New Time Locked Servers?

Alright, because you guys keep misinterpreting what I'm saying this is going to be my last post on these boards. It's not like it's accomplishing anything anyway. I even qouted your whole post, so hush.

1) I am not asking for anything to be changed, I'm just hoping for a new server sooner rather than later. Same rules as current set.

2) I know how easy it is to catch up. I did catch up. You're catching up to DoDH or PoR though, which is nowhere near the same as starting on a fresh server. You already missed out on raiding so many expansions.

3) I didn't say one server should be slower than the other. I said if they were at different eras they wouldn't be redundant. If they are going to merge Vulak it presents an opportunity to have two progression servers running very different eras.

4) I hope you're having fun on Vulak. I hope you continue having fun whether they merge or not. I didn't come here to in your cereal.

@Bigz I can't speak for everyone on this but I actually dislike quoting entire posts unless I mean to rebut all points made in that post. When I replied to you I only quoted the paragraph dealing with the need to merge Fippy Darkpaw and Vulak'Aerr; as that was only topic in your post that I was interested in repling to you about. I did leave that paragraph intact so that it would remain in context and with your entire post directly above mine there really is no need for me to post the entire thing again.

One of my pet peeves on forums like this is when someone quotes an entire multi-paragraph post to reply with a 2 sentence response.

Totally.

You were the lone voice in a sea of derp that wasn't just asking for a new prog server, but even expanding the time lock to "six months to a year" and that's who I was mocking.

I waited years for this round of prog servers to open because I regretted leaving the last one around this exact time in its progression. First the stupid 51/50 "server" came out when such a feature should have just been part of the regular game. And then finally the new prog was announced and I was crushed when I saw the new rules - it would take two friggin years to catch up to where I actually wanted to be. I suffered through the slow classic garbage that I'd already done before and finally quit out of mind numbing boredom, and now I've come back for what I consider to be the "good part" - the stuff I had never seen before. It took me a day to go 60-70, and in a month I've gotten 500aa and a mountain of loot. So hard to catch up omg!

But anyway, point was we had lots of warning when these things were released. I wasn't alone in anticipating their arrival and being prepared to jump on them at the start. I'm sorry you missed the boat.

Opening a server with the same ruleset at this stage of progression is sitll likely to cannibalize our potential recruits and undermine the current server population. That is why we oppose it.

What you are asking for has been mentioned many times in the last decade - even before the term 'instancing' was even a thing. It would also gut the primary thing that many (strange) people actually enjoy about classic eq - the competition. The whole attitude of "you only win if someone else is losing." Without that aspect, classic EQ is pretty trivial and dull for us experienced (jaded) gamers.

But what it really comes down to is developer time, and developer time means $$$$. Much like requesting that all of the many changes to the game get reverted for each expansion so that the game plays the way it originally did, this won't happen unless they think they can sell enough subs to offset the time spent.

One possibility is that such a server could have a premium subscription price (hard to fathom when MMOs are abandoning the sub model like the shinking ship it is) or at least a one time box price, similar to buying a new expansion. But even then it all seems unlikely. Even given the popularity of this round of prog servers and the (free) classic-EMUs, there just aren't enough people interested to justify the costs.

Assuming that the amount of people on an illegal server proves anything about an SOE server is silly. I've said it before and I'll say it here again a server that is free to play on will attract a lot of people that paid servers won't. It doesn't matter what is offered, look at Runescape.

Is there an interest in whatever version of Classic (no one can really agreee on what Classic is) that is discussed? Of course there is, but using that server to imply something is laughable at best.

That struck me as humorous. A Time Locked Expac Relase for 2 expansions.

I agree here...somewhat.
Instancing or forms of it takes a little bit away from some of the "classic" experience of every pixel being "connected" to the same world at all times. Giving that extra feeling of competition or achievement. Although I think those "strange" people you refer to can live with (or learn to live with) a form of this strategy for the good of a somewhat civil/peaceful server. Just as lots of peeps (me...) had to learn to live with no corpse runs (<---lame...but doable) and other pseudo-classic tweaks from the past progression rounds.

I consider myself to be a rather experienced (and jaded) gamer. But also didn't find classic too trivial or dull. I know most will definitely feel differently and with that being said, I support at least a Kunark release with future progressions.

I don't know. I think perhaps there is the interest. Even a big enough one that DOES justify the cost. But if I were a company trying to develop a new product, most of my resources are going to go into that "great new potential" risk/reward project. Even if my past ventures were/are successfully bringing in profit. Its hard for me to fathom that no matter how much of a demand for a constant stream of niche servers, that SOE would drop everything they got going on (new expansion releases, eq next, other game projects, bugs, testing, etc.) to pursue it.

I think as a company they understand that the current interest in progression servers will hardly ever completely dissipate so why not put it on the back burner for now until they have a "slow" development period? After all those years look how many people paid to try out (and stay) for Fippy and Vulak?

As much as I want a new round of progression, ( and I really really do want another round of whatever they can muster up) this is exactly what I would be thinking if I was part of the brain trust over at EQ headquarters. Why rush? They will be back... Progression servers and whatever future server similar to them are SOE's -ace in the hole- untapped revenue. And most of us are still young enough to always keep coming back when they need us.

I was actually going to come here and post some of the same stuff as you Malachi. I do feel strongly though after experiencing the progression that any new server should be released with Kunark included. It would be far easier to keep the peace once everyone gets into their 40s with Kunark and Classic content available. There was a huge uproar on Fippy about the lack of group xp content in Classic for people 40+.

While I do wish that a new progression server would be released soon, (especially seeing as how I just built a computer recently upgrading from my more than 10 year old machine) I don't expect it will be any time in the near future. I assume it would be a bit more cost effective than previous progression servers though, seeing as how they may have saved some of their work, and also due to what they've learned the last few go arounds.

people voted against corpse runs, its never been a real progression server.

If it's only a real progression server if everything is exactly as it was originally during each era, we will never have one of those.

I don't know, now that WoW said they are adding tri spec when they always said hell would freeze over first, I believe in anything!

The Macintosh server is as close as it gets to old world play circa-2002, though I suspect many would be surprised at how hard it was back then!

True. Fippy and Vulak started with revamped Freeport, combined Commonlands, nonfunctional ships (kept dumping the passengers, and had to substitute gnome teleporters for a while), and newbie armor quests.

One requirement for playing on a possible upcoming TLP server would be to make ppl have an active subscription for 6 months - 1 year? Would this be possible? I know I would be willing to do this if thats what it took to play on a new server. Any thoughts? This might keep a few more active ppl on the server a little longer.

I can't think of why any successful business would ever want to have a policy like this. Really, people are coming to Sony with their credit cards out to buy a sub to the new server when it launches, and you want Sony to not take their money and send them away empty handed? What reason would they possibly have to do this?

You obviously missed the whole post. Make them sub for 6months - 1 year in order to play on the server. Not make them already have been a subscriber for 6 months - 1 year before they can play. Come on man get real.

I'd pay for a year's worth if it was a new progression server and set to significant slower progression or locked to something. I think they could put some work into the ruleset as well.

I would as well! I had the most fun during the Velious to Planes of Power stretch. The rest is okay, but post-PoP you might as well just roll up on Vox or another standard server.

Oberson and Tachyon,

I'm with you both on this one. Id go in a full year of a sub(taken out monthly) to play a new progression server. A slowed down version of the server would be a plus, but id prolly still sub in its current state.