some people have to be banned to show the truth

[Wakanda]

I also collected some data from the Druids Grove about how Dire Charm changes in PoP ruined the game because it made Enchanters too good at solo'ing, and now groups are forced to play without mez / slow / haste / clarity. I can share some of the data, but this was 2003+.

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Notice how the recurring theme in this thread is about how Enchanters used to group, but because of DC changes, now they only want to solo? Weird because people on P99 will LARP that all throughout 1999-2001, Enchanter-quest was in full effect.

You also have to ask yourself, if Charm was always like ultra strong, then why was Dire Charm so game breaking at the time? Why was it so controversial at the time?

I make a similar argument when people try to tell me Rogues could always backstab while face-tanking mobs. Then why in the hell was Chaotic Stab such a popular AA that almost every Rogue immediately dumped points into?

It's a real shame that most of the forums and Allahakzahm pages have been lost since then. AC might still be king. Fast weapons might still draw insane aggro -- there's a reason why Lamentations / Bladed Thulian Claws were so meta. Hell, SKs might even still use Disease Cloud for aggro.

[cd288]

This argument has been gone over ad nauseam. Charming was not significant in the early days of classic for a variety of reasons: 1. Lag and connection quality, 2. People think pets ate EXP in groups, 3. Lack of understanding of the mechanics and refinement of charming strategy (including not understanding what caused Charm to break), etc.

The only thing proven to be unclassic on P99 which makes charming easier is channeling (although didn't they fix that recently). In years of discussion, no one has been able to present any evidence to the contrary...if you're going to raise this discussion go find some legitimate in era evidence.

[Sadre Spinegnawer]

It's always time for a CHA debate somewhere.

[Wakanda]

You have to remember I didn't even know P99 existed until 2020+. People act like everyone has been playing P99 for 17 years. In reality, it's a very hot topic on the the Monsters & Memories Discord ATM and I keep seeing all of these people say Enchanter Charm was always OP, so I started digging around and doing research. During that time period I saw all kinds of debates on P99 ... hundreds of pages long, but literally no one presents evidence (and there's ton of it still out there). They just cite their memory, which I agree... is accurate, but unfortunately it isn't proof. So I decided to help these fools out and BOOM... oh that thread is locked.. I better not make another one... but then I see this thread and I can't help myself, lol.

I just feel like a lot of people could have done advanced searches from the years 1999-2001 and proved that Enchanter charm was not the meta. Not arguing that Charm wasn't strong at times, or that it was useless, but I think it's obvious that the population and most Enchanters themselves saw themselves as CC-bots (that's where the term CC-bot comes from), and not unstoppable demi-gods who are 60% of a group's DPS, and who can easily solo anything in the game. In fact, necromancer actually had that reputation back then, lmao.

Also I genuinely wonder how many people are mistaking later versions of the game as being classic? Because in talking to people on that Discord, I notice that they always begin citing instances of Charm being OP but it's PoP+ and honestly, I do remember charm being the meta in PoP. Even Bards were solo'ing with Charm.

I also recognize that you can make the argument that Charm was always strong, but we all sucked or were limited by hardware, and therefore this is classic. I still feel like it's unclassic enough to make the classic experience not feel classic. Granted I main an Enchanter on P99, and acknowledge that it's a lot of fun. I just get triggered by people saying that the game was always played this way.

World of Warcraft Classic suffers from the same exact problem. In 2004, people did not care what class or spec you were. If you were level 60 people would invite you to their guild because getting to level 60 was hard, and finding level 60 players to join your guild was hard. I remember a lot of my friends being balance druids, ret paladins, hunters being considered a top dps class. Flash forward to when Classic WoW actually launched and guilds were literally only recruiting 2 specs out the entire roster. Playing anything other than a Warrior, Rogue or Priest was forbidden. That's not a true classic experience. You'll never convince me it is.

[Wakanda]

Also everyone thought Magician was a badass class back in the day. I'm pretty sure that the main reason they are considered a joke class in 2025 is because of Enchanter charm. They went from being the class with the reputation for having the most badass OP pet... to the class whose pet pales in comparison to Charm. At all levels.

At least Necromancer has a lot more going for it than a pet. Actually you could probably remove the Necro pet from the game completely and Necro would still be a top class.

[Reiwa]

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

Also everyone thought Magician was a badass class back in the day. I'm pretty sure that the main reason they are considered a joke class in 2025 is because of Enchanter charm. They went from being the class with the reputation for having the most badass OP pet... to the class whose pet pales in comparison to Charm. At all levels.

At least Necromancer has a lot more going for it than a pet. Actually you could probably remove the Necro pet from the game completely and Necro would still be a top class.

I recall being quite pleased with myself by defeating an idiot necro in a duel by chain blinding him and nukes.

Can't fear what you can't see!

[Jimjam]

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

Also everyone thought Magician was a badass class back in the day. I'm pretty sure that the main reason they are considered a joke class in 2025 is because of Enchanter charm. They went from being the class with the reputation for having the most badass OP pet... to the class whose pet pales in comparison to Charm. At all levels.

At least Necromancer has a lot more going for it than a pet. Actually you could probably remove the Necro pet from the game completely and Necro would still be a top class.

People used to tell me shaman was bad and reroll to druid while I was levelling up.

[Wakanda]

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

I recall being quite pleased with myself by defeating an idiot necro in a duel by chain blinding him and nukes.

Can't fear what you can't see!

I was reading about Necros being bad at PvP in general because you can CC the pet and dispell their DOTs etc. I dont actually have that much PVP experience despite playing on Sullon Zek for months. I was mostly a prey animal at that time.

[Wakanda]

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

People used to tell me shaman was bad and reroll to druid while I was levelling up.

I remember that sentiment as well. I also dunno if root-rotting was really a huge thing in original EQ. Reason I say this is my next door neighbor was a Druid. And I remember watching him play, and being confused why he would use snare and stinging swarm, and other DoT's to kill mobs (same strat was used for killing Sand Giants at level 35).

After watching him I asked him why he doesn't just root the mob, and pointed out that this is stupid to be running and sitting to med non-stop. He kept telling me "trust me, Michael, you have no clue." And then finally after 20-30 minutes of bugging him he said "fine, you want to see what happens when you use root? I'll show you."

And sure enough root broke so frequently that it wasn't really useful for kiting. With that in mind I can see Shamans being significantly worse at solo'ing. At the same time I remember watching high level shamans killing dwarf guards in BBM, so IDK.

I do know a few things from that time, in early EQ Shamans were seen as bad healers due to low wisdom, and not having a huge mana pool. And when it comes to damage, I don't think a lot of us had enough raw data to realize how insane their DoTs became at high level. I remember being shocked when I found out how much damage their level 49 DoTs did, and I can't remember, but I feel like I may not have realized this UNTIL I started playing P99. I remember Shaman as the class that slowed and gave me some of my fav buffs as a Rogue [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

[shovelquest]

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

People used to tell me shaman was bad and reroll to druid while I was levelling up.

to be fair druids were op back then because they were always killing guards and that was impressive so by defacto the class was OP