My Opinion on EQ expansions.

[Reiker]

Luclin gets slighted because it was the first expansion that introduced good AND bad elements. The bad:

* Ridiculously horrible player models
* Poorly implemented centralized market
* "We're going to the moon!" is goofy
* Playable cat people are goofy
* Boring / redundant zone design
* Instant travel (but imo still enough of a pain in the ass to not be that bad)
* Vex Thal is a piece of shit, perpetually unfinished end raid zone
* Paludal was too good for its level range, emptying classic exp zones

Many forget the good:

* AAs (somehow some people think these are bad) really fleshed out classes, added all kinds of new gameplay elements, and gave something to exp for at max besides death buffer
* Awesome dungeons that were criminally underused like Acrylia Caverns
* The first raid encounters that were completely epic, hardcore events (Ssra, Seru, Ring of Fire, even lower bosses like Shei had very unique elements)
* EQ really began to step up its scripted event game with not only raids but zones such as Hollowshade, which was always changing based on the race wars there.

[Noleafclover]

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

Luclin gets slighted because it was the first expansion that introduced good AND bad elements. The bad:

* Ridiculously horrible player models
* Poorly implemented centralized market
* "We're going to the moon!" is goofy
* Playable cat people are goofy
* Boring / redundant zone design
* Instant travel (but imo still enough of a pain in the ass to not be that bad)
* Vex Thal is a piece of shit, perpetually unfinished end raid zone
* Paludal was too good for its level range, emptying classic exp zones

Many forget the good:

* AAs (somehow some people think these are bad) really fleshed out classes, added all kinds of new gameplay elements, and gave something to exp for at max besides death buffer
* Awesome dungeons that were criminally underused like Acrylia Caverns
* The first raid encounters that were completely epic, hardcore events (Ssra, Seru, Ring of Fire, even lower bosses like Shei had very unique elements)
* EQ really began to step up its scripted event game with not only raids but zones such as Hollowshade, which was always changing based on the race wars there.

QFT. I wouldn't blame you for making this as a separate thread. Honestly, I think we should continue to introduce live's raid content and progression features (AAs, etc.) without any of the bullshit - that whole list you posted, and for another example - in PoP, get rid of all the connections to PoK except like.. WFP (by EC tunnel).

[Taminy]

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

Luclin gets slighted because it was the first expansion that introduced good AND bad elements. The bad:

* Ridiculously horrible player models
* Poorly implemented centralized market

Agreed. Luclin BEFORE the bazaar was great.

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

* "We're going to the moon!" is goofy
* Playable cat people are goofy
* Boring / redundant zone design

Meh. I'd call this neutral rather than bad. I never played a Vah Shir either (not a furry here).

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

* Instant travel (but imo still enough of a pain in the ass to not be that bad)

I thought was ok. Like you said instant travel but still enough of a pain to not be that bad. I still usually just looked around for a port because it could be 30ish minutes by the time you used Nexus to ghetto port and even then there were only what, like 6 locations? Maybe 4? I just remember NK, Gfay, DL, and GD. PoK books can die in a fire.

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

* Vex Thal is a piece of shit, perpetually unfinished end raid zone
* Paludal was too good for its level range, emptying classic exp zones

Yeah - but to be honest I never used Paludal. More regarding Vex Thal, I thought emp cockblocking was ridiculous, even though I wasn't in a bleeding edge guild at the time especially when I saw screenshots of that one guild using 3 ogres and a coh bot (ogres to block the door for other guilds, coh bot to coh in guildmates). And yes I know cockblocking happened in every expansion.

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

* AAs (somehow some people think these are bad) really fleshed out classes, added all kinds of new gameplay elements, and gave something to exp for at max besides death buffer

I remember hearing about AAs from another player before I read about them. Apparently they were going to be about "customizing" your character is what he said. I think this would have been better - and don't kill me here people but something more along the lines of arms vs fury vs prot warrior (at least that you would have to experience for). I think AAs done that way might have been better, but instead it was just how many AAs can you gather and make sure you min/max everything out.

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

* Awesome dungeons that were criminally underused like Acrylia Caverns

I liked that zone and got to do the worm boss there before they revamped the zone with ring events.

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

* The first raid encounters that were completely epic, hardcore events (Ssra, Seru, Ring of Fire, even lower bosses like Shei had very unique elements)

Agreed except I thought ring events were stupid.

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

* EQ really began to step up its scripted event game with not only raids but zones such as Hollowshade, which was always changing based on the race wars there.

That's one zone I wish I had taken my alts to. I only remember running through it on a high level character and thought it was cool.

[Reiker]

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

I remember hearing about AAs from another player before I read about them. Apparently they were going to be about "customizing" your character is what he said. I think this would have been better - and don't kill me here people but something more along the lines of arms vs fury vs prot warrior (at least that you would have to experience for). I think AAs done that way might have been better, but instead it was just how many AAs can you gather and make sure you min/max everything out.

I'm actually kind of glad that AAs were implemented as just a way to progress your character instead of specialize it. EQ has no room for class specialization. What would the advantage of a DPS warrior be over a monk or a rogue? Why would a cleric ever want to specialize in anything besides healing? WoW has a serious problem when it comes to this. You have certain classes like Paladins and Druids that are insanely flexible and can fit into a myriad of roles easily by respeccing, and then you have classes like Rogue who are way too one-dimensional. Rogues have 3 spec lines built around doing damage while a Druid can tank, heal, nuke, or melee dps. They're stuck. They could turn one of the Rogue lines into a "tank" spec based on evasion, but how would you balance it vs. Warriors, Druids, and Paladins? They would create raid bosses that hit ridiculously hard and required a Rogue evasion tank, sort of how Warlocks were required to tank certain bosses. It's superficial depth. It's like "oh cool I can respec my Warlock and tank one of the phases of this boss" but then you think of it and it's like "ok, so... what the fuck was the point of that?"

It's a huge can of worms that I'm glad EQ never got involved in. If you're going to have a base class + specialization system, you can only have like 3 or 4 base classes max before everything becomes retardedly redundant.

[Harrison]

*gasp* Someone makes sense when talking about Luclin without going into a rabid froth of hate and rage.

[Seeatee]

Ssra is probably the 2nd best designed zone in all of EQ, I could spend weeks there at a time, loved that zone to death.

also, while probably a pretty unpopular opinion my personal favorite expansion is

[You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

a big reason is Muramite Proving Grounds , that zone was near perfect, and IMO is the number 1 best designed zone in all of EQ. MPG was by far also my personal favorite zone , so many great camps, great rares, great loot, awesome layout, and the trials were a blast.

[Noselacri]

Luclin had some nice things, but it was the first and biggest step towards the downfall. I don't care about the updated graphics, it's not as if EQ could have kept going with the original graphics if it wanted to be competive with other games coming out. I can even get past the horrible and unfinished lore and how weird and un-EQish the zones and mobs were, though I still think Ssra was one of the best raids in the history of the game. AAs was a good concept, although I disliked the near-unlimited nature of it and prefer how they did it in EQ2. However, Luclin had two huge problems:

1) It was the first of many steps toward the utter removal of the sould of EQ. Nexus scions, the bazaar, basically the way it made the game world less real and meaningful. These two things alone did not have a huge impact on the game, but they went on and on with each expansion, adding PoK, assembly-line instanced dungeons in LDoN, maps and armor dye and completely unimpressive content in LoY, and eventually stated to produce expansions seemingly with a random content generator from GoD and onwards. It basically set in motion the progression toward the theme park style of MMORPG, the model that WoW has perfected because that game is meant to be that way, but the model that destroyed Everquest because it wasn't. EQ was about living in the world of Norrath, how the game world made sense (for a video game, anyway) and how every aspect of the game promoted community and socialization. Suddenly you could travel and trade without interaction, and while these two things alone had a relatively minor impact on the game at first, it slowly but surely impersonalized the game and changed the atmosphere for the worse.

2) Whoever came up with the bane weapons and key grinds needs to be drowned. That timesink was so obscenely ridiculous, so far beyond what a guild should have to go through to see the game's content, and had absolutely nothing to do with skill or diligence. Countless guilds stagnated and perished not because they weren't good enough for the content but because they couldn't get everyone to spend hundreds of hours acquiring access to it. It was absurd and completely unreasonable. Access to content should be limited by your ability to defeat it. If there should be a key/flag/attunement thing at all, it should be something that takes a reasonable amount of time and a guild effort, not endlessly camping trivial things for 0.1% drop rate shards and crap like that.

Other than those two things, Luclin did not kill EQ, it was just one of many steps in the wrong direction. And it wasn't the amazing act of brilliance and beauty that the first three eras were, it was merely decent.

[Reiker]

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

2) Whoever came up with the bane weapons and key grinds needs to be drowned. That timesink was so obscenely ridiculous, so far beyond what a guild should have to go through to see the game's content, and had absolutely nothing to do with skill or diligence. Countless guilds stagnated and perished not because they weren't good enough for the content but because they couldn't get everyone to spend hundreds of hours acquiring access to it. It was absurd and completely unreasonable. Access to content should be limited by your ability to defeat it. If there should be a key/flag/attunement thing at all, it should be something that takes a reasonable amount of time and a guild effort, not endlessly camping trivial things for 0.1% drop rate shards and crap like that.

a) Bane Weapons were not required, they only made the encounters easier. With maybe the exception of LISeru, every single extra body you add to his melee range puts a lot more strain on your healers. I still prefer the "safe and slow" method of 1 paladin tank + all ranged/spell DPS. Maybe because my shaman was usually one of the top DPSers in this fight.

b) VT key time/effort is overrated. I've completed 3. Really the worst part is the piece from the Ssra portal room, because it requires your entire guild to sit there for hours getting one piece at a time. The rest isn't too bad at all.

Actually I lied, the worst part is when you actually complete the key and zone in to Vex Thal and discover how shitty that zone is.

[azeth]

I vehemently disagree that Vex Thal was a poor raid zone.. actually VT/Ssra are in my top raid zones of all time.

[Reiker]

If Ssra Temple isn't among your favorite MMO zones of all time you didn't raid and should probably stfu. Not to anyone in particular but just sayin'.