Simple QoL fixes that would not jeopardize classic?

[Ooloo]

Originally Posted by cd288 [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

It is either way. Just more lev cloaks when you can trigger the spawn vs having guaranteed number of spawns per day.

Yes, you answered your own question. It's much *more* of a lev cloak factory once you figure out the trigger mechanic. And I'm talking like a huge variance window that would effectively make it random, but much more rare. The point is that in 1999, quillmane was incredibly rare to ever see, even with dozens of wide-eyed EQ noobs packing the zone and killing every imaginable placeholder all day long. Some system of emulating that would be ideal, and credit to the devs for trying their best but the neckbeards always figure it out and start popping out multiple cloaks a day which strips it of all it's nerdy mystique.

[Ooloo]

How about: Once quillmane is killed, a 3 day window immediately begins during which she can spawn at any time. So she might spawn again immediately after being killed, or ten minutes later, or two days later. Always in a completely random location\pathing. So you're guaranteed at least 2 quillmanes a week, but statistically it would shake out to many more than that cause the window is usually not gonna go the full three days. And as always, whoever engages first gets it. This would mean that any time you go to SK, there's a chance that she's either already up or could pop at any time. There would never be a period during which you knew she couldn't pop.

I think that would simulate how most people encountered her in classic better than having the spawn tied to any trigger mob or placeholder.

[cd288]

Was it rare because the mechanic was different or was it rare just because people didn't know what they were doing?

I hardly remember SK having people killing "every imaginable placeholder all day long". Primarily people killed at KFC and the Gnoll spires, plus eventually the Treants once people realized how lucrative they were. I guess it could vary depending on the server, but I would be surprised because that would mean one server had figured it out which would've ended up online for sure.

Two years later in like 2001 people had started doing it a lot more, but for the first year and like a half or so I don't remember people trying to mass kill trash mobs in SK to try and get Quillmane to spawn, which would explain the rareness at the time.

[cdfurry]

My list of QOL fixes that I would love, and wouldnt think it would jeapardize classic:

Keyrings to simplify corpse looting
Bandolier for fast weapon swap for melees
Custom chat channels (officer, raid, class etc) to get all the raid chatter out of public spaces and make small guild alliances and team ups easier to manage

[Ralexia]

Another QOL change I'd like to see is reinstating spell sets for easier memorization.

[Coridan]

Originally they thought more people would RP, and hang out in the pubs and stuff, since they were all coming from the world of MUD/MUSHs. They likely would have dedicated more dev time to that kind of stuff but nobody bothered with it. WoW tried to provide a mechanical incentive for it but eventually took it out I think.

They had no idea the game would be played like it was.

[Jimjam]

Apparently the game was originally intended to be about 20 levels but they had to stretch it out as some players burned through it too quickly. The guy in charge of spells was also prolific, which I bet didn’t discourage them from stretching it out a bit too!

I suppose the long regen times and vulnerability while low hp/mana was intended to be the game play loop that rewarded resting in inns, but inns weren’t really safe enough spots to do that. Especially with griffons and giants pathing by inns/gypsy camps early in game programming you not to rest in such places.

[BigPlays]

Originally Posted by cd288 [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

How old are you? And I don't ask that in a condescending way, but you seem to not have either been around for the classic era or been much more than a kid in the several years leading up to EQ release. Which would explain why you have this weird fixation that the devs designed EQ to keep subscribers paying.

EQ was basically a 3D, online version of MUDs/D&D. In MUDs and D&D, you get together as a group and go on adventures crawling through dungeons. As previously shown, the devs thought they might get like 30k people to play EQ max. As a result, if you open a bunch of servers there is plenty ability for a group to get together and do a crawl through the whole dungeon. Sure, that might have taken people awhile to level, but that's not why the game was designed that way.

And, again, as already stated, the subscription fee wasn't even originally intended as a huge profit driver. It was there to offset the at the time very substantial cost of running the servers etc. Once the game really exploded and subscription cost became a big cash cow for SOE, you saw them start making changes that could arguably be geared towards keeping people subscribed and stuck in the game (basically around the time of Luclin release).

I played at Launch and I think the $9.99 fee was shocking for most people. Imagine paying for a game then paying more each month to play it.

I started watching some of these interviews on YT and the consensus was that Brad himself wanted this game to be hard. He wanted HP gained every level to be a roll of the dice..so like it could range from say 10-50. Imagine being a warrior and only gaining 10 hp per level and another guy got 50.

The devs on the other hand did not want all of this loot to be super rare. They did not want mana to regen as slow as it did. They ran this by Brad and he said no. And here is the problem..one dude was making all the decisions regardless if others said different.

Sure it was new at the time but UO was around for a while before this, so they had to have some frame of reference. And yeah, people played blind but eventually figured things out. They should have adjusted the game based off of what players were doing. But camping say the Arch Magi is not "hard" what is hard is that you have to site for hours if not days for the robe to drop. It's not hard it is just time consuming. Imagine you are in line for the next drop and you sub is coming due tomorrow. You are surely gonna resub.

[BigPlays]

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

Originally they thought more people would RP, and hang out in the pubs and stuff, since they were all coming from the world of MUD/MUSHs. They likely would have dedicated more dev time to that kind of stuff but nobody bothered with it. WoW tried to provide a mechanical incentive for it but eventually took it out I think.

They had no idea the game would be played like it was.

According to the interview the downtime was long because "Brad" thought it would be cool for players to shoot the shit for 36 minutes between spawns. I don't know about you but if you wanted to just shoot the shit with others you could just join a chat room. Brad was way off what he imagined how people would play this game. Sure there is a social aspect to it but to build spawn timers around that notion is crazy.

[Ooloo]

Originally Posted by cd288 [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Was it rare because the mechanic was different or was it rare just because people didn't know what they were doing?

I hardly remember SK having people killing "every imaginable placeholder all day long". Primarily people killed at KFC and the Gnoll spires, plus eventually the Treants once people realized how lucrative they were. I guess it could vary depending on the server, but I would be surprised because that would mean one server had figured it out which would've ended up online for sure.

Two years later in like 2001 people had started doing it a lot more, but for the first year and like a half or so I don't remember people trying to mass kill trash mobs in SK to try and get Quillmane to spawn, which would explain the rareness at the time.

People in 1999 used to literally form groups to kill 2 or 3 mobs at outdoor camps that nobody touches now. The server populations were much higher, and since nobody really knew wtf they were doing they would just kill anything that conned blue. So yes there were guaranteed tons of people killing random shit in SK because they didn't know any better, who are not doing that now. So if popping quillmane is just a matter of running around clearing every conceivable placeholder, you should have seen her more often in 1999 than you do now. I played on povar from launch until 2002 after luclin was out and I only saw quillmane once, and would occasionally hear stories about other people killing her, basically always by just randomly finding her while passing through the zone. There were absolutely zero guilds requiring members to have quillmane cloaks, much less selling the loot rights to them.