Constructive Conversation About Vaniki Server

Based on what? The server description implied lower spell resists. Spell casting foci will be in game from the start including mage summoned foci. If you are comparing to melee damage, maybe but only after the melee get their high level weapons.

Regarding AA's I've noticed on other servers that not all AAs are auto-granted, so once the cap is moved to 51+, players will be able to farm AAs for those choices. The apparent schedule for auto-grant will though remove the grind of many AAs.

I'm pleased with this server as is. We were all spoiled with Mischief loot, but we don't have to have it here.

Remember that casters will never have their "in era" spells in era. For example, in Omens, the level cap is 60, so wizards will be nuking for 2k (as compared to roughly 4k for in era omens spells). That's just one example.

The ratios may improve in later expansions somewhat, but this effectively adds spell mitigation to every nuke or dot that a caster casts on the server, not just on raid mobs. Pets will similarly be weaker, being two ranks lower than the era appropriate pets.

There will effectively be no mez or charm for current content. What's the current formula for how things like Fading Memories works? Will that be a reliable pulling tool for current content or will the level gap be enough that even group mobs will ignore it?

Is this the kind of challenge people are looking for on Vaniki? It seems like some of these points were not that well though out when coming up with the server's design, even though they will be reducing resist rate to help with the ability to land spells without a max level effect on higher level mobs.

So here's my constructive criticism:

On it's face, it appears like this server was meant to be a challenge server to get players to attempt to do raid bosses at a lower level. I just don't see a reason, outside of a few select items, why anyone would raid at all on this server.

Let's say you're 60, you have two options for gearing. You can raid Vex Thal, tier 3 PoP, tier 1 GoD or you can gear through group missions from DoN/DoDH/PoR. The latter is significantly better and will almost always be better through the entirety of the server.

The correct gearing path for this server is tutorial -> ldon gear -> group mission gear from current expansion. Why raid at all?

And then when your guild is geared in all that nice group gear what can you do? Start trying the raids. That's the challenge. I think it'll be fun and interesting. Lots of options for everyone and many paths to take. It's kinda like an open world rpg vs standard ruleset tlp being rails rpg where we follow virtually the same path every single tlp. Also, getting that group gear is going to be pretty challenging too.

You're never going to be able to raid in era. Being 10 levels behind and missing a ton of AAs, it's just not possible.

Which means you're always going to be raiding multiple expansions behind the current one which means the gear is going to be useless. It's like raiding Sky during Luclin, literally no one wants to do that.

Actually there are still several good clickies in sky that are relevant at any level but I get your point. I don't really agree though. PoT raid gear is still better than DoN group gear iirc but I'm no gear:expansion expert. Any knowledge transfer would be helpful.

I wouldnt say the gear is useless. You need a base to get started obviously. Classic trilogy is fairly useless on this server and I for one will avoid most of that raid content. There are far better routes to take that dont require raiding and far better raids once you have a decent tank and mana pool on healers. The initial gap is short though? After we hit 60 MoTM will fall off most content your used to fighting in those levels ranges.

At 55 the ball will be rolling. Those early expansions will fold up easy once we have some defensive tanks to lead the charge. You will be surprised what is possible with MoTM buff removed, a defensive tank, and spells that land. Most of current TLP raiding is way to easy. Hopefully this will be an enjoyable challenge.

I dont think anyone looks at this server like its top xpac open is "in era" at least not at the beginning. Once we reach later expansions it brings the gap a little closer, but at first its going to be pretty large spread. Ill consider my level the era and anything i kill above that is testament of hardwork and might!

A million times this. Realistically, I think doing everything 10 levels below a cap is a little much. Something like 55 on launch, then going to 60, and then going to 65 upon PoR launch would be perfect and a lot more palatable.

What a lot of people are missing is that LDoN dungeon gear that you buy with points are going to vastly outclass the majority of the early raids. Go check out the gear if you want proof. Who is gonna want to spend the time doing Classic/Kunark raids when LDoN gear is achievable with a single group and is so much better. Farming LDoN dungeons will be the meta for sure. (I am aware some of this really good gear requires you to run tons of hard difficulty LDoN dungeons, but even the non hard dungeon loot is still miles ahead of most trilogy expansion loot)

Level 40 level cap for a month sounds absolutely horrifically boring. Your options are extremely limited on what is worth doing.

Take a look at the AA's and check the available level ranges, from what I quickly researched:
- Level 51 (6 weeks from launch) you get access to some of the weaker "Innate" type AA's
- Level 55 (6 Weeks from launch) being the earliest with only giving a couple levels of Combat Agility and Stability
- Level 59 (10 Weeks from launch) Some moderately useful AA's
-Level 65 (18 weeks from launch) Level 61-65 has some very nice class defining AA's

18 Weeks is a very long time to have to wait till certain classes like Beastlord/Berserker/Ranger are deemed "Good". I can only imagine how painfully bad a level 40 of those classes will be.

Almost all 70 content will be rolled at 65. It's massively undertuned.

Why not just release a new standard server then? If there's no meaning behind where the server is actually locked, and you're just playing to you/your guild's ability, why have the expansion locks at all?

Tutorial is not open with GoD. It takes 96 Hard LDoN missions at Level 40 to get an Anger III aug. Group mission gear from GoD is pretty limited, there are various quests in the T1 zones that can be completed at Level 40 assuming they lower the level you can get the quest.

So none of those steps are on the 'correct' gearing path. The reasons to raid other than whatever you think is fun while playing a video game are the achievements for doing specific raids at specific level caps and farming the ones that drop the best gear or best time vs reward gear. Focuses, weapon ratio and AC on especially non-vis and raids from half a dozen expansions earlier can drop gear better than the latest group content.

Yah but you're not going to get into Time at 60. The Rathe council hits for over 3k on a well-geared 65 tank, there's no 60 tank that can stand up to that output and there's 12 of them. That's assuming people even make it to the Elemental planes, Marr is gonna literally one shot everyone he touches.

And if you're talking 65, TSS and BS will be open and the gear there is significantly better and much, much easier to acquire since mercs would be available.

I hope I'm wrong and it's everything you guys want it to be but having a done a bunch of these TLPs, getting people to show up to raids where there are no upgrades available is like pulling teeth from a pitbull.

What else are you going to do at 40 besides LDoN? You're not killing anything in Kunark+ without defensive. You could zerg Kael arena but that gear is nowhere near as good as LDoN gear.

Can start out with Droga and Nurga (if they the harder revamped versions), Veksar, Akheva, Greigs. That would be some ragtag lvl 40's but I wonder if 70 of them could kill Riwwi nameds theres like 10 and thats pretty decent gear. I hope LDoN exp doesnt suck like it does in DZ's

I said something about this in another thread. The tutorial should be unlocked at GoD. The fact that it's not on Mischief/Thornblade is a bug. The fact that players aren't reporting it as a bug is interesting.

only thing i hope they consider is some kind of bonus loot, with the much faster pace of this server

besides that just ship it as described and tweak later if necessary

the problem is they NEVER tweak stuff AFTER it ships.

The time to make suggestions and changes is now. Bonus loot is a fantastic idea due to sheer pace of this server. It's absurdly fast, and there will be no chance to gear up any kind of a force without reduced lockouts, double loot, something.

And I just don't see how a MONTH at level 40, which is below even the classic level cap, with no AAs to grind, is going to be compelling gameplay even if you're pushing the envelope. Initial cap at 55 or 50 would be far more appealing and still lots of unique gameplay chocies.

They do tweak after ship sometimes and many times on Mischief for example. I would guess Vaniki will also be tweaked post launch.
I actually think a month at 40 is fine. Gives time to try to complete the reward challenges mentioned in the release notes.

this server will be 100% dominated by melee, scaling better with gear