I'll say I think this belongs in the "not classic, but acceptable improvement" category. The probelm with these though is they're like mudflation. The more you add, the less like classic it becomes. The more like live it becomes. Everytime they made a change on live, it was always to "correct" something and inevitably that's what made it non-classic. Some of us didn't like that.
But I agree with the change. I've always hated AE groups. I was something like a level 75 or 80 ranger on live and they were do Earthshaker pulls and I wanted to vomit. It's so against the spirit of the game and so boring I can't contemplate WHY. Yes I know camping can be bad sometimes, depending on the situation, especially camping spawns alone, but at least you're doing something. In the best experience groups you're busy the whole time. In AE groups you just sit and chat. That's it. For me, Everquest was about the journey and about the "pulling" and "assisting" and "add!" and "need heal" and "run!" and so on. I guess some of you think tha'ts a treadmill, but I loved it.
I'll say I don't ever remember seeing bard pulls or AEing when I was playing Everquest in 1999. But when I played on project1999 in 2010 I do remember ocassionally seeing someone clearing Blackburrow or kiting everything in West Karana.
Oh and one last thing. What about Fear? Killing the zone was a tactic, wasn't it?
EDIT: There was a lot of adversity in Everquest. Whether it be trains, ninja stealing, corpse runs, scamming, or whatever. I'd include swarm kiters in the same category. You go somewhere and someone is swarm kiting it, so you have to find somewhere else. It's an inconvenience. They might mistakenly take your spawns. And yet that was part of the experience. I can't say I'd play if that was the ONLY part. But being able to fail or meet with a negative outcome is a special thing in MMO's, since so many try to remove it. I don't think it's necessarily a good thing. For me, it's hard to appreciate overcoming when there's no hurt or failure. Ok so you get a slap on the wrist every now and then in a very controlled way. That's no fun to me. I'm still that way. I need some adversity in MMO's to get attached to them.
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