Please go back to the roots of EQ's gameplay loop

The strategies being employed from the "modern live service game design" playbook are genuinely having the opposite of the intended effect.

For 20 years you farmed your best items from specific named that you went and camped for. It drove the social aspect of the game. Now you just sit wherever or log in once a day to run the least annoying mission, and the only thing you need to camp a specific named for gear wish are augments, of which you'll need maybe 3 that don't also drop in the mission.

Everything is so homogenized and boring, [Expansion] of [Slot] of [Stat/Class] is a snooze. Killing 40 named without seeing a single piece of ore period, let alone the one you need is a snooze. And this seems to have extended to the raid game this expansion. 8 chests, 2 ores this week, neck and cloak. The straight to alts rewards.

My guild went from fairly active in ToL farming up group ores for alts and boxes to about half raid logging in NoS, people would rather just get the T1 rots for alts out of raids, to basically fully raid logging this expansion, with about 10 people stopping altogether out of boredom.

This is one of the most lackluster, boring expansions I've ever played through in EQ and I've played through them all. I guess maybe I expected too much for a milestone 30th expansion in a milestone 25th year of the game.

I'm convinced now more than ever that the ornaments are screwing up the loot tables. On good nights, I'm killing 6-10 named mobs (4 or 5 most other nights). If I'm lucky, I'm getting maybe 1-2 pieces of group T3 gear per week, and I have to distrubute those drops between 3 toons. The drop rate in the missions is even worse...maybe one T3 piece a week, other than 2h weapons because those seem to drop like candy.

On the other hand, I regularly (3 or 4 times a night) see 3 or 4 ornaments drop from the named I kill. Same with the missions.

I REALLY wish they would put the ornament drops on the trash mobs where they belong to ensure that the proper things are dropping from the named at the proper rate.

My favorite thing about old EQ was the itemization. It made items feel special, when you could get abilities or spells outside your own class. The game felt true to a tabletop brought to life, and sand-box style.

I do like the progression chain where questing matters. However I also think we should have more exp on mobs to kill.
you can always farm named for drops, its just not worth it cause you get more exp and garunteed drops from the missions.

It's ok, but you can't build a theme park with how few attractions they add.

I think the whole Achievement system is bad for the game like this, too.

Would love to see:

• Missions to stop being loot pinatas
• Harder end-zone content intended to challenge 3 coordinated players in group gear. This content would be the best place to farm group gear ore, or whatever the best group gear is

So your solution is remove all achievements and questing and just sit and grind? You already have that option. You're just advocating for stopping people from playing the way you don't want. Do what you like. Ask for more exp on mobs if you want, but being angry at how other people play is the old man shouting at the clouds gif

You should really take your own advice.

Yes, remove all achievements. I think it makes the game feel narrow in scope, and defines a completion target.

No, I'm saying that when you design as a theme-park that the game has to have more content. It's like Pac-man. Players just rapidly eat up the dots, and run out of things to do.

It's a dead scene, but I'd rather see more RP content and world building.

Woah. Woah woah, hold up there. Why you gotta try messing with my tribute farm?!?

yea I liked the old raids where the ornament drops were on the raid mob

The main EQ audience now "playing" EQ are not gamers. These players juggle between family and gaming. They rarely play any game outside of EQ, they're non-gamers.

This was one of my favourite things too. Such that I argued against and was unhappy with itemisation becoming homogenised and lacking in flavour and soul. How I handled that back then was immature and not ideal, and I do understand how it streamlined item creation through how the team standardised slots, but I still stand by what I was unhappy with in terms of itemisation direction.

I really looked forward to seeing cool items drop with unusual abilities not normally accessible to me. Amassing a collection of clickies and weapons with procs for different situations was fun. I still cherish my Mask of the Devious for this reason.

Re OP:
So far I have only bought LS for my main and not my other accounts. There really doesn't seem to be much to do at all for a level increase expansion, so I'm not in a rush. I did the few missions we have available, I have the evolving neck (that I can't even wear yet from lack of levels!) which after how the NoS cloak killed my motivation to log on and grind with Cleric DPS I doubt I'll level it much.

I have noticed fewer people being online in general on AB outside of raid hours and I figure it's for similar reasons the OP has mentioned.

I think less are playing due to the issues with DX11, hoping when those are fixed the player base will increase again. My attituded has shifted for live and is now I have all year to gear up and get things done. It isn't like any of the gear is needed for an expansion I have already beaten. Just need it for the next one.

I'd like to see Tradeskill gear being switched to T1 gear the same as ROS was and the top gear of loot for raids and groups all being dropped.

I purchased collectors LS on my main and standard on 2 alt accounts. 1 alt account will be collectors editon by May for TLP personas and 1 other account is likely to have standard LS added to it for TLP personas utility. My final 5th account, I'm undecided if I want to put personas on it or just keep it for a trader account on the TLP server which would mean LS isn't required.

If the AMA told me anything, it was that this form of gameplay is dead and the developers / DBG have no plans to ever bring it back.

I, like you, really loved that style of gameplay and it was what drew me into this game in the first place and I've hung around for the past few years hoping things would change.. but it hasn't, and won't.

I've understood more recently that many people who play (and post on these forums) also don't what the style of gameplay to return which baffles me even more as it wouldn't take away from the current gameplay, only extend / enhance it.

I no longer invest any $$ into this game as I can level overseer in just 20 mins a day for free. I also no longer invest any of my energy into this game as I now realise it isn't worth it - Enshrouded and miniature painting now take my $$ and my interest.

If you still enjoy playing the game as it stands, then continue to do so and enjoy it for what it is. However, I would suggest not wasting a single moment on trying to change this game to it's former glory.

Everquest, as we remember it, is dead...

I think personas could be one of the best things that has happened to the game in a long time if they would work on them a little.

Take a game like FFT for example. The class system for that game is probably my favorite for any RPG game ever. It was great you had to level up certain classes to unlock other classes then you could learn abilities for 1 class and use those abilities for another class.

I am not saying EQ should follow that system but with personas now alot of people like myself are completionist and want to max every single class. So if you made it so maxing a 2nd class made your original class slightly stronger or even if you did just graphic things so if you max a 2nd class you can use their ornament for epic on another class it would encourage people to keep playing after they beat the expansion.

I think they really need to add a way to get exp tokens back in the game if your toon is max exp and you beat a mission (increases in exp amount for every person in the group who gets an achievement for the mission). This would mean people who do want to level up persona but when they can't play their persona because others want their main to help mission achievements from past expansions they could both get something out of it.

Here is another way to look at it. You may remember the original endless and punishing grind fest of actual original eq (nothing like the carnival rides of tlp). If it was so good, why are there zero games that do it?
I played back then, and no one was happy to spend hours just to die and lose all your exp for the day (deaths used to take more exp back then). Ever had your body rot and lose all your gear? Spend 6 hours in a camp to see the item drop once, and a class that cannot use it wins the roll? How many times in modern eq have you spend 20+ hours trying to get a non-raid item to drop (barring wierd epic spawns). I bet that number approaches zero, cause no one wants a uninspired job, they want a video game they play for fun.

Lots of people quit playing over crap like that. We played EQ cause that was all there was. As soon as other competition came out, people left and EQ was forced (very much against their will) to adjust so that the game was more fun and rewarding instead of punishing.

The old grind ways are still there. All the items from missions also drop from named. You still get exp from mobs (And can spend days grinding for a single level like old times). This entire argument is disengenuous, because its not about your ability to play that way, its that other people aren't playing how you want them to.

Don't forget needing multiple sets of gear so that you could go and retrieve your corpse when you died in a difficult place to get to such in fear or hate.

Or deleving from dying too many times trying retrieve your gear and risk not being able to re-enter Hate, Fear, or Sky to retrieve that gear.

Agreed, and it's one of the more disappointing answers from the AMA. We all understand that can't continuously add new things, but they haven't made any efforts with things that already exist.

Take some time and mix and match abilities on gear for classes. I can't really remember the last time I got excited for an item as an enchanter. Maybe the Bifold?

I returned in mid-2020 and have continued to play expressly because it is not the game I left in 2007. Even the TLPs are not the same game I left in 2007. If the game in 2007 had been as it is on TLPs now sans Krono, I would likely not have hit the same frustration points.

But, I do acknowledge there is a niche audience who likes the game as it was at original launch. However, even the emus have made their own changes to the gameplay as have the TLPs so even they have "caved" to modern gaming sensibilities in some ways as QOL. But, those who prefer the emus and/or the TLPs are as valid in their preference as all other gamers (and anyone who plays games is a gamer). Those are the audience, too, potential future niche games are intended for, those that have been in alpha for more years than any of the current and past wide audience games pre-launch full development period. I wish them well and hope they can find a game to their liking but also think they're disingenuous jerks for demanding their gameplay style is the only one that's valid or that "real gamers" want to play.