Alter End-Game Mechanics

[Jimes]

People are complaining about not getting mobs, but you really just want them handed to you on a platter. There have been a couple of times in the past month or two where the servers went down and every single raid target respawned. All you guys managed to drop were what, maestro and vox? What makes you think you deserve raid content if that's the best effort you can bring to the table. Enjoy your hate clears and KC xp groups, because that's going to be your EQ experience until you pull your shit together and take what you want. If there are people on the server that want it more than you, then whose fault is that exactly?

[Ravager]

Originally Posted by Jimes [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

People are complaining about not getting mobs, but you really just want them handed to you on a platter. There have been a couple of times in the past month or two where the servers went down and every single raid target respawned. All you guys managed to drop were what, maestro and vox? What makes you think you deserve raid content if that's the best effort you can bring to the table. Enjoy your hate clears and KC xp groups, because that's going to be your EQ experience until you pull your shit together and take what you want. If there are people on the server that want it more than you, then whose fault is that exactly?

Having an opportunity to attempt a mob that you can just as easily wipe to without interference is not the same thing as having it handed to you on a platter. This is the very attitude that destroys the end game for the majority of the population who don't want to spend their game time sitting on spawn points, logging off DT cycles, dodging trains or corpse running.

And to insinuate that they're lazy or don't want it enough is a little ridiculous. EQ is a grind. For most people to get to the level to see this content they've got a /played in the weeks and months.

You say other guilds don't deserve these mobs, but what makes you feel entitled to these mobs on a free server? Do you feel entitled to all the free samples at the grocery store because the other customers didn't want them bad enough?

[Jimes]

Originally Posted by Ravager [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Having an opportunity to attempt a mob that you can just as easily wipe to without interference is not the same thing as having it handed to you on a platter. This is the very attitude that destroys the end game for the majority of the population who don't want to spend their game time sitting on spawn points, logging off DT cycles, dodging trains or corpse running.

And to insinuate that they're lazy or don't want it enough is a little ridiculous. EQ is a grind. For most people to get to the level to see this content they've got a /played in the weeks and months.

You say other guilds don't deserve these mobs, but what makes you feel entitled to these mobs on a free server? Do you feel entitled to all the free samples at the grocery store because the other customers didn't want them bad enough?

I never said I was entitled to anything. And that's the point. No one is entitled to anything. EQ has no instances, so the mobs are there for whoever is strong enough to get them. I think there's enough people and gear on this server for multiple guilds to be strong enough to get these kills, but at the moment only one puts forth the effort to make it happen. The others are too busy typing out walls of text about how unfair it is.

[Splorf22]

Originally Posted by Jimes [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I never said I was entitled to anything. And that's the point. No one is entitled to anything. EQ has no instances, so the mobs are there for whoever is strong enough to get them. I think there's enough people and gear on this server for multiple guilds to be strong enough to get these kills, but at the moment only one puts forth the effort to make it happen. The others are too busy typing out walls of text about how unfair it is.

By 'strong' you mean 'willing to sit at the computer for hours on end'. But other than that I agree with you.

MUST QUIT FORUMS MY GOD

[Ravager]

Originally Posted by Jimes [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I never said I was entitled to anything. And that's the point. No one is entitled to anything. EQ has no instances, so the mobs are there for whoever is strong enough to get them. I think there's enough people and gear on this server for multiple guilds to be strong enough to get these kills, but at the moment only one puts forth the effort to make it happen. The others are too busy typing out walls of text about how unfair it is.

But that's the thing. This is a PvE game. There should be no effort to get them beyond whatever obstacles are built in the game. This is a cooperative game, people band together to take down mobs. The only reason there's competition is because TMO or whoever is on top at the time, creates it. This kind of environment benefits only one guild and only one kind of player.

As far as typing out walls of text about how unfair it is, that's because it is unfair and a public forum is the place to bring it up. If it were fair and the server were fine the way it is with one zerg guild monopolizing the content, I don't think Nilbog would be asking for suggestions.

I'd be all for forced rotations on this server, and for the majority of the server, I'm sure it will only enhance the fun of the game. I would suggest something along the lines of any guild that can kill a mob on their own gets in the rotation, leave one slot as a free-for-all so that people can have their competition and bragging rights and also use that slot as a qualifier for new guilds to attempt the mob and try to get in the rotation. If any guild wipes on their mob or don't kill it in a certain time, it becomes free for all.

For the people who want to compete for mobs all the time, that's what the Red server is for.

[Jimes]

Originally Posted by Ravager [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I'd be all for forced rotations on this server

Of course you would, because you and everyone else seem to have zero motivation to do anything for yourselves. Just do yourself a favor and reinstall WoW. This game is obviously far too competitive for you.

[Ravager]

Originally Posted by Jimes [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Of course you would, because you and everyone else seem to have zero motivation to do anything for yourselves. Just do yourself a favor and reinstall WoW. This game is obviously far too competitive for you.

I take offense to your remark. Please don't be insulting.

I like EQ as a cooperative game, the game it was designed to be. Killing a dragon with your friends is fun. I don't play WoW, because I just don't like it. It's too repetitive and the encounters just aren't that engaging.

What I don't like is how content to the end game is arbitrarily blocked by one guild because they want "competition" in a game that was designed by nature to be cooperative.

[Fountree]

All i see in this post is fucking whining from people who never put in the work to compete. You want something? BOO HOO I WANT VP LOOT. fucking take it and stop complaining. We did. Honestly no sympathy at all for anything said by the other side. And no, this game isn't supposed to be 100% cooperative. Anyone who says otherwise is a moron.

You know what would fix the QQing? Keeping new content rolling close to the original timeline. Guilds move on and older raid/end game content is then made more easily accessible for other players. EQ is supposed to be an EVOLVING game. Any hinderance to it's evolution will cause problems and kick up server drama like this. TMO has handed several targets over on a silver platter over the past month, and all I see is more whining. Take your handouts with one hand gladly and QQ some more with your other hand.

[Jimes]

Originally Posted by Ravager [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

What I don't like is how content to the end game is arbitrarily blocked by one guild because they want "competition" in a game that was designed by nature to be cooperative.

Blame game. It's not TMO's fault that you refuse to put forth the effort that it takes to compete with them. Are you even trying? No, you aren't. So you really have no room to complain.

[Lazortag]

Originally Posted by nilbog [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I am still interested in hearing proposals for better end game systems. In the past, I have tried to comment on the ones I thought were good and still in the spirit of classic, non-instanced raiding.

If there was a perfect system in which raid targets spawned simultaneously within a certain window:

• Would guilds still poopsock?
• Would a single guild still get most of the targets?

From what I've seen, raiding guilds on p99 have far greater numbers than were historically on my eqlive server. I would hate to make a system that somehow made things worse :T

Anyways, keep up the proposals. Hopefully something is suggested that supports more guilds getting targets without diminishing competition.

I'm going to post a really long response to this, so please read it! I support a system with simultaneous repops, although I think there are lots of variations on how it can be done that all work fine. Here's an example of a system I like that I think is very simple and intuitive, and a lot closer to how things worked in classic:

-All 3 day spawns except Draco (so Maestro and Trak?) would be on the same timer, with the same variance they have now, except that all of them share a variance (ie they all spawn at the same time)*
-All 7 day spawns except Noble Djorn and VP mobs would be on the same timer (Nagafen, Vox, Inny, CT, Faydedar, Talendor, Gorenaire, Severilous, VS, and anyone else I missed), with the same variance they have now, except that all of them spawn simultaneously.
-All VP dragons would have the same timer/variance as they do now, except they all spawn simultaneously.
-Phinny would still be a 12 hour spawn, Noble Djorn is still a 7 day spawn, with no variance.
-Draco would still be a 3 day spawn with variance, who gets respawned whenever CT pops.

Additionally, I would have it so that ALL mobs repop at the same time after any content patch (so not a maintenance patch or a server crash, but after an intentional content patch), since this was classic.

The way it would work is that the timer for a set of mobs would start as soon as all of the mobs sharing a timer are dead. Draco has to be on a different timer because he's a 3 day spawn but CT also repops Draco. VP dragons have to be in a different group or else TMO could just cockblock the entire server by leaving one VP dragon up (I know they would never do this, but since no one else has access to VP, this shouldn't be allowed). I've thought of this system for a while and feel very comfortable defending it, so if someone disagrees with any part of it I'd like to hear why.

Here are some reasons why this system is better than the current one:

Time investment
The current system involves too much of a time investment, both for what was expected in classic, and for what should be expected of an average person with a full time job. Every 7 day spawn except Noble has a 96 hour window currently, which means guilds can waste anywhere from 0 to 864 hours a week tracking just 7 day spawns (compared to classic where raid mobs had very short variances). This leads to a lot of problems:
(i) Burnout: players invest way more time into this server than they would have needed to in classic, leading to a much higher burnout rate. It's no surprise that many players from high end guilds end up selling their accounts or quitting. It's bad for the server's population to have high burnout rates.
(ii) Discouraging competition: players from casual guilds try tracking, but feel that their time is wasted when the mob spawns while their guildies aren't awake, or if they just end up being outmobilized. Because of this many players feel it's not worth it to track raid mobs, leading to a raid scene that is more likely to be dominated by one guild.
(iii) Problems at the low-end: players spend so much time tracking that they don't have time for alts, which means that there are less players to group with at low levels, which is bad for the server's longevity. Also, many players hear about the raid scene since it's constantly complained about, and are discouraged from entering it, leading to some players quitting early so that they don't waste their time.
(iv) Rule-breaking: empirically we know that the current system makes players break the rules more than they would. Because of the time investment, tensions are higher when a raid mob spawns, and players are more likely to resort to training and other offenses. Also, using 3rd party programs to track raid mobs is a problem, as well as cheating to find out when mobs spawn (such as the incident where several guilds knew when mobs were going to spawn because they had access to an old GM account).
(v) Poopsocking: again, because of the massive time investment required, guilds sometimes resort to poopsocking (camping a raid mob with 15 or more players for the duration of its spawn window) because it's the only way to guarantee they will get a certain mob. This is very anti-competitive and has discouraged many players from entering the raid scene.

GM intervention
When you have mobs spawning at different times, it's more likely you will have multiple guilds present at the same raid. In contrast, when mobs spawn simultaneously, guilds often head for separate targets because there's simply more content available to kill. You also have all mobs dying within the space of a few hours. All of this leads to less work for GM's because there are less opportunities for raid interference, and all raid interference that would happen is contained within a small space of time. Some input from a GM would be nice, but I'd guess that the amount of work GM's had to do during the last repop was a lot less than the amount of work GM's have to do in the space of an entire week.

Bug reporting
When content is less accessible to other guilds, you have less opportunities for players to report bugs with that content. Case in point, when we first engaged VS (months after Kunark was released), we discovered that runes weren't blocking his lifetap proc (this was actually a really big bug that affected other encounters, not just VS). Similarly there was an issue on the red server where certain epic pieces were dropping in fear, which went unnoticed for a while. When you have various people with different knowledge of classic and experiences with classic content all seeing the same encounters, it's easier to fine tune those encounters and make them more accurate to classic.

As for this:

• Would guilds still poopsock?
• Would a single guild still get most of the targets?

1-Yes, but they would gain less from poopsocking. When mobs spawn at different times, you could theoretically poopsock all of them. When mobs spawn at the same time, poopsocking all of them leads to guilds being severely overstretched. I would guess VS and Trak will still be poopsocked from time to time, but there's like a dozen other raid mobs so I don't see this as a big deal.
2-No, a single guild wouldn't get most of the targets (and if they did, they'd get markedly less than they get now). They wouldn't even necessarily get all of the good ones. Our guild's only VS kill was during a server repop, and it happened because everything spawned at once and we knew the top two guilds would be fighting over Trak. On other repops (around the release of kunark) we usually got 2-4 mobs (like Naggy, Vox, Draco, Inny, Faydedar, Noble, Maestro), which isn't bad at all given the amount of time we invest in the game. In addition to the mobs we got, we also got to attempt bosses we normally wouldn't have much of a chance at seeing. I know the last repop led to TMO getting most of the mobs, but it wasn't representative of how repops usually play out on p99, or how they will play out in the future. Trust me when I say that if the system were changed it would really rejuvenate interest in the raid scene, and you wouldn't see guilds monopolizing content to the same extent that they do now.

*edit: I forgot Master Yael.