Just leave the xp boost on for levels 1-100?

I've asked what server, I've asked what class, I've asked you to ask more specific questions.

It's obvious you'd rather stew in you frustration, and ask for a change that the devs will likely never do.

Whatever. I'm done.

It would be nice if they increased the max level spread to like 50 or removed it completely

I think it's fair to say the addition of auto-grant sped up the 51+ leveling experience greatly. But I also think it's fair to say that 65+ before auto-grant was an unreasonable slog. Just because it's faster now doesn't mean it's good, just better than it was, even if by a lot. That means that 1-65 is pretty quick now, but after that is the point where you really feel the slowdown. You feel it in the 50's, but it's more gradual and there a lot of options for places to level. That makes it easier to find a place that moves pretty well for your class setup.

Having leveled characters to 70, 64, 59, 57, 52 (two toons), and 49, all before auto-grant, I think this is easy to see. Those who got the levels and AAs the hard way will always see the current path as too easy, but it's not about that. It's about how it feels to go 1-110 in the current game. I took that 59 and grouped with 85's during the HoT era to get him to 83. Despite being basically power-leveled, it took a while. Then later I upgraded one of the 52s to Heroic and leveled him to 105, some solo and some grouped with 105s. So I've seen slow and fast exp at different level ranges.

Maybe it's fine, I don't have enough time in the 70-80 range under normal group/solo conditions to say for sure. But I do know that's where it seems to slow down the most, so that may be where some tweaking would benefit the game. Try not to think of it as "used to be slower, so anything better is good" but more like "what is a good exp curve for the trip from 1 to 110?"

It isn't frustration, it is just slow and badly designed. They make a massive game and then make it so that only 0.1% of the content gives good exp. And it is the most boring and repetitive content. Makes no sense.

Exactly. And without twinking, power levelling, or the lesson.

A few thoughts:

-Heroic character boost should be level 95 now

-"Tutorial" quest chain @ 85 should reteach you the game (if you read it all as you do it) and get you significant XP (10ish levels if you do it @ 85).

-start at 51/50 and (now old) heroic 85 should be character creation options in addition to starting at level 1. Making someone play 1-85 doesn't really teach them much that they can't learn playing 85 to 86.

-Lesson of the Devoted could be increased in duration

-revamp a couple of the zones people tend to love leveling in historically into scaling missions (i.e., Grieg's End, Unrest, Old Sebilis, Lower Guk from 75-110 if you really want to).

-Increase the XP from the hotzone daily quests to make it worth 1 hour of effective grinding @ that level in that hotzone

-Maybe... maybe it is worth doing something like taking LDoN and rescaling the missions so they go to level 150 (think ahead) AND create the option to have "Wayfarer Mercenaries" join you (up to 4 of them). Give them some special conditions (Wayfarer tank #1 emotes "OMG I'm gonna die" if it gets below 25% HP, etc.) and maybe they even act differently (wayfarer mage #2 insists on using a summoned monster pet and boasts about how cool it is) than generic mercenaries. Basically canned imaginary friends you can play with in the special missions to level up.

-Maybe... select some key historical quests (Sol Ro, epics, other things with flavor) and put era-gated NPC in (so it doesn't mess with progression) so when you do "Bracer of Hammerfal" circa Ring of Scale and hand it to the new NPC they are impressed and you get massive XP (like 3 levels at level 50, epic 1.0 could be 5 levels at 65 and so on). Basically give the old timesinks new value, while stealthily building a player's connection to the character.

-Maybe add to the otherwise orphaned monster shroud system by adding a new tier/type of monster and let a player shroud UP to a very basic level 110 tank/healer/caster dps/melee dps that earns a level for every level 110 daily task completed (i.e., a generic kill 25 XP giving mobs). Note this is not a faster way to level 1-75, it's a way to do it with the community in the busy content.

Applying the HA-scaling-system to the entire ldon expansion would be awesome.
They could let the currency type depend on the HA-level. Level 110 gets RoS currency, 105 gets to choose between EoK/TBM/TDS currency etc, or maybe give players the choice to get "lower currency"(from earlier expansions) even if they are high level. Or allow the players to choose an additional xp-reward instead of currency.
Loot could depend on the level scale too, so that nameds have a chance to drop level-appropriate gear/ rk2-spells/augs. Trash should drop level-appropriate tradeskill-mats, etc.

It would give a lot of variation within the game to have 70+ dungeons to get level appropriate rewards from(not just xp).

Converting the entire ldon to the new system would ideally be possible to do more or less automagically(It will probably still be a huge project though)

Leveling up to 100 isn't that hard. some level ranges could use a bit of a boost, but I really think changing the hot zones all the time is a bad idea, I know some of the community wanted it but the TSS zones were really the best place for exp boosts, especially Blightfire Moor that place had such a huge level range with some good quests to get gear as you went along and had a POK book so you were there almost immediately.

The main problem with leveling I see is still the AA mountain. I've noticed in the last couple of expansions we have had AA lines that start at level 75, why aren't these included in the auto grant? Why are we once again forcing players to do AA pre level 100 to get them while they are relevant?

All of TSS having hotzone boost would be a good compromise - no guesswork, no mess. If you want fast exp, go to the expansion that was a 1-75 redesign. If you want old-old school then off you trot...

There was so much work into TSS - so many well thought out zones and quests, great place to get the early levels in if you are in a hurry.

I have been using Natimbi, The Broken Shores for getting from 45 to 52 level. What are some other zones ? I'll be moloing. I have toons on all blue servers, and most character classes; druid, ranger, enchanter, and shaman. A few servers I have a wizard.

I agree that Lesson should be longer than 30 minutes.

A pretty minor thing to complain about. The amount of AAs in newer expacs in those level ranges is very small, and are usually one-offs. The only exception to this which I know of is enhanced reformation, and while a nice line for melees, the old-timers didn't have it, so the new guys leveling can skip it til they get higher level.

Better yet would be to have it work like vitality. If you XP slow, it lasts a long time, if you XP quick, it's depleted more quickly. If you have to AFK, no big deal. The silly 30 minute timer thing is annoying.

Not factoring in hotzone status, pretty much everything in The Serpent's Spine expansion is a great way to level (1-75). Some zones or places suit tactics of course. Example is kiting works well in Blackfeather Roost and some camps in Icefall that you would be kind of wasting your time trying to tank & spank at the same level. Goru'kar Mesa should be good in the 40s, and move north to the Steppes or into Blackfeather Roost depending on your combo and preferences after that. Hotzoned TSS zones I am not sure a solo/molo person can find better xp at the lower (sub 80) levels.

Older dungeons tend to be great XP for the effort too. Sometimes even a better XP per hour rate slaying light blues. Plane of Hate is an example of a former raid zone that gets used as an XP farm (particularly AA) by some classes well into the 70s. Zones that would have been locked back in the day are worth trying too (i.e., Plane of Fire), especially if you never earned access.

I'd love to see a solo / molo guide on how to get to 110 by someone who has done it. A list of zones and spots taken in the zones and the length of time. Once the difficulties are highlighted, the zone ranges most in need could be catered for by the developers and improved upon.

Everyone who doesn't box needs to speak up. Tell us where you are experiencing the difficulties and perhaps something can be done. For me, I tried soloing and quit at around 70. However, I'm open to trying soloing again with some better guides and advice. I came back to the game and really wanted to play it and was advised to box and I took that advice. However, I don't see boxing as a solution as some people do. I think the game should adapt to offer an alternative to boxing. Or perhaps that's just what Everquest is - it's a group game, but a group game where people make their own groups through boxing. Look at all the true box progression servers that people are flocking too. Perhaps the future of Everquest lies in implementing firstly a single box code across all servers, and then changing the game to make it a bit more solo friendly.

Look at it this way. The newest expansions are releasing content at the max level and aimed at max levels, but nothing is done for the lower levels and the grind to 110 is very difficult soloing. So its very hard to break into the game. At least I believe it is, and few other people on this thread have experienced similar difficulties.

Almar used to have guides in place on where to go and which spots in the zones were safest but he has deleted them and I think is reworking them. Perhaps people can give feedback to Almar and his guides and he can refine them and we can have a workable solution to leveling up. I don't know.

He did write however that the non-boxing route would take months grinding instead of a couple of weeks. That is kind of depressing.

I hope the developers take note and make an easier route for a single account holder to level up in future! Perhaps in the next expansion there will be something for the low levels to rejoice in.

From what I've read, by far the best experience at higher levels is Gribbles HA through boxing. Its not possible to get that exp rate from soloing and the number of groups is tragic at low levels. Almar advices to box after you hit 75.

Other people advice grouping or being more sociable. I reckon the thing with boxing is, and someone mentioned this - you can do them at your own leisure. As fast or as slow and as many breaks as you want.

The advice I'm getting from most people is to go make a couple of accounts and box. That's the way this game works. That's the way it's meant to be played!

Look at what world of warcraft are doing at the moment. I know people hate me mentioning world of warcraft, but they have a number of expansions released too and are facing similar problems of unifying quests / rewards / gear / experience and leveling up across expansions. At the moment, they are implementing a new questing / scaling engine, where you can quest in any zone at any level and the mobs and rewards scale to your level. That is interesting. They are taking all old expansions and making them relevant again by adding a scaling system. They also have heirlooms that allow alts to get gear that scales according to the level / era. That is quite interesting too.

Also interesting is Everquest 2's mentoring system and chrono system.

I think Everquest can be made more newbie friendly to be honest but that's my opinion.

OK, you start.... what caused you to stop soloing at 70?

As to your first paragraph, you'll need 16 guides, one for each class, because the classes which have the easiest, quickest time will be using abilities not possessed by the other classes.

I'll start you off with druids: If you want to solo, you'll have to stick to things which don't summon. You can take out summoners with a tank merc, but the XP will be much slower.

I assume you are only after the fastest route here, so I will skip anything to do with moloing. And also because, there's not much to say about it. Heal the merc so he don't die, and work in some DPS to kill the mob. You'll want to stay away from particularly tough mobs, because at a certain point, you're always healing, and can't work in any DPS. And stick to outdoors, so you can use your calm spell to get single pulls, if that is your desire.

OK, back to soloing. Find non-summoners (list of what I remember below). You have three main options. If they are animals, use our animal charm line, and mass charm. If they are not animals, you can quad/quint (nuke) them down. I think there's a range of levels where this is difficult to quad, because they stopped giving us spells. Yep, just checked, from 62 to 91, there were no more quadding spell upgrades. So you can do this to the upper 60s, and then no until 92. The last option is to DoT, and with our upgraded DoTs, this shouldn't be a bad way to go in those in-between levels. You can either do one at a time, or in groups and kite them, just as if you were quadding.

Also, two more general points which will apply to almost all classes... fight mobs with fewer HPs when possible, meaning a level 75 mob in SoF will generally have more HPs than one in TSS. Also, there is a bonus given for mobs within 5 levels of you, so hunt dark blue cons when you can.

Other points: XP/hour is the key, so forget how long it takes to kill one mob. If another mob takes 50% longer to kill, but gives 100% more XP, then the harder mob is better. And mob density/respawn is also a factor. If you run out of stuff to kill, find a better camp.

For quadding, pretty much nothing below 50 summons, so you can quad your way to low-mid 50s just about anywhere.

Mobs and camps I remember:
60 to upper-60s: mobs in HoH basement (quadding/DoTing)
Mid-70s to upper-70s: Wolves near zone-in in Icefall Glacier (mass charming)
Upper-70s to mid-80s: Gators in Loping plains (mass charming)

Ran out of time for now, but there's a start.

Hi Tatanka. Thanks for your guide to soloing with a druid. My first attempt at leveling up was a bard, and I quit because the merc tank started to get really bad at the level I quit at... and it started taking ages for it to kill mobs.

I might make a druid and try that out. Thanks.

That makes sense from what I've seen. At 64 my Bard with a J1 Tank merc can still fight single blues and keep the merc healed. But with each level that gets harder. By 70, without access to J5 mercs things could get a lot harder. SoD is tough content for its level, doing those merc quests solo with a merc would require a level advantage over the content that would be hard to achieve without access to those better mercs.

I don't want to muck up the path for progression servers, but maybe if they added a late era locked quest for level 70 to get J5 mercs it could help. Basically like what they did for Heroic toons, but at a point where it would be relevant to the people leveling up normally. Auto-grant really helped with the mid-level game, something like this could be huge also.

Anyway, I tried leveling a druid with a merc for a good while, but reached a point where the experience per mob was really poor versus the amount of time the merc and I spent on the mob. Also, could only start taking on one mob at a time too, so it started getting too slow and I gave up and burned out.

I then tried three boxing with three level 85s. I did the new merc quests and died a few times but managed to do them. Then I tried to level up with the CotF Heroic Adventures. I did one, and it took me ages to do and after all the switching back and forth between characters I only get a really small dent in the experience for completing one HA.

Then I felt really sad.

I felt sad because I realised this isn't a game I can complete because it's too hard for me.

The leveling experience is too tough. Everquest is one of the hardest, most challenging games I ever played.

In a later expansion, I'm open to coming back to this game if they make the leveling system soloable or doable.

At the moment, I don't feel it's doable to be able to solo to 100s.

I might try playing on Agnarr when the bazaar expansion gets released. There will be people to play with on that server.

I really wanted to play this game and get to max level or a level where everyone is enjoying this game at, but it's too damn hard for new people to break into.

I am trying out Eq2 at the moment, and i quested to level 17 and enjoying it. I think I'll stick to eq2 for a while until the Agnarr expansion gets released.

Hoping they do something in the next expansion to help the leveling process for newbies. Would really love to break into the game at some point in the future.

My sincerest advice if you're resolute on soloing, and not boxing at all, is to change classes. Druid is just not the best class for that. Speaking as having a druid main since 2000.

I'd recommend you re-roll an SK, necro, or mage. In that order, definitely. Or, try the other things I recommended (quadding and charming).

I've tried Plane of Hate several times, 2 different characters in the low 60s. Didn't last very long.

One was a ranger, I forget the other one. Ah, just checked my spreadsheet ( I have over 150 characters on 5 accounts.)

Wood elf Ranger 62 on Xegony, Ogre Shaman 61 on Xegony, and 62 froglok cleric on Tunare.

I worked these three up by soloing, got the ranger from 60 to 62 by moloing. The ranger has a cleric merc. The other two have a tank merc. Although the froglok might have a cleric merc to.

I can only afford one account to be all access at the same time, but it just so happens those three are on the same account. Very low on loyalty on that account, so that wouldn't be a help. Nor would me spending cash to get station cash work for me either.

I have around 5 characters in the 50s range on the same servers, but different accounts. Those have a nice amount of loyalty points to use.

I don't mind hard games... I gamed on paper and pencil games in the early 1980s. Those are hard to gain levels.