After Velious

[guineapig]

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

Can't remember if I posted this already in this topic since it's old as hell.

But, a PoP-like expansion was supposed to follow Velious, lots of planes, lots of god killing, no PoK.

Yeah, there was a thread about this a while back. Basically it was an idea on how to add all the PoP planes to the old world zones, leaving out PoK and PoT completely:

http://www.project1999.org/forums/sh...t=planes+power

People added some pretty good ideas to the original one I wrote up.

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

The dream expansion thread made me think of this:

So this is all completely hypothetical of course.
I just wanted to see if I could place all the Planes of Power zones (besides Knowledge and Tranquility) in to the original trilogy in a way that would make sense.

This is what I came up with for zone connections:



on the fence:
Plane of Knowledge: would not be in the game unless it was somewhere real f'ing hard to get to like through the Tower of Frozen Shadow Mirror.
I think if it just had a single zone in zone out like that and no portals/books to anywhere else then it would be okay.
(In my original draft PoK wasn't even listed... I just added the idea based on posts below)

For the zones that are located in cities: The location of the zone in would always be the corresponding race's Cleric or Shaman guild hall. (Possibly an alter of some sort or what have you.)

This adds a little bit of challenge because obviously you will have members of the raid party that would be KoS in these cities which would further add to the importance of factions in the game. (Alternately you could just invis through the zone every time.)
Also, this creates new life for old cities.

Note that while Kunark and velious zones will be all the rage for the next couple of years, thereby lowering the classic zone populations, the introduction of this version of PoP will reignite the need for travel in the old world zones. There will be multiple options open for low level players and no matter where they go there will be some high level players hanging around as well. This is something that we never see in EQ now, except in PoK on live (or EC tunnel in the case of this server.) Instead of creating one main hub , many cities will have people in them and therefor resons for low an dhigh level players alike to revisit.

I would go as far as to say that most of the things that were added to PoK should be added to the old world cities (and Cabalis) instead.
(Druid and Wizard ports will never be useless in my vision! [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.] )

For the Planes that are located within the older planes (Fear, Hate, Sky, Growth) zoning in to the next zone would be a one way ticket. This makes it not possible to use this zone line as an easy way to clear agro and jump right back in. Also the zone line to the second Plane would be somewhat deep in the zone, requiring you to clear your way to torment from Hate (unless the zone was already cleared). Whether or not you need to have killed Inny to be flagged for Torment remains in question (I could care less either way).

I’m on the fence about where to put Plane of Time so I just figured The Sleepers Tomb being the end game in Velious would be appropriate. ( EDIT: Someone suggested leaving out PoT all together... not a horrible idea. )

Level cap increased to 65 with PoP
AA's (if implemented) are capped per level and you can never get them all. You have to specialize.
Respecialization is an option via a semi-complex quest.
Minimum level requirement (if the zone is even implemented) to enter PoK (somewhere between 46 and 60).

Feel free to add your own opinions and ideas.
(Can you tell I’m bored at work?)


EDIT: Thanks for all that added ideas. I still prefer the use of starting city shaman and cleric guilds for the portals that lead to major deities but there is definitely something to be said for keeping raids from having to zone through a town. So I added both

[Seritaph]

Personally, I'd like the server to stay with the goal of being "classic," defined as ending at Velious. I think that custom made content to expand would make the server...well custom and not classic anymore.

That said, there were some things I liked about Luclin. I don't see how you could do it without the Nexus and Bazaar as they were connection points to other zones. It would feel odd not having to run through them.

In my opinion, the Nexus wasn't that different from boats. Talk to a NPC, get a shard, wait 15 mins, get teleported to Nexus, pick a continent you want to go to (Dreadlands, Gfay, Great Divide, North Karana and Tox -- that's it, your only choices) wait another 15mins. Boom, at the Wizzie spires in whatever continent you chose. It wasn't like the PoP books where there was one for every zone, and you could get there instantly. It was easier, but not that easy. In short I liked the Nexus port system. It was still social (like boats), general travel (not specific, like books), and you could still get killed by mobs zoning in at the wrong time.

I also liked soul binders. Forgive the blasphemy, but they were a guilty pleasure of mine for characters who could not bind affinity.

Like or hate the Vah Shir, they had a nice starting quest line, that involved crafting and gave the opportunity (but not on a silver platter) to gear up a bit as you progressed in levels and learn the game mechanics. They also had tents with trainers, vendors and a bank in the newb zone, with wandering guards. I thought it was terrific. It also felt large, open and spacious.

Part of me misses Luclin, but then the server wouldn't be classic, and that's what I'm here to play.

[yaeger]

Hard to really say what I'd expect to happen after Velious comes out. It's hard to foresee the community's attitude towards a classic-only server when they have nothing new to look forward to.

Will the majority of people keep playing this server if no new content has been released for a couple of years? Probably not.

There have been some great ideas, all of which deviate from the 'classic' sense, but a custom approach is what I think we need.

Some of the good things that happened after Velious that need to get implemented in that 'dead' time after Velious:
1) AA's - something to do outside of raids once you hit max level
2) Raids - the one thing PoP expansion did right is raids (and class balance, okay two) make druids/wizards able to port to PoTraquility, toss in a port stone in 2-3 spots for everyone else.
3) Class balance - probably the hardest juggling act of them all, and apt to piss off everyone that loses out. Everyone knows how all the classes rank up prior to the Devs even releasing an expansion. Mix it up a bit, correct weak classes in an expansion. A little goes a long ways.

Of course it's going to be a lot of work, and difficult to plan that far ahead. But that's my take on it.

[Webwolf]

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

Luclin, without bazaar or Nexus transporters. Ssra and VT were some of my all-time favorite raid content.

This. Also remove other near empty and meaningless zones in luclin and add druid/wiz portals instead of the stupid nexus.

[Webwolf]

Custom content would also be an option. Pick a few cool zone maps from other expansions and populate it with the best of luclin. I wouldn't mind never seeing AAs again. I hate the grind.

[thewards072]

I agree. Do away with PoK and the Nexus. 2 wastes of space IMO and they helped ruin the game. The most fun i had on Luclin was in The Void. That's just me though. I do enjoy. Custom content would be interesting. I liked not being able to max every AA. It allows the classes to be more specialized. Just my 2 cents.

BTW: Thanks to all the devs who've worked on this. It's amazing.

[Cogwell]

I know its the hip thing to knock the Nexus, but

1) The ports there were extremely limited (if I remember correctly its only DL, GD, NK, and Odus). You also still had to wait up to 15 minutes for them. Going simply between DL and Odus could take as long as 30 minutes if you were unlucky. Character ports were still a much faster way to get around, and the locations you could port to were much more diverse, obviously.

2) It had a foundation in lore. The combine empire built all the wizard spires, and thats who was on the moon. Teleportation was sorta their thing.

3) The world was friggin huge at this point. To get from across the world if you couldn't find a port would essentially be occupying all your playtime. This is a game, and it should be about playing - not getting to where you can play. Even with the Nexus, it still took a long damn time to get to important places on other continents (old sebilis, for instance).

4) The overall map for luclin was a sphere, whereas the old continents were essentially flat. It required some creative tinkering with zone connections to get it to work. The Nexus played a role in the inner passageways of luclin - netherbian to shadowrest.

[Cogwell]

Originally Posted by thewards072 [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

The most fun i had on Luclin was in The Void.

You mean The Grey or The Deep?

[Humerox]

I thought Nilbog plainly stated the server wasn't going custom, because that defeated the purpose.

However...I personally feel going custom after Velious DOESN'T defeat the purpose, if the classic experience was extended in a direction that Verant probably would have gone, versus Sony.

It's subjective as to what that content may have been, but clearly...easy transportation, the bazaar, and things like that would likely have not been an option.

I didn't even think Luclin was really that bad if transportation could molded into a more "classic" feel (others have mentioned excellent ideas for tie-in zones) and the bazaar was nixed.

Even tho I hate cats, and moonwalking.

[Wrot]

I'd like to see PoP institued w/o PoK/PoT as previously outlined. I'd like to see Froglok playable characters, they had great models and animations and they have been in as a race since classic, if in a npc ugly model form only.

Given enough time after Velious if they do nothing the server will die, so I don't get the few who complain at the idea of doing something different. People would rather be playing all alone on a dead server than have something new to do? Smart.