Mercenary AAs for ToL?

Discussion in 'The Veterans' Lounge' started by Bobokin, Dec 9, 2021.

  1. Bobokin Augur

    No additional merc AAs for ToL? Is that an oversight or working as expected?

    Not having merc AAs ready to go on day one gives advantage to the automated box groups. Is that really what Darkpaw wanted to do? Nevertheless, it has been done. The automated boxers are at level 120 already, while the rest of us wait for ToL to be finished.

    The casual groupers and manual box players thank you kindly. ;)
    Knighted, Yorag and Paladin like this.
  2. Cicelee Augur

    You have 360 days to get to 120. I think you will be fine.
    Andarriel, minimind and Velisaris_MS like this.
  3. Bobokin Augur

    That's neither valid nor the point.
    MarttinPH likes this.
  4. MarttinPH Augur

    My guess it is an oversight. Hopefully, they will fix it in the January patch (at the earliest). The development team seems terrified of allowing mercenaries to anywhere near too powerful/competent, especially for the newest content.
    Shindius and Bobokin like this.
  5. Bobokin Augur

    A month late may be fine for players that don't rely on mercs, but it isn't fine for casual and pick up group players.

    This does show how few casual players post on here. It took two days from launch for even a word about it. My guess is that the automated box players were out in force pressing to 120 in those 48 hours.
    Coagagin likes this.
  6. Smokezz The Bane Crew

    LOL... automated groups are not 120. You are so out of touch with reality. Groups that did progression, missions, had collects sitting in the bank from previous expansions are 120 now. Trying to grind to 120 with just kills takes a long time, intentionally.
    Svann2, Ozon, WFSBelaar and 1 other person like this.
  7. Bobokin Augur

    Still automated groups for the most part ... at least on my server.
    Knighted likes this.
  8. Angahran Augur

    If the merc AAs are not coming anytime soon any chance on increasing the merc AA cap until they are available ?
    Coagagin, tanith and Bobokin like this.
  9. Keise Elder

    Sounds reasonable to me, if you’re maxed at 55, guess how many you get until it’s fixed….zero
    Bobokin likes this.
  10. Vumad Cape Wearer


    Well, it sort of is, since you made the solid connection about needing to keep up with the boxers, instead of just focusing on merc balance.

    I 3-box. I use ENC, MAG, CLR. My Warrior merc is tanking all of the partisan stuff. I have finished ME, UP and VT with my warrior merc tanking. So, while I agree with you that mercs should get more AA and new armor much more often, the lack of them is not keeping you from leveling.

    Now if you think that mercs should be able to tank or single heal the missions, that's a no go. I don't box the missions and I don't expect a merc to be tanking them. I haven't boxed any of the missions over the years except to farm (the TBL evolvers or collects from trash) which is just zone trash.

    Mercs are not stopping anyone from getting to 120. You only need to do each of the 4 missions 1 time to get the ACH XP. Form a group for missions. I box but I form groups for missions and only play 1 toon. You shouldn't have a hard time getting a mission group. I do each mission 3 times at a minimum, 1 for each of my "mains".

    The one main advantage I have is that I main ENC. I pull singles and CC. Merc tanks are not PC tanks, you need to bring them singles, they can sometimes handle 2, and they are not going to change that about merc tanks. Pulling and CC is a major part of using mercs. My cleric and mage box don't contribute that much to the group, beyond the pet effectively being an extra merc I don't have to control.

    I certainly don't expect my super un-optimized group of ENC, MAG, CLR with 3 mercs to keep up with an automated 6 box, which is effectively a full group of players. If you have an issue with automated boxing, then that's fine, but that complaint has nothing to do with merc AA, which is what Cicelee is calling you on.
    Velisaris_MS likes this.
  11. Bobokin Augur

    How does anything you posted change the fact that not having upgraded mercs gives advantage to automated boxers? Without upgraded mercs, half of the 3box group is not upgraded, while all of the group is upgraded in an automated 6box group.

    I don't have many issues with box groups, as long as the game doesn't cater to them. There is a big difference between players hitting 120 in two days to a week and others taking months or a year, as Cicilee suggested.

    You talk about merc balance, but isn't the game supposed to be balanced to allow non-automated players to do missions and other tasks rather than automated box groups?

    With automated box groups, all or most of the characters in the group are no more than robots that have paid for an extra expac. They are effectively a full group of player owned mercs.
    Coagagin and Knighted like this.
  12. Vumad Cape Wearer

    Nothing I posted changes anything, except to point out that your issue is with gameplay automation. Not with mercs. Merc tuning should not be changed to address a completely unrelated issue.

    The only thing impacting that is play time. Automated groups can run 24/7 with no input. Players have to sleep, eat, work and LFG. That again has nothing to do with mercs. You can not compare AFK automated groups to merc groups without also comparing AFK automated groups to full player groups. Automated PC groups are NOT more effective than non-automated player groups. AFK automated are, but only because they run longer.

    Mercs are about 1/2 as efficient to 1/4 as efficient in DPS as a player. That means your argument of a week of gameplay translates to about a month for merc groups, when eliminating AFK automation.


    So like... groups without mercs? I mean, mercs are automated gameplay. It's supported automated gameplay, but it's still automated gameplay. Really your argument is that your supported automated character (Merc) is not as efficient as an unsupported automated character (AFK box). It's still automation replacing a player. The irony is they bought 3 extra expansions and have 3 extra subs (possibly) so they are actually paying more to play the game (absolutely not justifying it, just pointing out the irony.)

    I absolutely support more merc tuning. I would love to see more merc armor and merc armor every expansion. I would love to see more and better merc AA. I would love to see other classes of mercs. However, I never expect a group of 3 with 3 mercs to match a group of 6. If the automation is an issue, correct that, and balance the mercs appropriately. Edit: and no, I don't think mercs should be significantly involved in beating missions a month after launch.
  13. Vumad Cape Wearer

    I'd also like to point out that a lot of the people hitting 120 quickly aren't actually getting it from killing mobs, and I'm not talking about ToL quests. I myself had not finished CoV progression. I had partisan rewards from Sleeper's tomb banked and didn't get paragon etc of CoV until after ToL launched. Each of those were worth 3% XP, plus the final ACH for turning in the last quest. You can bank 10 completed quests. A number of people had been banking L5 elite critical success on 24 hour research overseer. They also had an additional 5 overseer pending that they had not claimed which did not count until claimed, so 15. And additionally you could leave open final hails on partisan tasks, so the XP from them didn't count towards your 10 banked quests either. Many of us actually started ToL at 116.5. Having an entire half level more than people who didn't prepare is a big start. Also, the people who wanted to get real crazy, didn't claim collects at 2% each once claimed, and some stored XP glyphs.

    It was pretty easy for people to start ToL at L117. A portion of the game population has been prepping for L120 since the day it was announced.
    Velisaris_MS likes this.
  14. Angahran Augur

    Considering the average xp for simply killing mobs is around 0.001% I'd say noone is hitting 120 simply killing mobs.
    Chaining overseer tasks (and buying completions) and finishing collections (from this expansion or previous expansions) seems to be the expected way to level :(
  15. Gorg00 Augur


    You would be wrong. Questing is certainly the faster way to level, but straight grinding is completely viable. I was averaging 10% an hour with a 50% potion running in ToL zones, or 8% an hour in GD or WW, so 50 hours of grinding if you do nothing but grinding in ToL. The 4 heros are about 120% of a level on their own, so if you do them you only need to do about 38 hours of grinding.
    Andarriel likes this.
  16. Angahran Augur

    Because everyone has a dedicated 6 person group and enough xp potions to run for 38 hours, right ?
    so, no potions you're looking at around 6%/hour and a death can cost roughly 0.5%.

    I'm not saying it can't be done, but let's face it, this is a game, we play this for fun, and 38+ hours of killing the same mobs over and over and over is personally not my idea of fun.
    Bobokin likes this.
  17. Gorg00 Augur


    Then do the quests? I never said that everyone has or wants to do that amount of grinding, simply that it's perfectly viable to grind. Like if you do the 4 heros in one night, then grind 4 hours a night it will take you about 2 weeks to reach max level without any potion running.

    That seems perfectly reasonable? If you want it to go faster you can do the quests instead which involves more moving around and doing different things, so less mindless grinding.

    But ultimately, your statement was that grinding to 120 is non viable, which is entirely inaccurate, it's simply not the quickest possible path, but it is entirely viable to do so within a reasonable amount of time.
  18. Angahran Augur

    Done them. Completely done with progression.
    Still need 40% of mind numbing grinding to get to 120.

    No, my statement was that killing mobs that give 0.001% (and a death costs 0.4%) is not a fun or enjoyable way to earn xp.
  19. Velisaris_MS Augur

    This is the way...EQ's version of "doomsday preppers." :D Start hoarding those dispensers now, kids.
  20. Smokezz The Bane Crew

    Are you XP'n in Sathir's Tomb? Just killed blue con mobs in a T2 zone and went from 77.629% to 77.687%. You're massively exagerating things, as usual. The XP isn't great but it's no where near as bad as you claim. 1000 mobs per 1%? Come on man.
    Treage_Imminent likes this.