Classic (Not Progression) Server Rule Set; For the Fans!

Would love a classic server. The only way it's going to work properly is for it to be a SOE authorised server.

Someone spoke of an unofficial server which "had been in Kunark three years" - the only non-SOE projects I know of never actually opened up beyond invitation-only testing.

And the one which was being actively developed has crashed and burned last year, when the project lead threw in the towel. This will always happen because SOE are prepared to use their lawyers to shut these projects down.

It would be nice if they could change the EQMac code back over to PC. I'll be the first to admit that I don't have the slightest clue what it would take to do so though.

I'm interested.

Rock the house, Rock the House.

Lets get people's ideas and comments on here. if you have friends who are interested, tell them to come read the forums and comment. If someone has an idea for a classic rule set, please post it.

Lets show how many people are ready to support this. I know TLP forums are slower than the veterans lounge (probably because there are only 2 underpopulated servers), but this thread has been going very fast for its original date compared to everything else on here. Take into account this thread plus all of the others. Take into account for every person who posts, there are more who don't (and more who aren't even looking at forums or playing games).

Over 90, 000 views on the first four pages specifically on threads involving a call for classic/prog. I will post this excel when its done.

Lets have some more ideas or improvements. Let's get some support.

What ideas do you have for minimizing drama over raid mobs? Drama and fighting made it hard to enjoy the experience on the TLPs. Should end zones like Veeshan's Peak and NTOV be instanced on a new server?

One option would be to drastically increase the spawn time of all old world zones and bosses. Put them on something like a four hour spawn. It would have a similar result over the long term as instancing and would not take nearly as much development time.

Static zone raiding is what made the raid game back then so great..and frustrating. I don't want instancing.

What about it did you find so great? Personally, i'm glad games introduced instancing for some things.
Fast spawn times sounds like a good idea to me. A lot easier than making old raid zones instanced and would allow casual players to try EQ raids.

THis is what I agree with. No instance zones.. there is no fun in that. However fast respawn time would bring back alot of what the old game was like... And would fill more like the original game then an instance.

Open world raiding is exactly what I'd come back for over and over again. Although four hours seems very short to me, I wouldn't mind faster respawn times on all those popular targets to alleviate inevitable pixelated drama. But it's very exciting when a target isn't just handed to you via instancing. It works for some events perhaps, but by and large instancing kills emersion and isolates the community. I know there is a huge demand for instancing and that's great! But let's leave it out of these kind of servers. I would file it under out of era disasters.

Sorry quadruple post. :/

Sorry quadruple post. :/

Sorry quadruple post.

I still think that a "Locked" Classic server is a bad idea. Eventually people will tire of the content and move on and slowly the population will dwindle.

Progression Servers are the way to go, but they need to be LONGER unlocks and no votes. The second set of progression servers did much better than the first set and I would wager much of that came with the longer unlocks between expansions.

We can all probably agree that Voting was a pretty terrible idea though. Having a Set unlock time (3-9 months depending on xpac) would be much preferable I think.

A locked classic server is the only way I would subscribe to eq again. I could probably get 1 or 2 friends to sign up with me, if not more. I really like this idea. I hope it gets some real consideration.

I enjoyed progression servers when they came out, but like many, I felt they lost their magic after PoP. I know some say a server like this would become stagnant, but I could easily see myself playing on a server like this for years.

Really? So When Time is beat in less than a month after launch and guilds are not doing Kunark, Velious, or Luclin targets and everyone just farms time...how long would you REALLY stay?

Remember once people get full time gear killing past raid targets with a group of 6 or 12 becomes pretty easy - so that content will not be there for you to "relive."

Why do people think that locking a server is a good idea? It would stagnate faster than the original progression servers when people "Beat" the whole game in a few weeks time and then find out that they have 0 to look forward to but farming the same 1 raid zone forever.

The people who "beat" the game in record time will be gone, and I will still be there. You know what, so will a lot of people who support this type of server. Not to mention all the people who will get the itch to play classic again. Some will come and go, but many will be there for some time. So when the time comes for me to relive content; it will very much be there. I would REALLY stay in a server like this for years, because I am patient and will not be rushing through content.

Glub Glub and Trev, thanks for the ideas.

I think both have good points. As I said in my original post, progression was a mistake due to the racing of unlocking content, with most of the folks there to play a classic feel. Expansion's came too fast.

Hence, both of your ideas would work, and are debatable. Expansions at a much slower rate (not 3 months because that was typical of Flippy), but 6-12months.

Start with Classic+ Kunark to open up the space and end game content, then 6-12months later you release velious. 6-12 months later you release Luclin. Hence, a timed-release would be awesome.

There are other programs that have saturated player communities while sticking with the same expansion for long periods of time.

A time locked t planes of power would probably be very popular as well, however, I can forsee that after a long while (over a year) of most people reaching the end game gear/content, they may start to get bored. Hence, if we do have a time-locked, we need some more ideas on how to keep it interesting, etc.

Both ideas implemented properly are awesome and would surpass Flippy in terms of sustainability. Both would satisfy the fan base for classic. The problem with slow time-set progression is a lot of people may leave when it progresses into gates/omens. The problem with time-locked permanent is a lot of people may leave after a long length at POP.

Both have their strengths and both have a weakness, a weakness of what to do after the first 2 years when it reaches planes of power. However, it would be almost guaranteed to be popular for a long period of time. Does anyone have any solutions for the weakness?

Mac server still going strong and so I see it lasting a very long time.

I thought that was shut down?