Why ToL's Group Gear Level 120 Requirement Sabotages EQ's Core Gameplay Loop

Discussion in 'The Veterans' Lounge' started by Tucoh, Jan 9, 2022.

  1. Tucoh Augur

    tldr: ToL will be much better if you drop the level requirement of all gear to 115.

    So, here's a screenshot of my gear spreadsheet I use to track all my 7 character's gear and a screenshot of my mage's T2 "ToL gear" I took as soon as they reached level 120.

    [IMG]

    All of the yellow blocks in this image indicate I've got a T2 or T3 ore ready to be equipped, but am unable to equip them because of a level requirement. Every character, upon reaching level 120, had pretty much the same bag full of T2 gear. This effect will be more significant to players who do more missions than I did (I don't really enjoy farming missions) and less significant to players who do more overseer than I did (I really don't enjoy Overseer). Note that I've got a world-class 6box team that could've beaten this expansion back when I finished ToV, so this is all kind of academic, but to group players who really need that gear it's a huge problem for them to struggle to beat the expansion and stare at that giant pile of gear they can't use.

    The key problem with this, from a game design perspective is that it sabotages the core gameplay loop ( https://www.gamedesigning.org/learn/game-loop/ ).

    [IMG]

    In EQ, this is a simple loop of kill/quest -> get XP/spells/items -> boost character -> kill/quest and repeat. Because of the gear requirement when I kill a named or complete a mission and get the reward I can't even use it. So it goes into a huge pile of abstract gear. There is a similar issue with spells where I don't even bother upgrading my spells until the very end because in many cases they provide only a modest benefit without AAs / Type 3 augs / Rk 2, but I don't want to whine about that here because it's a much more complex problem.

    So what, I should feel rewarded for hitting 120 and getting a massive boost right? Well, sort of. There's a few problems with this:
    1. I don't feel rewarded at all for beating a named and getting loot I need, it's literally just junk in a pile. By the time I can use it I've long forgotten where I got it from, it's all anonymous.
    2. Many players will beat the hardest content of ToL (Oubliette of Light) before they hit 120, making their major spell upgrades and gear unnecessary for the major challenge of the expansion.
    3. When a character hits 120, all the huge pile of gear feels unrewarding to equip because I have to spend a half hour playing the augment distillation minigame and scribing spells, so it just feels like busy-work to build a character up for challenges I've already beaten.
    4. Around the time I hit 120 I'm basically done with the expansion (just doing hunter) and done with EQ until the next expansion comes out for the most part, so I won't even get an opportunity to really use my gear until it's literally obsolete by the next expansion's gear.
    Annastasya, Szilent, Allayna and 17 others like this.
  2. ClosedSource Lorekeeper

    Hey there welcome to Everquest. It’s always awesome to get new players like you into an old MMO like ours.


    It appears that you’re doing well in your first expansion. You are very correct that max level group has nothing to do with just the missions and group gear. You might want to try looking into a raid group or you will have nothing to do for the next 10 months.

    Without any interesting quest lines at all there just isn’t anything left for you to do. You might want to try going back and doing the last 27 expansions it looks like you must have skipped.
    Coagagin, HekkHekkHekk and Duder like this.
  3. Jumbur Improved Familiar

    I sometimes think DBG expects everyone to reach max level in a single day.
    It is certainly possible, if you have saved old quest-rewards/collections and rush through progression. But the majority of players are probably not in such a hurry, and they will experience the design-shortcomings you just outlined....
    Raptorjesus5 likes this.
  4. ClosedSource Lorekeeper

    There is a level 115 item for every single slot that drops in all of the tier 1 zones. The “majority” of players might still not be 120 today and working on all of that gear still.
  5. Iven Antonius Bayle

    I experienced something similar with the ToV expansion. The rogue PC was at the free player level cap (110) but could not use the shissar poison from the T1 ToV leggins even that it was possible to equip them with full useable stats. The poison potion had a requirement of RoS/TBL level cap +1 (111). A bug report has not changed anything so it is business policy that is hardly accountable.
    Wdor likes this.
  6. Jumbur Improved Familiar

    It is poor design, if they expect you to stay in tier1 zones until you get to max level, imo.
    Xianzu_Monk_Tunare likes this.
  7. ClosedSource Lorekeeper

    They aren’t expecting you to stay there though. If you can kill tier 2 then kill it and get the gear for 120.

    Some people are not that great of players and they need that step on the ladder to get there. This has been the same for the last 3 expansions though. The difference is that we had something to do at max level. In this expansion we have zero quest lines. We don’t even have copy and paste type 3’s. If you had a reason to be in any zone at max level this wouldn’t be a major concern.
  8. Petalonyx Augur

    If examination and potential revision of req lvl on ToL loot was precluded by other development priorities during development, I also think it merits a revisit now, or at least a changed approach going forward.

    The req lvl is too high and is adversely affecting a large number of players (particularly casuals with fewer means to power through to 120).

    The question that needs to be asked is what adverse impact would lowering the req lvl to 115/116 have on players? I dont see any, personally.
  9. Triconix Augur

    How is this any different than prior expansions? The upper tier loot has had max level requirements.
  10. I_Love_My_Bandwidth Mercslayer

    It's different because ALL ToL loot requires level 120 to equip. All of it - Level 120 required.
    Xianzu_Monk_Tunare likes this.
  11. Tucoh Augur

    Sometimes I'll be reading a book or article on engineering, business etc and read a trite anecdote about someone resisting a change purely out of preservation of historic decisions and incredulously think "this is made up, who would think like that?". Yet here we are.

    [IMG]

    I don't care how many expansions screw over players who wear group gear, it's bad design in ToL.
  12. Fintank Augur


    Except T1 Gear.

    Seems like a pretty easy change that helps and doesn't really hinder anyone to go back to prior gear systems. There seems to be a pretty stable and consistent 3 tiers now. T1 at 5's and 0's (Starting levels on expac launch). T2 at 2/3's and 7/8's and T3 at max level only. IE 115, 117 or 118 and 120 for this year. HoT was 80/82/85/90 for 4 sets of gear (86 for old style TS). UF was 80/83/85/85 for 4 sets of gear (81 for old style TS). VoA was 85/87/90/95 for 4 sets of gear (91 for old style TS). The groundwork is already there as far as figuring out what level range to use. Considering this would only be for Group gear I can't imagine anyone would be against it. I don't really see a balance leg to stand on to not do it either. The only excuse would be *workload* I guess?
    Syylke_EMarr likes this.
  13. Soulbanshee Augur

    Duder likes this.
  14. Triconix Augur

    This takes literally 30 seconds to disprove. Care to post any more lies?
    I have no issue with a change if people feel it necessary, but you're here posting as if this is some new phenomenon. News flash: It's not. I'm just curious, what exactly has change in TOL that T2/3 group armor is imperative to have prior to max level as opposed to prior expansions?
    bootman likes this.
  15. Warpeace Augur


    Not true at all.
  16. Ravanta Suffer Augur

    I play on Mischief, so I'm so far removed from this concern it's not even funny.

    Is Tucoh simply thinking that the recommended level of 120 means it's not viable gear if you are under level 120?
  17. ClosedSource Lorekeeper

    The change is that it’s Tucoh’s first expansion launch in who knows how long.
    Coagagin likes this.
  18. ClosedSource Lorekeeper

    He runs his own 6 box. As a result he was able to do all the missions easily and that’s mostly because it’s easy. The missions and tier 2 zones drop level 120 required gear. He beat the entire amount of group content before hitting 120. Thus he has gear he could not equip yet but was already done with the expansion.

    What he needs to be asking for is more content. Because even if there was a wider spread of gear levels the fact of the matter is that he already beat every bit of group content.

    In other words a person that is an expert at the game is complaining that he outdid the content in last expansions gear. Every person that plays a TLP knows that this is every expansion though. You get a new expansion and you beat it day 1 or 2 in the gear you farmed in the last one.
    Ravanta Suffer likes this.
  19. I_Love_My_Bandwidth Mercslayer

    Oops. I was wrong.



    Oops. I was wrong.


    Oops. I was wrong.

    I will admit it. I was wrong.

    Thanks for the correction(s)!
    Duder, minimind, Trochas and 2 others like this.
  20. Triconix Augur

    It's been like this for many, many years, especially if you raid. I think the most current expansion gear I've had at an expansion completion in the last decade was 5(?) of the 21 items.

    This isn't even a TLP thing. I don't remember a single era in which I was near or full BIS when beating an expansion.
    ClosedSource likes this.