| Zuranthium |
05-15-2014 05:37 AM |
Instanced content is awful.
Instanced zones are something that should be used for PvP only - specific battlegrounds and such for 4v4 battles, 6v6 battles, 8v8, etc. They of course will not be used here on p99, but I'm just talking about game design in general. This works for PvP because it's a separate game type (different from world PvP, obviously).
For PvE, instanced zones take away from the realism of the world, they take away from interacting with other players, and they take away from people exploring. Why go try to find an area that isn't being hunted in when you can always just have your own area? That's not a real MMORPG. It's just an MMO.
Now, THAT said, I'd love to see a classic-era custom content server a couple years down the road (with some different game mechanics than EQ too). It would have all of the zones that appear on the classic EQ world map, but weren't actually put into EQ during classic. There's a ton of them:
Abysmal Sea (I envision it as the largest zone in the game with a series of boats each stopping at a different island and you needing to travel to the other side of each dangerous island on foot -- eventually the zone would connect from the "west" side of the world over to the Akanon area), The Grand Plateau, Stonebrunt Mountains, The Vasty Deep, The Barren Cost, The Buried Sea, Broken Skull Rock, some kind of outdoor zone south of Qeynos, Jaggedpine Forest, The Northlands, The Hatchland, The Dead Hills, Winter's Deep, Lake Neriuss, some kind of outdoor zone southwest of West Commonlands (would connect to the bottom part of North Ro), The Loping Plains, Wayunder Lake, Hills of Shade, Elizerain Lake (should be the zone inbetween Steamfont Mountains and Greater Faydark), Dragonscale Hills.
Plus there are tons of other zones you could add that would fit into the classic world - The Warrens, a dungeon or two underneath Nektulos Forest, a dungeon underneath Neriak, Plane of Shadow (accessed from the very top of Tower of Frozen Shadow), a dungeon underneath Kaladim that would connect to another dungeon which connects to Lesser Faydark, a dungeon underneath Mistmoore Castle, a Minotaur dungeon over in Steamfont, a dungeon underneath Akanon, Veksar underneath Lake of Ill Omen. Tons of things could be added. Plus you can improve zones that are rather dead with more content - like The Emerald Jungle or Dagnor's Cauldron.
Also, speaking of the Norrath map, it still really annoys me where Lesser Faydark was placed in the game. The west zone-out of Greater Faydark should go to Lesser Faydark and then Lesser Faydark should connect to Butcherblock. Grrrr.
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