Depends, prefer easy overly hugely inflated hit-point sponges. They won't add extra mechanics into fights, so the only way they will make it harder is to over-inflate hps and damage output. Beating on some Gnoll named in BB for 20 mins doesn't sound overly entertaining.
The only way to make a hard mode TLE would be to properly bring us back to the old itemizations, none of the blue stats, a complete revamp of the way stats function, would likely require an older client and something they would definitely never do unfortunately.
So KoS on Stormhold server? lol There was some fun to be had with raid mobs one shotting tanks who didn't have a defensive cooldown up and pet tanking, but it killed the server off pretty quickly.
Think the main issue would be that every group would need to be an optimal setup. You end up with less people willing to run PuGs. It's fun being hard the first couple of times, but running it every night just ends up frustrating. SH KoS was painful, 2 healers in a group, and enchanter, just ends up excluding a lot of folks. I'd quite like to have a choice on the door for hardmode, but not for your average after work dungeon run.
Got to love it when people advocate for worse quality of life while at the same time shilling for a company that consistently provides a less than acceptable product.
There's heroic quests though, those could obviously reward greater xp (and of course heroic stuff will always reward better loot. Not getting fabled form a solo quest)
In classic they're aren't enough of them to compensate, and due to the way quests were handled back then, a huge number of them were started by random drops. Don't get me wrong, I like the way quests were handled back then. It definitely encouraged exploration. But it also meant that quest exp was more of a side bonus than something you could rely on.
Slow XP is not hardmode, it's just annoying and leads to burnout quicker. I'm fine with making mobs harder and fixing itemization to make upgrades interesting and logical but no thanks to the snail's pace XP that was in Fallen Gate. Higher debt and all access quests? Hell yeah. If they can't find a way to make Shattered Lands and DoF more interesting then they might as well launch in KoS or EoF though, or launch them together for a shorter duration.
To be fair, Fallen Gate xp levels wouldn't be necessary with increased debt and classic content gating. Required class/citizenship quests, access quests, full HQ quest requirements, wyrmsteel farming, etc. Classic is so weak on TLE because all of the work has been removed. Anyone can walk right into Fallen Gate or Enchanted Lands or wherever. Same with DoF. The whole pre-EoF game really. Of course that means nothing if content is faceroll and itemization continues to be borked beyond all reason.
I agree with you Arielle , but if all the mechanics in dungeons would work the way they are supposed to and than the nameds only hit hard if you don't do it right , now that would make those boss fights in any dungeon more interesting .
I played WoW for a little bit, after EQ2 was my first foray into gaming. I was surprised and disoriented at how much one had to move around to avoid ground aoes and boss mechanics. I agree with you that makes it more interesting. One dynamic we have in some raids even now is the more people who die, the stronger the boss gets till you just can't kill him. So incentive to do it right.
At the very least it should be hard enough that people are using the damn HO chains lol. I haven't played Kaladim since DoF but no one was ever bothering with them and it made me sad
I doubt I would ever bother playing EQ2 again if they did that. I had my fill of thousands of quests and I find few much fun nowadays. If anything I would prefer more xp per mob kill and sit back for good old grind fests. There's only so many times you can do the exact same quest line without wanting to pull your hair out. Gathering a full group to go kill a bunch of solo mobs sounds a wee crazy too. There is no challenge to that.
I was watching Asmongold's Twitch stream where he was discussing some of the nicer things about FFXIV vs. WoW. One of the things he mentioned is how FFXIV's quest dialogue is in bite sized pieces. In this way, he said, you are getting the story but you aren't standing there reading paragraphs of dialogue. It keeps the action moving a little better. EQ2's forte ought to be Questing (given the game's name) but how many times do you just blow by some of the dialogue to get to the quest action? I've read that one of the things they teach writers is 'show, don't tell'. A ton of exposition dialogue, such as we see in a lot of the quests, make them tedious, not interesting or engaging.
The last expac where I actually enjoyed the quests was TSO. Storytelling took a nosedive after that, probably due to Vhalen's departure.