Changes with the February Update: Alternate Ability Grants for Gold Members and Ability Changes

If this planned change goes through, AAs that have already been acquired should be reimbursed somehow, either by bumping the AA-storage cap for a one time spending spree, or items/gear/pretty shiny things. It's good and bad.

The swarming issue has been around forever, and it's good that it is being addressed. There have been suggestions of how to approach a reduction of mobs, or debuffs that occur when a large number are pulled. Some of those suggestions seem pretty doable, and not too drastic.

Bad players will still be bad players, even if they're given 5k free AAs.

Also, one thing that's nice about EQ is that the community gives their opinion on potential changes, and the devs seems to listen, at the very least consider the comments before going live. Making smaller changes over time may be the direction to (A) get more people grouping, (B) convince players to return, (C) lessen the gap between the max-AA badasses and those that are -bad.

..and you are and will be taking away the "longevity" of a lot of players..

That is so much free AA, wow. It feels like a large part of the game is being ripped out and thrown to the side.

The changes to the abilities are mostly good, I'm glad you explained why you changed some abilities, and why you didn't change some. For headshot/decap/assassinate, if you're only going to make them proc only twice a minute or so, they're useless. I agree they should not be a free experience AA. But if you're planning on reducing their proc rate, I'd make them work on higher (not highest) level targets at least. This will still not allow swarming and not tax the servers, and it'll still be nice for the class to see a big chunk of the mob HP to go down and feel like the AA is doing something.

For those of you ragequitting because of those ability changes, I'd say I'm sorry to see you leave, but I'd be lying. Relying on one single AA for you to enjoy the game is a problem with you, not the game. You were going to quit over something anyway.

Back to the AAs... still, wow. 5-6k AA for a paladin or a wizard, up to Underfoot levels? That's enormous. It's huge. The class is radically different at that point. All of that progression is being thrown away. Isn't one of Everquest's defining features is the amount of progression you put into your character, to make it your own?

I would suggest two things. Firstly, I would delay the AA grant for later. You have given us some time to discuss it, but this is a February patch. And it's February! That is not much time to discuss, and certainly not enough time for you to internally discuss, and code.

Secondly, make the AA grant optional like it has been suggested earlier. I have enjoyed leveling my bard from level 1, zero AA. Some of us like that.

I lied, and there is a third point. Instead of just blindly adding every AA from underfoot to every class, I would request you put more work into this. Go over each class, case by case. See what AAs are essential for them to function. If you are going to auto grant AAs, grant a portion (not all, obviously) of them to the classes, and make sure they are only the AAs they need. For a tank, as a example, give them some CA/CS, some shield block, some general sturdiness, and a few class abilities. For paladins, give them a rank or two in force of disruption, some lay on hands, and a couple ranks of slay undead, for example. Add a bit more if you feel they are necessary like heal AAs. Don't just blindly give every single Underfoot AA. It's entirely too much.

Please hold off on the AA grant feature. I know you guys are trying. Really, I do, and anybody with a brain should appreciate that. But please hold off on it. You have not given the players enough time to give you feedback on it, and for you to to change anything based on that feedback.

One thing I can say is I am glad about is there will be less "WTB PL WTB PL WTB PL WTB PLTWL WPTL BPL WTPWLPLPB PTPLPLPLPLPLPLPLPLPLPLPLPLPLPLPLPLPL" in chat. When it's working, I mean.

I don't know what to say, been playing a long time. Not on this account but on my main. People have invested hundreds of hours on the clickies and AA needed to swarm. Its been going on in EQ for a long time. I can understand that maybe it wasn't intended, but then why not kill it in the beta tests before it ever goes live. Now its live and we the paying customers have become the game testers? Mass killing has been going on for a long time as well. I have come to zones and had problems even getting any mobs because rangers were AE headshotting for years. years before it got nerfed. I never complained. Now my main, a zerker, has something to compete with the swarming, assassinating, bard charm kiting ( not to mention the years bards could AE kite) and we get a short time to work with decap before its nerfed. I don't spend alot of time doing it, but i do help friends get level and AA every now and then by pulling one whole camp in the grounds. Not even a whole zone. So now that we are paying SoE to test the bugs out of their game for them, so you would think they would just upgrade the servers over the spike points instead of penalizing the customer/gametester/sucker.

Hmm free AA, i don't know what to say about that one. I have all my AA up to underfoot for the most part. They have given away AA that i didn't get refunded before so I basically can count up a couple hundred days of active gameplay given away to the newb next to me that steals my mobs, doesn't respect camps, and has very low respect for the community that has been around for so long. So give them a bunch of AA?

Well i won't complain about what other people get for free but I am facing a loss to the ability that kept me playing everquest for the past 2 years and inspired me to buy VoA and CoTF. I think the lesson we should take from this is if you just afk and don't buy the product then SoE will eventually give it to you anyway if you just go gold for the right month.

I know this is a wall of text so let me just cliff note it for everyone.
*Uppgrayyedd the servers to handle the CPU spikes.
*Reward players by refunding spent AA that is given to them free.
*Embrace swarming, thousands of players have and love it.
*stop letting unintended mechanics make it onto the live servers.
*avoid double nerfs like taking away swarming and hurting decap and simular abilities.
* Make zones good swarming and bad for grouping, and vice versa. then players not swarming wont have to be concerned with it.

One of the simplest fixes to an sk swarming (I play one) without destroying their tanking ability would be to have riposte lifetap proc as it does now in a raid or instanced zone. That way in a raid or instanced zone (where you can't upset other players) they can be as effective as they are now. But in regular content (neither of the 2 above conditions) you could have it limited as in the post that was stated to be forwarded. I would have no problems losing the ability to swarm. But I don't want to lose any ability to be a tank period. So I reiterate in raids and instances full riposte lifetap so they can tank properly. In non-raid/instanced situations limit riposte lifetap ability so as to avoid swarming.

Why not let assassinate or decap proc from riposte discs? Those 5-6 mobs we kill with it on are too much for the servers to handle?

Anyone who actually seriously swarmed knows the zone lags. The mobs actually start warping.

Assuming you are even telling the truth, I think me and you both know that if you were so daunted at knocking out a few thousand aa (with a huge exp curve) that it prevented you from boxing, you won't be playing them long when you hit the 90s and are getting normal exp at 1/10th the rate and having to gear them up.

You will never extend them to matter and this goes beyond decaping or anything. Right now melee dps is far behind caster dps in group content and this just makes it worse. Now these classes have nothing to do if they cannot find a group while casters can STILL go solo kite mobs that don't summon which is almost every mob.

Still wondering how the AA change will affect the progression servers...

I've got subtlety on my list of things to discuss with the Devs as potential negative by product.

For the swarming thing, should just put in a mechanic for non-raid flagged mobs (so it doesn't interfere with add spawning raid scripts) so that if more than 10 mobs have you on aggro the 10 with the least aggro fade all aggro and go away.

Oh yea... this reminds me of one basic question too... what prevents some people from runninng around and gathering up 200+ mobs just for the fun of it... (wont this STILL lag the servers?)

has anyone ever tried soloing on a Mage vs a Berserker. Berserker needs Decap to be able to keep up. Does this mean they are getting buffed?

Having dorked around with some 50's and 60's characters grinding AA (which now feels like a waste to be honest) before going on to higher levels, there is definitely a problem with the health of the leveling game.

The world and mobs and game play was designed for a time when people could group, and there is just no one out there. You can't look over zone X and say it's being played like it was intended when the zone is almost totally empty except for PL'ing and 3 boxing with 3 mercs.

Alot of people have alot of reasons to not like the AA granting implementation, but that doesn't mean that leaving it like it is now is perfect and can just be ignored.

I wanted to come back to play a grouping MMO with realistic opportunities to group, but it takes quite a while to get to that point.

This is under discussion.

Its already way too hard for a cleric to solo, and thanks to you ingenious merc system, nobody needs a cleric to group, do you mind explaining to me how im suppposed to level now? At 89, with 1800 aa's, I cannot take on blue cons. and hunting lt blues one at a time is a practice in torturing myself.

We've been loyal to you for more than a decade. We stayed with you through the release of many other MMOs--EQ is and has been our love.
A huge part of that love is for the grind--the slow, plodding pursuit of greater ability for each character we create. Many folks don't enjoy a slow grind. Those folks tend to choose different games to play. Now it seems that you, with your upcoming change to the AA grind, have decided to alienate a great deal of your loyal players in order to reach out to those other people who don't play Everquest.
Any student of Business theory will quickly remind you that it is far more difficult to gain a new customer than it is to simply keep existing customers. So your decision does not make good business sense. What is more, it's incredibly rude to radically alter a system that is beloved to so many.
This game has been a big part of my life, and that of my wife and many of my close friends. I had hoped to someday introduce it to my children as well.
If there is any chance to reverse this terrible mistake before it happens, I would beg you: please do not do this to us. Please do not take our joy away from us.

Progression servers won't receive the AA grant until they have unlocked CotF I believe.

Why not treat AAs a similar way to how spells/abilities are treated? With different ranks. Allow users to purchase "rank 1" AAs with in-game currency. That way they are not overly difficult to obtain, but they aren't free. Allow a significant upgrade to these AAs via XP or -- since I hate straight-up grinding and the game is called Ever_Quest_-- via quests.