Additionally, could the devs change Empyr access so that if you beat 1 Smoke trial Empyr permanently opens up?
The xp in the HA is a lot better than the open zone, because the mobs are higher level and much easier. It is relatively boring to do though. The main reason for doing it is to top up AA for glyphs on raids, and to get the chest drops for tribute. The first HA is miles ahead of anything else when it comes to topping up tribute.
It is not "easy", it is trivial. There is a difference. And produces end game rewards. That is not right irrespective of where you stand in the game. It is not healthy and the sort of thing that ultimately will kill the game. No one is saying that there should not be easy content for less endowed players, but it should not be trivial and under no circumstances should trivial content be generating end game rewards.
The evolving items are not that hard to evolve if you were doing content during the various expansions, you should have had most of that stuff done anyway. It did not take that long to finish off. For me it took a lot longer getting them to drop than actually unlocking them for more progress. And you end up with items that are considerably better than raid items in the current expansion. The evolving items were simply too good. They should have evolved to something along the lines of 7k HEM for group, which would have placed them between current group and raid items. With the option of evolving them to raid level at ~8.5k HEM with some raid achs. That would have made sense. As things stand right now however, those 4 slots are probably not going to be improved on in the next 1-2 expansions. That is poor itemisation design unless the devs were planning for TBL to be the final expansion. Since it was not they now have the problem of how to deal with the disruption to itemization it creates. Difficulty for end game chase items is measured as "hard to beat with a full group of equiped players and a rare drop to boot. That is what the evolving items should have been, plums at the top for the very best group players to aim for with much effort, not stuff that drops in the easiest mission by far in the expansion. The risk v reward is completely out of whack. As far as no one going to GMM, the people who found TBL to be too hard would go there. After all, they do complain about GMM a lot, so it is safe to presume that they would go to the easy zone when that opportunity presented itself. And there would be appropriate rewards for them, just not better than top tier gear from GMM itself. It should actually be slightly worse than tier 1 group gear from TBL, that is what would be appropriate for GMM. The better players would gravitate to the harder zones, where the rewards would (and should) be much better. As far as the anniversary events are concerned, they should not be a torpedo that makes everything else obsolete. The devs are not perfect, they make mistakes like any other person, and they definitely exercised poor judgement when it came to GMM with respect to risk v reward IMO. Not just in the group game, the GMM raids are that way as well.
Depends which end of the spectrum you are on. For those who are max AA and Max TBL gear & augs then yes it is trivial. For those who have the bare minimum of AA and are not as well equiped it is not easy at all. Everyone has always advised players to get max level then AA, the problem is there is now a huge amount of AAs to earn after the auto grant runs out, for some classes over double what the auto grant gave. Which means there is a huge difference between level 110 players.
Ok, want to go “Full elite mode” then let’s do it. All of us play with only one commodity: time. People with loads of time can invest in raids and demanding guilds; they can spend hours with strong groups and achieve amazing gear. If you got time, then all those trade skills, hunter requirements and evolving gear can be achieved. “Get guuud” really means spend a lot of time in game and have some skill. Now, life isn’t fair. I don’t have a lot of time for the game, maybe 5 hours in a great week, 2 in an average one. So, I don’t have the hour investment of the Raid God of Guuuud. What I do have, however, is money. In life money buys access, friends, goodies, and - heck - even justice. Why not EQ? I propose DB implement a new tier of merc with T3 raid gear and RKiii spells. They rent these out with only station cash at say $30 per hour played. Furthermore, they allow me to fill an entire group with special classes, enchanter, shaman, beast lord, wizard and mage. Each with top of the line gear. So it costs me $150 an hour - I don’t care. Now,I’ll also have access to a store where I can buy amazing toys because money is the grease that moves the engine of the world. Now, when I scream by you on a jet powered unicorn singing 80s pop at top level, I’ll cackle in delight. Get guuud in rl and make some money. Money is power; money eases the way; money buys the attention of super models. I’m not calling- in a whiny passive-aggressive tone- for others to be nerfed because I feel entitled, I’m calling for real breaks and real achievements based on my ability to maximize the only game currency - time. I want to hire a chef to do my baking research; the worlds best tailor, brewer, fletcher, etc to do my dirty work. It’s only money, bro. Earn some and get perks. Yep, if we want a entitlement fest - bring it on. $1,000 a month to DB to maximize my time and achievements is worth it. Heck, charge me $500 for a raid per hour and fill it with 27 I’ll defeat all content in the first weekend. Yes, I’m serious. Time to make Uber and entitled match the real world. daybreak are you listening?
The old .. pay for power .. Is literally thee very bedrock upon which Everquest is formed on.. You can not be as powerful.. if you are a silver account, as a Gold account.
Most of us have little money, even less time...and a rapidly diminishing supply of patience for our fellow human beings. Maybe that is one of those "Pick Any Two" conundrums.
People like you are what will kill the game. For the record the devs listening to this dude you're nerfing this for the minority that will kill the game cater to the 1%. This entire thread this dude is the only one complaining about how easy it is.
Like, this is an awful mentality. The zone was a clear and obvious exploit to anyone who's seen it, and defending the devs "choice" to make it so easy is ridiculous. The developers themselves said that they made a mistake with this zone, and calling others out because they're bringing an exploit up in a manner in which the devs will respond to and fix it is absurd. I don't mind that other people get their XP in GMM. I earn mine.
Just a sidenote, I always get a little worried when I see 11 white mobs and 2 blues on extended target, because as a warrior, that means death literally everywhere else. Now, I wasn't gonna be the one to say anything, but don't attack the man for being a decent human being, learn from him. Become one yourself.
Using bad game design to your advantage doesn’t itself constitute as exploitation. Let’s get this straight, no one grinding GMM for EXPs exploited anything. This was a simple gear/AA reset for those who purchased TBL, but could not progress. HAs are a perfect utility for this since you can turn it off at any time (nerf). If people are so receptive to this type of content then the Devs are going keep serving this rubbish.
Again it was fine for 6 months but now its an exploit ? Sorry but we've all been here before. Something working as intended for months/years and all of the sudden now its broke.
People this was anniversary content it should be accessible to EVERYONE. The content should not be linked to TBL difficulty period. It will always be trivial when you're in raid gear. Go try it out in group gear with other GROUP geared toons.
Are you people nuts calling GMM exploit now? What's next, going to ask devs to ban people who exp'd there so we can have entire servers banned due to GMM-Gate ?
Here it is at the end of summer. Usual nerf call time. Toons are full AA/max augs/full kits of raid gear. People have all the pulls down to being done blindfolded. Bored. This whole thread could have stopped at this: And here we are. Who knew, eh?
I don't mind making the mobs a little harder tbh. But if you nerf the exp whats the point ? Should we just do a HA once for the achievements and never go back ? Content should give incentives to make people go back to it right ? Should it be the best xp ? No but it should be an option.
