Separate the Campfires from the Fellowship System

Keep Fellowships there so people can share EXP to people if they want.

But move Campfires to the party system. Only the party leader can summon a campfire, probably get rid of the campfire reagent and put a short cooldown on popping it instead.

I feel like the Fellowship/Campfire system sorta segregates the community into these small groups (cliques) and makes playing with random players feel like a detriment. It's great that playing with your friends is rewarded, but playing without them feels like punishment.

I don't think they'd implement group campfires if it trivialized travel too much. It works for fellowships because you can't swap in and out to get whoever you want to the campfire. It's a commitment, so it's going to be a group of people who have some long-term connection. Groups should still get some way of having a campfire-like feature, but it would need to have some restrictions around it so it's not just "port from anywhere to the group at anytime".

One thing that might work is to allow a jump to the group, but only every X hours. They could do it with something similar to a fellowship token, but with an X-hour timeout. When you click the group token, it ports you to whichever group member you have selected. If your token isn't active, you have to figure out a different way to get to the group. This would encourage grouping by allowing LFG people to quickly get to a group, but wouldn't be able to be abused to instantly port to lots of places with invite/disband to different groups.

Agreed, it would be terrible for a group based game to make it easier for people to make groups.

If they were to implement it, it would have to be something which encouraged grouping but didn't allow exploits like having 6 characters stationed around the world who invite/disband so that a single character can warp to 6 different spots in a few minutes. Allowing a jump to group only once per X-hours would allow actual grouping without being able to be exploited like that.

Agreed, people should have to spend at least $45/month for that kind of ability to move around rapidly.

I'm not sure why you're being so sarcastic. They're not going to implement a group porting method that allows you to port to 6 different groups in 1 minute. If you want the ability to port to a group, it would benefit you to contribute constructively to the discussion to come up with a workable idea that they might consider implementing.

They should. Traveling is an absolutely waste of time. It was dumb in 1999 it is dumb in 2023. You should have to walk to a zone the first time, and after that you should be able to teleport to that zone from anywhere. There is a reason fast travel is in every game made in the last 15 years.

In your first reply:

It's just irritating seeing the gate-keeping over an instant port ability that has less impact for an "established" group of friends playing together versus grouping with anyone. EQ promotes and rewards clique behavior too much.

All they have to do is implement the WoW Warlock summoning ability. It takes 3 people to summon someone. No need to get complicated with restrictions or other junk. There's already a tested and proven solution.

One thing I would add to this is that the world doesn't really feel interconnected, and hasn't for a long time. It feels disjointed and segmented, which makes traveling feel less immersive and enjoyable.

Part of that feeling is that there is no real danger in the world.. If you are 120 there are 21 zones you have to be somewhat careful traveling in, and hundreds that are utterly devoid of danger, and of the 21, you can bypass all danger with bard invis.

I agree 100%.

It is WAY past time to separate the xp sharing and the campfires. The fact that they won't even consider it shows just how tone deaf they are about the game and the way it's played today. Most of the devs still have a 1999 "The Vision" mindset about a great many things that just don't work for modern EQ.

I play with my group most days and we are not in the same fellowship. It does not stop us grouping or dragging other guildmates with us who are in neither fellowship!

A port to the group would be nice, but then I don't think it should just be the leader who can summon to group and it should still need 3 players. Should have some kind of cool down before you can switch to another group, but then that would mess with people who want to play longer than the group plays for.

A lot would depend on when you would suggest this feature unlocks on TLP servers. Also not sure there is a reason to separate the campfire from the fellowship system instead of making a new fire system for groups.

If this was unlocked on TLP's early on it would have a big impact on moving raid forces around.

I wasn't implying that the group leader could summon a campfire by themselves, I assume they'd keep the 3 person requirement. Maybe it could be lowered to 2 since Fellowships can have more than 6 members, although frankly I don't think any of these numbers matter, I think it's fine with 1, 2, or 3 and don't really care which it is. The Fellowship teleport has a 15 minute cooldown which seems just fine.

I think copy and pasting the current system would work fine, except IMO the reagent should just be removed since it'll just be a tax on those who aren't too lazy to make groups It is definitely a negligible amount of plat, I just think it's more fair.

I would gladly pay it if you would just get rid of the 18 hour timer to rejoin another fellowship. I mean really come on is that really a huge game changer ? Its more of a PITA to log toons in and out just for a fast port. At least knock it down to an hour or so.

campfires let one player with 2 boxes go farm tradeskill junk or go do instances and group content that is old and noone is backflagging.

"cliques"

Really?

"cliques"?

OMGZors! Buzzword!


Guilds use campfires in groups and a banner, they're "cliques" too, right? "Clique" is such a spiteful word directed at whatever group you are not in.

"Clique" = Guild
"Clique"= Friends
"Clique" = My own alts that nooone else is interested in leveling.

'Makes playing with random players feel like a detriment'?

Whaaaaat? This makes zero sense. Unless you mean to say - Not having a friendlist to fellowship with feels detrimental?

Fellowships are hardly some elusive exclusive club, at level one you can create your own even and strike out for parity.


This whole thing reeks of- I don't use this system and don't like that other people do and feel left out of their fellowships, so change it for me please!

The lockout timer on them is ridiculous and totally unnecessary. It's like the inventory nightmare of shrouds. They design something useful, then add a complication that throws a handful of poo at you, the user to make you not like it. Very EQ.

"Some games" (Like WoW)



You click on person's name, like in guild roster and if you're grouped, click to the nearest wayshrine to them, you know, to promote grouping.

Why Everquest has never adopted this is beyond me.

When fellowship campfires were first introduced there was no cool down for adding people to a fellowship.

People would use the fellowship to run 3x people ( rogue + corpses ) to a spot, then pop a merc to res the dead, set the fellowship and cycle as many people as required through the fellowship to set up a banner or whatever.

The EQ team saw this as an exploit and added a 24 hr cool down on joining a fellowship. ( not sure of the exact cool down, might be 20 hr )

The fact that they did this is strong evidence that they wouldn't like the idea of joining a group for a port to that group.