Mercs were designed to facilitate faster grouping, by filling a slot you were either having difficulty filling or were waiting to fill for longer than the group wanted. Moloing was a byproduct of some classes being able to molo content with a merc that they couldn't solo without one. Now EQ devs "could" choose to facilitate moloing as a fudged kind of solo-play and at least this kind of "semi-automated" solo-play is theirs to control, tune & modify as opposed to the "other kind" of semi-automated (or indeed fully automated) solo-play. But I wouldn't hold your breath, EQ is marketed as a group-focused game so really any solutions should also be expected to be group-focused ones that encourage or facilitate more grouping between players. I'd rather the devs invest in a side-kicking system which is group-focused than a moloing system that is far more solo-play focused. I've nothing against soloers I just think that since EQ has always traded on its group-focused design to differentiate it from all of the other MMORPGs out there which have proper solo-paths crafted for their levelling processes it should stick to that being how its gameplay is designed. All that said, it's a developer-team choice and a "molo-group system" with multiple Mercs available to a solo player as a catch-up mechanic is still cheaper as a system than crafting hours upon hours of solo-content tuned for 16 widely different classes to use when the new-player userbase for that would be tiny & infrequent.
Those who claim to see a difference aren't, really. Just the RNG playing in their favor at the time they choose to pay attention to that particular merc skin. There is no substantive or quantitative difference between merc skins of the same merc class and tier.
Thanks for the replies everyone, I'm in a different country at the moment, so it's hard to check for responses. With respect to the past comments about the multi-merc capability, in my OP I did mean having more than one merc active for the given account. The idea here is that it would become rapidly economically draining with the increased amount of simultaneous mercs. Thus it could prohibit afk play, unless you wanted to burn Plat. The value here is for those players that want to do a piece of progression that is a few expansions behind. I fully get the value of the just box it or ask friends in a guild or general chat approach, but I also think other methods may be helpful. I've been very fortunate to have awesome guildies help my bard, but they also have their own objectives and may not always be available for progression from 3 xpacs ago. Regarding other types of mercs, I think it would be fun to have a shammy merc or other class. I guess EQ2 does this? I agree in that a merc is inferior to a PC, but I also think that supporting extra playstyles is worthwhile. Thanks!
I want an Enchanter merc, haste/clarity group; slow mobs, mez mobs that aren't group assist target. Tash and Runes optional (maybe only self rune and only tash even con or higher before slow/mez)
I am sure the demand for a CC merc would be high. But ... wow. I don't think it should ever happen. Not only would the complexities for such a merc be much higher than other merc classes, it poses even more risk to the already endangered 6 person/player group.
It has happened before, usually with the "special" mercs - the ones you need to activate with a Contract, but it has always been unintended, and always fixed.
The tradeskill requiremnts for this are punitive and it's only a gimme for long established players and a /bird to everyone else.
Would be nice to be able to have my alternate personas be my merc, use their gear sets, and earn experience when they are performing the duties as my merc. Maybe an idea as a feature for the next, next expansion.
Merc gear/AA doesnt solve the issue of how strong they are. I would argue that the mercs dont really cover tanking all that well and I would argue cc/slower is the 4th archetype. ranged and melee dps is still just dps.
4 Archetypes: Tank Healer DPS Support Which merc provides support (cc, slow, pull, adps, etc). Support classes doing dps don't make them a dps archetype. Classes like bards, enchanters, and even shams, etc were/are primarily designed to be support classes rather than raw tanking, healing, or dps. Caster dps and melee dps are just...dps. They aren't their own archetype. A sedan and coupe are still pedestrian vehicles they are doing the same thing in a different style.
well i doubt i would use that since i already have my 6 toons ( accounts ) , but if we could buy from marketplace the ability to use 2 mercs at same time , it would be more profit for DB . and would help those class who can't solo well like he said. .
And that isn't a reason to not consider something. It was simply pointing out that mercs don't impact some classes ability to progress without a group. The fact that some classes can solo without a merc isn't relevant to the suggestion of allowing multiple mercs to be used. If you can solo or molo you don't really gain anything from adding more mercs to the mix as that will just cost more in upkeep and lower your xp rate as it is unlikely to speed up how fast you kill to make up for the xp split.
You act like they have a choice or not to play with groups You act like the LFG system is working. GW2, open party finder, open fractals T4, find a group instantly or look at it for another minute till some group is open to whatever your role is. Look at where the world bosses, goto the world boss, enjoy raiding against a world boss with 70+ other people, no nothing required just show up and participate. EQ, open LFG, do a search. Nothing. 30 minutes do a search. nothing. 30 minutes later do a search? nothing. playtime is only 1.5 hours. Do another search. Nothing. GW2 a solo player game. Most of the time your with tons of people. But still solo. EQ a group player game. Most of the time your solo/(with your own box, but solo player, 1 person doing the entire group). I see benefits outweighing the cons with additional mercs in EQ current state on Live servers.
You are getting that from my response that the ability of some classes to solo shouldn't be a reason to discard the idea of allowing players to use multiple mercs at the same time? I agree that suggesting that players need to get a group isn't a good solution.
I just wish we had a Shaman Merc that could buff me, slow/debuff enemy, and then heal. That or swap modes between heal/buffs and debuffing/dmg.
Show me the support archetype option for classes on the forums. A healer adding support doesn't make them a support archetype. Because i can, doesn't mean I am. Plus, mercs aren't AI. They're scripted. They wouldn't be able to do all the fun support things or the buffs that everyone would want them for. And if they did, it would always be when they should be doing another task and result in deaths.
I am not familiar with any instance where an activated contract performed any better than another merc of the same class, gear, and tier. Do you have any examples to share?
This is true! But the question now remains: what buffs would a Druid or Shaman merc give? Just Unity? Just the blessing of wood (teehee) line? Shaman going to use their talisman of kitty lines in combat? If so, are they going to do that when they should be healing? Will shaman mercs not heal? Will Druid mercs use Evac when the assigned tank drops <10% ? And if so, how many kills will that rob people from. Seems like more of a nightmare than Persona's currently lol
