) charm was not easy and safe in classic. As a result, most Enchanters grouped, and only charmed rarely when they did.

Jibartik

08-08-2022, 07:22 PM

whats the like going consensus on the more accurate charm?

commongood

08-09-2022, 08:27 AM

I'd still have provided more evidence than you have to this conversation.

But I would love to see you provide some! If I'm wrong, it should be easy to find tons of posts of Enchanters (and Druids/Bards/Necros) shouting from the rooftops "hey, charm is easy and safe, it's the way to level in this game".

You are on the side of the argument wanting things to change from the status quo. Therefor it's up to you to provide evidence that a change is needed. Not the other way around.

A change might be needed. I don't know. But I don't think you have presented anything resembling compelling evidence. Anecdotes about how "everyone who played in classic remembers X, Y and Z" is not good evidence, sorry.

loramin

08-09-2022, 11:05 AM

I can only make the best argument I can with the evidence available. If you aren't swayed, that's your call, but ultimately it's not you that I'm trying to sway.

-Catherin-

08-09-2022, 11:29 AM

JDAm0nk

08-09-2022, 11:40 AM

People seem to love talking past each other & in circles here.

From the first page of this thread:

http://www.eqemulator.org/forums/showthread.php?p=266999

Which is related to:

https://www.project1999.com/forums/showthread.php?t=395675

TL;DR - "Making channeling classic would represent a fundamental change to P99 gameplay mechanics which will reintroduce difficulty at all levels of the game and likely put an end to a lot of existing "cheesy" strategies. It may also even allow reverting AE group nerf changes as AE killing mobs would be significantly more challenging. This change will reintroduce a lot of the difficulty involved in soloing in particular especially indoors or without SoW/Jboots and in theory should encourage more grouping and social behaviour which I feel is lacking on P99 due to the ease of soloing and primarily related to channeling ability. It may also add to the difficulty of high level play including raiding and especially in situations where players are currently relying on being able to cast while being attacked by multiple high level mobs."

Hilariously this would also have a massive impact on Shaman soloing. Especially for non-Ogres :D

loramin

08-09-2022, 12:03 PM

I mean at the end of the day, it probably isn't going to sway anyone because this isn't even in the bug forum lol. I wonder how often they even look here. But then, the bug forum requires actual evidence too.

Maybe he does, maybe he doesn't, but I'm not just trying to convince him.

My point was, there's a bunch of Enchanter players who will not be convinced, no matter what I say, just as there was a lot of melee players who would not be convinced, no matter what evidence was presented, that combat bind wounds was unclassic.

Trying to convince such people is a pointless endeavor: I'm only trying to convince the convincible people. If I'm lucky, maybe a few who can research classic better than I can and provide more proof ... like the proof that started this whole thread ...

TL;DR - "Making channeling classic would represent a fundamental change to P99 gameplay mechanics which will reintroduce difficulty at all levels of the game and likely put an end to a lot of existing "cheesy" strategies. It may also even allow reverting AE group nerf changes as AE killing mobs would be significantly more challenging. This change will reintroduce a lot of the difficulty involved in soloing in particular especially indoors or without SoW/Jboots and in theory should encourage more grouping and social behaviour which I feel is lacking on P99 due to the ease of soloing and primarily related to channeling ability. It may also add to the difficulty of high level play including raiding and especially in situations where players are currently relying on being able to cast while being attacked by multiple high level mobs."

Hilariously this would also have a massive impact on Shaman soloing. Especially for non-Ogres :D

As a Barbarian Shaman, I say bring it! :D

DMN

08-09-2022, 07:54 PM

Maybe he does, maybe he doesn't, but I'm not just trying to convince him.

My point was, there's a bunch of Enchanter players who will not be convinced, no matter what I say, just as there was a lot of melee players who would not be convinced, no matter what evidence was presented, that combat bind wounds was unclassic.

Convinced of what, exactly? I don't know a single person/enchanter/poster who claims that the rate at which enchanters charm, both solo/grouping, as anywhere near the same rates it was during the classic time period. The fact is there were still in fact plenty of enchanters doing it, which you have already begrudgingly admitted, making this entirely unlike this red herring thats is bind wound that never happened in classic at all. Apples versus bowling balls.

the typical population of enchanters for most of classic was around 5-7% percent of the server, in vanillla on some servers it was as low as 2-3%. The population on p99 is, what? 30%? which is to say relative to classic you will be seeing enchanters doing anhything and everything from 500% more often to 1000% greater frequency.Mystery explained.

But the real question in all of this as I've asked you many times before and you conveniently ignore it, if you are so concerned about non classic RATES of behaviors, why do you have no issue with torpor soloing shaman or bard swarm kiting. anywhere around 10-15% of enchanters in classic were playing just as they do on p99 by mid kunark, while the percent of bards that where swaming dozens of mobs or shman torpor soloing high end obs : 0.0000000000000000001%. Why the bias, bro?

loramin

08-09-2022, 09:00 PM

the typical population of enchanters for most of classic was around 5-7% percent of the server, in vanillla on some servers it was as low as 2-3%. The population on p99 is, what? 30%? which is to say relative to classic you will be seeing enchanters doing anhything and everything from 500% more often to 1000% greater frequency.Mystery explained.

To me, that reads like an argument that our server is highly unclassic! In other words, because our emulator emulates Enchanters poorly, lots more people choose them than they would if our emulator was accurate. Thank you for the support :D

Or, like I keep saying:

All I know is that a Street Fighter II emulator where no one wants to Dragon Punch with Ryu is not a good emulator. You don't have to know anything about how damage works in Street Fighter II to know that: if you played the arcade game back in the day, you know Ryu players want to Dragon Punch.

(Only your point is reversed, so it's more like, if 3% of players played Ryu, and now 30% do on the emulator, that suggests the emulator made Dragon Punch too powerful.)

But the real question in all of this as I've asked you many times before and you conveniently ignore it, if you are so concerned about non classic RATES of behaviors, why do you have no issue with torpor soloing shaman or bard swarm kiting. anywhere around 10-15% of enchanters in classic were playing just as they do on p99 by mid kunark, while the percent of bards that where swaming dozens of mobs or shman torpor soloing high end obs : 0.0000000000000000001%. Why the bias, bro?

But again, people doing crazy stuff at the end of the game (when we have way more time than live people did) is very different from one class (and only one class) being played differently their entire leveling life.

DMN

08-09-2022, 09:18 PM

To me, that reads like an argument that our server is highly unclassic! In other words, because our emulator emulates Enchanters poorly, lots more people choose them than they would if our emulator was accurate. Thank you for the support :D

I got news for your loramin, no one cares what you think, especially after confirming what has long been suspected : you, both then and now, knew virtually nothing about classic enchanters. thank you for the rare honesty.

-Catherin-

08-10-2022, 05:20 AM

Jimjam

08-10-2022, 06:26 AM

Good post, Cat.

This thread, alongside another recent one, has brought me to the belief that the changes to life tap resists and rune aggro need to be rolled back.

Just because the broad availability of game knowledge has opened up skills and strategies to players which were previously unaware of them doesn't mean the core mechanics should be changed.

loramin

08-10-2022, 10:33 AM

With something like the internal mechanics of a spell like charm, whatever people are saying about their own personal experiences with the spell does not stand up as evidence. On Zam, especially during classic, a huge chunk of these reported experiences are wildly innacurate or just plain wrong. Or they were even true, but only because they had some bad luck or just sucked (happens here too). Hardly anyone really knew anything about anything, even if they had access to the raw data. Which was also not the case with charm.
....
I hate tying anything involving this game into real life because it is just pretty cringy. But I will say that legal systems have statutes of limitations for certain cases for several reasons. One of them being that what you think you "experienced" or "how you "felt" decades ago is not evidence as there is a very high likelyhood it is not accurate compared to the actual facts. There would be a lot of wrongful prosecution otherwise.

P99 is based X% on "hard evidence" ... data taken directly from logs, from ShowEQ recordings, from screen captures, or reports of Verant staff (all from the original classic servers, that one Mac EQ server, or occasionally live servers) ... and Y% based on "soft evidence", what we can glean from classic message boards, websites, etc.

I too wish that wasn't the case, and that we had perfect info to base our emulator ... but the reality is we don't, and so that's just how a twenty-plus-year-old emulator has to be built.

I think we can all agree that charm WAS significantly harder during live classic. But it was harder because of real things that have already been pointed out that none of us need a wayback machine to confirm as fact. (knowledge, hardware, server stability, internet connections etc.)

Trying to tease out the difference is hard, especially since it almost certainly is "a little from column A, and a little from column B". But to me personally (again, someone with no real Enchanter character, ie. no "dog in this race"), it seems clear that those factors alone can't explain the massive difference between Enchanters and every other class. Again, no other class plays fundamentally differently here, despite the fact that every other class has access to far more information, better internet connections, etc.

Look, ultimately even my you and my fellow detractors agree:

the typical population of enchanters for most of classic was around 5-7% percent of the server, in vanillla on some servers it was as low as 2-3%. The population on p99 is, what? 30%?

Whatever the reason for it, that's an major difference between here and live. If the goal of this place is to be a museum, and let people play the game from '99, it's absolutely, positively clear that our emulator is failing to do that with Enchanters (even as, again, it does an impeccable job with just about everything else).

DMN

08-10-2022, 07:53 PM

Whatever the reason for it, that's an major difference between here and live. If the goal of this place is to be a museum, and let people play the game from '99, it's absolutely, positively clear that our emulator is failing to do that with Enchanters (even as, again, it does an impeccable job with just about everything else).

The shaman population is also well over 400-500% higher than classic, too. Shaman were also one of the rarest classes back in classic, only behind bard/enc on most servers. Meanwhile in classic half the population was playing a ranger/SK/paladin. Now if you add all those together on p99 I doubt it's even 10%. So why indeed are hybrids played 5 times less, and shaman/en played 5 times more? got any ideas?

loramin

08-10-2022, 09:11 PM

The shaman population is also well over 400-500% higher than classic, too. Shaman were also one of the rarest classes back in classic, only behind bard/enc on most servers. Meanwhile in classic half the population was playing a ranger/SK/paladin. Now if you add all those together on p99 I doubt it's even 10%. So why indeed are hybrids played 5 times less, and shaman/en played 5 times more? got any ideas?

I've played a Shaman here for a long time, and I've played an identical Shaman (same name/race/face!) for years on the Bristlebane server. I promise you, Loramin plays fundamentally the same on both servers. On both servers he could (and did) both group and solo ... which makes sense because, again, our emulator is pretty damn awesome overall.

But look, I'm not in any way saying "my class" is perfectly classic (not that Shaman even is "my class" anymore ...) Every class should be as classic as they can, so I'm in favor of classic nerfs on any class. If someone finds proof that (say) Torpor only healed half the damage we think it does, I'll be second in line (after whoever found the evidence) to grab a torch and pitchfork and demand Nilbog make the change.

https://i.imgur.com/iWtXr7w.gif
(I'm the little guy)

Also I agree that, because of player knowledge, better connections, the "top-heaviness" of the server, etc. our the game plays a little differently from Live. I'm not denying that at all, and it may explain in part why Shaman are so popular here. They rock at 60 with Torpor, but on Live few people got 60/Torpor ... hell, I skipped straight to Quiescence, or whatever spell came next.

All I'm saying (repeatedly) is that those factors can't explain why only one class plays fundamentally differently here vs. on live.

Nycon43

08-10-2022, 10:57 PM

edit: nm

Kich867

08-16-2022, 04:47 PM

Idk loramin, bored at work so I decided to just start reading the old allakhazam enchanter forums, there's pretty thoroughly documented explanations of exactly how to use charm the way its used here. I was surprised at how many people specifically cited how incredibly fast they were leveling by charming.

There's definitely some posts suggesting that charm breaks incredibly fast, but the posts I see from enchanter's in their 30's and 40's in the year 2000, one notable post from 2000 citing "At level 16 Enchanters become the most powerful solo class in the game" and goes on to describe exactly how you would use charm to beat two monsters up and then kill them both.

"If you know how to charm you'll do just fine soloing" from 2000.

"Charm should last a good while with high charisma on a blue and wizard NPC's are by far the most damage you can get for your mana. Way more mana efficient damage then *anything* a player can do." from 2001.

Saw a handful of specific mentions of charms lasting anywhere from 2.5 minutes to 5.5 minutes without breaking.

Lots of posts of people having to explain that Charisma drastically improves how long charm lasts.

http://web.archive.org/web/20020129221717/http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/classes.html?class=13&start=450

I just started from the back and went forward while searching "charm". From what it looks like to me, a few people did figure out that enchanters were incredible at soloing and how to do it, and there was just a lot of people who never learned how to do it. The posts from the very few people citing that enchanters are primarily a grouping class are also some of the same people saying shit like Ranger's are good at tanking.

I actually have a lot more trust in the handful of people raising their hand like, "Hey...you guys know this is fuckin busted, right? Charm kiting is insane, why isn't everyone else doing this?"

Considering there are people, today, right now, that I've grouped with who still had fundamental misunderstandings about basic EQ mechanics...it's far more likely to me that charming is just a bit more mechanically complicated than the majority of other ways people soloed or grouped. Stigma also carries a ton of weight during various times...if the perception was that Charming was dangerous, despite it not actually being so, then Charming was dangerous and enchanters would all agree that it was too dangerous to do in groups and you'd get yelled at for doing it in groups. The same kind of shit applies all across a variety of games, just look at the meta from Vanilla WoW, it wasn't until just before BC dropped that people realized druids were valid raid tanks and had enormous long-term threat generation and huge damage mitigation because they were perpetually told Warriors were the only viable raid tanks. You can't even replicate that in Classic WoW because they use different talent trees now, that weird era is totally lost. There were plenty of misconceptions that were propagated that were bullshit during that time but everyone went along with because people are dumb and don't try things.

I mean just look at grouping. I've had people try to defend that grouping is the best way to level when it almost categorically isn't for most classes. People still sit in unrest spamming LFG because they think its "the best place" to level meanwhile they spend 4 hours dealing with trains and corpse runs in order to try and control like 8 blues on 22 minute timers in a full group. It's not that farfetched to me to think that most people at that point in time didn't get charm kiting because it was too complicated and the prevailing sentiment was that grouping was the only way to level.

Dolalin

08-16-2022, 05:27 PM

I spent three years archiving over 50GB of classic EQ sites and my best hunches on charm in classic are:

1) mob resists over lvl35 may have been higher in classic than they are on p99. Level 35 was a magic number for resists according to devs.

2) lots of little charm bugs that existed in classic that don't exist on p99 and would be hard to replicate (I compiled a list somewhere)

3) channeling at low levels is broken on p99, it's waaaaaay too easy to channel, a level 5 shaman succeeds like 80% of channels on p99 but only succeeded about 10% in classic, that matters

Just off the top of my head.

Kich867

08-16-2022, 05:36 PM

Ugh, my edit got eaten, but...

http://web.archive.org/web/20011202033709/http://forums.castersrealm.com/cgi-bin/eq/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=forum&f=20

Link to an in-era forum of enchanters all talking about charm kiting to solo and where best to do it...

I found another half-dozen or so posts from 2001 all recommending Charm kiting as the way for enchanters to solo, how strong it is, how enchanters are some of the best soloers, having 200 charisma allowing them to charm red cons, etc. etc.

I honestly do not see a strong case to suggest that enchanters weren't charming the same exact way they are now back then.

Some more quotes since I'm bored:

"Don't be afraid to charm at early levels. Oasis is a great place to start. Its loads of fun to charm a croc and send it after another. Just slow the enemy reptile and your pet is almost sure to win. Since these reptiles don't agro on you a succesful mem blur will get them off of you for good if charm breaks or you get into a fight you can't handle. I only had a charisma of 78 when charming blue to even cons and most charms lasted for about 2 kills.

PS People don't know much about enchanters, especially at this level, so they will think your pet is some unusual invincible croc because they won't be able to hit it until charm breaks." - 2001

"I was in FM recently and charmed a giant and all was great, except that I had a hard time controlling him, and then he seemed to be charmed for FOREVER! Is there a way to break the charm cycle???" - 2001

"As for charm, dont, thats something that takes several hours and lots of death to master, but once you do its very powerfull. I suggest learning on spectres in oasis, but its not something required for normal grouping (tho to be l33t you should be able to solo at least 5 blue mobs at once)." - 2001, joking about how enchanters can handle 5 blue mobs at once with charming...

"Using charm you can solo the whole island of spectres at a much lower level. It would also be more mana efficient on a kill by kill basis." - 2001

"As for how well charisma effects spells. At 120 cha charm will stick, but not every time and did not last long. At 160 charisma I could charm stuff higher level than me and hold them for most of a battle. At 200 cha, I can charm something red almost everytime, and hold it for most of a battle, and recharm with little or no trouble." - 2001

"Solo wise there are many ways for an enchanter to solo, I have posted one on how to solo with pets. You can also be normal and do the charm techniques. We are one of the best soloers due to the fact that when it is us vs one, we can't take just one most of the time. What we are good at is soloing 2, 3, or 4 at a time. Charm style." - 2001, emphasis mine, specifically citing that charm soloing is "the normal" thing to do.

NegaStoat

08-17-2022, 01:17 AM

Kich867, that was an amazing find. I spent over 20 minutes just browsing through the old posts from the pre Luclin era and chuckling over the comments of what players were dealing with back then. "FFA = Fighters Filch All" was classic. But I did read for myself the things you cherry picked, as well as the other posts relating to Enchanters solo play, group play, and acting as a damned party puller using Lull while keeping a charmed pet active (the chardok group post).

Unless someone can dig something up to contradict this, I think your evidence is a rock solid reference.

loramin

08-17-2022, 10:40 AM

Kich867

08-17-2022, 10:42 AM

I'm not arguing that you didn't think that, I'm arguing that your assertion that enchanters played differently in classic era than they do here looks wrong given the evidence of players discussions at the time.

You specifically said that you wouldn't find a lot of enchanters talking about doing it, or a forum of enchanters doing it, but there was a forum of enchanters talking about doing it and there were a lot of enchanters talking about doing it at the time.

There's no evidence that it was more risky back then, there's just people saying that it is risky. But there's also lots of posts of people doing actual research at the time and proving that it probably wasn't as risky as people claimed it to be. The consensus I read from this history is that: people thought it was risky because they were dumb and considering enchanters seemed to prioritize Int over Cha at the time and so it DID break more often for them because they didn't properly invest.

There's even a bunch of posts of people basically saying: "I initially went for int, and then I rerolled High Elf to go into Charisma, and the difference in charm duration is huge."

It's incredibly clear that by 2001, people were finally starting to understand charm and how powerful it was, how to build properly around doing it, and how to convince people it was safe to do. Like I said, stigma carries a lot of weight--if the general consensus at the time was that charm was dangerous, then it was dangerous regardless of whether it actually was. Maybe you were just one of those people that always heard it was dangerous and broke all the time and just followed suit while people were out there ballin with their charmed pets?

If Enchanter solo charming (or even group charming) was such a common thing in '99-'01, there should be lots of people saying as much back then.

To be clear--there are lots of people saying that at that time. Almost every single mention of Charm in what I've posted is people citing how strong it is as a solo option. I'm sorry but I don't trust the handful of people saying "charm broke all the time and is too dangerous to do" over the people who posted their Charisma breakpoints for charm durations and did actual testing on the subject demonstrating that it was definitely the way to do things.

I'd absolutely concede P99 might not have it _perfectly right_, but how could they? There were multiple posts of people talking about how their charmed pets would last several fights, or upwards of 5 minutes in length before breaking. The evidence doesn't align with, and I hope I'm not putting words in your mouth but I thought I saw you say this earlier--your assertion that charm broke in seconds and never actually lasted long enough to be safe and viable regularly. Given the fact there was a pretty steady discourse around whether Enchanters should stack Int or Cha, it means you had a large enough playerbase who didn't invest in Charisma, who would inevitably complain that Charm broke too often to be safe and reliable, compared to P99 where every enchanter is cranking the shit out of charisma and understands how it actually works.

loramin

08-17-2022, 11:47 AM

You specifically said that you wouldn't find a lot of enchanters talking about doing it, or a forum of enchanters doing it, but there was a forum of enchanters talking about doing it and there were a lot of enchanters talking about doing it at the time.

First off, I'd point out that literally every post at your link is from at least ten days after Luclin was released.

Bigger picture though, I think we're talking past each other, so let me try a different tact. At that same forum you provided, I happened to find this interesting post about ... Chardok AoE (https://web.archive.org/web/20020102181833/http://forums.castersrealm.com/cgi-bin/eq/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=9&t=006193). As that link clearly shows, people did AoE in Chardok in classic! There is zero doubt: Chardok AoEing happened in the classic era.

But that fact doesn't tell the whole story: it was also a very rare practice. And yet ... just a few years ago, you could not use that zone on Blue as a normal player: it was monopolized by AoE groups saying "hey, this was done in classic, we can do it here".

For years here, the AoE classes (including Enchanters) argued "this is 100% classic" ... while everyone else was saying "our Chardok looks nothing like the Chardok I remember when I played on live." It took awhile, but ultimately the staff did agree, and implemented the "unclassic" AoE limit. In retrospect, I think most here would agree that it made our server far more classic, not less.

Similarly here, yes we had Enchanters soloing in classic ... but anyone who played in classic remembers the holy trinity used to start every group: Enchanter, Cleric, and Tank. You couldn't always find all three, but you could find an Enchanter just as easily as you could find a Cleric, because both classes grouped primarily.

In fact, it's almost like Enchanters were such a primary part of grouping that other classes would go to the Enchanter forum and ask them for advice about grouping with them (https://web.archive.org/web/20020102184749/http://forums.castersrealm.com/cgi-bin/eq/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=9&t=006175) (again, from your link).

may i take the opportunity to ask you chanters, what you wish from your warriors? dont come with the very usual things like /assist. i know that one, else i wouldnt live to tell.

and my main is a cleric. so if you have any wishes to a cleric that i am not aware of yet, please feel so free to give me some hints here, too.

I promise, you won't find such posts on (say) the Necromancer or Mage forums, because those weren't primarily grouping classes in classic.

So, again, I'm not trying to get Charm removed from the game, and I'm not trying to make it impossible for an Enchanters to solo! I'm simply trying to make things on P99 look like the classic servers everyone played on from '99-'01, where charm was just a bit riskier, and so a lot more Enchanters grouped, because it was the fastest way for them to level in classic.

And ... we already have suggestions for how to do that, from people that know far more about classic evidence than either of us ... like Dolalin on the very first page of this thread:

I spent three years archiving over 50GB of classic EQ sites and my best hunches on charm in classic are:

1) mob resists over lvl35 may have been higher in classic than they are on p99. Level 35 was a magic number for resists according to devs.

2) lots of little charm bugs that existed in classic that don't exist on p99 and would be hard to replicate (I compiled a list somewhere)

3) channeling at low levels is broken on p99, it's waaaaaay too easy to channel, a level 5 shaman succeeds like 80% of channels on p99 but only succeeded about 10% in classic, that matters

Just off the top of my head.

oldschoolguy

08-17-2022, 11:50 AM

I'm aruging charm was more risky in classic

It wasn't, it was easier to charm in classic IMO. Shit breaks too much on P99.

I was charming yellow con crocs to fight red con crocks on live, was fun. I can't pull that off here, since here it's all based off level difference so attempting to Charm a yellow = suicide here. On live it worked fine.

Kich867

08-17-2022, 11:58 AM

Similarly here, yes we had Enchanters soloing in classic ... but anyone who played in classic remembers the holy trinity used to start every group: Enchanter, Cleric, and Tanks. You couldn't always find all three, but you could find an Enchanter just as easily as you could find a Cleric, because both classes grouped primarily.

--

For years here, the AoE classes (including Enchanters) argued "this is 100% classic" ... while everyone else was saying "our Chardok looks nothing like the Chardok I remember when I played on live." It took awhile, but ultimately the staff did agree, and implemented the "unclassic" AoE limit. In retrospect, I think most here would agree that it made our server far more classic, not less.

So, just so I understand, your proposal is to nerf charming not because it was actually mechanically different, but because you want to try to align the playstyles with how you think people played back then?

Also, which posts are you referring to being in Luclin era? Everything I posted that I saw was before the release date of Luclin, which was December 4th 2001. (this is also kind of a weak argument even if its correct from your position as you've already cited that early Luclin is also "basically classic")

Regardless, the consensus from the posts is quite clear, enchanters were great at soloing and charming was the normal way to do it. It was commonplace for them to do it.

Of course there were people talking about grouping with them, it's EQ, people have always thought it was a group-centric game and primarily focused on how to optimize grouping.

People grouped way more in era than they do here, your proposal would be that we penalize soloing to make it more classic?

You just cited an objectively non-classic change to make the game more classic as reasoning to adjust charm, so which is it? Either charm mechanically is about the same as it was in-era and you want it changed to make the game feel more classic, or it actually was riskier back then and you want it changed to be mechanically correct. Given the evidence though I don't see the latter as being a strong argument with the amount of enchanters back then talking about charm soloing and using charms in groups and having charms last for minutes at a time with no issue.

And again, to be clear, there absolutely were enchanters "shouting form the rooftops" about how good charm soloing was. It's not their fault people either weren't listening to them or they didn't learn how to do it. And I'll reiterate that, I place a great deal more trust in the posts of people who were actually testing charm and its limits in-era and demonstrating how good it was over a bunch of people thinking grouping is "the one true way". I mean, ffs, people still think that here, right now. Talk to any casual observer of EQ who isn't an avid P99 player and they'll tell you that no one could solo, grouping was mandatory, and a bunch of other wrong things. But the reality is that it was true at the time. But I also don't think we should change the game to artificially create an environment that functions more like how people _experienced_ classic EQ because you can never, ever actually achieve that again. We know too much.

If in-era people didn't understand how a certain spawn cycle worked, and so the classic era experience was that you just sort of eventually got lucky with the spawn, and people figured it out in P99, would it be your perspective that the staff should somehow change and randomize that spawn cycle to maintain the mystery, because the in-era experience was that people did not know how it worked?

loramin

08-17-2022, 12:10 PM

Also, which posts are you referring to being in Luclin era? Everything I posted that I saw was before the release date of Luclin, which was December 4th 2001.

Sorry, my apologies. I went exploring from your link, wound up a few pages past onto the general forum on that same link (https://web.archive.org/web/20011217214246/http://forums.castersrealm.com/cgi-bin/eq/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=forum&f=9), thought I'd clicked back enough to get to your link, but was on the wrong page.

Again apologies, and please disregard the first sentence of my post.

As for the rest, no I am not arguing:

So, just so I understand, your proposal is to nerf charming not because it was actually mechanically different, but because you want to try to align the playstyles with how you think people played back then?

Honestly, did you even finish reading my post? At the end, I quoted classic researcher Dolalin listing mechanical differences.

Of course there were people talking about grouping with them, it's EQ, people have always thought it was a group-centric game and primarily focused on how to optimize grouping.

People grouped way more in era than they do here, your proposal would be that we penalize soloing to make it more classic?

You're ignoring that most classes were not central parts of grouping. Yes, Magicians and Necromancers did group in classic! But they primarily soloed. Yes, Clerics and tanks 100% soloed in classic! But primarily they grouped. Different classes had different solo/group ratios, because of the mechanics of the game.

Sure things here are slightly different (eg. we have more player knowledge), but my argument is that Enchanter is the only class on P99 with a fundamentally different ratio from live. Pick any class, and say whether they mainly group or solo here (or have a roughly even split), and you'll find that on live it had roughly the same general solo/grouping ratio ... except with Enchanters.

Like I keep saying, if you make a Street Fighter 2 emulator and no one wants to Dragon Punch with Ryu, you don't have to know what's wrong with the mechanics specifically to know the mechanics are off. You know the emulator is a bad emulator, because people wanted to Dragon Punch with Ryu in the original game.

But in our case we do have some ideas about known unclassic mechanics ... again Dolalin outlined some, and I copied his quote in my last post.

Malk

08-17-2022, 12:30 PM

http://web.archive.org/web/20020313173941/http://eq.castersrealm.com/balance/VIEW.ASP?ID=71

Implementing this 'feature' could actually be fun.

commongood

08-17-2022, 12:32 PM

Sure things here are slightly different (eg. we have more player knowledge), but my argument is that Enchanter is the only class on P99 with a fundamentally different ratio from live. Pick any class, and say whether they mainly group or solo here (or have a roughly even split), and you'll find that on live it had roughly the same general solo/grouping ratio ...

What ratio is that? How did you measure that? Surveyed P99 players? Ensuring representation? Or are you simply relying on anecdotes? “Everyone knows”, “we all remember” etc etc. You have stuck to your narrative and no matter who brings what evidence (old forum posts which, earlier you used to propel your own arguments) to debunk this narrative you keep on refusing to consider you might be wrong

Kich867

08-17-2022, 12:33 PM

To be clear, I asked that because you cited non-classic changes as a means to make the game feel more classic...presumably as a reason to nerf charm. To me this is a binary perspective--you would either support nerfing charm to make it feel more classic even though its mechanically "the same" here, or you would support nerfing charm because it actually isn't mechanically "the same" and there's an issue with it. I didn't see any other reason you would bring up an objectively un-classic AOE nerf to make the game feel more "classic" other than to use it as a reference to say: "Even if Charm actually did work this way back then, I don't care, it wasn't in the spirit of Classic and it should be changed, just like this unclassic AOE change that we all agree made the game more classic."

Look I totally get that your point is:
"If Charm was this good, then why did no one do this regularly? The answer must be that charm is different here."

And my point is:
"I actually looked through all this stuff and the consensus was clearly that enchanters just didn't know. It's a complicated class and given that a large portion of the playerbase clearly didn't understand how important Charisma was, it's not surprising that the status quo was that Charm was too dangerous and unreliable.

But there actually was a rather common perspective that charm soloing was incredibly fast to level, and really just the existence of a few people saying that invalidates any amount of people who had already made up their mind that enchanters were a grouping centric class."

Also, because I know this was important to you earlier, I also have absolutely no dog in this race. I've never leveled an enchanter past I think.. 8? And that was on live in Kunark era. I've basically never played one and I don't have one here.

loramin

08-17-2022, 01:01 PM

To be clear, I asked that because you cited non-classic changes as a means to make the game feel more classic

I cited an example of the staff making a classic change. Again, almost everyone would agree that the 25 mob AoE limit makes things more classic, not less. Chardok looks more like it did in '99-'01 with that change.

But I also made it very clear (if you actually read my post) that we don't need any new mechanics here, we just need the unclassic ones (eg. the ones Dolalin outlined, though his post is likely not conclusive either) fixed to be classic.

Look I totally get that your point is:
"If Charm was this good, then why did no one do this regularly? The answer must be that charm is different here."

No, that's not my point. I've repeated my point over and over in this thread, so by now it's clear you're choosing to replace the argument I'm making with a simplified version that you can more easily argue with ... which is to say you're using the straw man fallacy (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man).

Kich867

08-17-2022, 01:14 PM

I cited an example of the staff making a classic change. Again, almost everyone would agree that the 25 mob AoE limit makes things more classic, not less. Chardok looks more like it did in '99-'01 with that change.

But I also made it very clear (if you actually read my post) that we don't need any new mechanics here, we just need the unclassic ones (eg. the ones Dolalin outlined, though his post is likely not conclusive either) fixed to be classic.

Then I don't understand why you'd even bring it up to begin with, it seemed to hurt what I thought was your perspective that Charm is mechanically not classic by citing an example of a change to artificially create a more classic environment even though that's not how it actually worked.

No, that's not my point. I've repeated my point over and over in this thread, so by now it's clear you're choosing to replace the argument I'm making with a simplified version that you can more easily argue with ... which is to say you're using the straw man fallacy (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man).

Then I'm sorry, I genuinely don't get your point then. I've read all your posts and that was literally my best attempt at summarizing what I thought you were trying to say.

Danth

08-17-2022, 01:40 PM

Almost every single mention of Charm in what I've posted is people citing how strong it is as a solo option.

Most of those examples which provide level ranges also describe charm as not holding very well when used against level appropriate content. Most of the charm solo'ing described is of the "charm and let the mobs beat each other down" variety with frequent need to re-charm, not so much the "charm one mob and hold it for three hours while it barely ever breaks early" type that is probably the larger issue for this specific thread.

The sort of hard evidence required to enact change (average durations at different level ranges and different CHA values) probably does not exist. I wouldn't want to see the pendulum swing too far in the other direction so for the meantime I maintain a wait and see attitude.

Danth