Instancing group zones is not the answer... Please, Daybreak...

I for 1 am extremely excited to see more instancing. Even outdoor zones like SKarana are starting to be over run in the 20-30 range where you see 4-6 hours fighting over camps that would have only supported 2-3 in classic. Not trying to say I should always be able to find stuff to kill everywhere, but like others have said, I see this more as turning ragefire into 2-3 servers without needing to add more servers.

They should have done this before trying to add a new server.

Lol!

The second server is to alleviate the queue.

The instancing sure seems to be needed, but the second server wasn't because of the limit of content, it was the limit of population capacity. They need to do both. Sitting in que for 2 hours is certainly a fix to content issues however, as half the players would have left next month allowing this server a population that wouldn't overrun that same content.

Instead, that half of the player base will just be on another server, no harm to anyone.

Times are different now. Waiting 7 days to have a chance to down raid mobs should be over. With the power and the sheer numbers of people rolling on the server it should be changed. It's a bad game design then and its worse now. The only thing that is classic are the zones we are exp/raiding in. Even that isn't the same with the amount of people in those said zones. I've always been pro instancing because of this.

A lot of people play this game to raid and progress with the guild he or she is in. When that isn't an option "some people" will stop playing. This is a major problem in the next few weeks/months when the server gets caught up with the hard core level. Instancing hurts nothing. Specially if you make it no drop.

Instancing isnt "entitling" people that feel they should get loot. Lets be real here. The difference between lock down farming raid content and not seeing a raid mob till kunark/velious is time you are willing to waste socking. I'm beating the #$#$@# out of a dead horse but the only people who care about raid instancing are RMTers, grievers, and people who watch their character screen thinking they are a celebrity lol.

I couldn't disagree more. Instancing of group zones is absolutely needed to maintain close to current player levels, many of which are returning players who in many subsequent years of playing other games, and have gotten used to games that don't suck. And camping in Guk with 200+ players SUCKS beyond belief. If you like that, you are a sadomasochist. I leave my SM in the BR.

DBG: if you do not instance group zones, you will lose players, and you will lose money. It is inevitable, and it is not rocket science. As more players hit their low to mid 30's, and start to gear up, if you do not have instances in the dungeons that drop this gear, many of these people will become frustrated and LEAVE. Guaranteed.

Yes, you will lose players that re-subbed over the next few months either way. Some may quit today over the expansion of instancing (I for one say don't let the door hit your on the way out). Yes, some will leave if you do this, but MANY more will leave if you do not.

This should be obvious to anybody who knows anything about MMO design.

EQ is a business. Make the decision that makes the most business sense. Clearly, that decision is to expand instancing.

Again, it's not rocket science.

No, EQ reigned because there were no alternatives that didn't completely suck, or did things the same way.

EQ was decimated by a game that embraced instancing.

Again, it's not 1999, and players will not stand for the toxicity and the inability to go hunt their own loot. It's that simple. They will leave.

Furthermore, adding a server so that there are 150 in Guk instead of 300 isn't a solution. So I get a hot poker shoved up my instead of a hot spear. Both suck. Both are things to avoid.

I want 30 people int he zone. I want to be able to find a camp. If not the camp I want, a camp where I can loot something to sell/trade for the item I want.

Period.

That won't happen without instances, even with 2 servers, or even 3!!! Do you not understand that at peak times there will be 10+ instances of Guk!?!?!

If you can't accept that, P1999 is accepting players, free of charge!

Do you not understand that the majority of players are not at that point yet?

It's called a bell curve. Wait a month.

If DBG doesn't get ahead of this problem, it will be too late.

Instancing won't do a damned thing if there aren't too many players, so if we are wrong, then no harm done.

If you are wrong, then 50% of recent resubs quit within 2 months.

Which is less risk for DBG?

I can't believe this is even worth discussing. The answer is so obvious for those of us in the MMO business...

Appealing to casual players will keep the money flowing in longer which is why they are instancing zones and why the server is (probably) going to adhere to a longer unlock schedule. The servers will be done with Velious in a year and a half as opposed to a few months this time, and lots of casuals will quit after Velious just like lots of casuals will quit after PoP. Drawing out the expansions will keep the customer base higher and keep customers paying more for much longer than a typical speed-run progression server. People should view it as a good thing because that likely means more progression servers in the future.

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Fantastic idea B:

MAKE all instanced loot NO DROP.

If that is done, then the reasoning that it will provide a reasonable path for those who just want a good chance at actually experiencing all content will truly be provided. Somehow, I don't think the greater portion of those who are pushing for instancing really like that idea though.

But how could that be done if the areas they are instancing are not specifically dungeons? Curious. I hear the wailing now.

You are the FIRST person I've read to suggest that in these forums. IF DBG does that, my hat is off to you and them and I'll retract all my comments/ideas against over-instancing the server.

Thanks Bolten. Watching and waiting.

OMFG! Guess what? THERE WERE NO OTHER 3D MMO's WHEN EQ LAUNCHED!!!!

Guess what? 2015 - 1999 = 16 YEARS!!

16 years of playing other games that didn't shove a red hot poker up your in order to get a ROLL on a FBSS.

Most players do NOT have 8 to 12 consecutive hours to put into a camp!!!!!!!

Get over yourself. You may be in the mid-40's already, and your friends 50's, but MOST PLAYERS ARE NOT.

You and your like may have been able to corner the market in 1999, but not this time.

Instancing *kills* RMT, *kills* plat farmers, because people can do DO IT FOR THEMSELVES!

Intentionally or not, the EQ of 1999 was designed for the 30 to 40 hour per week players. There was content and items that if you didn't have that kind of time to put in, in large consecutive chunks, or weren't lucky as hell, you simply could not get.

Players will not stand for that today. Not for ordinary content.

RAID items, sure. But not simple Group content. It is not right. IT wasn't right in 1999, but it was all there was. That is why it seems right, because of your fuzzy recollection of the lazy days of 1999. Bu it is not right. It is not good business. It is bad business, because it is not fun. Anything that is not fun should not exist in a game. It's Game Design 101.

And DBG had better realize it, or many of those that have returned will be gone in 2 months.

If they didn't have instancing in the newbie zones, they would be GONE ALREADY!!!!

They understand it. They wouldn't be expanding instancing if they did not.

Why can't you? It's not a difficult concept.

It is not 1999. If you want 1999, feel free to head over to P1999, and save yourself $15/month.

Instancing is needed. period.

Exactly!

This does nothing if there are the right amount of people for the zone... it adds access if there are too many for the zone.

Been preaching this for 3 months and still people do not get it...

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Not disagreeing with your whole post.

However this line is completely and totally inaccurate:
"There was content and items that if you didn't have that kind of time to put in, in large consecutive chunks, or weren't lucky as hell, you simply could not get."
The truth is closer to you understood it took time AND research AND friends AND commitment...and you sure as hell eventually got it if you had that.

You just didn't get it after logging in twice in a week for 26 minutes while changing over your laundry, playing Trivial Pursuit on Skype, and having an argument via text about kind of pizza to order. Instantaneous wasn't the 'norm' then. It wasn't respected, and it was not expected either. Time was not the only requirement to obtain good gear and learn your class definitively. And further, fast anything or buying an equal level item via Kronos or off of a cash store negates any satisfaction of earning something.

We were NOT all 15 year olds. I don't know why that keeps getting spewed about either. Maybe there were not as many couples, families, people in their late 30s to 40s in those first two or three years, but there were lots and lots and lots of over-21 year olds playing then.
I was in the military at the time and most of my peers and guildies were also, and we were mid-twenty-somethings with plenty of responsibilities in life, and some also had young families. There were plenty of guilds you would not want your kids in because of adult convo's and guilds who preferred not to have midteens in.

Matter of fact there were a lot of teens who carefully covered up the fact that they were the age they were because of that.

Maybe the solution to the battle here would be keep Ragefire like it is with all the boxers and all the speed until they reach where the others server are at and all the instances they want. Then bring up Lockjaw with the rule set other people are asking for no more bots, slow lvling slow expansion time line no instances. As close to the original EQ as they possibly can get. No transfer over of high end players. if your over say lvl 25 cant transfer over. And I do wish they would take out the Krono's or what ever they are called.

There are enough disappointed players with how Ragefire is going that they would love to have a server like they want. But maybe its the community anymore, its a totally diff kind of players then what was there years ago.

The point that is made over and over again is how a glut of SSOY and FBSS's will ruin the game. I fail to see how other people having decent gear destroys the game, unless the unspoken part of the statement is "because it allows them to raid content we want to keep to ourself"

Only the raiders and RMT crowd will get these items anyway. Regular players will find that they're permacamped in each instance, and will still never see good loot.

If you thought more loot meant you got any of it, you're going to learn otherwise very shortly.

There is a balance somewhere in the middle.

<---- also a very common name in Slavic nations. (And specifically my grandfather's middle name - and what I took Vincent as a confirmation name to closest emulate [although now older I think Wenscelas would've been a closer fit])

they don't have to use the same math for the high level instances though. they could limit it to 2or3 max ever, or they could just make it require 2or3 or4 times as many people online to open up that 4th instance.

that 40 and 11 were based on the math determining how many opened up, not just random.