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

Discussion in 'News and Announcements' started by Piestro, Feb 4, 2014.

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  1. Quilix Elder

    There used to already be a very effective way of stopping most of the problems people gripe about now like swarming (can technically = zone disruption = covered in EULA). It took account of individual circumstances without looking at changing whole classes or established playing styles. Now what was it they called that again? - sorry so long since I saw it working in game ;)

    Ah yes ! That was it - Active in game GM's :)



    Still remember years ago you did /who all gm and names would come back - send a quick tell with details of problem or disruption - problem solved in reasonable time frame with no coding issues at all.

    Very rare to even see a guide now - even then free cookie and Ale / Milk is about all they are allowed to do anyway. How about opening up guide status to longstanding players as an active and effective thing and giving them the option to help the servers in some positive way. I.e. if they can gather proof of players annoying others / using exploits / using banned programs etc then they can hand out instant justice like a 1 week rollback. Making sure they had recorded video evidence of the person committing the crime and posting it on the forums would stop people whining on the forums that their rollback wasn't justified :) (and provide the rest of us with some great laughs ;)).

    And before anyone says anything - The whole rollback thing is basically being said as a joke :) - I know it could be open to abuse !!!!



    It's just a lot of these issues seemed at lot less likely when you actually wondered if an invis GM was standing there to hand out justice if you did it. If the guide population was increased though they could help monitor what was going on on the servers.

    What about :

    Guide Ruok Tells you "Just saw you explaining game basics to those newbs for 30 mins - here have a 30 min triple AA potion for helping people along"

    Would sure beat going out on cookies & milk duty :D
  2. Critton New Member

    Hey if you want to give us something Grant us those useless skills that you you hae made so impossably hard to get, and really have no meaning to the Game Like Begging, Bind wound, And Alcohol Tolerance. At least make bind wound increase with level so it has some function. Begging, and AT should just be removed
  3. Smellyogres New Member

    It seems there needs to be a balance of bringing back old players (like myself) and keeping players. Auto granting AA's needs to be balanced with "giving" something to the older veteran's. I feel like you are taking away from your "monthly reoccurring revenue" when you penalize the current customers and incentivize new and returning players. While I may like the idea of giving me free AA's (which I do) I do understand the older players screaming "hey I worked my butt off for mine". You are rolling out two game changing ideas at once and both hurt your loyal customers that have been there for a long time. So, my idea is to go back to the drawing board and find something that will keep both your loyal customer base, and keep people like me interested in the game. I recently came back with a level 76 toon and I find that I am way behind and it is hard for the "me's" out there that do not have the friends that I used to have to group with or the guild to raid with to level and catch up. I do not have the answer but I think there have been a lot of good ideas put out there in this thread. So I do believe there is a happy medium to be found. I think that those players that say "its already too easy" need to look around at the unguilded mid level toons that are coming back. We have gear that we raided countless hours for that is no better than vendor trash now. I know that we left and we should have to pay a penalty to catch up but to grind out countless more hours, days, and weeks to be competitive in the game will turn us away again. So if you are going to give us some incentive to come back you need to reward your base to keep them here. Otherwise you are going to get us back only to lose them which,to, me seems revenue neutral.
  4. story New Member

    I wish they would allow people to change the class that has been nerfed beyond recognition. For me personally it makes me angry enough that if I ever see a item with sonys name on it in a store I will not buy it. Don't care if its a tv blue ray or computer if sony is on it I will not buy. Bottom line is the devs did not do there job so there solution is for the customers to pay the price for there mistake. Not a company I trust at all.
  5. dundada3100 Elder

    How is it that WoW with its 8 million players doesnt have this problem yet a game with like what 100k does?
  6. asgaard Augur

    That may be true if a person wants to get all the AA's available, but there are AA's that aren't necessary any more and some that are just plain useless. There's some useful information in the forums here and other web sites about which AA's are necessary and useful for all the classes. My guildmates have helped me also.

    Grinding AA's is part of the game. It gives people bragging rights too. It gives us a sense of accomplishment. It's just my opinion, but I believe your feedback has come from the vocal minority. I don't have any high level characters. I have one toon with about 2500 AA's. I don't mind working for them.

    AA's are not that hard to get anyway. They can be PL'd pretty fast if someone wants to go that route, but you should make people do SOMETHING for them and not just give them away. The game is already incredibly easy. How much easier do you want to make it? Not long ago I saw a guildmate go from level 2 to the 90's in about a week. I once went to a zone with a higher level guildmate and got 30 AA's in a short period of time. You can get quite a few AA's just doing daily's and other tasks in the zones. You get AA's for the kills, then several AA's just for finishing the task. We've also got Lesson of the Devoted and exp potions to help.
  7. a_cleric00 Lorekeeper


    How many servers does WoW have? How many times do people pull entire zones in WoW?
  8. Ineffable New Member

    My thoughts (if it matters at all)

    About the nerfs:

    1. Mage Beaming : Out of control, you are right. Consider Dannynine's words.
    2. Massive Decapitate / Assasinate : Does not work on even con or higher mobs, I don't understand this change really (server-load notwithstanding, but I would definately attribute spikes to beaming)
    3. Shadowknights : I been trained numerous times by SK's swarming. Yes it causes zonewide lag, yes it affects the gameplay of others who are not involved.
    4. Clerics: Seriously I would leave them alone.
    5. In General: Yes you are penalizing players for being creative. Once the creative and imaginative aspect of a game is gone, you are no longer playing a game: Consider this.

    About Auto-Granting AA's:

    Giving away what was considered to be an achievement for many to acquire on their own is outrageous. This would effectively disenfrachise long term players who spent an innumerable amount of time earning these AA's. The "Economical" analogy I thought was quite sufficient: "Give away a million dollars to every person, and now your dollar now buys nothing", Although in this case - "Give away 4,000 AA's, and now your efficacy and your achievement is now meaningless". This de-values what AA's have become to practically every single Everquest player you still have subscriptions for: a personal sense of achievement and value to their character. You are free to make your own mistakes.

    The Future of Everquest:

    Over the years, It seems to me that there has been a blending of abilities unilaterally to all classes that was meant for singular classes to have. How many classes can feign death now? or can completely drop aggro ? How many classes now can pull mobs for a group without difficulty? How many classes can resurrect now? When did DPS become the all encompassing goal of an EQ player? It seems to me the longer Everquest continues to operate, the more each class is no longer unique anymore. It was the disparity of the classes that made each class worthy of playing. Albeit inadvertently, this "balancing" SoE has been doing over the years has made each class less unique, less intriguing, and more like everyone else who rolled a different class altogether. There is a pervasive feeling in the EQ world that almost everyone feels is absent, but practically no one understands how to describe it: Efficacy.
    Giving away the achievements of others takes away the acomplishment one feels when reflecting on their time spent in Everquest: a good example of this would be flags and keys to zones (and now apparently AA's). The affinity to one's main, is a very personal one (you must understand this), it must be treated with more attention than a numbers game.
    Give power back to each class, allow them to again be the "undisputed" master of what they were meant to do. Empower each class, promote ingenuity, and reinforce their inherent differences and stop restricting what they can be.
    Halifax likes this.
  9. Dorf Journeyman

    Sounds like a huge amount of nerfs when only a few classes seemed the guilty parties of mass killing. Particularly, I don't think you needed to nerf warriors' NTTB or cleric nerf.
  10. dundada3100 Elder

    people will still pull entire zones. I do out of group PLing in pofire with my mage. I pull entire field and then castle and cleric merc gains agro. Once merc has agro use PLee to AoE the train. Then stack damage shields. Able to go from 60-75 and 1000 AAs in just a few hours. If higher level PLing becomes harder because of nerfs then people just shroud down to 60 or 65 and do it out of group.
    KarmaThaKing likes this.
  11. 123shamen New Member

    yeah personally i thing your taking the fun outta eq people spent countless time and money getting there aa abilities , and for the people that have a decade under there belt feel ripped off they had to pay year after year and spend a long time questing and killing to get them and your just gonna hand them out free you guys really dont use your brains do you and the swarm pull nerfing thats a whole different story people purchased them aa and quested them aa and farmed gear (= lots and lots of time and money ) to make there characters strong to do that for you to take it away from them is completely unfair like i said i feel reipped off for the people that are complaining about it shut up and put some dedication into building your characters up there is a reason its called EVERQUEST its now WOW your NOT suppoesd to be handed everything its not a playstation or xbox game you actually have to have skill time and dedication put into this game im a shamen and i dont think its right your taking that away from them alot of raids require the sk skills to do what there supposed to do and ur taking that away cause of some lil whiney people complaining cause they cant do it . time and dedication. you think the ppl that have 10 years spent on there account should lose all they worked for ??? how in any way is that fair ? i read alotta these post and most against it and ofcourse i read about ppl complaining about the swarms and why is that cause they chose a class that cant do it dont complain build a class that can like everyone else like i said im a shamen i cant do it but u dont see me complaining oh wait u do comlaining about them trying to turn eq in lame WoW stupid for you to even think about these changes and all you pple complaining cause someone can swarm pull stop and shut up really cause no matter what they do ppl will figure out a way to do something else your just destorying the reason lots of ppl bought this game years ago they are gonna get complaints of over powered characters but you know what it is what it is get over it ever character is called over powered in some way or another and the nerf complaints for beaming save your plat and buy one people earned the right to do it they played for years and got there characters built up to do it really come on guys stop your whining
  12. KarmaThaKing Elder

    Bump.

    Medically speaking... Let's fix the core problem, not the symptom. This is one of many.
    LostBoy32 likes this.
  13. dundada3100 Elder

    I find PLing very fun and something to do when not raiding. I love seeing how fast I can take a guy to say 85 with 2000 AAs. I dont see why Im not allowed to have fun? Im not hurting anyone else. I have left zones or just logged out if someone was in my usual spots. Or I use instances so again Im not hurting anyone else.
  14. moogs Augur

    Some of the nerfs make me sad, especially berserker decap, but I'm glad that beaming was modified. I think the devs have shown that there was a comprehensive team approach to balancing with fairness to the players and server health in mind.

    The autogranted AAs...Going way up to Underfoot+ seems excessive. If there are no available AAs to purchase as you level up, then I guess the idea is to shoot straight up to 85 or higher. What bothers me most is that the # of AAs assigned and the # of AAs purchased do not match up. It just irks me but I'll live with it. Always wanted Innate Charisma.
  15. Elendieal Journeyman

    I have not read all 55 pages of this thread, so forgive me if what I suggest is redundant.

    I play a mage as my main most of the time, and beaming? Well I am so very glad to see it being nerfed. The server lag was terrible and I am glad to see it stopped. Nuff said there.

    SK swarming? Again, server side issues need addressing, but the self healing nerfs need serious evaluation for the potential detriment to raids and grouping. Not sure about the solution, but SK tanks are very vital on the raids we do.

    HS/Assiassinate? Really? I have seen neither of those really affecting server performance. And the restrictions of one mob at a time, and humanoid only are plenty. The proc rate nerf is just unnessasary. Decap could do with a one at a time humanoid only nerf. How do you decap a mulch cube?.....

    AA granting..... GEESH, what a TERRIBLE idea....... If you want to get players up to speed, up the 4k AAXP boost to 6k and 1500 percent at the bottom, or scale the whole thing to 8k and 2k percent boost? Which seems like a lot, but still not just autogranting AA. I find that....... similar to getting a boulder kicked in my mages' face by a giant......
  16. Bayho New Member

    I have recently returned to the game with a few friends, who are working together to level and AA up. Currently, we are stopping around 85 to grind out some AAs and enjoy some of the relevant content. I started playing when the game started, initially, and left during Planes of Power. So, this is my perspective as a returning player.

    Initially, the AA Grant sounds like a great boost. I understand the goal, even, and like that it has the possibility to increase profits and make the game continue for many more years. However, I see a fault in this perspective. You may see a good deal of people go Gold for a month, and then stop contributing to the game. You should do something akin to what you do in Planetside2, just increase the experience for Gold Members. Make it 25% more experience or something like that, which the player can use either on AAs or leveling. Reasoning behind this is to create a game that will both draw more players and sustain the old ones, everyone benefits from this. You must be wary not to destroy the skill level of your player base, however, something which is greatly contributing to the loss of players in WoW, currently.

    Now, as to why you should specifically NOT grant thousands of AAs outright. As I have been gaining AAs and putting them in specific areas, I can see what this does for my character. I understand better the mechanics of the game simply through the experience of placing AAs and playing the character in-between ranking various abilities up. The knowledge gained through these transactions and their timing is something that will be lost on players simply granted thousands of AAs. Destroying the skill level of your player base ruins the endgame for everyone. It will lead to the dissolution of community, as people have a hard time grouping and raiding with the new "Granted" players, who have a hard time learning. This leads to making things easier to accommodate this less-skilled player base. Eventually, you turn into WoW, with a raid finder. Next thing you know, most of the game is on the same level as a Facebook game. I understand this sounds a little outrageous, but over the years this is what has happened to WoW.

    Find a way to make the game more profitable and sustainable, but not at the expense of the game itself. If you want to make Gold Membership even more appealing, throw in some more fluff, like the new Armor ability (of course, you might have to refund the SC spent on that by players). Do not grant thousands of AAs, market yourself as a game that can be played at any and all levels, so there is always something to look forward to. Oh, and to make things better at the end game, make more abilities at the end game that cost raw numbers of AAs, to give people at the end a reason to keep Gold Memberships when they cap out AAs.

    Anyway, best of luck figuring this all out.
    Melanippe likes this.
  17. rantss New Member

    ok just read something on hear from one of the soe people u say that swarm causes issues with the servers lagging out um just fyi have ur stupid programmer's take out all the un needed stupid code that's just there for no reason what is it a dos program that is used to run the game get a brain using the cheapest stuff u can on a server isn't very smart and up grad the servers I mean really what are ur servers running if its producing that many problems the solution is not to keep people from doing it its to up grad the crap ur trying to run with every up date and patch u all do it cause more and more lag on the same system only game I have every played that after almost 14 years u have to upgrade stuff almost every year to not crash every 5 seconds o wait that still happens usually with brand new systems im don with my rant u all need to stop listing to cry baby's that refuse to play and do any thing to progress then cry cause there's nothing they can do any way im don now
  18. Arioch New Member

    This is appauling.
    And I feel sorry for SKs most of all renders them almost unplayable.

    In fact all you need to do "fix" what is wrong is limit the number of mobs that beam spells affect. Its similar to the Ranger Hail, Wiz beam and Bard Kiting solutions that we have already seen and have WORKED. Nothing else has to alter.

    Nerfing abilities is going to LOSE you players.

    The whole giving things away without earning just devalues that which the rest of us have earned, effectively causing us to question what we have been doing for the last 16years of our lives.

    And that is something you really don't want the finiancial base you HAVE to be thinking about.
    The loyal and slightly addicted people.
    You may be creating the incentive for them to finally kick the habit which we affectionately call Evercrack.

    You tried the whole give away thing with server that logged on to and could be x level/x aa on... and it didn't take off.

    If you want to gain more players... look to your marketing options. Don't devalue what those of us have loyally earned.
  19. Zurd Lorekeeper

    I love this game. But it's not what it was...and it isn't going to continue forever in the new world of MMOs...so there is so much I can cling to for so long. Still...I'd like to play for a few more years if possible. So a few thoughts and questions.

    1. Do these changes bring in more players? It's a business...does doing any change at this point really generate an increased player base...if so then I understand why SOE does it...even if I don't love it. But I can understand it. Honestly I don't believe we're going to get more new players in than we'll lose (but with all the new games always coming out, etc....that's inevitable regardless. So is this hastening our sunset? I kinda feel like it is pushing people up then out into the next game....

    2. Do the changes make the game more enjoyable for those who already play? I think this is a cure that's worse than the current problem. For the game as a whole it means even less lower level development which funnels even more toons into the top end content and further abandons 80% of EQ's rich environment...how many zones can you go to now that have nothing to offer....and no players in there... sad walking around so many unused grey zones.

    3. How much Dev time will all these changes take? Could it be used better anywhere else? Actually reviewing the list, it appears these are simple, broad, blanket "fixes" that won't take much time beyond listening to a month of player screaming...but it's still a month I'd rather see devoted to some smaller tweaks and perhaps some attention to old content to make the 80% of abandoned Norrath relevant again.

    4. Swarming really needs to be an issue at the 10-20+ mob level...as someone who's primarily a melee and doesn't swarm, I still see no fix to the scaling issues between casters and melee here...however I do see a further hit on utility for SKs for instance...the solution is going to cause pain than the cause in its current form. I am fine with saying no player can take on 50 LB mobs at once...but when a caster or caster's pet can still tank multiple mobs (including named) that would crush a melee...there's a different sort of imbalance. And honestly lumping in rangers already gimped HS with beam kiting is just absurd. I can't speak to rogues or berz but given the sad state of warriors in all but the raid game, I think there are hotter topics.

    5. Auto granting massive AAs seems messed up on several levels. First...if some abilities are just in need of broad granting...eliminate the AA and just add to people's AC or HP or mitigation...stop stuffing more and more into a legacy system that is no longer relevant (or inflated past or whatever).

    *On the other hand...I have a problem with those who've spent 10 years (started in 1999 myself) screaming that any change today invalidates their lives spent in EQ...every time a new expansion comes out the old gear is 90% invalidated. Every time the level cap goes up the old levels are dropped in value...and the "I walked 12 miles up hill backwards in the snow to get to school, so everyone else should too" mentality just makes me chuckle. People do need to change with the times. BUT Things can go too far in either direction...the hell levels and endless grind for minor achievements was what addicted many of us to EQ, but it's also a huge contributor to our shrinking player base...it's great that EQ players want to remain in an exclusive club of gaming addicts :D But honestly, as a business, the model shows decreasing returns if things don't change. ...BALANCE is the key here.

    IF we acknowledge a need to increase access to AAs, then the suggestions to grant them in chunks every level or alongside regular exp, or even just making them all a lot cheaper, all provide better solutions than simply handing out 4-5K aa instantly. Would feel fun for a day...then ultimately deflating. IF an AA is so useless now that everyone is going to get that skill or ability for free...just modify the character and incorporate it and delete the extra line in an already over full list of things that it LOOKS like we should buy.

    Don't even get me started on selling level 85 characters...really?? sigh.

    Finally...6. Thanks for actually letting us hash this out ahead of the change. I suspect this thread (including myself) are the highly vocal minority...and the player base as a whole isn't entirely reflected here...most people want a big cookie for as cheap as possible and aside from the nerfbat...this is a pretty big cookie. I can't offer perfect alternative solutions, but I can say that the more smooth and linear the progression is in the game the better. Don't cater to one quarter of the game's population at the expense (or ignoring) the other 75%...and while it's important to FEEL some achievement, it's also not necessary to make EQ a second full time job just so someone can max their CS and CA...so the middle path (suggested dozens of times in this thread) seems pretty reasonable. And please...kill "Swarming" but don't do it by further gimping melee's basic ability to keep up with a mage pet when it comes to tanking.

    This is gonna be a fun one to watch...hope enough thought and change happen in the coming month that we can all play happily months from now.
  20. BalistoKeksriegel New Member

    Giving AA for free is ok, but a slap in the face to those that worked hard to be better than the average player. I don't like that idea at all.
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