Snip snip here and clip clip there and a couple of tra la las. That's how we wash away what you say in the merry old land of Oz!
I said that re-playable content is, in my opinion, good for the game. I also said that we asked for group currency to be attached to merc/partisan tasks (which is something I say frequently on these boards). I don't see how anyone could consider the above to be vitriolic posts.
Someone asked about lowering the amount of party members required to request group content, this was some of Absor's responses (to various questions regarding the same topic): Absor, I think there's a few things you are unaware of when it comes to Everquest's community. This game's community is actually very anti-social. Many players get segregated into their guilds/cliques and don't play outside of them. And that's perfectly fine, normal, and expected. But when you've got a 25 year old game, that means a majority of the relationships are already formed. So right from the getgo, someone coming into the game who isn't already in one of those relationships are a minority. Even TLP, a unique opportunity that brings back people who haven't played in years and even decades, and even occasionally someone experiencing the game for the first time, is full of guilds with a foundation of people who already know each other. On TLP in Classic through PoP the LFG spam is the way we remember it back in the day but after PoP it nosedives and eventually becomes near non-existent. A lot of people would legit either play with their guild/friends, or not at all. If your understandably obvious solution is simply "join a guild then," that doesn't necessarily translate into what you think it will. Piggybacking on the anti-social diagnosis, have you ever paid much attention to the Truebox argument threads? There are some people who want Truebox/no boxing at all. And you know what boxers' responses are to that? "What makes you think I'm going to play with you whether we are forced to play 1 character or not?" Some people box because they want to, because they enjoy it. Some people do it to give themselves an advantage, some do it because they want to play alone or want the ability to be able to, and others do it because they feel they have to due to the population size. There's plenty of good reasons to box. I won't pretend to know what % of the player base boxes (really hope the staff have a grasp on that). I don't know if it's a majority, I used to assume it was between 25-33% of players but that was before I broke out of the Classic-PoP TLP cycle. Eventually in the timeline boxing becomes VERY normal and I believe people are right in viewing it as necessary. If you told me it was a majority of players, I'd believe you now. If you haven't figured out yet where I'm going with this post, then prepare to have your mind blown. I know that you probably have the desire for this to be a group based game, and that you believe you "make the game with the group player in mind," but I've been watching video game players convert that into their own reality since online gaming first began. Players don't always play how you expect or want them to. But the truth is that it's perfectly OK for people to solo request group content on Everquest, and you want to know how I know that? BECAUSE THAT'S WHAT A VERY LARGE AMOUNT OF THE PLAYER BASE HAS BEEN DOING ON YOUR GAME FOR YEARS AND YEARS AND YEARS, THANKS TO BOXING. You may not realize it, but essentially your response amounted up to little more than "pay more money if you want to solo request group content." It also makes me worry that you are oblivious to the amount of players boxing. The requirement to request group content is the equivalent of Truebox - it is a POINTLESS ANNOYANCE that just creates problems instead of solving them. The developers of this game have continually tried to make changes based on their FANTASY of what they want the game to be, while the REALITY for the player base has always been on a different axis. Whatever you THINK things like member count requirements and Truebox are doing for the game is NOT actually happening. And I haven't even gotten into how requesting and participating are two completely different things... Not sure what's so "group game" about someone sitting AFK in another zone counting towards the member count requirement. And in response to "Should we also open up raids to single players?" boy do I got news for you...
If they really want Everquest to be a group game, they would not allow 3rd party software at all to assist boxing.
True. But if they did that and the game continued in the same direction it did do, I suspect the game would be dead by now. They have to wake up to the fact that the ONLY way for some of us to play solo nowadays is to create boxes and alt-tab our way through the game. For the devs (and some forum people on here) that suggest it's our own fault for not grouping - then fine. But I guarantee if everyone who boxes were to quit tomorrow - the game would be deserted. The AMA just made me realise that the game as I enjoyed playing it is now dead to me with little to no chance of it ever changing.
I have: 3 Krono total across my six accounts. approx 48 mil in plat. (worth about 8 krono on my server) 5 x lvl 125 characters 1 x lvl 122 1 x lvl 121 4 around level 115 3 FTP accounts stuck between 103 and 110 5 x epic 2.0 1 x epic 1.0 (mage) 6 houses 1 house full of collectibles 1 x guild hall I'm not giving any of it away unfortunately. I'll buy up a couple of years on my houses. Send my mains home for a long sleep. The FTPs are going to spend the near future sitting by a campfire in EW. Convert any plat to Krono. Check in every 6 months or so. Just sad that I spent on multiple LS expansions in December and I've never really spent much time there.
I expected more responses to this thread. Then i realized everyone is probably just quiting instead of responding...
At the very least there are a few outliers that should be looked at. For example, Goblin Dojo from DoN is required for the DoN progression AA line which is always relevant, yet it requires 6 players to be physically present in the zone to trigger the script to begin. Feels like an unnecessary requirement for ancient trivial content that you're obligated to do for character progression at some point.
I agree that it would be nice for group currency to be added to merc/partisans as a one time thing. But I get the feeling they want to have some challenge in obtaining them. Camping a named takes awhile, and a sell back doesn't always occur as a drop. Missions are somewhat challenging for many at first, but still requires people to go through them. Sure FF is duoable, but it takes awhile to do. And can still fail if not careful. I don't think they want merc tasks, which are very easy for all, to be handing out currency over and over. But a one time thing, as yet another incentive to do them (besides the initial XP boost), is good.
just because he says its a group game doesnt make it so, the reality of EQ to the players is wildly different. im fortunate enough to have some friends that actually still play eq, but thats hardly the norm.
This was started in the TLP forum for discussion on the answers we got on TLP issues. For some reason they moved it to vet lounge.
I'd be happy with just have my beloved beast at start. And waiting until luclin for epic, I'd have to do that any way if I couldn't have her in classic. But she would be leveled and have some time in early raids for a change. Plane of Fear already drops beast gear, so it's not like she would be running around naked.
I said what I wanted in their thread. As a paid geek before I retired, most of it made sense. Even with a large staff, large budget, and dream tools ... there are only so many days in the year before you go live. What you plan for 2-3 years in advance can and will change by the time you expect to go live with it sometimes due to nothing you have any control over. That said ... there are things that you are notified of well in advance that will no longer be available you need to pivot around. Services you use and are dependent on that will sunset 2-3 years out that need to be accounted for in a different way. Every coder has it's own unique way of doing things. What "should" happen in coding, doesn't always happen. Leaving behind documentation as to why something is the way it is sometimes gets archived off if it existed at all as irrelevant. Telling a coder, always do things this way when you work here ... yeah not gonna happen. Tried that, my coding partner decided to do their own thing cause they were "smarter," they had to have somebody "fix" their mess behind my back to work. Sometimes there are reasons behind the why not do this instead of that. A year later that smart coder broke everything ... and I do mean everything and paid for it with a "don't touch anything" position. One wrong line and spaghetti becomes a lump of stuck together ramen. Everybody wants their project in the pipeline ahead of everything else cause it's their shiny so they can collect the bonus and kudos. Not everybody can win. It's what's best and will be the biggest bang for the buck literally. Things that are broken are prioritized the same way ... what is the most broken and what needs to get fixed asap. Those daily meetings can get really ugly - is it fixed - why not - when - how. The techs fixing it hate them, it takes time away from actually fixing the problem. Some actually take a fix from a vendor (shocker there huh). Not everything is a fix within internal control. Do we want to move forward or move backward? TLP's are there to keep those that love revisiting happy. Live keeps moving forward. Some of us thrive moving forward and love seeing the shiny new things like Darklight Caverns all glowy and the hidden messages in walls, or eyes following us around in a mirror hidden at the back of a zone where what may appear to be a "sister" zone it doesn't exist. Technology and graphics has grown so much over the years that those things are now possible that weren't 25 years ago. The game is still growing in a lot of ways if you look for it instead of vrooming thru it. Do I wish things were better at this point? Yes, there are things that still need to be addressed. There are things that aren't working. There are things that need adjusting still. But in the long read, they area addressed. @Absor - my hat is off to you for all the training you did to bring the next set up to speed and still keep the wheels on the bus. As someone who did the same thing, that is not an easy task. The push-me-pull-you stress that goes with that can get to be raid-level. There is a ton of information in the thread.
People were not asking for merc tasks to reward the same amount as missions. People were asking for small amounts. Also, partisans are usually longer and involved, sometimes bordering on annoying and that deserves a reward every time the quest is run. Mushroom mob in PC comes to mind etc.
Since the designers don't seem to understand this, here's an example of how this actually plays out in game. If a mission requires three people to request, I go to general chat and ask if a couple people can join my group for 30 seconds so that I can grab an instance. It's tedious, annoying, and pointless.
I think Absor, like all the devs, have a very narrow vision when it comes to the game. If someone asks for group requirements to be lowered in order to access content, he's assuming they're talking about current content. I'm pretty sure the question was about older content that still requires a full group. For example, a newly created 100 heroic (or even a 125 toon) wanting to hit Anguish for an orb for their epic 2.0. There's ZERO reason why that toon would need a full group for the content, so why require it to request the content? Absor stated he doesn't think people go back to older content, so this sort of scenario is beyond his grasp.
