TBL : the most stupid and absurd extension

Discussion in 'The Veterans' Lounge' started by Merlein, Dec 26, 2018.

  1. Pirlo Augur

    welp......
    between this post and the post from bahdah about the CactusGate shirts , we have our top two posts of 2018 :)
    Bahdah and GoneFission like this.
  2. Ecchicon Elder


    No. The OP is simply wrong. The content is doable and most of the reasons people with decent groups at reasonable levels of gear are failing is due to the misinterpretation of encounter mechanics.

    That doesn't mean that the content is not harder than it should be. But most of the people coming here and complaining are either flat out unreasonable or completely mistaken.
  3. I_Love_My_Bandwidth Mercslayer

    I was in this group. The content IS difficult. But I stopped, put my thinking cap on, and considered how best to deal with the zone/mission/NPC mechanics that were wiping me. Rather than attack every encounter head-on with brute force, we are required to employ more refined tactics to eek out a win.
    Belexes likes this.
  4. So Happy Augur

    Still haven't bought it, probably won't. Short of obtaining and learning to use third party software it doesn't sound like there is anything I can box with my mediocre team/skills. Why should I waste the money on it when I have no intention of using cheat-ware? Just pointing out there seems to be nothing for us middle of the road, alt-tab boxer types.
    enclee likes this.
  5. took2summit11 Augur

    I’ve alt-tab boxed 75% of this expansion so far..the key is I also invite warm bodies to join me. Every single time I’ve gone to general and said “looking for 1 or 2 more for smoke trials” I get flooded with tells.
  6. Tatanka Joe Schmo

    Is the dev on the left wearing hair expansions? ;)
    jeskola and Endaar like this.
  7. So Happy Augur


    Good to know. I'm glad you are enjoying it.
  8. jeskola pheerie

  9. Slippry Augur

    No, it's all natural.
  10. Belexes ForumQuester

    There is a skill gap. Those who don't acknowledge that fact are being obtuse.

    I have grouped with Took2summitt and he is telling the truth. Yes, I am sorta raid geared as a ranger, but it isn't the gear that really matters, it is the AA and the skill.

    Since I have left Machin Shin, I have done a lot of pickup groups for trials and missions in TBL. Some guys are really skilled at their class and some aren't.

    I was in that group with the cleric. I am often the only sorta raid geared member in these groups. Took is getting AA and more current group gear and is getting better. I have done trials with him and he doing well with what he has on his pally tank.

    The things I have seen players do is crazy, a rogue dps'ing with a shield in the secondary slot.

    I have seen tanks that are well geared die because of mistakes and not being as skillful as others.

    Those who say the game is easy have been playing it for a long time. There are many who have not and there is a lot to take in and understand.

    There is a skill gap. Even among raiders and it is large. I have been in more casual raiding guilds and I have been in elite raiding guilds and the difference is skill...big time.

    Those who think they are skilled and yet the expansion is too hard for them, may not be as skilled as they think. If they are surrounded by less skilled people, then there is the possibility of the illusion that they think they are skilled. We have examples of this all over the forums.

    Example - Avory thought his ranger DPS was elite, because on his server, it was probably the best DPS there. But compared to other servers, it was just merely above average.

    There are many servers and what passes for skilled on your server, may not cut the mustard on other servers.

    Bandwidth has come on here and taken back what he said about being not possible for group gear players. Skill and character development (AA), is the limiting factor with ALL players, not just group players.

    There have been times where I thought I was pretty good with a character and then run across someone who is much better at it than I. I surely don't consider myself highly skilled and yet, there are things I can still get done if I think outside the box and don't do things as I have always done them.

    This game is meant to make you use your brain and figure out how to beat or finish the tasks available. If you only play one way, a new expansion will be difficult because your strategy and tools used might be different from one expansion to the next.
  11. yepmetoo Abazzagorath

    Most of these are not that hard.

    The people whining that they can't box it while admitting to being terrible boxers are just sad. This game has never EVER been about solo play. The players (and I'm one of them) that prefer to solo/molo/box are doing so to the limits of their ability as the content allows. Some years you can do almost everything solo/box. Some years you can't do squat unless you are a good boxer.

    People are whining about Fight Fire for goodness' sake. When everything is mezzable, stunnable, and hits weak enough that a paladin can tank all 7 on the first wave at once with a real healer?

    Ashes is overtuned, I'll give you that (should be X total adds per named up max, not infinitely spawning adds, that right there makes it beatable for many groups that couldn't before). I'm raid geared, I'm in the top guild in this game and play with top players. Guess what? We wiped on that mission too (low dps, went fine until the end, someone got punted off, that lost player made it impossible for us to keep up). Did we whine about how it was overtuned and ridiculous? No, we moved on after evaluating that our dps was too low to waste the time on keeping at it and did some other missions. Did it later that same day with slightly different makeup and was a simple quick win.

    I don't have a problem with complaining about zones being locked, I've never been a fan of that, except maybe one final zone. But that's not the main complaint. You have actual raiders complaining about it because they can't three box everything. Is that what we have come to?

    People whining that their level 97 main that just came back from a 3 year break can't kill anything? Really? (seen at least 2 of those types of posts in these complaint threads)

    Make friends with an enchanter. Expect to use a real tank (or bring two!), Stop expecting to pop more than 1 merc if any. Be geared up decently from the last expansion, and you'll be fine.
    Belexes likes this.
  12. segap Augur


    I see it more as an effort gap. The skill required for this game is abysmal. It's not hard. Push more buttons, do better. In group content, there's much less to be concerned with because stacking issues (the thing that does require some thought) is much less pronounced in a group of six with a tank, healer and mismatch of others. It's depressing to see the performance gap considering how little skill is actually required.

    Comparing raid performance from guild to guild is a tough thing. Guilds with better rosters kill stuff faster and thus everyone has higher dps than guilds with lesser rosters that kill things slower. The higher the portion of a fight that contains your full burns, the higher your numbers will skew. Not to say that people coming from lesser guilds that are top performers don't need to adjust when joining a top end dps guild. Timing and coordination does change (especially if adps is more diligent with clicks) and people need to have the modesty to recognize they need to adjust how they do things and possibly learn to be cooperative whereas in the bottom tier guild they could freelance more because others didn't have the aptitude to make being part of a greater team effort make a difference.
    Feznik likes this.
  13. NeverPayForLag Augur

    It is always nice to see how people don't even get if they are used to something and sitting in their high horse.

    You ALWAYS need skill for everything. And EQ is meanwhile as complex as games like Magic The Gathering and it feels like it. Combining the right set of spells and abilities for specific missions and named to get a win is partly the duty esp. in TBL or in RoS Missions.

    Everything is "easy" once understood and used to do. But saying so means to have not the slightest clue about judging difficulty to help others.

    EQ was once relatively easy compared to the hundreds of possibilities now. I never needed nearly all Hotbuttons but now I could have more. That is a clear sign that something is getting in a way complex which is nearly out of hand.

    I wonder if people who are new to this game will ever have the endurance to get good in it if the starting hurdle is so high.
    Corwyhn Lionheart likes this.
  14. Tappin Augur

    There isn’t much skill involved. Put your phone down and pay attention to the monitor.
  15. Wulfhere Augur

    Players truly new to this game might buy TBL, but they do not have high level characters. So what do they do? They start at level 1. or buy Heroic 85. Either way they have a long long way to go, without veteran friends, to ever see Stratos let alone be able to win in that zone, especially with other truly new players in their group.

    DBG stopped trying to sell expansions to new customers years ago with TSS. That's what progression servers are for.
  16. I_Love_My_Bandwidth Mercslayer

    Skill gap. Effort gap. Content gap. Thigh gap. :eek:

    It's all real. It's all relevant....well, except the last one.

    Look, gang. My initial assessment was posted in the heat of the moment. In a rapture of failure. I was frustrated. I took my frustrations to the boards. A general no-no.

    EverQuest's developers have an impossible task - pleasing everyone. Never going to happen. Ever. That said, I have been steamrolling TBL missions with my newfound attitude and approach to this expansion. The player(s) make all the difference. We fail. We fall down. We lose. Yet, people prevail.

    What we do next defines the final outcome. The only question remaining is: Are you a quitter or a tryer?
    Belexes, Pirlo and yepmetoo like this.
  17. I_Love_My_Bandwidth Mercslayer

    Now, now. Just because you're Captain Underpants doesn't mean everyone is. Skill comes in many flavors and sizes, like ice cream. I'm guessing yours has pralines in it.
  18. Wuddane Elder

    Now we know you are lying!!
    yepmetoo likes this.
  19. yepmetoo Abazzagorath

    Oof. Miss you Wuddane, come back to RoI!
    Wuddane likes this.
  20. Feznik Elder

    You people keep confusing skill with "attention", there is hardly any skill involved in this game. Maybe this is the only game you play, so you have don't have a clue what "skill" involves, but a 80 year old can perform just as well as 10 year old in this game, a person with an IQ of 90 can perform just as well as a person with an IQ of 180.

    The best example I can give you is I can teach a 80 year old how to play a few chords on the piano just as well as I can a 10 year old, that is equivalent to learning how to play your class, you can even go further and teach both a song on the piano and teach them to play it well, i.e. memorize what buttons to mash in what order in EQ.

    You can teach just about anyone how to play the class and learn to mash the buttons/spells etc the right away on different situations, that is NOT skill. Because there is very little "variation" in EQ on how you play those chords (mashing buttons) in different situations.

    Now if I asked them to compose a song with the chords they've learned and to make it sound remotely decent, that requires skill, there is alot of variation and to make it sound pleasing to others , it requires some degree of musical skill.

    EQ has very little skill involvement. Go try some RTS, Battle Royale, FPS , or MOBA type games, after you learn the basics of the game/class/avatar/mechanics, that is when skill difference STARTS....

    For example, in Starcraft 2 they have a ladder ranking system, that differentiate player skill levels. Because the higher ranked players make better decisions than lower ranked players , they will always remain higher ranked. I'll give myself as an example, I'm not even an average ranked player in Starcraft 2, I fall slightly below average in skill, even though I understand the mechanics and basics of the game. The players that are ranked higher than me, make bettter decisions in a vast majority of scenarios and there are infinite different scenarios unlike in EQ which you know what to expect 99% of the time on any encounter, even raid encounters once you've figure out the strategy. The strategy in EQ hardly ever changes.


    If there was any type of skill requirement in this game, even a slight bump then what it is now, majority of you would never even touch this game.