Would EQ be more fun if they made it hard again?

[Wakanda]

Possibly sounds like click-bait, but it's not.

Like what if they tuned the mobs to be more challenging, so instead of your group chain pulling an entire dungeon, your group struggled to handle one camp, like the good ol' days?

I'm really referring more to the raid scene than anything though. As a kid there was nothing more terrifying than zoning into the Plane of Fear or Plane of Hate. You could actually die instantly and may not be able to get your corpse back, perhaps ever.

The first time I got invited to raid on P99 it was Plane of Fear. Green server back when the server was still fairly new. I remember being so nervous and opening a beer to calm my nerves as we met up outside the portal. There wasn't enough people for us to do the raid, we only had like 15 people, I kept hoping more people would show up, but it was looking more and more like they were going to have to call it.

And then I got confused because they said to zone in? With 15 people? Are you insane? I don't want to lose my corpse, I just joined this guild a few hours ago. Against my better judgment, I zone in anyways, and am confused with how I'm full mana 99% of the time (as a Cleric), and how easily we're clearing the zone. And also how plentiful loot was.

Anyone who played back in the day knows that you normally raided the Planes with dozens upon dozens of players. I remember having close to 100 players at times, and having to stare at the ground to keep my computer from crashing. Despite having this many players we still regularly wiped and had hellacious corpse recoveries.

And yes, loot felt dramatically more rare. Perhaps this was because I was competing with 8 other dudes in the raid, since again, there was way more players in a raid? But honestly I feel like the drop rates were just way lower. Like I never saw a flayed turmoil skin belt drop in 1999, but I've seen them drop multiple times every time I've raided Fear on P99.

Also I remember spending months trying to get my last pieces of Woven Shadow, and I had seniority on them. We cleared all the abhorrents and the stuff just didn't drop. I also had a Cleric friend who despite raiding Hate for years, never completed their full purple look. Meanwhile on green I had characters getting full planar in a single raid.

Like I don't know. I think the game might actually be more fun if they tuned raiding to be way harder, and maybe made the loot slightly more rare, to where getting a piece of planar gear is a huge achievement and not the equivalent of welfare loot (a WoW term, I don't mean that to disparage anyone).

Or maybe I'm out of touch? Maybe raiding was easier on other servers, and I've seen some interviews with Brad where he addressed the planes being treated as a place where you get free armor. But man I swear I struggled really hard on my server just to get basic planar stuff :D

[Wakanda]

Also to make raiding the planes truly classic, you could make players load in sporadically at different times. I feel like that was a big cause of wipes "back in the day." We all tried to zone in at the same time, but would actually finish loading minutes apart from each other, so players would get picked off, or panic and aggro a bunch of extra mobs, lmao.

[Rygar]

Over tuning mobs doesn't make the game better. They tried this in SoL or PoP in the end game zone (forget which), gave some minis something crazy like 3 million HPs and took end game geared guild like 45 mins of tank and spank. EQ got blasted hard after that for being a dumb time sink, and devs reacted swiftly to down tune the content and add different features to the bosses.

P99 can make some simple changes (which require no coding, simply policy change) to make life more classic and challenging: no longer summon rotted corpses, no longer restore accidental destroys or drop transfers, no transferring of raid loot even if on encounter log, no restoring deleted accounts.

This was classic as fuck. Real death fear no longer exists on P99, staff should not do corpse restores. Period.

For coding changes: fix the mana cap / mana values (everyone gets the nerf bat here), make channeling classic, adjust charm to classic rates. This would objectively make all content harder (i.e. more classic).

[Rygar]

Forgot: no longer reimburse botched quests because you gave wrong item to NPC, boo hoo. This was also classic as fuck and would remove a huge GM burden for item restores

[Duik]

Ive said it before in another thread.
Throttle ya bandwidth down to 56k. For old times sake.

Getting 70 -100 on a raid is prolly fantasy, there were 1000 - 2000 per server at times back then. Maybe tuned to be bronze/ class armor clad tanks needing 30 odd.
I did a naggy raid with 60 odd and lagged out while moving and i ran into a giant people said. (I didnt see obviously). My wizzie didnt tank real well. I was wearing cultural chain. Classy...

[Ekco]

I totally feel you, Wakanda! The game's lost its edge, and it's time to bring back the good ol' days of challenging raids and rare loot. I mean, who doesn't remember the thrill of zoning into the Plane of Fear with a 100-man raid team and praying to the EQ gods that you wouldn't get insta-gibbed? The game needs a serious difficulty rebalance, and I'm not just talking about tweaking a few mob stats. I'm talking about a full-on overhaul of the raid scene. Make it harder, make it more rewarding, and for the love of all things holy, make loot rare again! Welfare loot has got to go, and we need to bring back the sense of accomplishment that comes with earning your gear. So, who's with me on this? Let's make EQ great again!

[Swish]

I'm really referring more to the raid scene than anything though. As a kid there was nothing more terrifying than zoning into the Plane of Fear or Plane of Hate. You could actually die instantly and may not be able to get your corpse back, perhaps ever.

What we have here is an "old server" problem. In the past (like 10-12 years ago) the more casual guilds would occasionally wipe doing a break in and sometimes have to call on another guild to come and bail them out.

Unfortunately at 15-16 years of blue and 8(?) years of Velious, people are geared to the teeth...the most committed are probably BIS on 4-5 characters or crazier.

Do planar break in attempts fail on green or is everyone tooled up by now?

[WarpathEQ]

For the most part P99 does a great job of emulating the classic environment (better than any other project out there) aside from a few things mentioned that it seems the Devs are focused on resolving (i.e. classic channeling and spell resists that make things like charm and pacify less guaranteed).

To me a lot of the "imbalance" referenced here is a function of a time locked progression server. Having everyone run around in full velious gear at lvl 5 is undoubtedly a massive impact on the feeling of ease as one progresses through the world. Even the folks trying to do self found are massively boosted by basically being gifted all loot in any group they join as everyone else has an abundance of gear/plat.

In true classic live as better loot became available there wasn't enough time to create such a surplus that it trickled down to brand new players (twinking was always a thing but it was like a fungi, weapon, and haste item not a full suit of skyshrine armor or better). Players were focused on exploring new expansions and learning new mobs, mechanics, and furthering their primary character.

I joined P99 green after it was already in velious so I didn't get a chance to experience a fresh server yet but I would imagine the sentiment on day 1 of green wasn't that this was some unclassic detuned server that was way too easy. I'm sure when everyone is running around with rusty weapons and the definition of twinking is banded armor that the difficulty level would align with what we recall of our classic experience. Just more evidence that its time for a fresh server.

[cd288]

I would agree with no more corpse summons even though I have taken advantage of it at times.

The loot thing is totally tangential. People are saying "loot was more rare" but that's just your own personal memory. You need to display actual evidence that it was. My understanding is that the current drop rates are as close as we can get based on in-era sources, source code, etc.

As far as people being twinked and the server being mudflated, that is a solveable issue by rolling a new server once the existing one reaches a certain point in the timeline. Green can be merged with Blue and a fresh server rolled out which solves the twink issue for a period of time.

[WarpathEQ]

I would agree with no more corpse summons even though I have taken advantage of it at times.

The loot thing is totally tangential. People are saying "loot was more rare" but that's just your own personal memory. You need to display actual evidence that it was. My understanding is that the current drop rates are as close as we can get based on in-era sources, source code, etc.

As far as people being twinked and the server being mudflated, that is a solveable issue by rolling a new server once the existing one reaches a certain point in the timeline. Green can be merged with Blue and a fresh server rolled out which solves the twink issue for a period of time.

Would be pretty insteresting if on the day of Luclin release in the classic timeline the existing server automatically merged with any prior end of timeline servers and a new server automatically began.

[wuanahto]

nah, live tried that and look how that turned out and where we ended up.

[Gozuk]

Actually it's the opposite for me. I'm playing on The Hero's Journey server and it's the most fun I've had on EQ in a good while.

[shovelquest]

I love live TLP servers! They are so easy and fun.

[Ciderpress]

It's not just the game itself there are peripheral problems that I don't think can possibly be solved. Discord alone totally cheeses so many aspects of the game. Not voice chat per se, discord specifically.

That being said I fully agree with everything in the op. Also raid leaders here seem to get way angrier when somebody messes up. Every guild has some asshole that just frightens newer members because oh my god how could you mess up this thing you've never done before gawwwwd.

[richice]

The fact that it doesn’t cost anything to make multiple accounts also impacts the game. How many guilds have a raid team of just shared accounts that are more geared than the players driving them?

[Old_PVP]

First, they need to revert all non-classic changes they ever made to the server. Second, they need the classic UI. Ban all custom UIs. Disable all voice chat programs. So much QoL now, people have forgotten what classic was really like. And wtf, do necros even summon corpses anymore? Don't think i've ever seen someone seeking the services of a necro.

[shovelquest]

Maybe just have to wait till nerualink is a thing and when you sit down to play a game your brain gets adjusted to think it's 1999 and to think youre a kid again.

[Duik]

No one here was a kid in 1999

[Ekco]

No one here was a kid in 1999

tons were, especially those that are interested in the emu scene because EQ was our first experience with adult rpgs in general and had such an insane impact on us.

i was 13, i had only been playing MTG for like a year maybe and had been playing DnD 2e for like 4 months maybe with a age gap of like 15 years to the next youngest player in the group at the magic shop before hearing about everquest because someone was in the beta that played DnD

i was quite literally that "i'm 12 years old and what is this" meme to everybody that came to that store because i was a only child lol

[shovelquest]

I did well in school so I got to buy a new game and then i failed all my classes.

[Duik]

@Ekco
I was 34 in 1999 and I'm more into the eqemu scene than most. Well outwardly anyways. Given your recent posts I'm not suprised you are into a way to manipulate the emu server in creative ways.
I've been squirreling away lua and perl code that wouldn't stand up to a 1000 player server (like here for example) but more of a proof of concept type thing.
I prefer perl but lua seems to be the prefered scripting lingo. Poop.

*Good* C/c++ is a lil beyond me. I can follow it to the sections i wish to investigate/change but i wouldnt push any of my changes.

@Shovel
Failed classes hey, that would explain alot ;+p

[Rygar]

Timelock specific rules would be interesting. To help with the alt problem off the top of my head, all gear no drop, disable all multi quest. To prevent parking alts for loot, all gear gets limits to equip based on the zone it dropped in. Example: all loot in velks requires level 45 to equip.

Now you don't have a million jade maces flying around, money is kind of useless except for gems / trade skills. Bigger market for crafted gear (which also needs equip limits).

[Ciderpress]

I did well in school so I got to buy a new game and then i failed all my classes.

Haha yeah my academic performance took a nosedive because of ultima online and everquest. Luckily for me that was just late middleschool, and then EQ launched when I was in 9th grade as a highschool freshman. Failed math twice, then had to take it in summerschool and aced it cause it was the only class I had to take, leaving plenty of time to work on my shaman epic which was the real priority.

[Sadre Spinegnawer]

If you made everything no trade no drop, you could use that one change to alter how both grouping and raiding works. Tagging along to loot an item, buying loot rights, would replace EC.

Would require much more social interaction than the current group-guild model of acquiring pixels. And, would end sizable part of what otherwise happens in EC.

Decrease corpse rot times to 5 minutes or else this gets gamed quickly too.

[cd288]

The fact that it doesn’t cost anything to make multiple accounts also impacts the game. How many guilds have a raid team of just shared accounts that are more geared than the players driving them?

This is probably the thing I hate the most about the end game raiding scene. It totally makes everything boring and trivial.

You have armies of bots, COTH bots, several cleric bots parked at every possible major raid target, etc.

I miss raiding from back in the day where for the most part everyone played their own characters. It created actual motivation to roll a certain class because you'd be valuable and wanted, and it could make a real impact on your guild's raid force. Now it's like why would I ever roll a cleric? The guilds already have tons of bot clerics parked everywhere. Shit, there are even tank bots all over the place so why roll a tank?

It just makes raiding way less challenging. I would love if they found some way to limit or ban bots altogether.

[onmove_broke]

If you want to make the game "Harder" start a new server and make it 100% classic. Classic UI, Looking at your book till 35 etc. Giving mobs more HP and just making every mob a sponge is boring.

The problem is everyone knows what items to get, where to exp, what to avoid and where to fight. You would need to make the game completely different..like adding new zones, switching up loot, creating new mobs with loot tables. I do not think any of the ideas here make the game harder but just more annoying and will drive people away. Not many people have 10+ hours a day to play a 25 year old game either, so you limit the amount of people who play.

I think a game like Evercraft or Monsters and memories will scratch that itch.

[Ciderpress]

If you want to make the game "Harder" start a new server and make it 100% classic. Classic UI, Looking at your book till 35 etc. Giving mobs more HP and just making every mob a sponge is boring.

The problem is everyone knows what items to get, where to exp, what to avoid and where to fight. You would need to make the game completely different..like adding new zones, switching up loot, creating new mobs with loot tables. I do not think any of the ideas here make the game harder but just more annoying and will drive people away. Not many people have 10+ hours a day to play a 25 year old game either, so you limit the amount of people who play.

I think a game like Evercraft or Monsters and memories will scratch that itch.

This is such a dead horse topic. If they could make it 100% classic in terms of the client, they would. There are limitations because it's the titanium client, not the original velious-era client, so they get as close as they can. You *do* have to open your spellbook on p99 to med until the point in the timeline where that was removed. They can't make the spellbook take up the entire screen though, because the little letterbox window view is completely missing from the titanium client.

Making "unclassic" changes to rules and certain mechanics in order to curb unclassic behavior is not itself an unclassic endeavor; the original devs in 1999 were also changing things on the fly to respond to emergent player behavior. They literally cannot make both the client and how everyone plays the game identical to 1999, so they do the best they can to make it close.

[shovelquest]

If you made everything no trade no drop, you could use that one change to alter how both grouping and raiding works. Tagging along to loot an item, buying loot rights, would replace EC.

Would require much more social interaction than the current group-guild model of acquiring pixels. And, would end sizable part of what otherwise happens in EC.

Decrease corpse rot times to 5 minutes or else this gets gamed quickly too.

Has there been a live server that did that?

I agree that would be dope. Id love to try a full no drop server. Although that would make camping things pointless so maybe it's a total failure.

But I'm curious if it'd be a fun progression server.

[Sadre Spinegnawer]

Has there been a live server that did that?

I agree that would be dope. Id love to try a full no drop server. Although that would make camping things pointless so maybe it's a total failure.

But I'm curious if it'd be a fun progression server.

How would it make camps pointless? People still need the drops. So players would have to figure out a system with other players, to get said drops.

This both creates new social interaction as well as potential for cornering camps. So, guilds still relevant as camp breakers.

I'm assuming a p99 eq. Anything live dies b/c subs = Russian yachts.

[WarpathEQ]

Login accounts are IP locked with no IP exemptions would be interesting. Sure there would still be work arounds like VPN that people would use to create additional accounts but perameters could be set to elminate the proliferation of bot armys and the ability for people to swap around to multiple accounts in quick succession.

Just like back in classic live there was a rare person that had multiple computers and funds to pay for multiple monthly subscriptions but it was a big enough hurdle that it was by far the exception not the meta.

[Ciderpress]

Login accounts are IP locked with no IP exemptions would be interesting. Sure there would still be work arounds like VPN that people would use to create additional accounts but perameters could be set to elminate the proliferation of bot armys and the ability for people to swap around to multiple accounts in quick succession.

Just like back in classic live there was a rare person that had multiple computers and funds to pay for multiple monthly subscriptions but it was a big enough hurdle that it was by far the exception not the meta.

Fully agree with this and the idea that account sharing in general and being able to have an arbitrary number of accounts is a major contributor to the problem here. Sharing your login credentials with others was never against the rules iirc, but many fewer people did it because the stakes are higher when you're paying for the account, and you know that your buddy Jimbo might get your character killed in an unrecoverable place and the GM's won't just restore it after it decays.

[cd288]

Info sharing was also dampened by the fact that if you did get banned or your corpse rotted, we just didn't have the same amount of knowledge with respect to getting a character leveled up really fast.

Today, if you lost your character/account and you're in a big guild one of the Bards can just swarm kite to PL you back up to 60 relatively quickly (or at least into the 50s relatively quickly). There's just no risk to it anymore.

[Wakanda]

Info sharing was also dampened by the fact that if you did get banned or your corpse rotted, we just didn't have the same amount of knowledge with respect to getting a character leveled up really fast.

Today, if you lost your character/account and you're in a big guild one of the Bards can just swarm kite to PL you back up to 60 relatively quickly (or at least into the 50s relatively quickly). There's just no risk to it anymore.

That's a really good point too. Your main character was truly your main character. Most people didn't just re-roll a new character because they decided another class was discovered to be over-powered. I remember having one of the highest level monks on our server and having people message me to tell me they were shocked at how much damage I was doing since we didn't really have any data to go on or any clue how strong the class may be at higher levels when the game first came out. But by that point we were all level 50ish in the Planes, no one even considered completely re-rolling to make a monk to be a viable idea.

I also suspect that the experience on P99 is way faster than what was original, but IDK if that's true or not? It felt like back in the day I spent months leveling in Overthere (30-40?) before I got high enough level to go to Dreadlands. I mean having to come home from school, spend hours LFG, trying to slowly solo while dodging dragoons, then getting a group for a few hours before bed time and the exp was really damn slow. Now I go to OT and just plow through 30-40 in like a day or two.

Like obviously we are way more knowledgeable now, but sometimes I wonder if the exp granted on P99 is actually faster than it was in original EQ?

[Wakanda]

If you want to make the game "Harder" start a new server and make it 100% classic. Classic UI, Looking at your book till 35 etc. Giving mobs more HP and just making every mob a sponge is boring.

The problem is everyone knows what items to get, where to exp, what to avoid and where to fight. You would need to make the game completely different..like adding new zones, switching up loot, creating new mobs with loot tables. I do not think any of the ideas here make the game harder but just more annoying and will drive people away. Not many people have 10+ hours a day to play a 25 year old game either, so you limit the amount of people who play.

I think a game like Evercraft or Monsters and memories will scratch that itch.
By harder I didn't necessarily mean grindier. The grind on Pantheon is one of the things that really turns me off right now. It feels like unless I am going to log into the game for a solid 6 hours I might as well just go do something else. So a lot of times I want to play, but realize I can't make any meaningful progress with the amount of time I have available to actually be in the game.

With EQ I always felt like 2-3 hours in the game was rewarding even if it was only spent traveling or trying to auction items.

[Wakanda]

This is probably the thing I hate the most about the end game raiding scene. It totally makes everything boring and trivial.

You have armies of bots, COTH bots, several cleric bots parked at every possible major raid target, etc.

I miss raiding from back in the day where for the most part everyone played their own characters. It created actual motivation to roll a certain class because you'd be valuable and wanted, and it could make a real impact on your guild's raid force. Now it's like why would I ever roll a cleric? The guilds already have tons of bot clerics parked everywhere. Shit, there are even tank bots all over the place so why roll a tank?

It just makes raiding way less challenging. I would love if they found some way to limit or ban bots altogether.
This is a valid point too. I mean if I die and someone is going to log onto a cleric and instantly 96% rez me, maybe even give me some buffs and a POTG, I'm obviously going to take it, but the game feels really trivialized right now, even from a leveling experience. I bet there's a 90% chance if I go to City of Mist on the character I'm leveling right now, some friendly Druid will show up and give me POTG, which is awesome and nice of them, but a lot of times when I'm in these zones, I don't feel like it's classic.

I grouped with a husband/wife duo who were warrior and cleric and they asked me to stop CC'ing and slowing mobs because it was faster for him to just mow everything down. And it turned out he was right. (Full Skyshrine armor on both of them, insane weapons, haste items and drive by buffs from guild mates). Like that to me is not really a classic experience even though the people are nice and it's better than solo'ing.

And also it triggers me how Magicians did kind of get relegated to COTH bots because I remember Magician as being a badass class back in the day (they still are pretty bad ass on P99 before Kunark launches). I feel like Enchanters charm being so damn good has made Magicians feel a lot weaker because their pets dull in comparison. I never got that vibe from Magicians before. But I also didn't know really any Enchanters who were reliably charming the way we do now. But it feels like an indirect nerf to magicians in terms of relative power.

[shovelquest]

I also suspect that the experience on P99 is way faster than what was original, but IDK if that's true or not?

It was but only because we were conditioned to it. Like for example, the pop, and skill of people both reduced the rate of kills in a group situation. A chain pulling group in 1999 or 2000 would be so boring for todays standards.

In Mistmore, you had a group at the pond, and in the little cubby behind the gargoyles and one in the canyon on live. But here it's pond.

So leveling was way slower on account of just how much slower we killed and population, and lack of knowledge of all the camps contributed to it too I'm sure.

[aaezil]

Its not really that its so much easier of a server its just people arent clueless noobs now and will do things like bard kite the fear ent so everyone doesnt insta die on zone in. derp.

[cd288]

Like obviously we are way more knowledgeable now, but sometimes I wonder if the exp granted on P99 is actually faster than it was in original EQ?

Think it's been confirmed that EXP isn't faster. There's a bunch of different reasons it feels faster...knowledge of the game and how to play the class and how to most efficiently level and kill a mob, gearing of characters, don't have to be as careful because you know you can get a 96% clicky rez easily, etc.

And also it triggers me how Magicians did kind of get relegated to COTH bots because I remember Magician as being a badass class back in the day (they still are pretty bad ass on P99 before Kunark launches). I feel like Enchanters charm being so damn good has made Magicians feel a lot weaker because their pets dull in comparison. I never got that vibe from Magicians before. But I also didn't know really any Enchanters who were reliably charming the way we do now. But it feels like an indirect nerf to magicians in terms of relative power.

I don't think it has anything to do with Enchanters, it just has to do with the fact that as people have gotten more knowledgeable with the game everyone has realized that Mages aren't really useful in those latter levels beyond COTH and mod rods. In fact, their pets are more often than not a risk and a hindrance due to pathing etc. and barely add much DPS to a high end encounter like a raid, etc.

[Ciderpress]

Which invites the question, why are people willing to pay almost a mil plat for an earth staff? If the class is so meh here, why is it so seemingly imperative for a mage to finish their epic?

Is it just the most expensive fashion quest ever or something?

[WarpathEQ]

Which invites the question, why are people willing to pay almost a mil plat for an earth staff? If the class is so meh here, why is it so seemingly imperative for a mage to finish their epic?

Is it just the most expensive fashion quest ever or something?

Mostly likely solo quest stuff. Secondarily it makes a decent tank and solid dps against naggy/vox compared to lvl 52 dps. Lastly, can be an effective tool for powerleveling

But I agree seems way overpriced, from what I understand water staff with water pet is a pretty solid alternative. Most importantly its for the loot completionist memes.

[Rygar]

It's funny reading stuff while bug researching. Apparently there was huge consensus that rogues were the worst class, even after evade became a thing. I'm talking into velious here, everyone talking how they can't do damage output good enough because they draw too much agro.

I even remember during classic when everyone was saying enchanter class was broken. "So dumb, our animations cant listen to us and get us killed" and frankly not understanding their spells. I don't think it was until kunark that folks started thinking enchanter was a powerful class to have in a group

[cd288]

It's funny reading stuff while bug researching. Apparently there was huge consensus that rogues were the worst class, even after evade became a thing. I'm talking into velious here, everyone talking how they can't do damage output good enough because they draw too much agro.

I even remember during classic when everyone was saying enchanter class was broken. "So dumb, our animations cant listen to us and get us killed" and frankly not understanding their spells. I don't think it was until kunark that folks started thinking enchanter was a powerful class to have in a group

Careful, you're going to set Loramin off if you suggest that Enchanters weren't as good in classic because people simply didn't understand the most efficient way to play the class rather than them being unclassic on P99

[shovelquest]

Well funny enough they weren't... :o

https://project1999.com/forums/showpost.php?p=3700313&postcount=81

[Wakanda]

It's funny reading stuff while bug researching. Apparently there was huge consensus that rogues were the worst class, even after evade became a thing. I'm talking into velious here, everyone talking how they can't do damage output good enough because they draw too much agro.

I even remember during classic when everyone was saying enchanter class was broken. "So dumb, our animations cant listen to us and get us killed" and frankly not understanding their spells. I don't think it was until kunark that folks started thinking enchanter was a powerful class to have in a group

I mained a Rogue (and a Monk) in true classic. It's true that I felt ridiculously weak in a lot of aspects. I would regularly get aggro from a mob while running through Dreadlands or Firiona Vie and there was nothing I could do, I just died. Meanwhile my Druid friend who was twenty levels lower than me was solo'ing Hill Giants I could barely scratch and had no problem running away from mobs due to SoW / Snare etc. It felt bad.

But then there were the times where it felt like the most broken OP class in the game. Where I could solo KS entire groups with ease. I was pretty much always in the exp group in every raid. But I remember "helping" groups while LFG by DPS'ing for them and accidentally KS'ing them and getting raged at a lot. I don't remember if it was an accident or not in hind sight. I was an immature kid.

Also from memory, the most OP group I was ever in was a 3 Rogue group in Sebilis. Normally Disco 1 and Disco 2 were separate camps, but our DPS was so high we could do both of them really easy. We weren't really aware of Enchanter charm (although I was aware because I had heard tales of it, but I never witnessed it being reliable enough to be viable for groups).

So IDK. Like right now on P99 Rogues are considered OP, but if you took a new player and made him try to level each class in the game, he may struggle with Rogue the most. A lot of the Rogues you see leveling now either get PL'd, have full twink gear to include fungus tunic etc. But they scale insanely well and are broken at higher level.

I think a big part of why Rogues were so insane too is because we all had our Epics. It was super easy to get. Meanwhile almost none of my non-Rogue friends ever got their epics. I remember having friends who wouldn't level because they needed to be able to do Nagafen and Vox for their epics etc. Meanwhile I was level 60 in full Skyshrine gear getting ready to start a new character.

[onmove_broke]

By harder I didn't necessarily mean grindier. The grind on Pantheon is one of the things that really turns me off right now. It feels like unless I am going to log into the game for a solid 6 hours I might as well just go do something else. So a lot of times I want to play, but realize I can't make any meaningful progress with the amount of time I have available to actually be in the game.

With EQ I always felt like 2-3 hours in the game was rewarding even if it was only spent traveling or trying to auction items.

You could always shake things up a bit by moving things around to break up what people know about zones. Re-populate a zone like Black Burrow to be way harder with a new loot table or shake up Upper and Lower guk a bit.

Or just do self found if you want a harder challenge or play a harder class. Otherwise there is not much you can do aside from making mobs damage sponges or make them cast more.

[Sadre Spinegnawer]

No one knows sit aggro sorrow like an enchanter. You can be not doing a thing. No malice in your heart. Don't matter. You're an enchanter and you're sitting.

[NopeNopeNopeNope]

It can’t be stated enough that the biggest factor in difficulty between now and vanilla in just about any game is the evolved meta, not the character’s performance

Just look at WoW classic vs vanilla. Characters are still the exact same in function but molten core which used to take vanilla guilds between 3-5 hours has been done in like 20 minutes or something crazy with an optimal comp in classic

And onyxia that used to regularly wipe 40 man vanilla raids was done with like 5 people? Lol sorry 3 people, looked it up. Takes a long time but it’s doable

Meta is infinitely more impacting than possible character function changes

[Sadre Spinegnawer]

It can’t be stated enough that the biggest factor in difficulty between now and vanilla in just about any game is the evolved meta, not the character’s performance

Just look at WoW classic vs vanilla. Characters are still the exact same in function but molten core which used to take vanilla guilds between 3-5 hours has been done in like 20 minutes or something crazy with an optimal comp in classic

And onyxia that used to regularly wipe 40 man vanilla raids was done with like 5 people? Lol sorry 3 people, looked it up. Takes a long time but it’s doable

Meta is infinitely more impacting than possible character function changes

That's why the only way forward is some kind of ray that mem wipes you. Like from the MiB movies, or, the spells.

It's not just that game's meta, it's the entire meta experience of playing an online computer game. It all has to go.

I still can't get over people expect you to want to hear their voice while you are enjoying playing a game. That kills my immersion immediately. "Don't move past me," said the man who sounds like goatboy.

Type. Type allows you to at least pretend the people you are playing with are likeable people, somewhere, deep down inside. Chat makes it too clear to pretend: I'm spending time with goatboy.

Furthermore, language servers. This is why? To ruin the chaos?

Gans fuck you up ~la

[nyclin]

It's funny reading stuff while bug researching. Apparently there was huge consensus that rogues were the worst class, even after evade became a thing. I'm talking into velious here, everyone talking how they can't do damage output good enough because they draw too much agro.

I even remember during classic when everyone was saying enchanter class was broken. "So dumb, our animations cant listen to us and get us killed" and frankly not understanding their spells. I don't think it was until kunark that folks started thinking enchanter was a powerful class to have in a group

mained a rogue for a long time on live, and I have fond memories of shooting the shit in sebilis ooc while being completely ignored for groups in favor of warriors, monks, and SK

during classic, pre-evade, it was so much worse.. rogue was literally dead last in group priority most of the time, people would happily take a SK or PAL over me

tarew marr had it better than most because Zato and Vaslin (Safehouse admins) both played there, and it was still pretty rough

[Reiwa]

mained a rogue for a long time on live, and I have fond memories of shooting the shit in sebilis ooc while being completely ignored for groups in favor of warriors, monks, and SK

during classic, pre-evade, it was so much worse.. rogue was literally dead last in group priority most of the time, people would happily take a SK or PAL over me

tarew marr had it better than most because Zato and Vaslin (Safehouse admins) both played there, and it was still pretty rough

You say classic but describe a kunark zone.

Who was evade?

[Duik]

Womp womp

[Cecily]

No one knows sit aggro sorrow like an enchanter. You can be not doing a thing. No malice in your heart. Don't matter. You're an enchanter and you're sitting.
Enchanters are the RL equivalent to psych pop narcissists. Everyone in Norrath should hate them. It's the most evil class in the game and should be openly KoS to everyone.

[Cecily]

As to the thread topic. I think EQ was fun because it was novel and it did something new on a scale that we had never seen before. It's addictive and I think that gets confused with fun often. There's a million micro goals to get constant dopamine hits and as I've preached before, this game is a gambling sim with social elements to reinforce the addictiveness. If you feel like you have a community, it's hard to leave the behavior you associate with that community behind. Like you have to drop your friend group if you wanna get off drugs. Game was made by a guy with addiction problems and if the current year you're reading this is any indication, he did a pretty good job channeling that experience into his game.

[Ekco]

There's a million micro goals to get constant dopamine hits and as I've preached before, this game is a gambling sim

by the end i ran out of goals, last thing i did was camp the WR bag in kedge.

[Ekco]

i don't think the addiction part was intentional though, the old greybeard DnD players working on it quite literally thought nobody would sit and camp rare items, most player behavior was emergent, same way the meta on classes developed. bard wasn't designed to be played the way it was..etc..etc

[Cecily]

That's fair. EQ did have a sandbox element to it and that's the purest form of fun you'll get from video games, literal play. I wonder what happens when I do this. The core game loop does however focus on acquiring items and progressing via number go up on dubious statistics, and that relies heavily on a gambling mechanic gated by time. 60% to get common thing, 40% to get rare thing. 1 chance per 45 mins.

[Cecily]

Or in your case, like 2% chance every 90 mins or so for that treasure chest? Lol I had 2 of them on blue I got without really trying, just derping around on my ranger.

[Ekco]

The core game loop does however focus on acquiring items and progressing via number go up

yeah, but in classic eq the game more closely mimicked Dungeons & Dragons concepts regarding item acquisition. For example, obtaining a magical +1 sword is a big fucking deal in a properly run DnD campaign. The gameplay loop in EQ that mimicked this was seeing willow-wisps since level 1 and then finally grinding enough plat to invest into a combined long sword.

you can see the ghosts of this objectively correct take on Everquest all over classic, the scarabs in Rathe Mountains being apart of Brad's original idea of a epic quest involving puzzles and having to talk to NPCs all over the world to Kedge Keep's dungeon design and loot tables of the common drop being wands with charges.

the game is suppose to have permadeath and you die on your first vox/naggy raid then reroll or play something else.

[zelld52]

EQ would be more fun if there weren’t players continuously doing the same stale content for 5-10 years and getting sweaty as hell over it

[bcbrown]

That's fair. EQ did have a sandbox element to it and that's the purest form of fun you'll get from video games, literal play. I wonder what happens when I do this. The core game loop does however focus on acquiring items and progressing via number go up on dubious statistics, and that relies heavily on a gambling mechanic gated by time. 60% to get common thing, 40% to get rare thing. 1 chance per 45 mins.

This reminds me of an interesting essay I read about EQ: http://www.nickyee.com/eqt/skinner.html

[Cecily]

This reminds me of an interesting essay I read about EQ: http://www.nickyee.com/eqt/skinner.html
Who doesn't enjoy a nice food pellet on a random ratio reward schedule? Thanks for sharing that.

[Ciderpress]

As to the thread topic. I think EQ was fun because it was novel and it did something new on a scale that we had never seen before. It's addictive and I think that gets confused with fun often. There's a million micro goals to get constant dopamine hits and as I've preached before, this game is a gambling sim with social elements to reinforce the addictiveness. If you feel like you have a community, it's hard to leave the behavior you associate with that community behind. Like you have to drop your friend group if you wanna get off drugs. Game was made by a guy with addiction problems and if the current year you're reading this is any indication, he did a pretty good job channeling that experience into his game.

Low blow with that brad smear, smh. Always makes me sad. Hey guys I'm not addicted to eq, it's just that brad was addicted to pills! Nice post hoc rationalization there.

Lots of people play eq casually without issue, they are often referred to as the "filthy casuals".

[Ekco]

EQ would be more fun if there weren’t players continuously doing the same stale content for 5-10 years and getting sweaty as hell over it

yeah, i have zero interest in playing EQ again after multiple runs on different emu servers, i don't even think i'm going to play M&M or Pantheon because it's gonna be the same shitty player behavior.

next MMORPG I'll care about is the first decent fantasy virtual reality one in the style of .hack//Sign or Ready Player One
https://c.tenor.com/wSQsUwnzmq4AAAAd/tenor.gif

[Ekco]

[QUOTE=Ciderpress;3716731]Always makes me sad. Hey guys I'm not addicted to eq, it's just that brad was addicted to pills! Nice post hoc rationalization there.
/QUOTE]

you act like they aren't tons of interviews/forum posts with/from devs and ex coworkers talking about how shitty of a work environment he caused with his addiction before people politely stopped talking about it after he died from the exact shit people we're criticizing him as person about prior.

[NopeNopeNopeNope]

It’s been so long I barely remember the concept of soft reserve but that is what we did in classic WoW. Raid sign up sheets allowed you to soft reserve an item, meaning if it dropped and you had it soft reserved you get it if you were the only person who did. Otherwise you roll against others who did. And if I recall winning a soft reserve roll meant you couldn’t roll on anything else for the rest of the raid (whereas you otherwise could on any drop that wasn’t soft reserved by anyone)

I’m assuming more hardcore guilds did DKP but the casual guilds and PuGs did soft reserve (least until other horrible forms of auctioning insane amounts of credit-card bought gold in raids, known as GDKP, became a thing)

But even with soft reserve I quit classic WoW partly because I had burned out on the PVE. After realizing that winning a piece of raid gear made my entire week and doing 3ish hour raids where it didn’t drop wrecked my night…I told myself “This is just fucking gambling. And I hate it”

And I quit then

[Ciderpress]

[QUOTE=Ciderpress;3716731]Always makes me sad. Hey guys I'm not addicted to eq, it's just that brad was addicted to pills! Nice post hoc rationalization there.
/QUOTE]

you act like they aren't tons of interviews/forum posts with/from devs and ex coworkers talking about how shitty of a work environment he caused with his addiction before people politely stopped talking about it after he died from the exact shit people we're criticizing him as person about prior.

So? What does that have to do with my critique of cecily passing the buck to brad for her own eq addiction?

I feel like you don't like me now just cause I'm critical of stealing software.

[Ciderpress]

I should be clear btw: I'm addicted to EQ also, I just don't blame other people for it.

[Ciderpress]

The notion that EQ had some kind of grand design to addict their subscribers is ridiculous if you just listen to the aforementioned interviews with the original devs. They're all like: "yeah we had no idea if it was gonna succeed and constantly expected to get the axe, we all just liked d&d and muds". You might be able to make an argument WoW is kinda guilty of actually consciously calculating the addictive nature of their game cause they had the benefit of observing EQ for five years.

It's also ridiculous to even compare it to some kind of legitimate addiction. A healthy relationship with eq or any other fun videogame is completely possible, but nobody has a "healthy relationship" with heroin or crack. Actual gambling is kind of a gray area, but it's definitely pretty close to a drug in terms of potential ruination of one's life.

[Ekco]

you were instituting he wasn't a piece of shit, when 30 years of internet posts disagree with you.

there is no "low blow" about a guy who got caught stealing prescribed medication from coworkers because he was, a piece of shit.

he just happened to make a game you like. nice triple post btw

[Reiwa]

It’s been so long I barely remember the concept of soft reserve but that is what we did in classic WoW. Raid sign up sheets allowed you to soft reserve an item, meaning if it dropped and you had it soft reserved you get it if you were the only person who did. Otherwise you roll against others who did. And if I recall winning a soft reserve roll meant you couldn’t roll on anything else for the rest of the raid (whereas you otherwise could on any drop that wasn’t soft reserved by anyone)

I’m assuming more hardcore guilds did DKP but the casual guilds and PuGs did soft reserve (least until other horrible forms of auctioning insane amounts of credit-card bought gold in raids, known as GDKP, became a thing)

But even with soft reserve I quit classic WoW partly because I had burned out on the PVE. After realizing that winning a piece of raid gear made my entire week and doing 3ish hour raids where it didn’t drop wrecked my night…I told myself “This is just fucking gambling. And I hate it”

And I quit then

https://img.itch.zone/aW1nLzE2Mjc3NjU5LnBuZw==/original/iMrhNk.png

[Ciderpress]

you were instituting he wasn't a piece of shit, when 30 years of internet posts disagree with you.

there is no "low blow" about a guy who got caught stealing prescribed medication from coworkers because he was, a piece of shit.

he just happened to make a game you like. nice triple post btw

You can't edit in r&f, apologies for the triple post.

Also I was no insinuating that he "wasn't a piece of shit", I was saying his piece of shit status has no baring on cecily's personal eq addiction

[shovelquest]

The best artists, the highest quality entertainment, is 110% created by people who society thinks "are pieces of shit"

When are we going to accept that all of us are amazing in one way or another, but none of us are perfect?

GOD I f#$^%ng hate this species.

[Ekco]

The best artists, the highest quality entertainment, is 110% created by people who society thinks "are pieces of shit"

When are we going to accept that all of us are amazing in one way or another, but none of us are perfect?


oh, i agree with that. my two favorite movies are directed by Polanski. i'm on the love the art, ignore the artist train for sure.

[Sethius Marlowe]

If that guy didn't steal those drugs he probably wouldn't have made the game that was so good that brought you here to complain about it so you should be thanking that piece of shit lol.

But on the topic of "how to make things hard again.. like they was in the old days ya know guyz"..

the simple fact that we have the internet that's not on a modem breaks everything. We can alt tab to look shit up. We have library after library after library of information on how everything works online, all super easy to access and distribute.

When it was new, no one really knew wtf was going or how to deal with it. It's like how Covid was. At first we were all like "OMG HOLY shit this is the end of the worrrrrld" and now we're like "yeah we figured it out, no worries."

The most basic component that prevents anyone from really being able to experience things the way they used to be is... we already know how the shit plays out, how it works, and why. Back then we were all still figuring out what the fuck was what and why and how and every single twist and turn was a magical mystery to us.

Now we all have volcano Ph'D's and we're like "isn't it weird how I don't feel as extremely scared and excited and mystified as the first time I saw a volcano?"

yeah... cause... duh.. yeah..

[Cecily]

Low blow with that brad smear, smh. Always makes me sad. Hey guys I'm not addicted to eq, it's just that brad was addicted to pills! Nice post hoc rationalization there.

Lots of people play eq casually without issue, they are often referred to as the "filthy casuals".
If you think me saying "made by guy with a drug addiction" is a low blow you should consider what other ways I could have phrased it and realize that I was being pretty tame. Generally the scum of society, cheaters and addicts and homophones and presidents (ie people) lash out when others criticize their problem. So I'm sorry about your history with or present issues with drug addiction that inspired you to make that triple rage post. It's nothing to be a shamed of and I hope you find peace or at least create something with it that people stay addicted to themselves for multiple decades.

[cd288]

If you think me saying "made by guy with a drug addiction" is a low blow you should consider what other ways I could have phrased it and realize that I was being pretty tame. Generally the scum of society, cheaters and addicts and homophones and presidents (ie people) lash out when others criticize their problem. So I'm sorry about your history with or present issues with drug addiction that inspired you to make that triple rage post. It's nothing to be a shamed of and I hope you find peace or at least create something with it that people stay addicted to themselves for multiple decades.

I think you're shitty for bringing it up at all. Needless comment and just shows that you're shitty

[shovelquest]

I think you're shitty for bringing it up at all. Needless comment and just shows that you're shitty

[shovelquest]

(to be clear I dont think you are shitty cecily I just hate how creatives get shit on for not being perfect little angles).

You didn't really, you made a funny comparison. I love you cecily. But I also love drug addicted creative poets.

[druidbob]

Want to make the game harder? Figure out a way to disable GINA. That thing is the biggest crutch on the server by a country mile.