Changes with the February Update: Developer Updates

Please be reasonable with this HS change. If a mob has a head, it is decapable. If it has a head, it should be HSable, too, whether human or not. Remaining humanoid only will push HS into the same catagory of usefulness as our vs. summoned spell line, which collected dust in our spell books from day 1.

We picked 85 for HA because we were more comfortable with the level of balance testing we could get in. We had already created the rewards to 75. That's the entirety of the reason.

You may not be saying it but I am. Granting AAs to new players has absolutely nothing to do with what people did gain AAs prior to this decision. I am sure you are as aware as the rest of us that when I company starts marking things down or giving stuff away for free they almost always don't retroactively apply it.

i have read what is in the thousands of posts now and thought it time to put in my 2cp

i do not envy the hardships you devs are going thru with all of this and do give you kudos for trying so hard to respond and help ppl understand why you are making these changes to eq, and i know most of you really care about this game and want to please us as much as you can yet still make the game as good as possible for the majority of players, vets, new & returning

i have no feelings either way about the aa grant, i know you must have your reasons, other than just to make money for soe, and feel you are trying hard to make it all the best you can for everyone

i do have one question tho ... not real long ago i started a ranger, i never went to hs places but when i did come into a spot where hs worked on those mobs it brought a giggle & big smile to see my bow was doing what i had always thought a ranger was meant to do

my question is ... why is it ranger isn't able to do more damage with thier bow than melee? i have always thought it was what made the ranger class different from the melee classes, they did dps with a bow

it seems eldiroth doesn't like rangers much from what i have read but, even so, please tell me what you feel a ranger should be if not more of a class that uses a bow as it's primary dps rather than melee ... what defines a ranger in your eyes?

I use the whole right click on an empty spell gem. Once I got used to it it was much better than digging through the book.

Actually there is gear from every expansion (even raid gear) that is not prestige. The first and second tier of HoT, VoA group AND raid armor are non-prestige. The first tier of RoF group and raid armor is non-prestige. The first tier of CotF group and raid is not prestige. There is a gear path all the way to 100. Is it ideal, no. But they want those accounts to have a reason to go gold sooner or later..

How much different would Toon 1's expenditures be from Toon 2's? How much of an edge is it?

OK - Toon 1 can ignore some of the less important lines that Toon 2 may have bought a few ranks in, thinking 'I can wait and get it by autogrant.' So Toon 1 may spend more on some of the more advanced ranks of some AAs and ignore others. Let's say he is able to go 1k further in some lines than Toon 2 was before he takes the bonus. (Toon 1 will have to buy a lot of the stuff he would get in the grant anyway, so he can build up the later levels). Meanwhile Toon 2 already has the critical AAs - probably gets a lot of 'fluff' AAs filled in that he hasn't bought yet - and continues AAing while Toon 1 is just starting out (albeit with the AA curve).

On their path to 10K AA (to pick a random number) - yes, Toon 1 may have an easier time overall; but with Toon 2 starting with 4k when Toon 1 has zero, I would still expect Toon 2 to reach that goal first.

Do I understand your concern correctly? If not, can you try explaining it some more?

Still suggests that there's the silent (not posting) people that will quit and the silent upset people. This issue is very very controversial to have so many new posters but long time players.

I think the majority of unhappy people will keep playing, but adds another straw to that camel's back. When it will break, I don't know.

I've got 99 pages (of this thread) but a ... something ... ain't one.

Seriously -- developers please post your updated plan in a new thread. This one is impossible to glean anything useful from now.

quote]There is an advantage in time. Most of us who make alts don't need the alt to contribute. We need the alt to soak XP from more powerful toons. There are more non-grant AAs than you might realize. Use your AA filter by expansion to review.[/quote]

If you don't "need" a bot to contribute, then you don't "need" it to soak up exp either; "need"ing a bot to soak up exp is a ridiculous idea.

And I never said that the number of non-granted AA's is small. I said that most, if not all, will be locked behind pre-requisite AA's, which are covered by the grant.

In the cases I was responding to, Toon 1 at Level X with 0 AA's, and Toon 2 at the same Level X but with 4000 AA's, ALL the advantages lie with Toon 2. With equal kills yes, Toon 1 will get more AAXP per kill (for the first 4000 AA's) than Toon 2 will. But at no point while both are still earning AA's (before they both cap out) will Toon 1 equal Toon 2's AA count. Narrow the gap, yes; close it entirely, no.

We've confirmed we're doing it. It generated a fair amount of positive reception, and the characters will not be at all end game geared or ready.

This is something practically the entire player base would like to see and has wanted back ever since it was nerfed.

If you devs made moves in this direction I suspect it would allow most folks to swallow the HS nerf.

I haven't seen this asked yet, so: lets say I have a level 60 character. I want to opt in for the AAs between level 51 and 60. Can I then turn OFF the auto grant feature once I have turned it on, if I want to grind AAs on my own from that point onward? Or am I stuck with the feature being on once its been activated?

Yes Ssixa

There was a post earlier in this thread about the effects of the mage beam changes. The original poster was disrespectful to the devs, so it's gone now, but I wonder if they saw his point:

Limiting mage beam to 12 targets will not stop the swarming, but will INCREASE the server CPU stress. Killing the mob swarm is only half of the process, the shorter half (currently). Gathering the swarm and herding it into a dense group takes longer than actually killing it (currently). Limiting the beam to 12 targets will not affect the gathering part, but it will make the killing part longer. The swarmer will take more turns to allow the mobs shuffle randomly and hit different targets with each cast. And it will take 5-6 times more casts than the current unlimited version. The swarmer will still receive the same amount of xp, but will spend less time AFK waiting for repops. But the longer active phase of swarming will generate more server CPU load.

Dev responce?

You bring up a good point. You can look at my suggestions on Pg. 23. I specifically picked out some nostalgic old world models (Old world spectre for example) that most new players are going to find lame and won't pursue (they could get Efreeti Death Visage instead).

The functionality items I offered would not even compare to the time spent to get the AA's except maybe the veteran AA + 1 year, but in my opinion you gotta have a whole new level of determination if you want to spend months grinding AA's just for Throne of Heroes or any other vet AA, they offer a very minor level of convenience. Even Lesson of the Devoted isn't going to make up all the time lost grinding AAs.

In any case my vote's in to let new players (and old) have a chance getting this reward if they go the slow route. It will be a nice choice for those players who have already farmed out ~1000 AAs or so to finish manually and feel like their time wasn't wasted. As a Veteran it won't hurt my feelings. At the same time it isn't going to be the end of the world if they never get a chance to access it. As a long time beta player I missed the RoF beta that gave us the cubey, the ONE beta I missed in years because I had taken a break. I am an illusion collector so not having that bothers me more than it would most people (and yes I have the crazy hard to get illusions like AotB, etc). But I still recognize that my chance has passed and I can deal with it. If SOE decides not to grant newcomers the option to get whatever the reward is, they will deal with it too.

And while we're on this note others should give their suggestions for rewards too. I tried to give a list that would mollify every type of player I know. If you think those suggestions weren't enough then think of some suggestion that isn't powerful enough where content will be balanced around thousands of players having it...and something that isn't so tantalizing for players currently at 1,000 mark to feel obligated to farm another 3,000 or so AAs (there will always be a few, try to think of this as a generality).

I don't think I could swallow being put back to doing dps by bow. With Focused Storm of Blades and Bosquestalker we can finally do some decent melee dps. In no way, shape, or form do I want to see them move us anywhere near being primarily bow uses. Might as well change the name of the Ranger class to Archer if that happen. I can assure you the two are totally separate.

I'm not quiet understanding the AA thing. If I go gold for that month and get all the AA's to my level, or is there a level that it will stop at and I have to grind to get the rest? Then why should I stay gold and not just revert back to silver. I get to play for free with all the AA's. Good Business choice?

I have been thinking the same thing, as well. I used to play a WE ranger WAYYYYY back in the day, then they got nerfed, and though this was not the actual reason, I started playing other characters. Was a long time before I picked up my ranger again, by then things swapped entirely from Ranged to melee cept for HS really. and Seeing how my old ranger was skilled as ranged and all (this was before the easier skilling) I decided to remake the ranger.
Ever since, melee has been the dps method for rangers, except for HS'ing (usually solo or PL'ing) due to the fact rangers normally have crap damage for ranged now, unless HS does go off. and it takes 2-4 hits to kill mobs at the top of the list for HS for your current level. HS being restricted to humanoid what have been seen fewer and fewer as content gets newer.
Why not Add full archery damage back in for rooted or snared mobs, not for when they are fighting a tank? to me this makes no sense. You are having a mob parked by a player or merc and do more damage? when in a real situation you'd do less due to chances of hitting your friend, while a mob in the open you can pick your shots more, like hunting. Isn't this Backwards? Rangers should do more in a solo environment and slightly less in group. Sure the ranger will still take more time solo to kill a mob, but its more accurate, cause a group can pour in more dps, the deaths would be faster and the xp gain would be more. That would be a more accurate mechanic.
Anyways, that's just how i see it.

Rangers *are* melee. Always have been. It was a fluke that allowed Rangers to do more damage with archery, non-disc, for the PoP era. While not *the* original Triple Attack class, Rangers are part of the "main 4" Triple Attack classes (Warriors, Monks, Rangers, and Berserkers after they got added to the game). And I strongly believe that Quadruple Attack skill is needed soon, for those four classes (at least, at first; the other melee classes maybe a few years after those four).

Its not a matter of "feeling what a Ranger should be" - its a matter of acknowledging what a Ranger IS. Rangers are better at the bow than anyone else, but that's like saying Rogues are better at picking locks than Bards : who cares, there hasn't been a use for the Pick Lock skill in ages.

There was a debate among the Ranger community, and years ago I saw a segment of that spill onto the Ranger board I frequent (eqoutrider.net). While there was one guy who was adamant that Rangers should be primarily bow users, more of the vocal community there (myself included) was against the idea, knowing that Archery DPS would hold the class back. And we were proven right over time. Any other melee/hybrid have a primary DPS disc line whose last upgrade was in HoT? Didn't think so ... Bosquestalker's Disc and Bullseye Disc are completely different DPS discs.

If y'all want to know what my idea of a ranger is, its simple : a Cuisinart machine with dual blades, who can, at need, shoot the bow better than anyone else. A Woodland Warrior, more at home in the woods than in a city, but perfectly at home in the thick of battle. Why merely be an archer, when a Ranger is so much more? EQ's version of Rangers differs somewhat from my own, in that I don't think that a real Ranger would be able to cast anywhere near the plethora of spells the class gets, being more a physical than a magical class, but that's EQ for ya. I ALSO don't think that Archery should be so Ranger-specific in EQ; Warriors and Knights should at least have access to Endless Quiver and a level or two of Archery Mastery.