Should really just make them all level 60, give them epics, and perhaps 10k starting cash.

That way they'll feel welcome, won't have to worry about how slow classic exp is, and will immediately become useful.

or lvl 1's with epics that req 60. that'll make the xp grind fun.

Easy buddy you're going to bust out of your muscle tee flexing your reg-date like that.

This is already done by the ZEM...

+1 internets.

I aggree with OP, a 25% bonus or so for say one week, following a formal invitation to the EQMac guys, would be nice to help make them welcome. Just make it clear that it's not a normal thing.

I have to agree. This isn't about bragging how you had to walk to school, in the snow, uphill, both ways. We all will benefit by having more players on the server. The fact that the EQMac folks have no recourse at all makes this a true opportunity for P1999. Because of the way the EQMac server was setup, you could never transfer characters to, or from it, so when it shuts down, these folks lose everything with no recourse. So why not pull out the welcome wagon, roll out the red carpet, and make them feel welcome? Post a nice letter inviting all the EQMac folks to come join P1999 with a good tutorial on playing EQ on a Mac, followed by a week long exp bonus (a nice reasonable amount) for the whole server, and I think we'd not only get a lot of those players trying P1999, but a lot of them staying on P1999. If Rogean doesn't want to ramp up exp for everyone, just up the ZEM's for the starting zones so the new players get the bonus. Zones catering to L1-15 or 20 sounds about right.

People play on P99 because it is the closest thing to a Classic EverQuest experience that you can find, grind and all.

i dunno, i don't get it i guess. so they get a tiny exp bonus, maybe in that time they get to level 10 or whatever. bonus goes away, and now the exp seems even slower to them, and they say "wow, even with that 25% bonus exp it was slow, it really sucks now"

/quit

What happens when the exp bonus is removed and the grind returns to normal? If EQMac players are unhappy with the grind, I'm not sure a mere week will result in enough invested time to where they would stay when it was over.

Is it worth setting such a precedent without any guarantee of a sustained increase in players?

Intentions and results are often very different.