What's the Consensus on Mischief/Thornblade?

I find that interesting. What do you do in game if you don't raid?

The best part is when the next expansion comes much of the last expansion gear drops in price and is super common.

All that gear on past servers that was No drop, got deleted or rotted in someone's bank.

Honestly I think they didn't make a new free trade or random loot sever because they didn't want to kill mischief.

When they see how these new servers are utter failures they will probably make a new free trade server next year.

I five and six boxed for years (decades, really). I generally had BiS for non-raiders (which isn't BiS at all, I know but it's what I have). I'm on Pacific time. I hated trying to sneak out of work early to make a 5:00 raid start (most guilds are EST or CST). I'll be moving to Central time in a couple of months. Maybe I'll have another look then.

The Mischief ruleset will (or should) remain a staple Darkpaw can use sparingly from now on whenever they need to bring back that part of the community. If they're smart, they won't over do it, or else in a few years people will complain they are 'bored of the same thing', much like we saw in the lead up to the Mischief ruleset.

You can "alt". I occasionally just alt a bunch and don't even bother to raid. Depends on my mood and life situation when a new server fires up. Or you can play the tunnel/baz if that's your thing or box. some people primarily just do tradeskills and everything they do is towards maxxing those out, usually combined with some tunnel ratting. Maybe people will just pvp someday ;-)

All these people with different play styles talking about the different ways they like to play Everquest. It is almost like the Mischief ruleset allowed the most personal freedom to play how a person desires. Maybe we should curb that before it gets out of hand!

This is a mindset that almost none of the people I play with share. But I'm in a solid raid guild. We earn our gear and sell our leftovers.

In general, Mischief's population is great and I see it going into Omens very strong. A lot of us are tired of the same old 1-65 game. Most of the best expansions in EQ come after 65. All these stubborn people who refuse to play beyond GoD are doing themselves a disservice. They can't really even say they've played EQ since they're missing MOST of the game. That's like turning Mario off after you find the princess wasn't in the first castle, then claiming you've done it already.

I think we just disagree on the effects of free trade and that's very subjective so we're both right. I agree that Mischief will go the distance. Assuming they hold off on additional free-trade servers for a while Mischief may very well remain in the top populations on average for a long time. I will miss the loot piñata and random loot, I quite like those aspects. Maybe someday I'll get my Mischief rules but heirloom instead of free trade and we'll both be happy

It's the best version of the game I've played. I 3-boxed casually from launch-Luclin, took a break for 3+ months, missed PoP entirely, and most of LDON. I came back at lvl 60 with a mix of Velious & Luclin gear, no PoP flags, and between 50-80 AA's. On a Mangler clone, I would have just quit because catching up would be so daunting and unfun. What would I do? Go toil away in Velks some more? Limp through normal ldons or the PoP starter zones in overpriced ornate gear? On Mischief I was able to start gearing up right away, and in 2-3 weeks I could hang in Paw grinding amazing XP during a bonus event. It's F-U-N. I'm having as much fun as I was at launch.

I love this more modernized version of EQ. I'm not the type who likes raiding three times a week every week in perpetuity. I think 50 or 60 people raiding for 3+ hours to kill a boss that drops 4 items is dumb and antiquated and a waste of my time. The old way burns me out. I get why the old school purists consider it "easy mode" or feel it's a cheapened experience, but I'm the opposite. It's exciting and refreshing.

Mischief is the least "pay to win" of any TLP server. In the early eras, buying and selling gear is part of the game. You're not going to get everything you want through drops. Hence the "need all" loot rule that every TLP server I've played on adopts. I "paid to win" on Mangler and Aradune. And every server has "pay to win" avenues. Buying loot rights is just more inconvenient and more expensive. On Mischief loot is widely available, more accessible, and way cheaper. A game being "pay to win" implies that you have to spend to get ahead. Mischief is the antithesis of that. Everything is a bargain. It costs way less time and money to "win."

And if you want to get a little more abstract and consider time a currency, Mischief is even less of a "pay to win" server. In early era EQ it's not like your gear is a reflection of how skilled you are. It's purely a reflection of how much time you've sunk in.

Truth!

On my Nec I had full time gear before I attended my first raid. I don't think I've ever seen anyone come remotely close to that via SLR on normal servers. Add to that the silly speed that raid bosses die because everyone in the raid is ridiculously overgeared and it's just not fun for me. Normally the goal would be grouping and raiding to get gear and raids consist of mixed and matched levels of gear. Bosses are more challenging. Getting that gear and those barely squeaking by (after several wipes) boss kills are like half if not more the point of playing (to me) and I consider that fun.
I don't consider time I spend playing games "a currency". I think the point of that time playing is for the social aspect of grouping and raiding to get gear and the sense of accomplishment, from the time spent and bosses completed, that comes with it. I had some fun on Mischief and I see the draw for some people. It's just not for me. Maybe it's perfect for the OP. Maybe not. I think saying a standard tlp is "more" pay to win than Mischief is way out there, though and just plain wrong to me but it's cool, that's your opinion. I'm glad you're content with Mischief.

Did you consider not buying the gear that you will later wish you "earned"?

It takes a little self awareness to understand that what someone really wants is the dopamine rush of looting an item that is rare(so at least he has that going for him). However, this rush of "rareness" is just in comparison to the rest of the server. What these type of people really want is to have something that someone else does not. I get it. I just don't play the game that way.

That, or this person has never been BiS before, and has no idea what it is like to log in to raid 2x a week solely just to accrue DKP, and the subsequent boredom that follows. Imagine being able to, uhhh, get your toon gear without having to earn special imaginary points from daddy guildleader.

Wrong. For me the fun is seeing the guild get geared up by beating content and then being able to beat harder content based on that work. In other words, the most common game loop of most MMOs. It's not about having something better than others for me but I certainly wouldn't hold that against anyone because that's a common and perfectly fine way to play these games. For me it's about getting geared up together to take on harder content then rinse and repeat. I'm relating how I experience EQ, which I have played on and off since beta, not looking for a gaming psych eval. I've probably had BiS at several points in there from raiding but I'm no hardcore raider and I don't really care if I'm BiS. If your goal is to impress others that's fine, it's just not how I play the game. Also if you get everything you need in EQ from Mischief that's cool too, it's just not for me. I learned that legitimately by playing there.

The first toon on Mischief I didn't buy anything really, maybe a few spells. Took some time off then when I came back I had some fun playing baz and made around 100kr from that so spent several and geared up my nec. It was shortly after that that I lost interest in the free trade ruleset for playing. It's the fact that you don't actually NEED to play at all to achieve the highest level of character power, that nearly everyone in the guild is BiS and doesn't even need to raid, that's what kills it for me. I'll probably still pop in to Mischief to play baz on occasion if I need some kronos on Vaniki. I'm glad Mischief exists and I'm positive it will be popular for a long time, it's just not my jam.

I think that you're being a little hard on Zrender.

Mischief's rule set is like a couch sitting on the curb with a free sign on it. You were going to purchase a new couch soon until you saw this perfectly fine couch for free. Of course you can put in more hours at work for a better or similar new couch, but everything that you need in a couch is sitting right there.

Whenever I was running through quests on Mischief, I often found that a particularly difficult or time consuming quest item was being sold in EC tunnel for under 1000 plat. I could go ahead and camp the potentially long camp, or I could purchase the item instantly and move onto another item on my list.

I never experienced the bazaar on Mischief, but I have to imagine that Zrender had the same feeling as I had regarding early era quests. He or she could level, group, and raid to "earn" those items or just purchase them for little cost with a few clicks of a mouse.

On a side-note, I must have been really sucky at Tunnel Quest because everyone else's krono counts are astronomically higher than mine ever was.

Thanks and that's essentially right. And skillfully and chillfully phrased The moral at the end of the story is that Mischief is pay-to-win, not sure why people get offended by that and go into denial and start with the insults. Have you ever seen an MMO that's REQUIRED-pay-to-win? No, I don't think that exists. Pay-to-win games are called that because you CAN-pay-to-win. Mischief is the most CAN-pay-to-win MMO I've ever seen. You can and many do pay with kronos there to the point that there's no real remaining reason to play besides making more kronos. It's great for making those kronos though so I'm not knocking it. I just don't enjoy playing the rest of the game on it.

Edit: It's not you it's just that Baz quest is much much easier than tunnelquest. I've had several items that I 20x'd my purchase price on. It's really a fish in a barrel kind of thing. The thornblade cross server aspect with a char move made it even easier, you just need to cover the cost of moving the char by making additional kronos. I once made 3kr profit in less than 5 mins just selling kronos on Mischief then buying them back on Thornblade. I then came back to Mischief with a load of goods to sell also. ;-)
Edit2: Oh, the funniest baz play was when I made a krono buying kronos on Mischief and selling them ON MISCHIEF, yes, the bar price on a bunch was higher that the baz price lol

Every TLP is pay to win if you want it to be.
Just enjoy your play style and let others enjoy theirs it's really that simple.

You can step on a new TLP and buy anything you want some people have hundreds if not thousands of krono to waste. What does it matter what the rule-set is...

I always wondered that. Will we lose Random Loot when merging with FV? That would suck.

I think it's really unlikely that they would merge into FV. Thornblade and Mischief will likely merge and become the merge into server for this ruleset.