I don't understand some TLP players, help me

I can't speak for other TLP but Phinigel didn't die when PoP ended, at least it didn't for raiders.

What dies after PoP is PUGGING and most raiders hate that anyway, it's the fans of PUGGING who leave & cry about the server being dead ad-infinitum like it is the gospel truth.

The raiders just carry on chuggling along, losing 1-2 raid guilds per expansion unlock until there is 1 or 2 left on the server by the time it reaches ToV ish era.

If the puggers gave GoD a chance they would realize it got massively re-tuned & it won't destroy them like it used to, maybe this is some leftover PTSD that makes them bail?

You have this 100% backwards. The real raiders normally stay and the casual-focused re-rollers/PUGGers are the ones who migrate away. For example, Aradune still has about 10-12 raiding guilds actively clearing all of SOF all of which maintain 60-100 raiders roughly. Meanwhile there's virtually zero casual group-oriented players on the server anymore. They are long gone.

Yes, I should not have mentioned anything there about raiders. I stand corrected.

After PoP, nearly my entire experience is from the "casual group-oriented players" point of view.

Mangler is still rocking 7 or 8 raiding guilds and they are up to CotF (Heroic adventures make catching back up easy, if you are considering returning).

Everquest as a whole improves a lot with TSS, and bad raid scripts are fewer and further between. The raids are more technical, you can't take nap like you can against the AoW or most of the fights in VT.

If you look at the recent thread that discussed the hardest raids in EQ, almost everything discussed is Underfoot or later content. Also nothing from the re-cycler eras is listed. In general the raids prior to UF weren't nearly as challenging.

I think a lot of people would enjoy a TLP starting in TSS with a standard unlock cadence. That expansion has a lot of content that is lost in the current TLP format.

Me and my buddies usually play at launch for a month quit play next expansion play for a month quit wait for Velious play for 2 weeks quit and wait for next TLP.

1. Nostalgia
2. It’s a hobby
3. As stated earlier, universal reset.
4. Play the game “over” with a new (to you) class.
5. Farm Krono for other servers / accounts (Big one for many).
6. Push the limits of what was previously done (faster clears).

As someone who's never raided past PoP and plays (almost) every TLP since Phinigel, it's 3 things mainly for me.

1. nostalgia
2. bustling world and fresh resets (like diablo/path/etc seasons as many pointed out)
3. overall game feel: everything becomes more and more overtly thematic and curated. too theme park. the zones try to be too formulaic and logical. the newer designs and textures look awful and out of place compared to earlier zones. the whole game starts to clash/contradict with itself. it doesn't feel like a sandbox world anymore and becomes another fast food mmo.

I don't understand the reset suggestion. The game isn't resetting like Diablo where it migrates your char to NL. Your char is still on a server actively progressing so it functionally didn't reset. It's still going. It's just people choosing to redo the content they just did on a different server. That's not a reset. it's closer to just making a new char on the same ladder than it is to a global server reset.

I think they just meant that they get to experience a "fresh start" again? If so, I very much identify with that pleasant feeling (it is to me, anyway). I enjoy new servers so I can help the newbies!

The problem with TLPs and EQ past Luclin in general is the time investment required to stay on top of your character. You have to raid at least three nights a week to clear content. Then there is leveling and AAs on top of it. Exp rates on these servers are too low. They need to be doubled. People need to be able to keep up with their characters and live outside the game too. Once you get to Luclin its keying, levels, AA, TSing, quests and quite frankly too much to keep up with for people that have to work for a living. Im retired at the age of 36 and only have to get my kids to places and I still am having trouble keeping my three box crew up to snuff in PoP on Yelinak. The expansions go by too fast or the xp is too slow. Causes alot of burn out when all of it starts piling on in PoP. In classic -> luclin you just got levels or AAs maybe a single keyed zone….exciting dps races and contested content pretty much goes away in PoP while adding more chore content.

If you ask me its not the players deciding to take off but the game becomes too much to keep up with so its just generally easier to restart in classic every year.

The other reason is past OoW the game ceases to be the EQ we all know and love. Throughout the years the devs never really reigned in anything. Instead of changing abilities they just kept adding. I look at people playing live currently and they have 10 full hot bars with 100 abilities and all kinds of nonsense going on. People don’t wana play EQ like that. They like it simple. Simple is elegant. They don’t want to play with merc npcs. They wana play with people.