This does absolutely nothing to ae powerlevelers and Im pretty sure that was never a given reason for why this was being put in place. After the very first announcement people theorycrafted this was a reason, but it was immediately put to rest with yell and eventually the ability to just unlock all of the mobs with a couple extra spell casta.
Everquest's biggest issue is the playerbase not the graphics, coding, rulesets, UI, etc. FTE doesn't stop a player from exploiting the game. It doesn't force a player to stand in queue while casual players kill a specific mob for a certain item. The ruleset doesn't change a player's personality. It just adds extra steps to traditional mechanics (powerleveling, training, etc). If Oakwynd players want to break out a calculator for every pull to calculate the several hundred possible outcomes, I truly hope you enjoy your time on the server. I'm neither for nor against the ruleset because I just don't get it. What is the purpose of FTE? I'm honestly confused.
Actually then FTE (as currently described) will further enable AE PL'ers to now be able to pull with total impunity, since it will allow them to mass pull without the worry of anyone being able to derail their pulls.
Yeah, the FTE changes are definitely in favor of the AE PLers. I used to screw with the AE PLers in the hole on occasion by running into their pile of mobs with my wizard and mage and chain casting PBAE nukes for easy experience It will now be much harder to disrupt their AE PLing now. But we already know that DPG loves the AE PLers because the AE PLers never get suspended. They have 12+ characters running scripts 24/7 and I've never seen one get suspended.
As Doze has said, the FTE changes actually benefit the AE PLers because it makes it harder to disrupt their AE pulls. If DPG had any interest in hindering AE PLing they would just make 5% of the mobs in the zone randomly immune to stun. Or even simpler, make a change so that if a mob has been stunned a dozen times in a row, they become immune to stun for 15seconds. This would prevent AE PLing while having very little effect on typical group combat situations.
Due to the legacy characters ruleset, we will absolutely see even more AE PLing services than on any previous TLP. Instead of just one instance of a zone being dominated by AE PLers, you're going to see multiple instances locked down by AE PLers.
I would love to see a Velious or Luclin start so that I can actually level up in the fun Velious/Luclin zones. The zones would be much less crowded for the first several weeks as well. Lol this made me laugh. Yeah, people are going to be just as salty about getting beaten to a tag as they would be getting outDPSed. FTE doesn't change anything.
FTE does change things. If you have a group, you can almost always guarantee you will outDPS a bot instantly tagging mobs. If you have a group, your chances of getting a FTE tag over that bot are overwhelmingly lower.
This is the problem coming on. Low ping and good connection will be the primary factor in tagging first but this 'bot' talk will result in tons of false reports that will waste CS time
I assume with the /yell command (that allows the functionality of circumventing the encounter lock) being included as a caveat; this means that the feature is only intended to minimize kill stealing; and not really meant to stop aoe power leveling (as the aoe power leveler would just have to /yell each mob). I almost feel like the /yell command shouldnt circumvent the encounter lock tbqh.
This is not an issue anymore. On test there is now a delay after visibility before unlock which removes ping advantages for tagging. Now it just comes down to who lands the first hit after unlock. Looks like tflux wizzies are really the only class with an advantage. They're the only class that can spam an attack non-stop in classic. Still waiting to hear if melee instants are burned when used on pre-unlocked mobs (haven't had time to test it) but I assume they are burned just based on the fact that misses or out of range burns them. Also will be interested to know if wand charges are burned when used on pre-unlocked mobs. If not then thin boned wand will be a valuable commodity (might be anyway).
I kinda wonder if it will make it "easier" to AE PL. I mean it's safer to other players in the zone to be sure but that's not really a negative. Remember that other players can lock the mobs before the PLers as well so it goes both ways. As for the process, they will have to either /yell every mob OR the pally/puller has to be in the group. I'm assuming they'll have to group the pally because the mass /yell is going to be very easy to catch if they're using scripts to do it. I'm guessing it will be about the same as always, which is also unfortunate. I'd prefer they eliminated the afk version of PLing. I'm fine with basic DS PL and just buffing oog but not even being at the keyboard and leveling to max is lame imo. Your solutions are pretty good. I could see the RMTing PLers finding ways around them, though. Possibly in combination with FTE. I think if they actually wanted to eliminate AE PLers they would both eliminate XP after a /yell AND have a timeout that when expired requires some kind of aggro from the player to continue to get xp from group kills. i.e. heal/buff/damage aggro.
