Changes with the February Update: Developer Updates

The arrow nukes can only headshot your actual target, all 8 never hit only your target. So it's maybe 2-3 extra attempts? Unless the higher level arrow nukes start focusing on a single target I'm curious how you're working that. According to Deloehne's magelo he's also over 1200 dex and is clearly raid geared with 12k+ AA. Basing this kind of balance on a person that is raid geared is a horrible premise.

Damn, sometimes the devs reply way too fast.

I just don't quite get it why you don't 'feel comfortable' making wiz beams work like mage ones.

After reading both threads regarding this topic I finally feel the need to post. I am not surprised to see the nerf to beaming and swarming. In all the years I have played (10+) this type of player advantage has lasted longer than most. In regards to the aa proposition I can see both sides of the fence. I retired from eq two years ago as an end game raider and let my son take over my accounts... I know that's not supposed to happen but it does. I decided to return and instead of raiding my original main I started all over. What a daunting experience. However I maxed aa'd and geared my class in less than a year. However had I never played before I wouldn't have stayed with it. For those vets shouting against the free aa, what's the difference between sony granting them and a Mage beam kiting them? Nothing really. The player receiving them is still new or returning. Our job as vets is to teach them our tricks to salvage the game we love. So I say to those haters against this put some faith into sony to help salvage what we have. I quite frankly would rather see the devs develop a better expansion than spend time on this thread. Because honestly COTF part b is very week. And as a last note please fix chat channels.

Wizards are innately smarter than mages. Therefore, the devs must be extra careful and cannot treat them as equals.

I agree gifting all of this to new players will do nothing but give them a reason to quit playing sooner. One of my most fond or should i say not so fond memories of EQ was back in 2001 lvl'ing my shaman it took me an entire week to solo my way threw lvl 45 but i did it and i for one am glad it wasn't just handed to me i know my class and can play my class better because of it. Just giving someone all this power straight out of the box will cause more problems for veteran players due to inexperienced players not knowing how to play their toon in a group/raid situation. So my advice to everyone involved would be to sit back and think about all the variables involved not just cater to new players cause you think that is where the majority of the population is. A lot of veteran players will end up leaving the game and taking their $15-$60+ elsewhere and when you have enough of this happening you loose population/money fast. Just food for thought!

Axxius said: ↑

“But that's a matter of simple logic and fairness! Ok, if you don't feel comfortable making beams more appealing for wizards, then why not finish the job of making them much less appealing for mages? Hit mages with a 12 sec recast time too, or recourses?”

If it's not fair or logical that wizards have lines of instant-cast nukes with detrimental recourses and mages don't, then Norrath is certainly an unfair and illogical place. Also, at this point I'm assuming you're just asking for the lulz, so I will lulz with you.

PrathunSOE,

I just wanna add to this as a mage, I do not play a wizard but I can say that the beam line(s) for a mage are a bit extreme when you are using them their refresh is pretty quick and the mana cost is fairly low. If you use your gather mana+ a few other select items/aa's you can recover mana quickly making this a endless ongoing event. I don't do the beam kiting but have been in the shadows trying to hunt in a zone and felt the results of it having mobs ghost in and out from anywhere the zone that it is occuring making it impossible to hunt there, so I say it should have been nerf long ago and I still think 12 mobs is to high of a count to be frank while other classes are plan out getting shafted. I feel sorry for them.

Wild Speculation -

I think they planned on creating HA's that could be scaled down to level 85. Decided 85 was a reasonable Heroic Character level. Wanted these level 85's to be able to do HA's (and other things) with higher level characters and a particular equipment quality and AA capability emerged. These are going to be stout level 85's - more like the level 90's of yesteryear.

I think HA's, Heroic Characters, the AA grant, random 90-92 armor dropping in RoF is all part of a get lots of Gold accounts initiative with SOE wanting then to hit the ground sprinting (things are easier after UF if you pick your path cleverly). Forgive me for seeing conspiracy where there might not even be any...without higher level experienced players picking their $$$->Chrono->pp->PLing bones in the process (and shifting their monthly playing costs to these newer players likely causing resentment).

All of which resulted in less content for higher level players and the All New Model for Content in the Future. To put a happy happy joy joy shine on things SOE sees this as the best chance to create a healthy (and profitable) EQ extending into a longer future.

new 'cool' abilities - ok sks took one for the team along with the 'mass killing' classes and lost some functionality, are there plans to compensate them for that? when monks had their long distance silence button 'nerfed' to a super long range pulling tool they (out of the blue) got hate's attraction additionally, despite some protest on their part ('til they realized how great things became for them). what's the next step?

I think SK's will probably get a piece of Warrior defensive abilities that should not be shared (and for which Warriors will get no compensation for sharing - unless you consider our Epic 2.0 compensation.)

This may have been a solution in 2005 when people still used DS to PL. Sadly not on. DSing has nothing to do with PLing level 100 toons.

In other news.. was someone swarming today? There was some lag on my server.

People still use DS to PL. It is still the fastest way to PL.

Lvl 96+ DS is like 300 points? Will get someone to lvl 60 easily.

Obviously not 100%, but you do have a point. An average swarm pull is what, 60-ish mobs? I don't think you can find and herd more together reliably before it starts lagging the server too badly. So pulling the same 60 mobs and chain-beaming them 12 at a time will take longer (the killing part will be 5x longer, but the killing part is already the short part). But it will result in the longer server stress while the efficiency of the mage's xp intake will be only slightly diminished.

P.S. Damn, I just realized that wizards would become able to swarm kite again if our beams were made like mage ones post nerf! All I was thinking about was kiting 12 mobs. Ok, I can see why Prathun may not be comfortable with that. But then why is he comfortable will letting mages continue swarming slower, stressing the servers for longer?

No, it doesn't quite work out that nicely. Limiting the target amount will make beaming exponentially more difficult since the swarm ( which might be 60-80 mobs or more) will stop lagging with many targets with lots of hitpoints left. It would be more than just hitting burns for 1-2 casts and they all topple dead. Even with a bard helping, you stand a good chance of dying. It might discourage some. Giving out the AA that would be earned by beaming PLing for free would discourage even more. Plus, if you are still at it and zone disrupting after all this, you are going to become a pariah.

The Nerf won't completely eliminate it, since beams have merit in situations other than PLing or getting mass exp lesson burns. Same with the other mass killing methods. They are hobbled, but not taken around back and shot.

when mob will stop lagging mage will fade , then start to pull again mobs who have repop and go again

Yeah up to level 60 or 65...after that it is most certainly not the fastest way to PL. If they want to change this they will...but I mean really...are you new to the conversation? This is about such large (read: MASSIVE) pulls that are resulting in server lag in zones that other players are being griefed in. Maybe someone takes DS PL to a higher level than I ever have...but the fact remains that 95% of zones intended for use of level 1 through 65 are empty or have one person in them, at any given time and no griefing is likely to occur. Let's try to stay on topic here...mage beams were broken. They put a bandaid on it, by limiting them to 12 targets. But this does not mean those same mages can't still pull a massive swarm of mobs and do the exact same thing with a target limit...it will just take longer, as Axxius said, and cause more grief. Cunning players will always find a way around things like that...its been happening in EQ for a long time (though way more prevalent lately).

They won't be dying 12 at a time. One 90-degree turn and the beam hits 12 different mobs in the bunch. Etc etc. It will only become harder at the very end when they really start dying, but they will all be at very low hp by then, so it'll still be short.

Seriously why is everyone crying so hard about the AAs? This only helps players new and returning become more competitive. How is this ANY DIFFERENT from new expansions that make old gear completely Obsolete! This grant will still make it so players are thousands of AAs bellow the current cap. Would you like players to spend YEARS to get equal gear to you too while we're at it so its "fair"????

Guys, i've had 3 friends join me in EQ, who i had to convince. They enjoyed their time to a point but after spending Months of time grinding AAs they quit. They had no fun in low lvls unless i played with them, and grinding AAs Is NOT fun when new to the game. (Especially knowing how useless you are until you have enough of them to be relevant.) AA's arent as "fluff" as they once were when there were less of them. Its not FAIR to new players for them to sit in mediocrity forever just to inflate the ego of veteran players who had years to grind out AAs.

Of course they focus on a single target, each of the two spells usually procs multiple times on 1 target and said target dies. Click on your next target and cast the other spell which procs multiple times and kills that target. rinse and repeat. Frankly I am done with this thread, believe what I am saying, don't believe it, I really couldn't care less. I am not responding to anymore trolling from people who are intentionally trying to play down headshot in hopes that it miraculously won't be nerfed. I have been playing a ranger since kunark came out and I will continue to do so, I personally am not in favor of this nerf but at least I have the integrity to voice my qualms without trying to deceive the developers about how the aa actually functions. Come on, they know how often it is capable of procing, you aren't going to fool them. Lets for one second assume that it is only actually capable of procing 9 times per minute currently, most rooted mobs that are low blue to a lvl 100 take on average 3 procs to kill, so you would be getting 3 low blue kills per minute. If this was accurate nobody would ever want to pay for such a crappy pl which is obviously not the case, and the developers would not be trying to nerf it based on its propensity to cause "server lag".

the ones who charge real life $$ for this wont care before or after. the ones earning plat to sell wont care either.
Like those who perma farm epic drops to charge huge plat for that stop most enjoing fully doing epic 1's dont care they take enjoyment away from others (which sony could have stopped 14years ago with a simple no trade / no flag)

If the Mage wants to be an anus and beam in static zones maybe. If the lesson didn't sink in after all this that what they are doing is wrong, than I would be all for beams going away completely or the random summoning mobs being added. Than everyone gets to suffer because a few jerks didn't get it. I have only beamed in the Evil Tree instance so I never had the luxury of repop, btw.