Developer mistakes that drove away casual players.

The few times when I had asked other players to build a fellowship they already were in one, often only containing their alts. Not sure if that type of fellowship was meant but it is hard enough to find other players that are compatible with the own playstyle, accessible content, and playtime. And of course to find other active players at all. Most are only doing daily tasks or Overseer or standing around passive AFK for days and thats it.

EQ is a dwindling game which is even more visible now that the Corona player boost is over. Only a very small percentage of those new players are still active. The game does circle around PoK and the Krono dealers, guild lobby, bazaar (offline traders), player estates, Tutorial, Blightfire Moors, Frontier Mountains (Eok), and the latest two expansions. Everything else is pretty much a graveyard. Even Crescent Reach is dead now on some servers.

I don't understand why the LFG tool is virtually unused. Granted I don't look at it much, but when I do it's just not used.

Because there aren't many actual live players beyond the first month of expansion release and during raid times.

I would say that there are just not enough players there, Zunnoab. Most of them do not need it as they have guilds and (RL) friends they do play with regulary. Most players might also not know about it or are just to lazy to use it. It is much easier to call lfg in the general chat, and 80% players will read the msg instantly.

Maybe you should become compatible to OTHER peoples' playstyles, rather than looking for people compatible with yours.

Yes you should.

I'm not the one whining that everyone in the game doesn't play like I want to, and claiming that boxing should be removed from the game entirely as a "cheat".

Get with the times, or get with other people, or stand in a corner screaming about no one being your friend while the rest of us avert our eyes to not make eye contact with you. Your choice.

You should visit your local, legal dispensary.

Me neither. Have you forgotten your pills ?

I'd just like to point out that, despite personal differences, this thread is still on-topic.

I have never boxed and do not think i have the mental capacity to pull it off, i barely have success running one toon properly. I am a 100% firm supporter in your last thought, let people play they want to play, its their dime should be their choice. Grouping if you are looking for loot can be tougher, depending on who you are grouped with. I have been in groups where I was told to never click "Need or Always Need" even though i was only there for that one item. I have been grouped where the looter doesnt pay attention and never disperses items until you are too far away to auto loot or it rots before they do it. The idea of the game is to group and I understand that, but having to rely on other people to be aware and honest can be a huge ask sometimes. I tend to solo because I hate begging for groups, and BF, SV, KV from ToL are nearly impossible for certain classes to do that effectively without Raid gear. So I as a non-raiding person ( I do not enjoy it really) am stopped from being able to do certain zones the way I like to play which doesn't seem ideal.

So bigger guilds are run by 5-10 people maybe at the most, so out of the 60ish people that raid, most are "jumping online doing group stuff" just happens to be in a massive group size. and to get enough ores and gibbous drops in raids, you would probably need 350 DKP, at a standard of 10 per raids that is 35 raids, assuming no one over bids you on gear or ores. That is a ridiculous time commitment to be able to play end game content solo or molo.

The worst developer mistake was forcing everyone into the same sandbox at the same time.

SoD seemed casual/low play time friendly but it instead eroded a huge part of what made this game so special to so many play styles. Tuning everything around the median average so it was meh to most and not good for any and the stupid gear resets negating years worth of content for upgrades. The reduction of viable content - instead of having 2-5 expansions worth of content to work on for upgrades based on your play style you were now essentially forced into only the most current content. Entire guilds suddenly had their niche taken away when they no longer could farm older content for value but didn't have the skill, attendance or numbers to farm most if any current content.

It was a very short sighted change to the game that's impact has rippled through the game for 14 years now. Content is over tuned a while and folks leave, content is under tuned for a while and folks leave: many never return or sour. Money slows and the cycle of smaller and smaller expansions and lack of content furthers population impact.

Man, don’t blame SoD for ruining the game. People were going to catchup, when they started releasing only every year expansions. Of course there is a lot to do, when they blast out content every 6 months.

This is 100% because EverQuest has been on maintenance mode with a few recycled content releases once per year. Veil of Alaris was the last 100% fresh content release and that was a decade ago.

You brought up a good point. It seems that current expansions are only there for hardcore players. A casual player can hardly catch up so why should they buy new expansions or invest time to grind gear if it will be obsolete with the next expansion already ?! I do miss the early years when gear and mobs only became slightly more powerfull with each new expansion. The current marketing strategy to nudge players into buying each new expansion because they do offer much more powerfull gear does not seem to work that well but well enough to still make good profit. However, more and more players do become aware of that it is a hamster wheel with zero benefits because the mobs do also become more powerfull.

It is very close to maintenance mode. Some players do say that it is no real maintenance mode as there are still many updates and patches but without new expansions EQ would be dead so they are required. TDS was the last good expansion to me even that it was small but the overall quality was very nice in nearly all aspects. And there was RoF which was a big expansion with a similar concept like SoD and it included a sequel to VoA.

Tuning to keep many expansions relevant isn't sustainable. They were popping them out twice a year too until SoD (or SoF depending on where you count the gap starting).

I think narrowing the gap between group and raid gear was very good too. It was awful when group geared players couldn't even survive on raids.

I for one loved SoD, and House of Thule may be my favorite expansion. Underfoot's nightmarish tuning right after SoD was a huge mistake.

It's true I've only experienced it from the perspective of a raider since 2004 though.

This has been talked about almost every year for over a decade now so I know lots disagree but opinions don't change the fact.

It isn't just about the masses "catching" up. Its that they literally cut the game off at the legs to do it. Rather then continuing to embrace old content, gear and design for as long as possible to maximize its value and what the consumer has to experience from game, like they had for the decade prior. They pretty much stripped the value of older content overnight reducing a player or guilds option to only what was most current. Hundreds of guilds and thousands of players had what the game had given them taken away all because some wanted equal trophies at the same time as anyone else since they paid an equal sub amount.

Everyone still wanted to buy the newest expansion because it still gave them power. If you only tackled current content you got more power. If you only tackled some new content and some old content you still gained in power via access to new levels, spells, AA, etc. If you only tackled older content due to skill, time, your situation then you again also gained in power from levels, AA, spells, maybe newer tradeable gear to handle the older content better. Everyone gained something no matter their situation it just wasn't always utilizing all the current content at the same time. But you had multiple expansions of content for true upgrading reasons. This suddenly became the issue, that everyone paid the same so it wasn't fair that current content required you to be this old and this tall to ride. Everyone should ride rides at the same time regardless if youre 6 yrs old and 3 ft tall or 45 and 6ft tall (skill, guild, knowledge, circumstances) and every ride had to work for all equally.

Tuning the game to be fun and engaging for the entire population is whats not sustainable. Its not even possible. There are far to many differences in skill, attendance, circumstances, knowledge, teamwork, etc. So in an attempt to appease everyone you end up pleasing no one or only some for a very short time. Prior everyone had a vast array of content to fit their circumstances it just was happening at different times. Your skill level, knowledge of game, playtime, teamwork, etc all determined what was and wasn't your window of possible. Regardless as I said every subset of those (skill, playtime, etc) had giant chunks of content that worked for them its just some of it was often 1, 2 or even 3 years old. Vocal minority folks framed this as a bad thing or that it wasn't fair because everyones vast array was different. They wanted the exact same array as anyone else since they paid a sub regardless of their own circumstances. So rather then it being acceptable that guild/players of some sets did x and others y and other z we all had to be equally locked into z and x and y were removed since it wasn't fair.

People still do old content. What are you talking about? Are you upset that the low-end raiding guild died off?