Save the Server, Allow guild instanced raid zones

[indiscriminate_hater]

i think OP in on to something here guys

[Nibblewitz]

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

i think OP in on to something here guys

I agree! The backlog of petitions reminds me of a RL justice system. Such immersion.

[jcr4990]

There's a huge part of me that would love to see instances. Be able to raid mobs on a schedule with my pals and not have to log on crazy hours for certain targets. I see the allure of it for certain.

On the other hand I also realize that about 90% of the difficulty of raiding in EQ is beating other guilds to the target. How many raid mobs in EQ are actually difficult to kill if you have unlimited time to prepare and can engage at primetime hours with a full raid force? Very few my friends. Very few.

[maestrom]

There's some question begging going on here.

Is EQ supposed to be hard?

EQ is an organic difficulty game. Mobs/camps have a fixed difficulty and you're either strong enough for the encounter or you're not. You can make it easier on yourself (twinking a monk) or you can make it harder on yourself (soloing an untwinked rogue).

If you want difficulty, you can look through the solo challenges. You can try to 1 group VS. Trio Arena. Do some really innovative charming.

Logging on at 5pm and not being able to raid because all the targets are dead or not in window does not make the game "difficult". It makes it unavailable. You can practice and get better at difficult things. No matter how much I practice, I can't log in when I'm not home.

Of course rampage argues that the game needs to stay the way it is and that this is the best form of the game--this is the form of game that benefits them the most.

You can argue that competitive raid scenes are classic, but many servers had GM run rotations. You can also argue that because some servers had "competitive" raid scenes that P99 should continue to be a competitive raid server. I can speak from experience that leapfrogging and the current FTE rules were not what GM's enforced on Nameless (first guild with a raid force in zone was the rule there--a rule that I have refined and advocated elsewhere on the forum).

You really can't argue that the current state of competition on this server adds anything "difficult".

[jcr4990]

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

You really can't argue that the current state of competition on this server adds anything "difficult".

I disagree 1000%

I don't think theres much of an argument for challenge in the P99 raid scene outside of the race for targets and maybe a couple of the hardest encounters in the game (Tunare and such) I can't think of a single raid target I've personally killed that would be anywhere near difficult if there was no competition for it. Unlimited time to buff/med and setup/test CH rotations and tank/ramp tank assignments and such = Nearly every fight in EQ is ezmode. Not to mention if theres no competition you can wait for primetime hours and get all your best raiders online at the same time. The ONLY hard part about raiding here is the race. Sorry.

[indiscriminate_hater]

Originally Posted by jcr4990 [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I disagree 1000%

I don't think theres much of an argument for challenge in the P99 raid scene outside of the race for targets and maybe a couple of the hardest encounters in the game (Tunare and such) I can't think of a single raid target I've personally killed that would be anywhere near difficult if there was no competition for it. Unlimited time to buff/med and setup/test CH rotations and tank/ramp tank assignments and such = Nearly every fight in EQ is ezmode. Not to mention if theres no competition you can wait for primetime hours and get all your best raiders online at the same time. The ONLY hard part about raiding here is the race. Sorry.

learn2play

[maestrom]

Originally Posted by jcr4990 [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I disagree 1000%

I don't think theres much of an argument for challenge in the P99 raid scene outside of the race for targets and maybe a couple of the hardest encounters in the game (Tunare and such) I can't think of a single raid target I've personally killed that would be anywhere near difficult if there was no competition for it. Unlimited time to buff/med and setup/test CH rotations and tank/ramp tank assignments and such = Nearly every fight in EQ is ezmode. Not to mention if theres no competition you can wait for primetime hours and get all your best raiders online at the same time. The ONLY hard part about raiding here is the race. Sorry.

You missed my point.

Who says EQ is supposed to be hard? EQ is a fixed difficulty game, for example Puma's in EC don't have more HPS/DPS based on your level or class.

You're either strong enough to kill the puma or you're not. There is a very narrow band where you're just barely strong enough to kill a puma where your skill actually matters and then it is "hard", but the vast majority of pumas are killed either quite routinely, or they smash the person trying to kill them.

Swap out "puma" for everything in this game.

If you want a harder game, you roll in with barely enough people to kill a monster. If you want an easier game, you bring 80 people. This is called "organic" difficulty--where you decided how hard something is not by changing a setting in the options menu but instead of practicing the game or bringing more people.

The "difficulty" described in your example is in getting enough people in your guild who work from home. That's not really everquest-related. It's also not difficulty related because its not really skill-based.

What you're really saying is, you think that Everquest raid targets should only go to those people who prioritize them high enough and who are flexible enough to get to them, and if you don't prioritize them enough and you're not flexible enough, someone else will take them from you. That's fine, you're not alone. But that's not "difficult".

Edit: I think there is an argument for difficulty in P99, actually. My guild was in Kael arena last week and Vindi popped. No other guilds in the zone, we would have had a clear shot at him. He was up for another hour before someone else came in and killed him (might actually have been BDA). We didn't kill him because we would have gotten killed. We could have stayed there for a full hour getting our Cheal rotation just right and buffing and executing a perfect pull. We also could have had everyone in the raid do their jobs perfectly and we still would have lost. This is because Vindi is too hard for us. When you say EQ isn't hard enough without competition, you mean your guild doesn't have any problem of taking down any target in the game given enough time. So why should your need for some non-everquest element be added to my everquest game? FTE is the rule here and that's fine--you guys have convinced the staff to cater to you when making raid rules. OP and I think it should go differently.

[jcr4990]

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

You missed my point.

Who says EQ is supposed to be hard? EQ is a fixed difficulty game, for example Puma's in EC don't have more HPS/DPS based on your level or class.

You're either strong enough to kill the puma or you're not. There is a very narrow band where you're just barely strong enough to kill a puma where your skill actually matters and then it is "hard", but the vast majority of pumas are killed either quite routinely, or they smash the person trying to kill them.

Swap out "puma" for everything in this game.

If you want a harder game, you roll in with barely enough people to kill a monster. If you want an easier game, you bring 80 people. This is called "organic" difficulty--where you decided how hard something is not by changing a setting in the options menu but instead of practicing the game or bringing more people.

The "difficulty" described in your example is in getting enough people in your guild who work from home. That's not really everquest-related. It's also not difficulty related because its not really skill-based.

What you're really saying is, you think that Everquest raid targets should only go to those people who prioritize them high enough and who are flexible enough to get to them, and if you don't prioritize them enough and you're not flexible enough, someone else will take them from you. That's fine, you're not alone. But that's not "difficult".

I think you're over simplifying it a bit. If the only thing that mattered is what guild had the most people with enough flexibility to log on for raids then Rampage would get every single target. Granted they do get most of what they try for but they can (and have) been beaten to FTE on many targets since Velious came out. They also happen to be exceptionally good at mobilization and have multiple characters parked all over the game and a very skilled pull team. But I won't deny that having lots of flexible high playtime raiders is a big part of their success too.

However! Very very very often there are multiple guilds with adequate force in the zone shortly after a hotly contested target spawns. Being the guild that secures the FTE and gets the kill is where the challenge comes in. If you remove that (imo) you remove the only arguably difficult aspect of raiding on this server. You can artificially increase difficulty if you want by doing things with less numbers and such like you mentioned. But many people won't do that. Keeping the race for FTE ensures that there's always going to be an element of challenge to acquire pixels.

[Sadre Spinegnawer]

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

You missed my point.

Who says EQ is supposed to be hard? EQ is a fixed difficulty game, for example Puma's in EC don't have more HPS/DPS based on your level or class.

You're either strong enough to kill the puma or you're not. There is a very narrow band where you're just barely strong enough to kill a puma where your skill actually matters and then it is "hard", but the vast majority of pumas are killed either quite routinely, or they smash the person trying to kill them.

Swap out "puma" for everything in this game.

If you want a harder game, you roll in with barely enough people to kill a monster. If you want an easier game, you bring 80 people. This is called "organic" difficulty--where you decided how hard something is not by changing a setting in the options menu but instead of practicing the game or bringing more people.

The "difficulty" described in your example is in getting enough people in your guild who work from home. That's not really everquest-related. It's also not difficulty related because its not really skill-based.

What you're really saying is, you think that Everquest raid targets should only go to those people who prioritize them high enough and who are flexible enough to get to them, and if you don't prioritize them enough and you're not flexible enough, someone else will take them from you. That's fine, you're not alone. But that's not "difficult".

Edit: I think there is an argument for difficulty in P99, actually. My guild was in Kael arena last week and Vindi popped. No other guilds in the zone, we would have had a clear shot at him. He was up for another hour before someone else came in and killed him (might actually have been BDA). We didn't kill him because we would have gotten killed. We could have stayed there for a full hour getting our Cheal rotation just right and buffing and executing a perfect pull. We also could have had everyone in the raid do their jobs perfectly and we still would have lost. This is because Vindi is too hard for us. When you say EQ isn't hard enough without competition, you mean your guild doesn't have any problem of taking down any target in the game given enough time. So why should your need for some non-everquest element be added to my everquest game? FTE is the rule here and that's fine--you guys have convinced the staff to cater to you when making raid rules. OP and I think it should go differently.

Can I maybe help you? I'm an old player, and not getting any younger. But let me tell you the direction to Valhalla.

You said Vindi was up. No one was going for it. You say you could have tried to get your ch rotation down, and gotten buffs perfect and got a perfect pull. But you say you still would have died.

Do you realize that is the challenge? Do you realize that is the signal to you, you need to bolster your roster?

How close do you think you were? Maybe find another non-raiding guild to ally with? Maybe make a plan on your guildpage to have max members on for next spawn?

Do you realize this is how this game was played for years until Sony implemented the lame instanced model?

I am saddened, that you see contested content as a hindrance instead of a challenge. I feel sorry for your guildmates, if they agree with you. I feel bad for your parents, because they gave birth to weakling who can't figure out how to win.

This game is very beatable. It is not complicated. And it is not "sociopathic." Quite the opposite. As your own account verifies, if you gather the forces, you can get the content.

So gather your forces.

[ManuelThePopStar]

Originally Posted by jcr4990 [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I disagree 1000%

I don't think theres much of an argument for challenge in the P99 raid scene outside of the race for targets and maybe a couple of the hardest encounters in the game (Tunare and such) I can't think of a single raid target I've personally killed that would be anywhere near difficult if there was no competition for it. Unlimited time to buff/med and setup/test CH rotations and tank/ramp tank assignments and such = Nearly every fight in EQ is ezmode. Not to mention if theres no competition you can wait for primetime hours and get all your best raiders online at the same time. The ONLY hard part about raiding here is the race. Sorry.

The problem with "racing" on this server is that "certain guilds" get an unfair advantage; a headstart if you will.

They have players with so many level 60 toons that it allows them to have multiple raid forces camped out in multiple zones ready to pounce on any mob that pops.

Other guilds don't have this luxury, and are forced to select individual targets (or zones perhaps) to focus on. Basically sitting at the zone line of said zone for hours on their mains, knowing that if they don't they have no chance. If they need to mobilize and travel they will lose.....because "other guilds" likely have an entire raid force camped and waiting, fully buffed, ready to go.