EverQuest Producer’s Letter April 2023

I’m sorry… are you calling encounter locking a quality of life fix…? The fact that now we could have a server with no jboots, no vp keys, no mage, ranger, Druid, monk epics due to a new incredibly simple form of griefing is a positive change?

F on FTE.

The people still playing EQ at this point are those who largely agree with the DPS race mechanic. You're not going to get people who left because they want FTE type rules back because of that, so all you're going to do is make those who still play angry, as this server rule proposal has done.

Could we get a clarification of what "engage" means for FTE? Damage? Proximity aggro? Social aggro? The details will matter. If social aggro is included, then it would seem FD pulling goes away or is limited at least.
Also, can members be added mid fight to the group or raid?

There is time to modify this Devs. Just clone it and add free trade. Give us a choice.

Non-Abusable encounter locking has been apart of World of Warcraft for 20 years, there is NOTHING new or experimental about it.

Those arguing strongly against FTE have obviously forgotten the enforcement of play nice policies all throughout the olden days of EQ. FTE was the cultural norm that was often then enforced through GM action. The only exception was when you were FTE something that was beyond your ability to kill for singular mobs or to keep down in the case of camps. If implemented with care and tweaked to counteract bad actors that will seek to abuse the system, this will most likely be a net gain for players. Let's be honest; the use of highest damage done to "race" for a mob has done terrible damage over the years to the camaraderie in our community.

The addition of evolving perks to help keep a healthy population, essentially a catch-up mechanic, is interesting. I don't know if it will actually work long term, but if ever there was a "Dad" server, this one is it. For those that cannot keep the same pace we used to before the kids, this sounds pretty attractive. The only other thing I can think of that would make it truly Dadcore would be to share flags and keys across your toons on the account.

Suggestion though, Free Trade would make this even more attractive. I don't think randomization marries well with the addition of FTE, but Free Trade would greatly assist in keeping a healthy population of returning players and make the addition of extra experience for alts more attractive as we can easily trade gear to those alts. It would also potentially allow for community-based solutions to FTE mistakes. Further, Free Trade could make for an interesting server for raiders that have shifting teams on the most friendly server for main changes to date. The ability to maintain multiple options for your main without losing all of the transferable gear each time could keep small man teams going longer in the server than would otherwise be feasible to maintain.

#FreeTrade #FTE #DadServer

I'm ok to try new things like FTE and see how it goes.
But another 8 weeks of Classic and 8 weeks of Kunark? How could you think that would be a good idea? The first month of Kunark is when a lot of attrition happens. And it's not only because of summer...

I want to agree with you, but your two statements i bolded, "enforced through gm action" and "implemented with care" are 2 things that just dont happen these days. and without that the toxicity and griefing that will now be enabled is going to be off the charts.

when there are singular spawns needed to get things done, thats where the easy new griefing methods through FTE can happen. if i get a ph agrod on me i can do whatever i want with it. kill it or just let it attack me forever. this could mean no j boots, no quillmane for mage epic, no raster or pipes for monks, no faelin for rangers or druids...

The problem is the Play Nice Policy doesn't exist anymore. The game doesn't have the staff to enforce good behavior. Instead it is put on the community's shoulders to police ourselves. Realistically the number of offenders banned vs the number of offenders isn't even close. I do think this is a good faith attempt to automate behavior enforcement. The problem is that without a staff of people to make sure it is not abused, it makes the problem drastically worse.

Oh man I’m sorry I’m so sorry Colton Grundy but I must be dumb. Can you please link the part where that said they’re using the “rampage mechanic” for oakwynd FTE mechanic?

FTE seems like a good solution until you actually think about the multitude of ways it can be abused.

All it takes is a bard permakiting Begurgle's PH and no cleric on the server can get their epic. Not being able to contest or DPS race mobs, especially ones in your own camp, is going to lead to more toxic behavior than the status quo.

Like so many others, I will also put my input into the new TLP ruleset. My friends and I are also very disappointed with the server rules.

The encounter lock is interesting and at least of all the rules this will be different. People will grief one another encounter locked or not. As others have said, the stacking EXP bonus per roster is just not enough at all. People do not make alts on the same account, myself included. I generally box 1 character. 10% exp is not any kind of incentive to make a character on the same account.

I would revamp that system and increase it by 25% per character stacking up to at LEAST 100%. It should persist permanently on your main character. This would at least incentivize myself and i am sure others to make alts on the same account, otherwise it is pretty pointless.

The rest of the unlocks are very boring and don't inspire my friends or I to play really. I also feel like another classic launch with 8+ week unlocks is tedious and done every single TLP. Why not for once can we get a Classic + Kunark + Velious release, or even just Kunark. Just to change up the leveling paths.

No way I can bring myself to grind out Lguk and the Hole again to max level. Please Please PLEASE start this server with more then just Classic open.

Was looking up for this year TLP and for the first time was going to bring 2 friends to play with me and if the encounter lock stay youre losing 3 customers its easy as that... only someone that never played the game couldnt see how this will be abused.

The last time I recall DPG really missing the mark on a TLP and having to make corrections was the Mangler\Selos announcement. That garnered 10 pages of comments on the Producer's Letter. Maybe there is hope they'll make adjustments here as well.
As there was leading up to the announcement, there continues to be a ton of great ideas coming out of their own community...

expansion related bonuses is a great idea ... FTE is not

Too what!?!? It solves nothing…. Stopping AOE PLing is as simple as a GM zoning into the deep and seeing a crew of enchanters chain stunning over and over for 4 hours straight, even when waiting 10 minutes for respawns. It’s not like it hard to see automated play. The only automated play that’s hard to find is the people who we all know that use a program to automate instanced raids. If they wanted to fix cheating with a radical change then get rid of instances. Don’t give botters a safe place to cheat. This whole thing is so dumb. Seems like the new parent company wants to make the game more casual friendly. This game is 24 years old. Figure it out.

FTE is a pretty dramatic change to Everquest to just throw out there. I am willing to see how it plays out, but I'd love to hear about what the dev's "Vision" is for how this is supposed to work in an ideal world.

Even if it plays out good, its going to make Everquest feel less like Everquest and more like other modern MMOs with similar systems. Thats a bad thing on the whole. Everquest is unique in large part because its old and not modern in many ways, its combat and aggro system being one of the fundamental reasons for that.

regarding the server itself...it really just feels like a phinigel clone with extra stuff they want to test tacked on. The core ruleset seems pretty bland. I dont need free trade, but some sort of tweak to the tradtional TLP formula would be nice.

Regarding the Legacy Character thing....can we get AoC lockouts to be character specific instead of account wide? This would actually make leveling alts on the same account make more sense, and encourage people to do so. As it is now most people level secondary characters on other accounts so they can bring those characters to AoC raids as needed.

Also, think of all the times you've accidentally aggro'd a KOS mob and needed help and a random person near by helped you killed it. You're screwed now. Maybe they'll probably add somehting like if you /yell for help it breaks the lock like in EQ2 but that's just another extra step you have to remember to do. This is not a QOL change.

Give us 2 versions of this server, one with FTE locking and 1 without and see what players actually want.

It's provably bad for player retention and maybe they finally learned not to break up guilds?

Testing FTE is one thing but having out of group dmg and effects null doesnt make sense. A big part of the game is helping others do things. Were now attempting to limit player interaction , in an attempt to "force" grouping in designated level ranges. You actually think were going to spin up extra alts on our accounts to group with friends that are behind? Thats going to get old real fast and NOT fun at all.

Anytime ive had a friend start they always say they want to play but dont have time. So i introduce them to a good PL guy and now our guild has a new raider for a few months. This only gets worse as the expansions increase. They are not 4-6 hour a day players and lets face it most of us shouldnt be either. Its not laziness, its just to demanding for a responsible adult to be a Evercrack fiend. They spend all their active hours camping keys, epics, and progression just to stay caught up with the guild with the little available time they have! There is a massive amount of players that fall off the tlps as it is due to this time commitment.

I like how you disingenuously cut off the entire quote. The full sentence reads:

FTE seems like a good solution until you actually think about the multitude of ways it can be abused.

Reading comprehension is your friend.