Changes with the February Update: Developer Updates

This makes me feel like reading through these threads is a monumental waste of everyone's time.

Sorry Piestro - Taken in true context - I meant that nothing could be / should be assumed from all the back and forth from BOTH sides of a pointless argument. I do admit that I several times said lets have a vote - the difficulty is that in threads this long my head still has all the previous logic from other posts running through it as well and everything is getting lost - Was just sick of people quoting a 2+ year old poll.

It is simply that a lot of people are making their feelings known and a lot of other people are immediately saying that these feelings are not worthy of consideration for x / y/ or z reason. The logic was that a poll would have taken all that away from the forum and left it for the more important details.

I will even go as far as to say that I reckon I have probably made posts that possibly fall outside or are certainly very close to the lines of the forum rules. But this thread has turned into an I'm right & your wrong argument from BOTH sides.

I did make one previous appeal that if people were not happy with what player X was asking for then instead of replying back to player X they simply replied back to SOE stating their better suggestion.

Had 15 years Customer Service myself (5 star hotel) - had a team of up to 40 - If someone came with a problem they got sent packing - If someone came with a proposed solution to a problem I had all day for them - just me . So for what it's worth - I admire the calm way you are dealing with this

But do wish the forum mods would apply the rules in general instead of being very selective about what posts disappear

Certain zones are more susceptible to this than others. Some zones will lag out with VERY modest pulls. Wolf pit in Valde or Bloody Kithicor camps for example. Only takes 10-15 mobs to see what's happening. Other zones I can pull literally triple-digits of mobs and not see a hitch.

I must admit, I am starting to warm to the idea of the aa grant, as I have alot of guildies who are too low to group with me, this may hurry them along. I do have another concern, which may have been answered already and I missed it, about the bonus curve. If I, as an 89 cleric with roughly 2000 aa, choose to recieve the grant, won't my aa line be filled with alot of useless stuff (inate lung capacity comes to mind) therefore making aa earning beyond that point require much more effort?

lol. You are funny. You do realize that the survey I am talking about is conducted every time a player decides to cancel their membership? In this survey players address why they are leaving the game. One of the things pointed out about why they are leaving the game is AAs. Believe it or not SoE is concerned about making money. If they thought not granting AAs was the way to make more money they would do it. I don't know how to make it any clearer for you. But hey, keep lobbying for that new poll.

i just wanted to say, i am becoming more comfortable with the new changes.... or make that, more comfortable with the idea that changes are coming and lets play, wait and see. The game is still great, im still enjoying the heck out of it, and it took some conscious acceptance on my part that even though i was on the 'disagreeing' side, these changes are coming and i can either accept it, or rage quit. haha. rage is not my answer. =) i feel bad for those whose it was the answer, its merely a matter of accepting change and moving on. life is funny like that, we can become so passionate about what we believe in, we dont see the big picture, we only see our side. Having trust helps me get through- i trust that you devs are doing the right thing for the game we care about so much. this is your job and your livelihood, and you surely have way more data and insight about whats going on than we will ever know. bon chance, devs! love the game.

Honno, lvl44 halfling druid, 1999

ps i will still probably opt out, till i grasp the size of the mountain before me =) casual player, here.

p.s.s. if anyone can tell me how to get my old account back, send me a pm! =D


psss please fix the chat server lol

i would just want to have the new ranks already

Please consider - if possible - granting the auto-grant AAs with zero count towards assigned. It would address so many peoples' desire for retaining prestige by characters who purchased their AAs 'manually,' without the grant. It would also allow the bonus rate to be useful, although lowering it to 500-2k might be appropriate. Let me know?

Oooops sorry - it was me that took you out of context there - With the silly political reference I threw in and your reply mentioning politics and then mentioning an exit poll. In UK exit polls are what the newspapers do on election days where they stand outside polling stations and ask everyone what they voted - may be accurate / may not be.

Anyway Sorry.

Yes please.

A number of significant changes went in as a result of player feedback. We could have pushed these changes, or pushed the patch date, were there sufficient reason. At one point we thought we may have to in order to accomplish some of the decisions we made as a result of the feedback. We managed to get the decisions in though. We can break design lock for good reasons, it just needs to be a really really good reason.

Long time member, completely on board with the changes, please don't IGNORE my opinion either And they did, by the way, give anyone that doesn't want the aa grant the option to never ever ever use it to advance their characters. I kinda wish there was a way to tie it to the boards so if one of the anti aa grant people ever did check the box that a post popped up on here

No promises, eh? How is it that purchasing a rank in any AA should ever diminish a character's ability in that vein? They are, by definition, supposed to serve as upgrades or extensions. If for some reason coding the current rank's granted benefits is difficult, why not grant another rank that functions properly? You could even make it zero cost and/or pre-HoT and thereby include it with the grant.

It depends. But the option remains yours, you can pick either way. And after you get closer to 4k with less and less of a bonus you can still opt in for the missing AA you hadn't bought yet.

best bet is to contact CS: http://help.soe.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/28939/

So here are some updated numbers for the incoming changes, as well as answers to some common questions:

Cleric

• Increased the proc cap on the Ward of the Divine line of spells from 80 to 120.
• Increased the proc cap on the Shining Rampart line of spells from 40 to 72.
• Increased the incoming hit cap on the Shining Defense portion of the Shining Rampart spells from 2000 to 3200.

Ranger

• Several players asked to increase the target limit on the Hail of Arrows line to 12. This line is already very efficient and reliable damage so we would only consider increasing the target limit if we also reduced the damage or increased the mana cost. Neither change is something we would like to undertake at this time.

Shadowknight

• Rather than change the Melee Lifetap effect to work only on direct attacks and not procs, we have instituted either incoming hit caps or successful attack caps on all of these spells that are available to players. These limits are designed to endure as expected under 'normal' tanking circumstances but expire quickly when exposed to more than 4-6 attackers.
  • Leechcurse Discipline will now fade after 350 incoming hits.
  • Epic effects (Reaper Strike and Lich Sting) now fade after their owners deal 800 melee hits.
  • Leeching Embrace (a breastplate effect) now fades after its owner deals 180 melee hits.
  • Leeching Touch (another breastplate effect) now faades after its owner deals 360 melee hits.
  • Mortal Coil now has a hit limit of 1320 incoming hits and will trigger Mortal Residue more often (currently 8 percent; needs further testing). Extended Mortal Residue's duration to 28 ticks to prevent chaining once it has landed.

Druid

• Increased the proc cap on the Skin of the Reptile line (again) from 40 to 72.

Shaman

• Increased the proc cap on the Lingering Sloth line from 160 to 240 procs.

Wizard

• We decided to keep the present drawbacks on Wizard beams/funnels because they are still instant-cast spells and more damaging than Magician beams.

1) Regarding the "AA Grant"
There's not much to do to either "help or appease" those already at or near Max AA.
But they presumably have had the use of those first 4000AA for a long time, and there's nothing to really "grant" them. (which sucks - but what can you do there?)
But for those almost at, or just over 4000 AA - of course this grant is a blow.
They feel like they just ground out those thousands of AA "for nothing". (and rightly so for the most part!)
So if you grant the 1st 4k AA, why not add a huge AA bonus curve to those currently between say 3500 and 8000 AA? (this might require delaying the AA grant by one patch - but so what?)
2) Regarding SK swarming:
Dozens of people, who actively play EQ and SK's in particular, have all proposed the exact same method to effect the desired nerf on SK swarm tactics, without at all harming SK viability for tanking and/or tanking adds.
Any other implementation to SK's has to be construed as a clear message that someone isn't really listening. There's no other conclusion to draw there.
-Rat (not even an SK)

PS: And I STILL never, ever, saw a Cleric selling PL's on general chat - ever.

I've been reading most of this (on vacation) and whichever way the changes fall i think this his all been handled pretty well. I'm kind of non-effected in all this but i do like the feedback. In times past this would go up on a friday and the rage would build to insane levels over the weekend

P.S. i just started teir 1B and i kinda wonder if all the dev time was spent on coming up with all the first names for the McMannus clan

are these 'incoming hit' caps something that drop off a number on every single hit against you?

In my eyes that is how you play the game (not the boxing part). That for me is what is fun about EQ.