Old raid mobs with long respawn timers.

Discussion in 'The Veterans' Lounge' started by Goth, Dec 10, 2013.

  1. Rauven Augur


    I don't think you understand what those mobs were for. They weren't just for epics. They were for the other drops too. The reason they had long respawns was for the same reason current raid encounters had zone lockout timers.

    If it isn't broke, then why not have it set so only ONE group can do current raid encounters every couple of days? This hasn't been done since Planes of Power. Speaking of Planes of Power, they realized it was broken and turned Plane of Time into an instance.

    Epic 1.5 and 2.0 doesn't count. In fact Epic 2.0 is exactly what we need for 1.0. You have an Anguish instanced raid. They don't need to be touched, they work like more modern quests already.

    You're assuming I want these changed for personal reasons. I already have my epic 1.0s on my main classes and 1.5/2.0s as well except for my Rogue which has their 1.0 (did it in 3 hours, only needed help with the general). I want them changed so that I can help others do them and actually have a decent challenge while doing so.

    As I said before, I want Epic FIGHTs. Not epic waits.
  2. Sinestra Augur

    You mean like the people that were crying and whining non-stop about the PoWar item needed from Earth?
  3. jiri_ Augur


    No.

    If you want to get caught up as quickly as possible, you completely ignore your epics. There's no practical reason to do them. The people they appeal to are the ones who aren't trying to rush to 100/7k.

    Melanippe, I get what you're saying. I really do. But the Everquest of 2001 isn't the same game. Waiting three days, or six, or a month, didn't matter so much in 2001 because it took weeks to get from 50 to 55/60. I remember when LoY came out, and a guild set out to have the first ever level 65 Froglok character. They did it in about a day, and it took probably a week of preparation and an all-guild effort to do so. Now you can be 65 in probably two days, by yourself without help. So the choice a player used to have was "I can try to raid for meaningful gear upgrades and possible progression in my epic and if I can't I'll keep grinding, also for meaningful gear upgrades." And now it's "I can spend a significant amount of time on a quest that does nothing to advance my character, or in less time I can level far, far past the point where that quest is useful."

    When stuff is current, valuable content, it's worth restricting. When it's not, there's no reason to.
  4. Stabbies Journeyman


    Tell that to the necros who are still using their epics as their primary weapon, or the bard/shaman who get the side-eye when there's a call for burn and no Ruchu or Vesagran to maximize dps. The epics might not be as prestigious as they once were but they are still practical for some classes and some people still see them as one of the benchmarks for how dedicated you are to your character due to the time it takes to get them.
    Melanippe likes this.
  5. Grelthur Elder

    I'm pretty sure all of those examples you noted are 2.0's, as are many of the other "necessary" epics. While still needing those spawns, many of them are triggered, and if not, the mob doesn't drop anything except the 2.0 piece. I might be wrong about that, but I'm pretty sure about it.

    As far as the 1.0's go, I'm not sure any of them are even used anymore outside of getting the ornament, but again, I could be mistaken, as I really can't remember what all of them do, and I'm not in a position to be able to look them all up.

    I do agree that it would be nice to have the mobs implemented with a triggered spawn option with a modified loot table that can only drop the epic piece, or an optional way to quest it, even a specialized instance. Whether that's a judicious use of resources or not is an entirely different subject. I know several of the classes who lose out due to people farming the mobs for the other loot table items and then taking the quest item and selling the . I do know there are people who have offered to give the away, but, and you can call me a pessimist if you want, I have a feeling that those are few and far between.

    I'm not really sure that lowering the timer would actually fix anything. People would still camp it no matter how many of the item they had just so they could sell it. It might provide a smaller chance for others to get one as you might be able to find someone killing it who is willing to let you have the item, but again, pessimist talking here, I kind of doubt it.
  6. Melanippe Augur

    What is being asked for here by some is that the game be changed merely for their convenience. Yes, convenience. In today's game it is very true that one can achieve level 100 in a matter of days if one sets ones mind to it. Heck, one can merely click a button and be instantly granted all their AA's, with few exceptions, through level 85! That alone cuts days if not weeks out of the leveling process, not to mention the learning process. Various posts contradict themselves in a nearly hilarious manner. First they demand reduced spawn times, instanced zones strictly for Epics, a complete reworking of 16 (x3) Epic tasks, etc., etc., ad nauseam and THEN say the Epics are "useless" ! Duh!

    The premise that merely because a task, mission, raid, quest, etc.is older content and that continuing it's original "restrictions" should end, is flawed on its face. A raid mob is always a raid mob at the appropriate level. Merely because said mob is easily defeated by a higher level character does NOT negate that fact.

    What all this boils down to is a request to cater to those players who didn't "stop to smell the roses" in their rush to level and, for their convenience, alter the game. You are correct in that EverQuest isn't the same game as it was in 2001. It's one heck of a lot easier !! As for the choices you mentioned, they continue to exist. One chooses ones path in this game. Requesting, insisting, even demanding massive changes to long standing events MERELY to remedy someones desire for an item that they could have and still can obtain, albeit one they may have to work and plan for, is just another request, insistence, demand for "Gimme!"
    SaderakhBertox and Mithrandyr like this.
  7. Corwyhn Lionheart Guild Leader, Lions of the Heart

    Hmmmm no... many things in the game were extremely hard to do in the early days BECAUSE players were extremely devoted to the game. Most of us were EQ fanatics back then. Times have changed and so have many EQ mechanics because it is not realistic to expect people to put that effort into doing their epics.

    That being said I have no real use for epics personally and after 15 years of gameplay with 10 level 100 toons I have done the epic weapon for just one of them.

    I do think spawn rates and whatever over time related bottlenecks there are in epics should be reduced however. The existing epic bottlenecks are dinosaurs that belong back in the era where raid guilds would take down named raid mobs just to block other guilds. Its old, its outdated it needs revision.
  8. jiri_ Augur


    Pretty sure we're exclusively looking at 1.0s. The 1.5/2.0 stuff is much more sensible with quest progression spawning mobs at the appropriate times.
  9. jiri_ Augur


    So, with all this being taken completely as given - which is silly as it's pretty dumb - what's the problem?

    People would like to avoid competition with currency farmers to complete content that's twelve+ years old. And your response is that they're lazy and gosh darn it I remember corpse runs and when copper had weight.

    I still haven't ever seen a reason changing respawn timers on obsolete content actually damages the game. Every argument against it is rooted in nostalgia and bitterness.
    Sixth_Sense likes this.
  10. Melanippe Augur

    Avoid competition? Competition was, is and, hopefully, always will be a part of obtaining items in this game. What is being asked for, what seems constantly, is a cessation of competition, i.e. make it easy!

    Indeed, I DO remember corpse runs and when ALL currencies had weight. I also remember players who wanted something arranging their play times in such a way as to achieve same, including but not limited to, arranging with friends and/or guildmates phone chains to rally a call for help. People even set their alarm clocks. ;)

    Contradictions abound...again. IF the content is "obsolete", then demands for massive, developer time consuming changes to "obsolete" content makes no sense at all. You do not see any reason that these demands can and would damage the game? That statement alone speaks volumes.

    Oddly, every argument presented in support of the demand for changes to "obsolete" content as a means to obtain a "useless" item seem rooted in the instant gratification mantra, "Gimme".
    SaderakhBertox and Stabbies like this.
  11. Tatanka Joe Schmo

    Patience? Dedication? LOL.

    It's called not having a job or a life.

    If you can't be on 60-80 hours a week, you have >zero< chance to compete for the spawns.

    And who says it's about the drops? Maybe people just want to have the satisfaction of taking an old raid target down, or to complete an achievement.

    Here's a solution to satisfy both camps... if a mob spawns every 3 days, and has a 10% chance to drop an awesome item, then perhaps make it spawn every 7 hours, with a 1% chance (same overall generation rate of said item, but you can at least have the opportunity to take out the mob more often).

    Tat
  12. gcubed Augur

    Ok, so the arguments against a change are rooted in "nostalgia and bitterness", while the arguments for a change are rooting in "laziness and instant gratification". Both sides are using Ad Hominem attacks, which the Dev's are perfectly capable of recognizing as logical fallacies.

    Here is the deal. If a change is to occur, it will take a certain amount of effort on the part of the development team to make the change. It just doesn't happen automagically, in an instant, by a Dev snapping his or her fingers. In short, the development team needs a reason to make the change and that reason MUST be worth it TO THEM for the effort involved

    Believe it or not, "I want", "No reason not to" and "Why not" would only be valid reasons if no effort was required to make a change and all it took was a snap of the fingers. These reasons certainly don't make expending any kind of effort worth it to SOE. This is especially true since SOE will have to go through an additional effort to identify all the mob's people want changed.
    Note: Earlier in this thread I stated this and in response a PARTIAL list was submitted (I noticed that at a glance). Now just imagine SOE implementing a change for some old raid mobs but not all of the ones (or any for that matter) in which some people have interest. We would be seeing threads on it until the Sun goes nova.
    This pretty much leaves us with the argument of "increasing customer satisfaction". Oddly, this is a valid argument. Having said that, there are some problems with it. Essentially, the request boils down to increasing satisfaction by decreasing the achievement. That is to say, people are asking that it be made easier to accomplish in order for them to feel like they are actually moving forward. This is an incredibly difficult metric for SOE to gauge simply because every player's sense of satisfaction is different. I, personally, gain more satisfaction from actually catching one of these old raid mobs up than I do sticking my sword in their eye and watching them drop like a wet sack of [expletive deleted]. Reducing the spawn timers will reduce that satisfaction. In other words, I enjoy the hunt more than the kill. I fully recognize that other people do not enjoy the hunt.

    What it boils down to is would this change increase overall customer satisfaction or reduce it? And if it is a net increase, is it enough of an increase to make it worthwhile for SOE to expend the effort? That is really SOE's call.
  13. Mithrandyr Augur

    I am living proof that you are incorrect on all three counts.
  14. Rauven Augur


    That is why the suggestions I have mad will help the game in the long run. They tie into other suggestions for simple named mobs. You know, the things currently that just have more HP and do more damage than the things around them that have 'a' or 'an' in front of their names.

    To summarize what those suggestions were, as they aren't all in this thread. Is basically a slow but steady transformation of the named encounters in the game. They could start with the hotzones and epic encounters. Basically these mobs get new mechanics that have to be dealt with. Complex mechanics, not simply throwing out a dot every 30 seconds.

    In one of my examples as the Pit Fiend in Gloomingdeep, getting a smashing attack that heavily AOE's the area. He does a roar, maybe a screenshake during the initiation. And to avoid the attack, you run out of its range. What's the point? Teaching new players a VERY basic means of avoiding an attack through jousting. Bam.. they've been exposed to a raid mechanic used very commonly.

    What's the point of this? Why not ask the devs yourself?

    This is in reference to Plane of War. But why not tune other bits of the game to be more accessible to more players? And why not make it challenging enough so players learn from it so they can join the top 1% of the game in the end game content.

    Epic fights could help with that too. Make them challenging and interesting. A stepping stone for things to come. Is it an easy change to do? No, I never said it would be. But it is an investment of time. Time well spent to train the average player so they can see the current endgame content when its current. Not when they outlevel it by 10 or more levels.

    And you know what? It saves the devs time for retuning harder raids. They won't have to do it as much since most people will have the skills needed.

    An empty Plane of Fear doesn't make the encounters there very accessible at all.
  15. Tatanka Joe Schmo

    There's always an outlier. Every exception doesn't disprove the rule.
  16. Mithrandyr Augur

    It does when you phrase it like this:
    It's sensationalist. It's inaccurate. It makes any other argument you make suspect.
  17. Stabbies Journeyman

    I just waiting for someone to post how they would cancel their gazillion accounts if something's not done. The "go to" response of the savvy customer. :p
    Mithrandyr likes this.
  18. Falos Augur

    I'd love to see a lot of these old mobs have spawn times reduced or instanced but people have been asking for it for years and it prolly will take a noticable amount of dev time to adjust. I don't want to see us get even less content for the sake of these timers being reduced, but that being said. I honestly feel the game would be better served if the time being spent on class nerfs was instead spent on reducing these spawn timers (since it isn't being spent on content imo)
    Mithrandyr likes this.
  19. Mithrandyr Augur

    I wouldn't mind them spending the time to put in a couple epic mobs for significant roadblocks (fear mobs, wiz staff on VS, pally books, red to white dragon scale conversion quest) like they did with trakanon and VS. They could probably use the same content that is already there (VSR drops the staff too, green conversion offers the white as an option).

    Making all old raids and raid mobs instanced or scaling epics up to current level, means we lose an expansion or two. In the risk versus reward balance, that is unacceptable. Losing one expansion of content (which is what they said it would take time-wise to do 16 new epics) would likely cause more people to quit the game than it would appease.
  20. Rauven Augur


    I doubt we would lose an expansion. The hardest part about designing an instanced zone is the design of its layout. That was done for everything people are asking for in this thread 14 years ago. Look at some of these anniversary quests. They send you to instanced versions of the zones.

    Then comes mobs. Thats easy too. Give them HP, AC, ATK, Resists (in case they need to resist something), their damage bonus and interval, and then a list of skills (many are already in the game, select them by their IDs). Mobs don't have heroic stats, or secondary stats.

    They could scale them like they do in COTF. Or by every tier like in the anniversary quests. But no one is asking for every raid to be scaled or redone. Its just that if you redo all the epic enounters you've updated nearly a third of the old raids.

    But not all epics need this treatment. Some are saying we have 16x the work. Rogue epic for example has you spawn the general at the end. No waiting there. Alot of classes share the same encounters. Another thing that could be done is turn in quest givers... if they depop, they could be adjusted to repop quicker. There's a SK mob that once someone turns something in its gone for three days. Whats epic about that? Its a quest giver.