Is EQ small potatoes and not worth developing?

I believe EQ will be amazing (not that it isn't already amazing).
I love this game, and have great respect to every member of the team.
Just don't nerf us.
Please add a way to have us PAY to 'alive' a accidental deleted character.
Please make a pizza slice weapon ornament and a pizza slicer weapon ornament.
Please let us have the ability to order food from within the game UI.
: )

Wow.

It's funny that this thread basically asks for new ownership and MGI takes an 8% stake in EG7.

They’re buying EG7 for DCUO, Marvel, and LotRO. EQ is just kinda there.

You make some good points here, but they are addressable, other games have done things that provide examples of solutions that could be utilized.

1. Squire/side-kick system, involved in a thread that got into that some here - https://forums.daybreakgames.com/eq/index.php?threads/reversing-the-power-level.279249/

2. An overhaul of the UI would help massively in this regard, also some sensible condensation of AA/abilities & spells could help reduce some of the "whack-a-mole" style combat EQ has been iterating on for several years and head more into a "Meaningful impact" combat system - there's a balance to be struck between too many buttons to press and too few and there being too little or too much complexity involved in any class along with creation of the headroom for class devlopment (class development being a very large can of worms to open).

I disagree with this conclusion, and we have a case study in EQ 2 that shows why it is not as clear cut as you seem to suggest.

That's like saying the only thing an education does is help you know more things as if having more knowledge doesn't impact every facet of your life.

Which is like complaining math is a waste of time because you haven't yet figured out you want to be an engineer.

You can not build a house until you lay a foundation.

its a double edged sword. EQ is a great MMO.
but.. it's coding was flawed in the beginning and people have exploited its flaws.
Those people are behind the dupes, behind the krono, behind the botting softwares.
Those people have chased away the regular players to the point were they and their bots now outnumber the players.
The game will never take a chance and fix itself of the coding errors and prevent them from exploiting the system because it has let it go to this degree.
one can remain hopeful, but its been 23 years now. Pretty sure the horse is dead.

This is a really bad analogy.

I don't see that as a major problem anytime soon as there are still a lot of major apps that are 32 bit. If there was any move to drop 32 bit support soon there would be warnings from Microsoft so that everyone had time to make sure they could support the change.

Unless that "right leadership" made some major design changes to the game I don't see that as the case. A lot of the newer MMO's have the ability for true solo gameplay in addition to group and raid meaning that players can log on and get playing right away without having to either find a group or box one themselves. One of the downsides to EQ is the fact that you either need to find or box a group to get a lot of stuff done.

Hindsight is 20/20 as the old saying goes.

I think the biggest missed opportunity for EverQuest was the decision to create EverQuest II rather than make the investment in a major upgrade to EverQuest. That upgrade could also have included measures to address player needs in terms of being able to login and immediately do something fun and productive if they wanted to outside of a group for whatever reasons they may have had. Solo instances would have worked nicely as they introduced into EQ2 at some point later in its life. Early on they could have invested in anti-cheat software as well and killed boxing before it became a widespread thing. It never should have become something people felt a need to do for lack of a good solution being provided to them in the game.

These things are all history now and there's only the way forward to look to which I personally hope will be good fun. So far it always is for me overall. I think it must be for most of us else we wouldn't be here.

There is so much untapped potential in EQ, I just have no understanding why there is no movement to develop the game itself?!

Like we could have a system that persists through expansions that is linked to instanced content. Imagine if all HAs gave you an HA type currency that you can use on cosmetics items, titles, potions goodies, overseer stuff, collections etc. There could be a leader board with number of missions completed, etc.

It would also be nice to have a system in which we can temporarily de-level ourselves (modernize shroud system) so we can group with any player at any level and have meaningful rewards at max level.

Leader boards can be very problematic as they can cause people to not want to take risks when attempting those missions. LDoN is a prime example of that where people only wanted to do them when they could be assured they will win.

Other games manage leaderboards just fine I am sure clever folks could come up with lots of ways to make it work in EQ...if there was anyone even thinking about developing EQ. Which there isn't. Which is my point.

I didn't say they couldn't be done, I just said they could be problematic depending on how they are done and if they are done like LDoN it could make it harder for some people to do them as people will avoid groups they think might fail.

Everything is problematic before it gets implemented by that logic what's your point?

The game lost its RPG community and appeal as DnD adventure brought to life. Leaderboards like LDoN create an e-sports environment that runs contrary to the spirit of the game.

OK this is a fair point. What I am trying to establish is some kind of long term permanent system that exist to provide content in between expansions. It needs to be instanced content obviously, but it doesnt NEED leader boards. It has been my experience that leader boards are neat way to motivate ppl to do content they otherwise wouldnt. I was part of the majority of players who liked LDoN, and wasnt scared off by the leaderboard. I feel like the people scared off by it were very small portion, I never had any issue grinding those things in groups non stop 24/7. This was way before we all boxed too.

And they have implemented leaderboards in EQ before during LDoN which caused people to be very picky about who they grouped with in order to avoid failed missions. I brought it up because I saw it as a problem with how EQ has done it in the past. This isn't a concept that would be new to EQ.

No one is saying people where scared off by leaderboards, what we are saying is that they made groups/raids to ensure that they would have little to no chance of failing. If someone was unknown or thought they could lead to a failure they would get excluded.