Every year or so I come back only to be hit with a massive slow down at around 87-90. Every your I'll make a post asking the community if the game has maybe gotten easier for molo'ers to reach end game or at the least start of latest expac level. There's no way eq2 compares to eq1 but in eq2 I am able to create a toon, have fun leveling to the latest expac and then be hit with put on your big boy pants content. So... how is Eq1 leveling with this latest expac ps: I usually end up choosing a char in eq1 hoping he's OP enough to push through that wall but sadly it seldom works out. Thank you
I'm not a hardcore player in either game, but I have hopped back and forth a bit over the years. My feeling is that both games have walls, but they appear in different spots. In eq2, getting to max level is a pretty small effort. The wall comes with acquiring all the alternate currency needed to gear up after hitting max level. I also hit a wall in eq2 with a pretty strong requirement for doing group content to get gear upgrades. You can molo for a certain amount of gear upgrades each expansion, but the next tier requires a group (for me at least). In eq1, it's a pretty long slog to get to max level. I know experienced players can do it quickly, but that usually involves having high level boxed characters, or making friends who have powerful characters. And it sounds like you want to actually play the characters instead of getting power-leveled. So leveling is part of the wall in eq1. Then there's the aa wall, which doesn't exist in eq2. Then there's the gear upgrade wall, which is probably about the same as in eq2. To answer your question (just re-read your post...), I'm finding it's not too bad to get to level 70ish, but it still slows down. Nothing in the new expansion changes the leveling experience before level 105. However, if you can get to level 106, there is really nice tradeskill gear you can buy that is between tier 1 and tier 2 group gear of the latest expansion. That is a new thing, and somewhat removes the gear grind. It does require a lot of plat though...
Thank you Odenor, guess I'll revisit my toons, chose one and hunker down in one zone for months to come =)
If you are coming back after a long break, your characters are likely not lvl 105 and properly geared. Ringo of Scale is a 105+ expansion. In all honestly you will not likely be able to effective "Molo" in the actual expansion and make meaningful progress. Now some people will post that you can ... sure you can kill a random mob here and there, but if your going to actually PLAY the game, you will need to either play previous lvl 100-105 content to gear and properly AA to molo. With all that said, you can group in RoS easily if you can find a group willing to take you and work with you and help you get back to "Fighting" strength. EQ1 and EQ2 are significantly different animals with is comes to the Solo/Small group content. In EQ2 you can easily play eh entire game from start to finish and never group with anyone at all except your mercenary and still make meaningful and satisfying progress outside of raiding. EQ1 that gets harder and harder with every level you ding. The difficulty of the solo game ramps up very quickly when you move into the 90+ content. Its just not built as a solo friendly game, even though over the years they have added tools and systems to make soloing easier since the industry is trending more towards solo and small group content.
Play a beastlord with pet tank and a healer merc. If you really want to play and nothing is going to stop you. Learn how to box. One more free toon with one more merc is game changing
Boxing probably is the answer, unless you happen to have the very rare (mythical?) regular group to play with. And sticking with one toon (per account). Join an active guild quick!
You can play one toon and go from 0-110 with no problems. the best classes to do this with is: Nerco: is the best solo class in the game and is very low dependent on gear. Shadowknight : is also a great solo class but more gear required then the nerco. so progress will be slow as you gear up. Enchanter: is one of the hardest classes to master but if you can is a great solo class. Next you have your "pet classes" (These give you much freedom in being able to get stuff done.) Bst is like the SK will be more gear depend because your getting in melee range Mage is a caster and so will be like the nerco letting you stand back kill so gear is not need as much to keep moving forward. Now When I say gear is not need I don't mean you can do it naked. All class need gear and better gear = more content you can do. We i say a class is less dependent on gear I mean they don't need to farm gear but can take it as it come. Where melee classes tend to need more at each level to stay alive. After pet class come your CC classes they can solo but use tricks to make it work. These tricks can be Root Rot, Kite, Fear kite, etc. or they use gear drop / spells to help them pull it off. Self healing, Stun , DA etc. These class tend to solo when they can't get a group and can pull it off but imo take learning the class well to pull off. Druid, Shamy , Ranger, bard cleric. ( yes I said cleric: a cleric can solo and depending on the exp was great at mass killing (pull 20 mobs with reverse damage shield then DA and watch them die) The problem with these classes is the tricks they use get harder the high level you get. Most become more resistant, or even immune. But this is 70+ and by that time I hope you made 1-2 friend that you can play with. The next option is using merc. the tank merc can molo with any class from 1-70 with out question you then should have learned to play your class. after 70 with a merc some classes can reach 110 other will struggle. once you have your class next come questing. starting out most quest are do able solo or with a merc. But questing is not all EQ offers. at around 40 you will find missions these are often doable solo or with a merc as long as they don't have a required # of players. some will require 3+ or 6+ based on if it group or raid intended. those mission you will need to find some one to group with to do. Once you get with in 10 levels of the cap the game is still solo able but requires more effort to do so and group mission start to become Group Required.
I got to 105 on a few characters about 1 or 2 years ago, but I was playing in very old content. The mercs just do not scale well enough to be able to rely on them in anything close to "new". Remember just because you can solo to 110 doesn't mean you will be doing anything remotely close to "new". The game is fun. I wouldn't come back to grind out 5 more levels on old content, and I don't have faith that there are enough people to play with. But, if you have never done it, then why not do it? It was a great experience.
Beastlords used to be gear-dependent if they wanted to solo efficiently. However, now that their pets (technically "warders") can tank for them, gear is not as important as it used to be. You just need to have a decent "pet focus" item, which will make your summoned pet tougher. Other than that, good weapons will help kill monsters faster. Anything on top of that will improve your DPS, but won't have a drastic effect on your ability to solo. Better gear will also make your character tougher, so you will be able to take occasional hits better, but it's not nearly as important as it used to be.
You sound very experienced, and above advice is really good. My take on “the wall” is that it was part of what made it fun to come back about 3 years ago; having to re-think setup, spells, tactics every time we levelled up was real fun to me. It also go me into boxing, which is just so much fun to me. The important thing is not to grind the same spot and same zones, but to plan for variation, I think. It can take you a long time to get through the wall the first time, and doing the same thing over and over can easily burn you out. Also, make sure not to do AA until you hit 105, use and rely on autogrant. I would support above advice that suggests going for a non-gear reliant class. Having mained a mage since 2000 I am biased, but mage, necro, bst, sounds like solid options. I have a soft spot for the enchanter, but it takes more to molo one, I think.
My experience has been similar. Typically, when I get a character to 60ish, I create a lit of things I want to get for it: gear, augments, faction, spells and so on. For the most part I try to choose level-appropriate goals that would remain relevant for a long time. For example, the Dodge augment from the Everfrost LDON is a good item to get in your 60s and 70s. LDON is still decent XP at that level and the augment will last you a long time. If you wait too long, LDON will green out and will no longer be fun. (Note that this requires having a group or a second account because you need 3 characters, including mercs, to start an LDON adventure.)
Unfortunately, this is very true. Yesterday I heroic-ed a toon, set up my box for max xp to that toon (only 2 dps in group with new toon, rest solo with merc so that new toon splits xp as little as possible), and popped Lesson, and after that the /claim xp potions, and I got the toon to lvl 90. It does not mean that this is the right thing to do, though. The sense of accomplishment vanishes with this approach.
Can you do it? Yes. Will it be fun? That depends on you. First of all, on Live, you will likely be dependent on farming money and trade skills, and either buying equipment from other players or making them with trade skills. Both are certainly capable of taking you all the way to the end game, especially on Firiona Vie where you can literally buy raid equipment, though you might end up paying actual dollars for it. Second, why it might not be fun, is because you will spend a lot of time farming lower level zones. It will not feel particularly challenging, but more like a waste of time. Most people will come to ask, during the process, why are they doing this when they could be doing much more rewarding work with their time in life? Like you could be learning how to cook, advancing your career, making money off of day trading, etc. But there are people who enjoy it. You might be one of them. You will know when you reach level 70 or so and begin the long climb to 110. Third, in terms of classes, almost all classes can get to 110 by themselves. However, certain classes are to be avoided in such a journey: Rogue: because this class cannot do much by itself. At best you will be able to farm light blue monsters, at worst you will get stuck because you cannot tank and you cannot use a mercenary tank because they suck and also you cannot heal. Warrior: because this class sucks until 85 or so, and killing monsters at lower levels is like watching the grass grow. The main problem isn't that Warriors cannot advance, but that they kill way too slow to be fun. You might eventually get there but by then you will have wasted your life. Cleric: because this class, even though it can technically advance at an okay speed, is dependent on farming light blue monsters by itself. Yes, there are ways to kill zombies and such at higher speed and maybe you can heal yourself and stun a monster while a mercenary wizard does damage, but it is dependent on having nice equipment and that once again gets you back to more light blue farming. Berserker: similar problem to the Rogue but slightly better because you can tank better. Still limited to light blue monsters more or less. Bard: because it is boring to run in circles and you will be wasting most of the value of the class by going at it alone. Outside of the above five classes, I would say every other class can be enjoyable on the way to 110. They all have their special skills and knowledge that you can only learn from playing the class for a while. For rangers and monks, you will start with a mercenary tank, and end with a mercenary cleric. For druids and shamans, you will start and end with a mercenary tank, though you might stop using it around level 90 or so. For mages, necromancers, wizards, enchanters, shadow knights, paladins, and beast, you will start with mercenary tank and eventually either go for a mercenary cleric or mercenary wizard, depending on use case. In the end, the best class to play, is the one that you enjoy. Class balance changes too often these days for it to be any different.
