EQ2 Basic Edition: Djinn Illusion (10% XP buff) + 110 Heroic Character.

Just a PSA for those who don't follow EQ2. I think EQ2's basic expansion - especially with pre-order - is the better deal this year. You get a Djinn illusion (major stat buff) for pre-order and a Level 110 Heroic Character for purchasing the base tier. Also, previously, you needed to purchase their Mercenary Feature separately (1500 DBC) but Mercs are now unlocked with a current expansion purchase. EQ2's expansion launches on November 13 so I would take advantage of the pre-orders now.

EQ1 is still the best but a 110 Heroic Character on EQ2 is very nice to have.

On a side note, the devs were able to add Battle Cats and Brother Island Teleport later to The Darkened Sea Collector's Edition. Maybe, the devs would be able to Djinn illusion to EQ1 Basic edition? (The illusion would almost tempt people to upgrade to the Collector's Edition for the matching merc contract).

Heroic characters come up often.

While I don't know the effort that is involved in creating heroic characters for EQ2, but for EQ1 we estimate that a new level of heroic characters would mean one less zone in an expansion, and we don't believe we can afford that. For EQ1, heroic characters are a monumental undertaking. The basics are, our game is in no way designed for the heroic character feature.

While it might be possible to add our existing level 85 heroics, we also get the idea that people are no longer interested in that heroic character.

I have no comment on the illusion other than, for us, the Jann model is a memory problem that we solved by making a much more restricted version of the model for the mercenary, so the illusion would not be "unique" (it would look like the mercenary) and we feel that enchanters should get priority on an illusion like that over "everyone."

I won't otherwise comment over the Oranges to Tangerines comparisons between EQ1 and EQ2

I'll comment. EQ1 is good. EQ2 is bad.

But EQ2 pretty in videos .

EQ2 plays like WoW at lvl 1-2, had me fleeig the game fast.

i watched the eq2 stream and was like holy crap they are getting a lot of way cool things, they have the snail too, if you can take the snail model from eq2 why not take others too ?

We are getting their jann. (this is a bit of a misnomer... the jann and the snail was made for BOTH games) But see above for explanation about issues using the jann.

Why not just keep the same existing lvl 85 Heroic toons, and then give them a one-time clicky level boost to 110 (max level, just like EQ2) and give them all a full set of Conflagrant for their class? Done and done, problem solved, super easy. I'd buy it.

I don't think you would need to change anything else at all: no new items, no new nothing. Just add two lines to the existing marketing pages for the level boost and Conflagrant gear.

EDIT: Heck, you could even just sell the level boost and set of Conflagrant gear right in the Marketplace. It's essentially the same thing as a Heroic toon.

Ahh people would cry if the heroic did level 110, but they could sell a cookie that levels you to 100 and grants you enough cotf currency to let you buy a full suit of cotf armor, auto grant would do the aas

Are people crying in EQ2? Max level means that a) The Heroic toon is doing its job: to let people play with their friends instead of toiling alone for a month and quitting, and b) makes lots of money for DBG.

Removed by me

He just said why. It would cost a zone in a new expansion. I don't think it matters whether it is a boost or a new heroic. I think the work is in making an insta level 110 toon. I could be wrong but I think that is the point.

I don't think so: if you look at the existing 85 Heroics, they did a lot of dev work to create brand new, heroic-specific gear, quests, NPCs, mounts, AA grants, etc. A simple level boost and a set of pre-existing gear shouldn't take much resources at all.

In comparison to adding higher level heroics how much work did adding the luck stat take?

You might be right but I would have thought it would be obvious they could simply add a basic geared 110 and have people buy it. But you might be right I didn't think of it that way.

Remember the heroic characters have sample hot buttons, all spells, spell sets, special no trade versions of items, updated skill caps. At least a few of those may be hard to automate. There are tons of abilities now, it would be difficult to make a lvl 105 or 110 series of hot buttons for all classes.

Which is why I'm suggesting to skip all that, and just provide a level boost and existing gear set.

exactly I be most interested in getting the level and gear. people can figure out the aa's and such on themselves and there is no need to make special quests and stuff for the new heroic chars. 110 with conflagrant gear or if level 100 toons make cotf stat wise. would be good just make it all no trade. I sell a lot of conflagrant gear and have np with this. theres a chance for them to make a lot of money on this so it probably wont happen. not sure why eq2 gets all the cool stuff and we get water down stuff. even the prem edition should have a free heroic char or something.

Andarriel

You don't need content for the heroics there is plenty of that. How much work is it really to boost them to 105 with EOK or TBM equivalent gear ?

Then everyone will be upset that the "110 boost" won't have everything the 85 heroic does... The developers aren't going to go halfway on a feature like that because they'd probably have to price it in the $35-$60 range to stay consistent with other MarketPlace offerings. If they could do it well and cost effectively they would to make the money.

I don't think making that boost is worth giving up another expansion zone. You have to remember that we're a niche game, relatively low player base with a minority of those players probably accounting for the bulk of the revenue, that's how most F2P games' monitization plays out. Generally, content and additional features sells more than ways to bypass content.

I think we should be thankful the Devs managed to get us what they could in the past couple expansions, especially when you consider how old the EQ game engine is! I personally think the Jann & snail models exceeded my expectations.