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

Im not saying this to be bitter but since Daybreak took over EQ it just seems to be about getting as much money as they can out of us for as little effort as possible. I still love the game but gone are the days of getting any cool items for purchasing the basic expansion. You either shell out more or you get nothing at all. Gone are the days of offering goodies to get people to return to the game. If they do offer anything now as in log in for free item or a market place sale you have to have an active sub to take advantage of it. As i said im not bitter, i know its all about making cash but i miss those days when they actually appreciated the whole player base. I dont play EQ2 but I applaud their staff for their attempt to get people interested in their expansion by going back to the old EQ1 sales tactics.

I'm not saying you are right or wrong, but I just want to point out that none of this is necessarily the fault of the game designers, developers, artists, community team, customer support, etc. They can only do what they are told they can do and what they are given the resources to attempt.

I just want to add that this is a BUSINESS, if they don't make money the Devs lose their jobs and we lose our game. Honestly, I think we get way more bang for our buck compared to other F2P games. My girlfriend spent over two grand on the Candy Crush family of games last year, and has way less to show for it compared to what we spent on EQ which wasn't even a grand. Also we can get good stuff WITHOUT LOOT CRATES, sure we have them but there's comparable/better stuff you can get by either buying upfront or raiding.

Seriously, we have it good!

You can't compare EQ to EQ2. Other than EQ2 is a newer game, the Dev team for EQ2 is much better at trying to please their customer base than the EQ Dev team is. I know both the Dev teams have their challenge's but the EQ2 Dev team will at least listen to their players and have more interaction with them. Plus, when the Dev team for EQ2 says that they will do something as in spell changes for all the classes they will at least say why they couldn't finish it as in the Necro DOT changes. As for the '25 Expansion" for EQ it is very lack luster as in the amount of content, it is nothing I would want to be proud of if I were the EQ Producer. If the Snail is the main item than I would hang my head in shame and hide from my customer's.

Are they different teams? I was under the impression EQ/EQ II were pretty much pooled resources, but I've never paid much attention?

From what I understand they both work on each others games but the top people on each team are different people so they steer their teams in a different direction. The EQ DEV team doesn't even compare to past Dev teams for EQ. I am only talking about the leadership and that is where the general direction of the game comes from. Hence the word "Leadership". They may discuss with each other the direction of the game, but it still comes from the top. To me the EQ2 Dev team is far better at keeping their customer base happy without hurting the game. Our Dev team doesn't seem to know how to do that.

What about using the beta buff character templates/system?
I am sure such an idea would probably fall more towards your marketing/sales folks, but has there ever been any kind of consideration to offering preorders for features requested by the player base contingent on a preorder threshold being met before the feature would be added? Might be a good way to gauge cost resource allocation vs profit.

The EQ2 team has a Discord server, and when you say anything they don't agree with in any way, they kick/ban you from it. So... yeah. It's not quite the happy go lucky environment you speak of.

For the record, every MMORPG forum I have ever read has the same negativity towards the DEVs as on these forums. The details of what the customers complain about is obviously different to fit the game, but the same customer versus developer negativity is there.

You could literally take snippets of threads from various MMO forums, and play a game of "Guess which MMO this thread was posted on". I guarantee you I could go to the WoW and EQ2 forums right now, and find threads created in the past month that I could cut and paste on these forums, and you would think it was about this game.

Would it be possible to do something like 85heroic toon with vitality pool to 100 or 105 so that the path to end game would be faster. I feel like this would enhance the experience for those new people to enjoy playing with us. It really hard to get new players because once they see the current content its a huge mountain to climb to even be able to be useful in Eok or RoS zones.

They kind of already have what you're talking about in the form of EXP potions, but I guess re-updating the EXP tables could work too, I wonder how often they do that?

I wonder if they could even replace those potions with a modest EXP boost cllcky that only works in the recent purchase expansions and disappears when they announce the next expansion? I could see people not waiting until the October sales to buy the collector's editions if they did that.

I think an easy way could be to make autogrant catch up 1 expansion. So when TBL comes out, and people are level 105, then it would autogrant tds and tbm, instead of just tds if people have bought tbl.

Dont think this would require big code changes.


People still have to gets spells/equipment the normal way.

I was thinking the same thing when he said a new Heroic character would take a lot of work, just take the betabuff command and use that along with /spells and let people pick what level HC they want to make.

The 85 HC is not so popular now because it is so low level and poorly geared compared to the current game, anyone with a couple of level 110 friends can easily level up a new character to 85 in just a couple days, and outfit it with superior gear than what is offered by the HC claim.

New heroic char: Level 105 char, AAs up to TBM, 50k remnants of tranquility and into the temple B done. Its all you really need!

I, for one, welcome our new snail overlords.

Absor, I do thank you for setting the record straight. So the EQ2 team does not help your team with the new expansion? I always thought they did because your team is short handed. As for this expansion I think even you would say that this expansion being the 25th expansion for Ever Quest is very lack luster. The way I read the Producers letter the 25th expansion was something that was going to be very special. Six zone's are not special, and if the Snail is the special item for our 25th Expansion than I am not the only one who will be very disappointed. I just think that the Dev team could made our 25th Expansion one to remember, but I guess not. The Team seems to do less and less every year for our expansion's, and that includes helping all play styles. Also, it would go a long way if someone would give an update to what is happing with the Necro spell revamp.

Ozlaar

I just want to state that the purpose of my thread is direct some attention to EQ2's package that will allow players who want a break from EQ1 an opportunity to roll a 110 Heroic Character and Mercs (with at least some money staying in the Daybreak family) or people who want a way to fulfill their "Jann" illusion craving.

It looks like I opened up a can of worms in someways. There is a lot of healthy feedback which I appreciate. I am grateful for the devs' responses to set the record/reality straight.

Would it be possible to use the vanilla EQ Efreeti model - Noble Dojorn - for an item illusion? (I know you may be referring to that model when you speak of the 30 iterations. And, I don't know the intricacies of crafting an illusion so I beg your pardon for my ignorance here).

We don't even agree on what we don't like.


There have been some development whiffs over the years, sure. There are longstanding decisions and "original vision" things that are dumb (to some at least) too. I'd make a list but then people would post that I'm wrong and item #3 is one of the best things about EQ and item #17 should be doubled in effectiveness rather than removed.

Credit to the dev team for making this warty thing last 20 years and still be fun. It takes more than luck to accomplish that.

Obviously you have actual data on your end to show heroic character purchases and such to support these claims but I don't think I am the only one who appreciates what heroic characters do for veteran players who like to box and can level a character up without the struggles a new/returning player has to endure using a heroic character. I have even made toons that were max level heroic just so I did not have to spend countless hours maxing out time sinks such as swimming and AT. They might not be as useful as they were when initially created and their current use might be slightly different than what they were created for but they are still welcome by many. Worse case scenario by adding them to the premium expansion purchase some people will have them in claims while others might see the added value of purchasing them. I do agree that a revamp at the cost of a new zone is probably not worth it but I also hope there are plans to address the issue of new/returning players struggling to get caught up to current end game before quitting out of frustration. This game needs these players to stick around to make up for the natural departure of players off the top. At any rate keep up the good work for what often times seems like a thankless job reading these forums. I think a lot of us are appreciative of you guys even if it does not always reflect that on the forums.

I agree with not putting much work into it, but I would like to see it upgraded.

I think a solid workaround would be to reuse /betabuff code to let you /herobuff to up to 100 or 105. Then have a "Hero Fish" or "Hero Snail" to click for a vendor for maybe level 2,3 or 4 expansion old group gear, then put in a clickable item that ran the /spells script.

Yes, that would still be work, but I think that route could be done in maybe a few days costing us a small quest maybe and not a whole zone.