So I'm an EQ veteran from way back, and have been back to the game, quit the game, back to the game, etc, multitudes of times because of one reason or another. I'm on Erollisi Marr - The Nameless, just FYI. What's been driving me from the game the past few years when I unsub has been two things...1) No offline Auction House system (seriously, WTF has taken so long?), and 2) No one groups anymore. So, to address #1 first, RoF is going to solve that - which is actually why I re-subbed recently because I was excited about this. But holy sh*t it's about impossible to find a group to XP with, or even to work on VoA progression tasks with...That counts for both strangers AND guildmates. Since I've resubbed I've left and joined a few guilds who always have the same tagline: "Blah Blah Blah guild is recruiting players who are looking to group and progress towards raiding, blah blah...". So I fall for it, join the guild, and attempt to get a group going within the first few hours of being in the guild (at peak times, 20-30 people on in guild), and all I hear is crickets. Seriously, I'm currently in a guild (name withheld) that is fairly sizable (900+ members), and most of the time, no matter what time of day I play, there are about 15-20 people online at a minimum. So, what's the point of a guild if I feel as though I'm just talking in /general chat all the time. Of course there are the "cliques" as expected, of people who will *only* keep to themselves with the exclusion of all others - that I expect. But for the others, what's the point of being in a guild if you don't want to work together? I even took on a 'philanthropic' approach recently just to try and re-engage the community...I basically offered up myself and my time (free of charge) to those working on epics, progression quest lines, or other various needs - I figured, you know what, if I can't find a group to help me with what "I need", then I'll just take a step back and help others, then see where things go. At first I got a few tells from people, and I immediately responded, helped them, and they were very grateful and I felt good helping them. But then I seriously went several days in game offering help (at various hours), and not a single person requested assistance. I think that right there proves my next point about the "molo" aspect of the game now. The game has become nothing but a "molo"-driven society. Mercs have essentially become the 'safety blanket' for all players - and you know what, I can't live without mine either, but once I pop that merc, I still have several other group spots available to fill. I don't expect any response on this, it's just a rant for the sake of getting this off my chest. I predict that after RoF launches, there'll be the normal 'honeymoon' period for a lot of people (including myself), but things will quickly return to 'the way it used to be'. I'm sure I'll stay Gold for the next 30 days or so through the RoF expansion, but expect to unsub at that point.
I hear this complaint in general sometimes too, but usually it is from trolls, or people that want to leach and get something for nothing. I play multiple classes throughout multiple levels and I can honestly say I NEVER lack for a group. Usually I have to decline people and there is a waiting list =( Not saying you are either of those things just maybe keep trying, make some friends or attempt to make specific groups. Offer people a plan and seems to work better than Class etc lfg, pst. . . maybe be like Class - lvl - AA - headed to whatever need this and that pst leaving in 5. . . show some leadership and people will come. From what I found, there are usually WAY more followers than leaders, take initiative and maybe will have better luck that way. Just an idea to try to help, you might be doing all those things and be in a diff world than me but I play on FV and I would be hardpressed to believe your pop is less than mine. Best of luck to ya !
Guilds today deal with many diffferent factors then guilds of several years ago when it comes to grouping. The biggest three are the prevalence of botting, mercs and much lower server populations. Even if a guild wanted to be a GROUPING guild the numbers of players out there make it unreasonable to exclude botters or people that use mercs from a guild. And personally, I would see no reason to do so. I think a guild should be able to handle all those play styles and in todays game NEEDS to if it hopes to have a reasonable playerbase. What that means though is that the numbers of players in a guild needed for good grouping prospects rises dramatically. "So I fall for it, join the guild, and attempt to get a group going within the first few hours of being in the guild (at peak times, 20-30 people on in guild), and all I hear is crickets." This really doesn't seem to be a winning strategy. Joining a guild and instantly expecting groups to be available is pretty unrealistic. One of the major reasons for guilds outside of raiding is so that people have a smaller subset of the server population as a whole to get to know better and bond with. Neither is going to happen in the first few hours of joining a guild. Having run a guild for almost as long as EQ has been around I can tell you that in todays EQ 15-20 players online at a time is not enough to guarantee or give a good chance for someone to consantly be able to get groups. Taking into account, mercs, bots, bazaar toons, guildhall sitters etc, you need to see 40+ online to get a good chance at groups being available often AND as a previous poster said you need to take a leadership role to do it. Most players want someone else to form a group so they can join it. Whether its zone chatter or guild chatter I have many times seen two to four people of similar levels ask for groups and yet no one starts one. A couple of my officers are group starter types not because it is an officer duty but just because they are that type of person. I rarely ever see them without a group when they want one. "I even took on a 'philanthropic' approach recently just to try and re-engage the community...I basically offered up myself and my time (free of charge) to those working on epics, progression quest lines, or other various needs - I figured, you know what, if I can't find a group to help me with what "I need", then I'll just take a step back and help others, then see where things go" This is pretty much never a winning strategy unless being "philanthropic" is just part of your nature. If you just like helping people then it always pays off no matter what the results. If you do it as an investment then inevetiably it will have negative results; in my opinion at least. Plus the people out there creating the groups you want to join aren't usually the ones looking for someone to help them. And we also come back to the "leadership role" situation. Usually there are not enough players taking such a role in creating groups.
Ok im gonna attempt to be helpfull but you seriously need to abide by the basic forum rules such as no masking curse words and no ranting, if your entering this with a negative attitude it wont go well. It sort of souns like your joining starter guilds that just accpt any one, if this is the case I recomend you find a decent size/active guild which has an application process this seems to be the best way to find a home. I myself played on that server for 5 years and still have a few friends there so I know its not dead, if your approaching them in the manner you approached this thread that wont get you far, Game experiances may vary as it says on the old boxes and the web site. Again finding the right guildis key with active officers that start groups nightly. I didnt see what level and class are you? just asking wondering if maybe hats a factor to. Have you cheked out the guild section on the boards? http://forums.station.sony.com/eq/index.php?forums/guild-recruitment.25/ If your possitive you might just find more people are willing to help you and please dont rant on the boards thanks.
group game is alive and well. i would suggest joining a guild, making friends and forming a fellowship with friends made.. i dont raid cannot with time conflicts..but my fellowship peep's do..and we always do stuff together during off raid times for them..what class do ya play? im on emarr as well and there are several guilds on the server that might suit your playstyle
The honeymoon has been over for ages at least with the veteran players and this is the veteran's section. Players today go for what is going to realistically achieve their goals in game with the most efficiency. PUGs are a gamble in that respect and so are unproven guild mates. Mercs and boxes or cliques are far less of a risk in the time wasting department. Especially with players in raid guilds who want to get in and out of the group content required to succeed in raids as quickly as humanly possible. With guilds at least the newer people will be thoroughly vetted, put on probation and set up with a sponsor whom you as the applicant deal with directly as opposed to harassing other guild members whom you have not earned their trust or respect. The sponsor at least should be able to speak on your behalf if they have any pull in the guild or can at least relay what it is you need to do in order to make yourself more successful. Just like any other respectable human organization. Eventually they will come around as long as you are patient and keep up your end. It might get better for grouping as returnees and new FTP players going gold bring in some new blood who want to either experience the whole innocent period of group play again or for the first time.
I agree! I six box on test now, once six box'd on live servers and paid for years on those six accounts. I too started boxing because of long wait times, "looking for groups". Started with a single boxed cleric, grew to a full boxed group, self reliant and full of whoop . I've tried to come back and do the single toon. It never works for me. After the first day of looking for help or group, without response, I go else where. The been there done that mentality sets in and I soon become the self reliant group, I wish I had. But lets be honest. The group of 5 other players I remember from long ago, that took years to form, are but a memory and everquest is far beyond a group game anymore. BTW. If you want to test copy and try and do the group thing I am game. Name hateboxx, inrpeace, armone, novario, soarr, and bluepickle. Best to send hateboxx a tell...
I join pick up groups about half the time I am grouping... sometimes its nice to group outside your guild to maby find a quality player that no one knows OR just to practice on people with lesser gear then you to help you practice *as a cleric its always fun to heal a tank with a fraction of the gear I am used to healing in my guild*... But you just claiming that grouping is dead just sounds silly to me.. Maby its your play time.. your class.. Maby your attitude.? There are people that I refuse to group with not because of their ability/class but because of their negative attitude. No one wants to group with someone and then listen to them complain the whole time they are in the group about "How long you been trying to get a group/angry about mercs getting your self declaired spot in exp groups/etc.." No one wants to listen to you complain!!! Maby next time stop being the victum and make the effort and start up a group.. First do /who lfg.. sure there is a few on there if you play at a normal time.. even if they are anon/roleplauy send them a tell asking what class/level and ask them if they want to join you.. dont matter the class... with tank mercs healing mercs/dps mercs.. you can fill a group with whatever you want and fill in whats missing with mercs... So take 3 clerics add 1 tank merc and 2 dps mercs and go exp... dont matter the classes.. just fill up your roster and exp will come if you put in the effort.
Arm chair analysis is very easy. Just blame the other guy or whoever has the grievance. Still, there is plenty of blame to go around for the current state of grouping in spite of dropping it all on the OP and branding them "Bad attitude. Persona Non Grata." Especially if their problem is not your problem so of course their attitude is going to be "bad". People who are not stuck with the brown end tend to not complain. To OP's credit, it looks like he has made attempts to form his own groups in guild but got lackluster response since people are off being efficient with their time using mercs/bots/clique players. After that, what is left? General Chat or the hardly used /lfg tool. For a single played toon without box support, that can be frustrating at times. Can't drop boxes or mercs to add players if you don't have them to start with. Carnon, you also have the advantage of being in an elite guild and play a class where you plug in nicely in place of a merc. A player dps class from a no-name guild won't always find a ready spot if it means giving up a tank merc or a healer merc to get them in and leaving the group short on heals/tanking. The current way of doing things in EQ is what it is. It is something we can't beat, so we all have to just go along. It is not good or bad. Only what it is. If someone is used to how it was, than it might not be apparent that grouping is in the same state of health as it was back 5-6 years ago or longer. Not dead by any stretch, but it is definitely older and more pressed for time.
Working on progression is generally something people try to grind out at the beginning of an expansion, and often times it takes up a decent chunk of play time, and takes away from things people would probably much rather be doing. I help my guildees whenever I can, however I would be hard pressed to help someone through the entire language progression for VoA. I do camp augs and will link them in guild for someone who can use it. As for joining a guild and attempting to form a group so quickly, this most likely doesn't work solely because people are unfamiliar with your playstyle, or what you are capable of, so they are going to be reluctant to just jump into a group, they can avoid feeling "guilty" for leaving if they don't feel you play to their liking.
Call me a downer but unsubbing with no offline trading being a primary point made me want to discount the rest. If it's that much of a deal to you just find a friend willing to sell some of your stuff for you on consignment. Not like most people need money for anything anymore. Or at least they have an ample amount to make it not a worry, if they don't quit every other month. I've made over a million plat this year without spending more than a few hours in bazaar, hardly trying. I'm not alone. Be creative. Tell General what you have, or something. As for grouping, if you're trying to grab anyone who will group with you for things and that's still not working... switch servers. During normal hours I don't see a lot of problems usually with groups being constructed, but that's on Drinal.
I was thinking of coming back this week. After reading this i must admit i feel a bit depressed about it now. I think ill still give it a go just for the nostaligia of walking around the zones again for a month Warsheol its been a LONG time I still remember Empire Sheol from the good old days...
The only part of grouping that is really dead is PUGs and trying to get progression done 9 months into an expansion. It has been easy to get windsong groups, cob groups, etc. as long as you have a good rep. Being in a good guild helps too. The difference is that not every zone has folks grouping in it. Most of the time it is the most popular zones and then you go there and ask if they can drop a merc for you. Using the LFG tool is dead, but not asking folks if they have room. If you want a group, you need to do something other want too.
Parsing and the knowledge of game mechanics have ruined the random grouping for me. It goes both for guildies and randoms, if you're dps and are only parsing less than 10k sustained (I feel that's very reasonable), more than likely I wouldn't want to group with you again. It's controversial and there are a few exceptions to this rule, but it is what it is. You see players who perform better and you know what they're capable of, so you only group with them.
PUG's (this is what the OP is talking about) are long, long dead. I've been playing EQ since 12/99 and I can tell you that pug's actually died out shortly after the plane of discord expansion. If you try to pug every night you will learn who invites who to groups. On my server there are about 5 people who make groups from the lfg list or from shouts...that's it. All in all a moot point though. EQ will continue limping along with about 80% of the population boxed. The raiding community will support the game and buy expansions but the population can go nowhere but down, as the OP so painfully illustrates.
It has been a long time like since 2005ish? I do remember you, and dont get depressed over this thread finding a decent guild is key then you never have to wait long for another group to start
One of the things with being new or recently returned, is that the EQ community has a lot of "expected knowledge." From the beginning, there were zones you were more likely to get a group- like Oasis. They were formed by travel constraints, faction constraints (so different races and classes could get to common ground and hunt together), and proximity to XP mobs. For a while, we went away from that. SOE gave us hub zones, like Nexus, PoK, PoT, and even LDoN camps that you could quickly port between. We still have hub zones, but they have their own quests, and when you're done there, you move on to the next zone. You have no reason to do anything more than pass through the hub zone after that. Original EQ was closer to that, but the biggest difference is, now there are hundreds of zones, and as of next week, double the level spread. The amount of info the average EQ player "accepts as read" is significant. As a really brief example, that most of the people in the lobby are in fact AFK, that the best place to look for a group in a lower level are the hotzones, that consistent players tend to knock out group progression at the beginning of an expansion, that if a lower level toon is in a zone alone with a high level <insert class with killshot or swarm ability here>, they're probably just one person, PLing an alt, that the general channel is avoided by many people, that the /LFG tool is virtually unused on many servers... many of these things are counterintuitive. We're just used to them. Where you're most likely to get a group at current expansion levels also depends on your class, your gear, and what you're after- Beast's Domain on Xegony is usually fairly busy for people still catching up on XP in the game, and willing to play at a casual pace, while you'll find more people wanting to work on specific things in Pillars, or Resplendent Temple. I'm not sure how it is on EMarr, but try looking for someone like me on the server that types too much also? Crystilla, where are you?
Exactly. If you want to get some obnoxious flagging done, (like Alaran,) you have to get on it early while other people are still interested in doing it. The OP did what any of us would recommend. We have a huge guild and people can usually fit themselves into one of the 4 groups doing something on a busy night. A person who can't get in one of those will threaten, "Don't make me go to general (channel)," at which point, someone will invite him/her out of pity. People only have 4 hours a night, if that, to play nowadays and they don't want to spend it rezzing people who can't get to camp safely. Inviting strangers is risky and potentially wasteful. If you have 2 toons, with one each mercwar and healer, you have your own group. You can invite people and let them drift in and out and go afk without disrupting what you set out to do that night. *.Lee of Povar
