I (incorrectly) tend to lump Barbarians and humans together as a single group, forgetting that they are separate races in the game.
There is only one person that is claiming/guessing that AP switching will only be in certain zones. NOBODY knows anything right now(probably including the devs lol). Honestly, not being able to switch personas in any or most zones, would make it 99% useless. Much better to just run my alts to where I am and buff my group up or be there if I want to switch. Imagine having to leave the group or area, run back to a zone, switch personas and then run back, then do the same, if you want the original toon back? What the heck is the point of that? I have to go through the time and effort to relevel a toon to 125 and all AA, for what? I think that the same as a Merc timer, when OOC to switch, would be fine or just OOC would be even better. QoL would improve a lot and it would make the game less frustrating and more fun imho.
That is the problem, only one person is claiming to have this information from the CRC. It would be nice if more than one person could verify that this information is correct.
We are hoping to have an FAQ with the responses to at least some posted questions for next week. It will by no means answer every question put forth, but it will be a start to getting some information out. Thank you all for your continued patience.
I don't understand why people want more missions? They are more of a pain than anything. Most people just do one or two missions over and over. Doesn't really add much to the game, unless they had like 12 different ones. As long as the two are decent and not too difficult, that's more than enough for me, much easier to get achievements. EQ was never about missions, it was about an open world that you could explore and hunt.
Because missions = content. EQ moved away from the open world model to smaller, instanced experiences a while back. Even open zones can be instanced with /pick. I mean, I agree with you, I miss the days of it taking forever to get from Freeport to Qeynos, but unfortunately we have what we have, and to cut that in half isn't a very good sign.
Working one is annoying and long, could not finish it as we just got rolled needs tuning. Could not test other one, it was broken Having 4 at least gave some variety obtaining currency, with 2 it is going to get boring real quick.
Doesn't 4 get boring real quick too? Most people will probably avoid the harder ones and end up just farming 1 or 2. Not saying that 4 isn't better than 2, but missions were never part of EQ for the longest time. Now people act like it's the whole game. Missions should be something people do once for a prize and then hunt/exp in the new zones. I hope that they at least give good exp now, for killing the mobs in zones.
Sorry to burst your bubble, but unless they fixed something recently in Beta, grinding XP is still a...grind. The last expansion that had anything remotely "hard" for missions was CoV, with Aaryonar and Vulak missions, just because of the mechanics needed for achieves. Sure, running missions over and over to get coin for augs and a bag is boring, but it is what it is now. My group farmed all 4 missions in NoS on a nightly basis. Once you learned them, they weren't too hard. So, yes, missions are part of the whole game now, and so is raiding. It is what EQ has evolved to with limited staff and resources.
People act like missions are the "whole game" because Daybreak has essentially deemed that they are, as far as group players are concerned. The game you're describing no longer exists. Do the progression to level...grind the missions to gear up. That's the formula DB has imposed on players. I'm not in ANY way condoning it...I'm just saying that it is what it is. Personally, I hate it. I'm in the "more content, more" camp. Considering how much they charge for expansions, I think we should be getting double digit new zones at minimum; and I mean NEW zones, not recycled/retextured zones. I think every zone should have at least 2 missions...and not just raid hand-me-downs, but unique content. I think there should be quests, that have NOTHING to do with progression, that are just there to do for enjoyment, xp and rewards. But that's not the reality of Daybreak. Their reality is to do the ABSOLUTE bare mimimum to keep the game going, and just recycle the same old cut & paste content from expansion to expansion. That's the way it is. They already give us so little content to begin with, cutting a major part of that (the missions) in half is just a slap in the face to players. THAT is why most of us are so upset about 2 missions as opposed to 4.
It's easier to load up a game and get people to play with an objective like missions rather than merc/partisan or hunter achievements. Also, you're rewarded for your time unlike doing hunter achievements, where some weeks you're not going to get anything and that just feels bad.
You get 40+ slot bags for hunters, that you will then stick in bags because you don't need anymore bags.
Missions are an ideal method for a quick and repeatable way to socialize while getting something done in a known and finite amount of time. Once you've done them a few times they have the benefit of familiarity so that you can include practically anyone or any class and still have a good time. For us boxers it also gives us the opportunity to play a box while still contributing to the overall welfare of the guild. You can easily play mix and match the group depending on who wants to play which class. For example, after raids we run the 4 NoS missions to quickly cap our AA back to maximum. When you regularly use Dragon glyphs it's nice to have a quick way to recover. The missions make that easy and fun while proficiently staying in current content. Although they may double the currency reward will they also double the AA granted?
Dropping the missions from 4 to 2 also has the potential to be a huge handicap for gearing up. Missions -> 5-15 min with 100% chance of getting gear. Grinding -> 60-90 min and you have a 30%-40% chance of getting 1 piece of gear. Of course they could increase the spawn rates, etc.
Well if they want missions to be an integral part of the game, then I guess it's ridiculous that there are only 2 or even 4. I hope they are shifting the focus more to regular exping and exploring. Just glad they don't have any flagging for zones(I think?). I did enjoy the Dead Hills mission back in the day, would repeat that over and over. Just easy way to kill mobs and get exp, without worry of people camping areas.
And you are being EXTREMELY generous with those numbers. I don't care what they say or how many times certain devs spew the "you'll get a named every 72 min" garbage, they seriously f'ed up the spawn rates of named mobs in NoS, particularly the ones that have a gazillion placeholders, and I'll never be convinced otherwise.
