Changes with the February Update: Developer Updates

Since EQ is going to be broken, can we have a gold member only classic server with vanilla, Kunark, Velious and a classic-ish EXP curve?

There's no point in blocking Silver from the grant. It's going to cost $15 to get the 4-5k grant for 1 month of Gold. It's going to cost approximately $125 more in AA unlockers for an account which remains silver to be able to earn any more AA. An 85 buff bot someone only spends $15 on isn't going to be very worthwhile. The person would still have to spend money, perhaps significantly more money, to exploit the current FTP "vision."

Yeah, at least a full refund of those AAs that I have spent throughout the years that are going to given away freely to whoever in couple weeks...

Your analogies are not the same. Again, "apples and oranges". Those are not hobbies. Those are careers. If Everquest is your "career" I applaud you but it doesn't pay my bills. The chess comment, maybe...but still a bit far off.

I have ground for a year to get to the "near" end game raiding content I'm at now...and the past year was fun...but nothing on a guild first Xorbb clear....or downing DHs 2 for the first time. And again....alluding to my previous comment a few pages back...if you enjoy the "journey" to the end, this is NOT stopping that. You can still quest, immerse yourself in the story line, do all that junk...and get the rewards. They're just giving a hand out (that in six months will be a thing of the past and not a big deal at all) to help get to that end state of playing current content. And again...alluding to my previous comment....this in no way shape or form affects players who've been there and done that. Give it a rest. Change is coming. It's what life is about. If things didn't change or progress...EQ would have died 15 years ago....then who'd be whining about the "old days" or bragging about their achievements? No one...because there'd be no one to brag to.

Wow. Background check before inviting someone into your group? You know this game isn't hard, it's not rocket science. There are people of varying ability out there irrespective of how they "came" by their levels and AA points.

Why not invite anyone into a group and rather than lament the state of the game, offer players that need fine tuning some constructive suggestions so they can... improve.

The hardest part of Everquest is that nothing is obvious. The best resource out there for players to learn from is, in fact, other players. You could be embracing newer players that could use a friendly push in the right direction. This isn't going away with the AA grant We have "Heroic Characters" coming soon too. Level 90's that have never even kicked a snake. That is going to be a much bigger deal than a few people getting an AA boost.

NewWarrior_lvl90 tells General:1 "What does this taunt button do?"

You know that isn't even a joke, it's going to happen. But I'm going to be there to answer:

Sam tells General:1 "It helps you grab aggro off someone squishy to keep them from dying".

I'm looking forward to seeing more people playing. Both the Heroic Characters and the AA grant push more people into the thick of things. They're going to need some help but I suspect that there are enough helpful people out there that they'll be pulling and twisting and healing like pros in no time.

No it would take you more than one kill to gain a single AA (it is capped), but we are talking about two different things here. I know what you are referring to, but I am talking about today's game where two different toons, in the same group, same level, class, race, etc. will gain AA's at a different pace based on the number of AA's they currently have. A toon with zero AA's gain them at a rate four times faster than one with 4000 or more AA's. This increased rate lessens as they gain more AA's and disappears entirely when they do reach 4000 AA's.

I have played EQ since March 1999 with no break at all. I am almost max AA and do not feel that these changes are going to ruin the game.

Having a mage, cleric, rogue, bezerker and SK I loved swarming, beaming and headshotting... to a point. It got old to me quick.

I take more enjoyment in doing quests and raids to progress. I have grinded levels and AAs on characters over years and have also leveled a char to 100 with 4k AAs in weeks. When EQ first came out I would buy an expansion and start a new account. I have 20 PoP boxes with FV in my storage unit! Bottom line is I love this game in ways that border on obsessive and it has continued to bring me enjoyment. I would hope people wanting to quit take a step back and think hard about giving these changes and the mentioned monthly content and future expansion model a shot before abandoning ship.

PS - I love to box due to my OCD. No other game is this challenging to do so

Anecdotes are not evidence.. sorry about it

hi, returning rogue here.



i've just made a return to EQ, came back with about 2k aa in a month ive gotten 1500-2k aa but, it is overwhelming and i understand why they are doing this..keep in mind i didnt rush out to max out assassinate either.. i found it useless.. but i only came back and really got back into it when they fixed crit damage on backstabs.. i stopped playing hardcore probaly in tss, where there we started to get ignored with dps..


it does suck when you come back and all your friends are max aa, and you cant join their guild because you dont have 5-6k aa..auto granting seems like an okay solution, most of the complainers need to think of the longevity aspect of the game..its not easy carrying a game for 15 years with dreams of keeping it going.. imagine leaving now and coming back knowing you have to get 15k aa to get a group.. what then? it just sucks how EQ became a box fest, i want the socialism aspect back and roleplaying, with that.. we need people to play.


i think the new assassinate thing sounds great, but its not helping us on raids..rogues are one of the best classes in EQ, with lore and all those things, and its a shame its being ignored.. keep in mind, assassinate has been around since kunark if i remember correctly..



please excuse my writing, it is very terrible.. hope someone gets a clear idea from a returning player (rogue) and it sparks a clear solution.

Free AA ruins the game, bad call. This is worse then swarming, at least they had to play to get the aa's and levels.

Two Thumbs down to this.

Or get the 4-5K grant for $15 and make do with that until next expansion release then pay $15 to gain everything through HOT as well.

"Based upon player feedback to the initially proposed changes, Spell Casting Subtlety and Tradeskill Mastery AAs will NOT be automatically granted. These abilities can still be earned as normal, but because they are not beneficial under every circumstance we want to make sure you have the choice of whether you want to have them."

I did. I do not see anything about innate stats that do not help certain classes. I also read that AA's can be not auto-granted. My point was that people could get 4k AA with the curve and buy what they want and then autogrant AA's and get to 6k AA much faster than the other way around which seems counter-productive to how they are implementing this.

I do embrace new players and give advice and lowbie gear away and random help doing things, I always have. Does that mean, on a night where I have short play time and I invite someone who wipes the group or doesn't even buff? People get crazy when you make suggestions as if you're being righteous, atleast lately, and that is why I three box. I don't have the time nor desire to help people who don't want to hear it or should already know basic skills and when to use them. Background check? That's a bit of an overstatement, I was pointing out more particularly how people do not want to group with PLd folk and I know a lot of those are newcomers.

I didn't say that they didn't have to do anything to get the free AA's, they do. A person with zero AA's does have to earn one AA to get the three free AA's. One they earned, three they got for free.

That guy's initial comment was worded as if he was proving those characters were progressing toward an end state of "maxing" the game. I understand different people play for different reasons....so......what the hell does granted AA have to do with you? Giving you AA isn't ruining your quest through the older stuff? it's not affecting your game play? Just pretend you were always going to get the AA stuff....it's not affecting your play style because ONE: Your either progressing to end game to play current content then it's only helping you get there, or TWO: You're interested in taking it slow and "progressing through story, quest, raids of older content...and it's not stopping you from doing any of that.

I can't seem to see this through the eyes of someone who casually plays old content.....I cannot grasp why this affects their "style" or enjoyment in the game at all if they truly aren't worried about the experience points...then why does it matter that you're getting more of it now?

its not old content to the fast majority of new players this aa things meant to be aimed at because they have NEVER done it.

should they have to spend 15 years catching up ? No. even without any changes it dont take that long.

But add in some big aa rewards for doing content they never have and catch up will be super easy.

flag an account for having done some 'catch up' expansion AA tasks and alts need not redo.

the content may be old but is it bad content? if it wasn't bad then why are sony not wanting people to do it by pushing players levels and aa past it by granting an auto mode?

buy a level 85 sc toon. do some old school quest arcs to unlock expansion aa's - ding 4kaa in 1-2 weeks part time play.

On the topic of the free AA grant. I would just like to say two things please:

1) Please allow everyone a complete opt-out option. Those low level looking up believe it or not sometimes ENJOY the climb up your so aptly-named "mountain" For them, you're removing complete expansions of fun and adventures. It's also important for level-locked toons. Some people want to earn those AA on their own and simply saying you can waste their time on 25AA glyphs instead isn't ideal.

2) Please have some sort of benefit of not using these AA. I personally don't hold contempt for giving away things I've already worked for, but for some, especially those who have recently achieved such AA the only way I could describe it is a big slap in the face. Many saying it's a great thing are players like me who have more AA than they know what to do with already and frankly don't care if everyone else in the world gets them effortlessly or not because they've been detached from the arduous process of getting them without the aid of said abilities. I would argue it's not up to us to say those who recently earned these AA that will given away are in any way wrong in their anger. Sony should at least attempt to make it up to these players in a fair way.


Perhaps a status symbol such as a differently colored name for every character opting out under gold? It seems silly, but after this has been live for a year or two what we've all done (I think) will be the hard mode of Everquest, much like those leveling up in old EQ compared to us today.

I would hate to see SOE turn towards cable-like strategies of "New customers matter, old customers don't" Please show us that you haven't forgotten about those of us who made you (kept you) what you are today, rather than focusing on those who just want another easy game to conquer on their desktop.

Because some of us truly enjoy watching characters develop as they work for it, and there won't be anyone grouping with them anymore because they don't have 4k+ aa from the silver spoon.

Piestro....please if able respond...is there any chance you could at least include a way to make it that folks can only keep the 4k AA or so they are auto granted via gold that they can't just switch back to silver and keep those bonuses? It seriously is unnerving to know someone that buys 1 time only or with krono 1 time only gets gold and can load in any of their toons and boast there aa count with little work and then they don't even have to maintain membership. Its incredibly disheartening to the casual/regular player Please throw us a bone here....a "one time buy major power" thing is seriously un erving

If you get silence when you "shoot a simple tell" to a raid class the same as yours, you have my condolences and the suggestion to either "shoot a tell" to someone else or do a server move.

SoE tried to attract people to the game. Free to Play! Silver accounts! Altering the benefits given to both to make that more appealing! Where did that get them?

There's that elitist word again. People who have done something for years are, for the most part, assuredly in a position to make judgements based on their knowledge and accomplishments. That is the way knowledge and accomplishment works!

IF you paid any attention it wouldn't be difficult at all to discern who is and who is not a veteran. But if you need a hand, you can do a search at Magelo and look at Veteran rewards.

A medical doctor is an M.D. , though many also have earned a PhD. Key word there is earned. When one considers that a new doctor isn't tossed into the emergency room or the operating theater UNLESS they have spent a number of years as an intern under the tutelage of a veteran , not to mention the years that the veteran doctor has spent attaining ever increasing knowledge of his craft through completion of hundreds of additional course hours of training, well you take the young one, I much prefer the elder. Plus, I will take bets on which one of us is the healthier.