When I want to float levitate seems to not work worth Gnome spit but when I don't want to float levitate is the bixie's knees?
This might seem obvious but its like swimming, is your character looking forward, up or down? Levitate tends to stay "up" better and longer if your looking ahead or some what up. Also it seems some zones levitate seems to work better then others.
I'm not really trying to do either. It just seems like some zones I sink straight to the ground (Even in zones where Lev works) and then in some zones I'm constantly rising. I notice it in tunnels in Warsilk's. I was constantly having to hit the "end" button or I was getting stuck on the tunnel ceiling.
Can also be affected by framerate. Older, less complex zones tend to have better framerate, especially if you're playing on an older PC. Better framerate = less sinking.
Speaking of PCs - How does an SSD affect EQ load times, zoning, etc...? I'm due an upgrade and I'm sure I'll get an SSD regardless but I was wondering.
I'm no expert, but afaik getting a SSD is the biggest improvement you can make for zoning/loading times, other than possibly improving your internet speed if it's very low.
When I want to stay up i go 1st person and look up a little. If I need to be in 3rd person then I first go 1st person, look up, and then switch back to 3rd person. It seems to remember what direction I was facing up or down when I was last in 1st person view.
You're describing exactly what Gherig was talking about. Remember that, if you're using 3rd person camera (i.e. you have the mouse scrolled back so that the camera is behind you), the angle of the camera is now no longer the same as the actual angle you're facing. So, you're probably facing straight forward, meaning you fall VERY slowly. But you think you're angled down, because that's what the camera angle shows. If using 3rd person, look a bit downward first before scrolling the camera back. And you're never "rising". Lev let's you float down, very slowly, but there's no way to go up unless there's ground to walk on. Which, in the tunnels example, may be what's happening. If the walls are slightly out of vertical, where you can angle up them, you may be gaining altitude from that. And then, of course, the lev doesn't let you come down too fast, so it seems like you're "rising".
It makes almost 0 difference in EQ, zone times are effected by other stuff significantly more then storage speed, mostly in the amount of stuff your character has saved on you server side (items on you, items in bank, etc), the more advanced your character the longer it takes, Basically unless your PC is absolutely ancient (like some 15 year old thing) or you're on 56k the specs wont really effect that to any appreciable degree
I'm not going to argue with you but I'm sure glad I've got an NVMe PCI-e SSD with a data transfer rate something like 4 times as fast as the fastest mechanical hard drive. Everquest may not care but the 150 other Windows tasks running sure loves it.
You hard drive speed really is based off what you have now as a hard drive vs what tech your current motherboard uses for a ssd slot. If you're still using a 5400 RPM drive and looking to upgrade, yes the SSD will be much quicker.
This is the biggest factor, IMO. When my boxes are on autofollow the characters on the lower performing laptops always sink. Pretty quickly, too.
Framerate is key. If you can sustain 40fps or higher, your fall rate while levitating will be normal. Lower framerates causes the fall rate to increase.
Reminds me of the early days of EQ. Would port to DL and run to meet friends at KC. I'd hit the ground (with lev) WAY before I got to KC, once I got out of the mountains. Then I got a new PC, around 2001, and the first time I made that trip, I was still way up in the air when I got to KC. And then the real fun began. While I was typing to my guildies about what I'd found out with the new PC, I slowly floated down into KC. INTO, not on top of. There's no roof on KC in the DL zone, so I floated down within the walls, with no way out. Had to re-port to DL, and make the whole run again LOL
This is a great point, even if you don't put EQ on an SSD, your OS should always be on one. Even my second PC, which is mostly a potato, has a 100gb SSD for the OS. I haven't moved up to NVMe on any of my systems yet, but that's the next step.
That's the main reason I'm doing it honestly. I don't really play any other games besides EQ1 and 2. My bandwidth is great for my area but it just seems that I don't really zone any faster than I did back in '99 when I was playing on a Packard Bell. That could just be my 44 year old brain misremembering things from my 22 year old brain though.
There's really no good reason not to switch to solid-state. 500GB SATA SSD for $50 is a steal, and a direct upgrade for most people using HDDs (SATA port required). The computing experience is so much better. How to Copy Your Windows Installation to an SSD.
Getting an SSD and then moving your operating System to it is almost like buying a new computer in speed and response. If you can afford just one SSD and that is it, get it for just your OS and use your other drive for your other stuff. OS benefits greatly from SSD and will pretty much makes everything you do on your computer better.
OS on SSD vs OS on HDD is like night & day, I actually have 2 SSD & 1 HDD in each of my 2 desktops, 1 small one for the OS & a bigger one for the games I regularly play, MMORPG on SSD are so much nicer to play vs having them on HDD, especially if they are "zoned" like EQ is.
