Mix it up a bit for new expansions

Nothing because that's not what I said. You can have new without asking the devs to make new zones and new mobs. The hypothetical is that players will quit if they don't get this and that's just not the reality in gamming. People have been replaying the same content in Runescape for over 20 years and it has a much better player base than this game and all they do is add a new raid or two every so often. They keep people interested by constantly updating their content not trashing what they already made and starting from scratch. If you dont want copy pasta stuff then you are going to have to get realistic.

Doesn't matter if they don't work and the truth is that the catchup mechanics are horribly inadequate. This is very apparent by the lack of new and returning players on live servers. If they really want more people to play live they should just let everyone start at 5 levels below max lvl.

What exactly do you expect to happen if they make something new for lower level players? The time to make that has to come from somewhere and it would mean cutting content for the higher level players that already complain about a lack of players.

You can't compare Runescape and Everquest as they are two different games with two different playerbases.

The fact remains that making a limited amount of new content for lower level players isn't going to bring in new players or convince people who quit to return.

I never was writing about memorizing spells into the spell bar. Instead I mean memorizing all the many things into the player brain, but maybe your brain has only 15 slots ? Clickies alone can fill many hotbutton bars. If the player does not memorize them into it's brain he will not use them and will waste many of it's potential.

Had subscriptions running for many years so I know the difference. I only do buy expansions for their bonus features and for exploring their content a little bit as they have nothing else to offer for FTP. I do not like subscriptions and the current AllAccess concept, and do prefer one time payments instead. The current concept is only about duping the customers and has nothing to do with honest business. This is what happens when investment bankers are becoming managers of a company.

The game would be so much better if either AllAccess or the expansion prices were removed. It would be easy and fair to fund free yearly mini-expansions (7 zones) with higher monthly subscription prices of +$2 since FTP can't do anything in them anyway. The previous expansion bonuses could be immediately added to the marketplace with a free expansion version (keychains, depots/safes, mounts, bags, teleport house items). They would sell well because FTP would then also have immediate access to such features. Additionally, a bonus zone package (2-3 zones, $9.89) per expansion could be added to the marketplace, which would realize and finance larger expansions. Instead of whale expansions (family, etc.) there could be whale subscriptions within a tiered account/subscription system: Copper, silver, gold, platinum. The platinum version could already include the access to bonus zones and other things.

• Copper would include FTP and the grandfathered silver account.
• Silver would be a slimmed down AllAccess/Gold subscription for the half price of that.
• Gold would be the current AllAccess.
• Platinum would be a premium subscription with additional bonuses.

That was meant for the TLP crowd:

The issue with 80+ is geometric growth rate of the XP required to level vs nearly flat XP per kill.

At low levels you can go putz around killing stuff and see your XP bar filling up. At 80+ it takes 100's of kills to move the needle. At 110+ its 1000's of kills.

Adding "catchup" zones isn't going to help unless they also adjust the XP per kill. If they did that then those "catchup" zones would be the only zones anyone every used from that point on. Aka. Dead hills HA's all over again.

They "fixed" the problem by giving us the overseer system. Which is a completely different argument.

It is not only the 30th expansion, it is also the expansion where the 25th anniversary will take place. As there was nothing special during the 20th anniversary in 2019, that might be just repeated. Hope dies last.

Catchup zones have quests, just like in TSS.
Quests give the xp.
Quests give gear, augs.

Catch-up mechanics or lack thereof is not the reason why 25 year old game isn't bringing in new players. How many new players are flocking to Pong and Centipede?? The two are unrelated. The fact that a new player (with some form of gaming experience) can get within grouping range of a max level character in less than 5% of an expansions life shows that they're perfectly adequate. You're not meant to get onto the same level as someone who's been playing for years and started the expansion and been playing it since week 1. That's not what catch-up means.

Nothing I said had anything to do putting spells onto the spell bar. Your lack of reading comprehension is becoming tiresome really. Again, you only have to memorize the first 15 spells. After that, it's just a new rank. You don't have to memorize every rank as it's redundant. If you can understand how to add, subtract, multiply, and divide, you can essentially do every aspect of Math as those are the basics that all of math runs on. Hell you could even simply put it all down to adding up and down. Multiplying is just adding up multiple times. Dividing is just adding down multiple times.

Your attempts at trying to insult my intelligence when you're unable to understand the very basics of the game is not playing out the way you think it would.

The current concept is in black and white. There is no duping. Like i'm genuinely curious how you think you're getting duped in anyway?

That's a horrible business model to try to run. And there's plenty of FTP in the current expansions. Just because you're FTP and not in the current expansion means absolutely nothing about the rest of the player base. Because you're unable to do something in game, doesn't mean everyone else is unable to. Again: takes you a year to level. Takes everyone else a couple days/weeks/months tops.

Can't project your personal experiences onto the rest of the player base. Not how that works.

There was nothing that was broken and needed fixing. They just moved the bulk of experience into quests/achievements. And there's nothing wrong with that.

Oh okay. So every expansion and zone from HoT onward then. Good deal. No need to make new zones when we already have hundreds of zones with thousands of catch up mechanics! Glad we got that squared away.

Great post again, in a double meaning. I have stopped reading at 50% content because it is huge. Maybe you could compress further posts by focusing on what really matters and not repeating informations.

You are totally right to mention that ToV and further expansions are garbage for catching up. That problem started with TDS, and EoK was the last expansion that worked halfway for catching up. Dunno if that is intended but it does cause many problems. Had AllAccess running during EoK and it was such a waste of money. Had to wait until ToV for T1 gear which gave me the ability to molo some content in EoK. No chance in RoS, even for a FTP magician who does tank so much better than a rogue. Whoever is doing the game balance is either a genius or an idiot.

Your best info is your intuitution and common sense. Many players are watching since many years how DBG is driving EQ towards the wall. No need to get impressed by numbers, studies and names. If those studies, numbers and names would be any good, they would not drive EQ towards the wall.

The fate of EQ had been already sealed long ago. Ji Ham has announced in the last EG7 presentation that EQ will be continued with a minimum of reinvestment and that it will receive all help that is required to keep the game running. That is just the pirate way to say that EQ is in maintenance mode since years and that they do continue in a vampirical way to suck the blood out of the cow until it is dead.

Most of that had been already posted in this and similar threads.

It hasn't really. Nothing new at least that isn't already evident in the game.That line just keeps getting repeated.

It has but you obviously have not red the whole thread because else you won't ask that here:

You keep repeating the same line without answering the question.

Uber said he wants zones with quests
Quests offer xp
Quests offer gear/augs

Like what TSS did....Almost every zone, if not every zone, in the game meets those requirements. You do not need to make more lower level content in a new expansion focused on 120-125 when everything you want, is already in the game. Stop being lazy. That's the answer

Everything you want in the new expansion, I can give examples that are already in the game

That is overexagerated but the game has a few dilemmas (problems) that are only solvable with serious changes. The DBG managers do think that they can get away witout changing the running machine and they also do not seem to care about EQ as it is in maintenance mode already. They do treat it, the devs, and the players badly, and as if EQ is already dead. They want to have EQ dead in about 5-10 years, for their upcoming action RPG project in 2028 under the EverQuest (R) word mark, and are working towards that goal.

It is just the fact that EQ is in maintenance mode where all investements that are not needed to upkeep the maintenance mode are being forbidden. Basically there are enough ressources available to make multiple things happen: Adding a catchup expansions + two lower level catchup zones per expansion + the usual 7 zones per expansion. I think that everybody could live with my concept for a catchup expansion. Yeah, that would mean a little bit less content for lvl 125 players for one year, but it would be better for the remaining years. I just think that such an expansion would not be allowed by the management because it could stretch the existence of the game for many more years. EQ has already been written off for its action RPG "successor".

I have not repeated anything and I cannot remember there being a question. Which question ?

Study the whole thread instead of being lazy and you will know why it is better to add a catchup expansion above TSS up to current content ! One answer that had been given about 10 times is that existing content is not suitable as catchup content because it got made for well established players with uber characters that had enough time to grind out everything year by year, and receiving all the rewards and bonuses like heroic vitality points and augments. Prog tasks do take a long time and are very problematic for balance.

Nothing got fixed with Overseer. It is just a stupid minigame that does prevent that people do actually play the other game. It is part of EverQuest's downfall.