Progression Server Poll Results: What's Next?

I have to weigh in on this because the last progression server i was a part of ... Hateplane was a nightmare. So many people and groups of boxes all fighting over the same mobs. Gods perma-camped and not enough to go around. Kunark must be VERY FAST to give people the room to spread out. After that happens im all for the vote for absolute snailcrawl speed. Without kunark though i wouldnt stay till it was released. Just not enough room for people to go do stuff at the high end. I know I would get tired of all the fighting over spawns in hate and fighting to get a chance to do something in Sky and Fear. (last go 'round the box teams would killsteal left and right and then the legitimate groups pullers trying to not pull over or off each other... it was a mess.) I quit not long after. I came back like twice i think during kunark. But never got back into it. I had lost the draw due to the long absence waiting for the kunark approval. and that was on a normal vote for it progression.

To back up what people said, I only found out about the vote after it had actually happened.
I really think there's enough juice for 2 servers tho, they can always start up 2 servers with the proviso that after 6 months if they are empty they can merge them (if the rule sets are similar).

I'd suggest making it a top priority--it seems like it could bring about more long term revenue than any other ideas I've seen here--but I don't imagine it would be popular with the regular posting folk on these boards who eagerly await their next expansion.

I've long been /feedbacking for adding instanced versions of old zones, similar to the revamping they did with some of the popular old classics, but tiered to the avg group level like LDoN so the mobs yield experience and allow raiding and soloing as options. Guarantee 2-4 random named mobs with tier 2-3 group drops of that level range, set an appropriate timer, no respawns, and you can earn some kind of alt currency like several expansions have done in the past. That seems to have been the most popular feature of those expansions (LDoN, DoN, CotF, and the raiding currency + OMM was really fun before they got rid of the exp). It would be fun to go anywhere and makes the whole game relevant and applicable again. I'd eagerly await an expansion that only added this single feature.

If they give into the instancing on TLP like a few here are lobbying for, that's a great step in this direction.

I forgot to register after moving until Dec 2014 - they didn't let me vote for that election for some reason. =/

The poll ran for a month, and it was promoted on the front webpage and login screen - its hard to say that they didn't get the message out there as much as they really could.

[Not to mention polls only work with characters that existed before the poll is run - so if you're someone with a fresh account for example, you were always out of voting]

i like the idea of combining the kunark expansion in with the initial first launch of the server: I've listened to many original player horror stories, (from the days of EQ's beginnings back in 99), where there would be well over 100 players fighting over the few mob spawns available in a zone. With very few zones in existence at the time, there just weren't enough options for places to go and (from what I've been told) players were often unable to level their characters simply because they couldn't find anything to kill for xp. I've always shuddered and been glad I got to skip that part. It sounded very not fun and agonizingly frustrating! So - while I'd love to experience the game in a more classic way to see the good things I missed out on - going 100% back to the way it was doesn't seem like a good idea, either. We should learn from the problems and mistakes that existed then, and make concessions to create an enjoyable *MOSTLY* classic experience. Pretending the classic game had no issues is just silly. I think its a great idea to combine Kunark with the initial release, and just have them both up together for the full time total that was meant for them separately. I love the Kunark areas still... except sebilis - i hate sebilis....

I also think max nostalgia mode would be best. If people with more free time get bored waiting - as others have stated - they can always go play on their normal server while they wait. Its better to have some waiting, than to rush everyone and ruin the experience for them. I still agree with the idea of just setting release dates and not having voting - after all - noone got to vote on expansion releases when they came out originally...

While I don't mind the idea of the server eventually reaching a lock point - if you decide to do this - please don't put it at PoP. I had a blast in the few GoD zones I got to experience - my first days of raiding were there (and in Omens) and I loved it. I trully adore the Omens expansion, (and it sounds like its pretty popular among many others here, too). DoN, DoDH, TSS & SoF were all very good experiences for me that I would really love to revisit as real events again. I'd hate to miss out on the chance to revisit these era's once more.

On the other hand, when you are discussing this server being set to max nostalgia mode, and consider that it would take more than 8 years just to catch up to where the game is NOW, (don't forget there will - I assume - be more expansions released between now and then also); you are looking at a minimum of 12 years before this new server could potentially catch up to the normal servers at that time. I don't care if it eventually catches up - I don't mind if we pick a lock point. But - isn't deciding a lock point 8+ years in advance getting ahead of ourselves just a little? Anyway, picking a lock point is going to be a major point of contention - nobodies going to agree on the "right" time - everyone has their own idea of when it was "the best". (For me: 75/80 in TSS/SoF era). Keep in mind - if you pick a point where nothing will advance any further - ever - eventually everyone will be bored and done with it anyway. There are only so many times you can kill all the cows in the secret cow level before its just not fun any more - yes, thats a D2 reference - this is actually the reason I quit playing that game

I say just let it catch up eventually - and keep making new progression based servers periodically so those who wish to relive the experience again can. Coming out with a new one every year might be an idea to entertain =)

I fully support the suggestion to set up instancing for the old raid content- I think its an excellent idea. That way everyone has the chance to enjoy the content, instead of just starting guild wars and server hate over it. I've heard those horror stories too - the events themselves were fun - getting trained by the servers guild full of uber-d*cks so they could steal your raid mob was not...

Also, there are time considerations to remember. We are all older than we were - many of us now have full time jobs and/or children that we didn't back in more classic era's. Many of us just don't have the time available that we once did. We can't be out hunting raid mobs at 4 in the morning on a daily basis any more - as I've been told was quite common before the instanced raid zones were added to the game. DZ instances would go a very long way towards making an old school raid schedule feasible - so please try to be considerate of that, too.

I do think it might be a good idea to consider having shorter timers on the raid instances/repops than what is on a regular server. Maybe take a full day off the timer, so 3.5 days instead of 4.5 - or possibly more. Reason being - if we have half the time (or less) of the original expansion to complete its content - that is a small window of time to get your guild geared and ready for the upcoming expansion - and there is a finite amount of drops per run. Noone wants to be stuck raiding Luclin when Omens is half over.

Created a petition on Change.org.
https://www.change.org/p/daybreak-game-company-create-a-time-locked-server-pop-with-ldon-or-dodh

Everyone clamoring for a classic experience... it just doesn't exist. Between upgraded spell levels, insane mage pets, monk fists, raf, boosted exp, etc. the game won't be the same. It's a square peg in a round hole, and 1 year of classic + Kunark given the current game state seems pretty miserable.

Now, if Daybreak commits to revamping the experience somewhat, then great (or opening up 2 servers with variable rulesets).

And to everyone that says "longer unlocks means raiders will get bored and the content will open up to the casuals," well, there is a special existing server that has been in Kunark for 4 years and dragons still have a lifespan of about 40 seconds. So, enjoy your 6 months of full grouping the 3 spawn ghoul ritualist camp because overpowered mage pets are soloing the other 90% of the zone. You will have plenty of time for all of the "chatting" you seem to be so fond of.

Also worth noting is that 6 months does not start until everything is cleared first... So it will actually be 7-8 months per...

4 months each expansion without voting would be about 4.5-6 months per expansion easy..

My vote would be timelocked non voting at 3-4 months after the criteria are met.
Instance raiding and/or put a player cap on instances and make it so once there are xx players in said zone another copy of the zone is made..(not sure if that's possible). Also for those wanting to relive there favorite camps like frenzy, freeti, etc. good luck prying those from the fingers of the hardcores until they are out of date..

Im saddened by the news... I wanted a locked progression as people on the forums tend to be yelling for years for it. But oh well. If your going to do this.. at least fix the issues that keep coming up. NO VOTES PERIOD!!! stop with the voting for unlocks because it fails. SECOND-----Either instance Raid bosses/make all drops NO DROP/ or reduce spawn timers on all Raid bosses to 2-4 hour spawn time on all CLASSIC Bosses and rare spawns. This will at least give casual players, casual guilds, smaller guilds, progression guilds etc a chance at the mobs that get locked down by farmers. On the last progression server a single player with a bot army locked the dragons down for most players who eventually gave up on their epics. Also please REMOVE the fast exp... bring back the slow exp and reduce the mob exp given so that players can feel some nostalgia instead of seeing level 50's within a day of the progression opening.

17 pages of posts in three days!

I think this shows you what important and "hot" topics to the player community. This is awesome news in every respect.

Frankly, I've been trying to find a way to relive my 5 year Noarrathian life.

I want to vote as loudly and strongly as I can, in support of a previous comment: this is an opportunity for players to relive Everquest and be together with a community of players again - not another race to get ahead.

I think the most important thing will be giving people the experience again (which is why a prog server is so important to so many). I don't want any progression experience bonus, no rush to the top, no motivators to griefing.


I also am against unlock voting. The old EQ experience released expansion without regard for player opinions. Expansions should be unlocked on a set time schedule not based on player behavior. Players can work hard to consume content or to go slow and savor the moment.

Most importantly (to me) is I want a very very very slow progression. The slowest imaginable. I want to *LIVE* in Norrath again and experience that world in every regard - not race to the top again.

I've been away several years - which server is this you describe?

Please, please, please consider opening the server with Original+Kunark. We've seen, first hand, how much interest there is in this and the original content gets extraordinarily packed with people. Opening with Kunark enabled gives a lot more room for leveling without making original content obsolete.

This will also give people who hit the high end early more to do, without stepping all over each other at every turn. This will still happen, of course, but mitigating this will go a long way to make that part of the community a little more tolerable.

There are servers that have stolen IP from EQ, and are operating independent of Daybreak. We are not supposed to discuss them on these forums, but I guess people think that if they aren't called by name, or the word is not used, it doesn't count.

It would be cool if people would stop, and quit wasting RadarX and Roshen's time. They have been perfectly clear about what is acceptable on the forums.

The most disingenuous about that which shouldn't be named is that the real numbers for it can easily be found. It's not too much harder to find out that they lose about 400 accounts per month and given that it's free then this can only translate in a ban rate of that high.

These are both positives in my book. Transparent and accurate popluation numbers and justice against cheaters.

I don't see it that way classic has an enormous amount of zones so unless you rush to level you should have plenty of zones to go to. Somehow i don't see tons of people on any of the karana zones(east,west,north and south).I could continue with more zones that gonna be underutilized..With the way it's gonna be it's gonna be a big detriment to even try to level fast. I think finally this server gonna be casual pack with not much raiding guild until many expansion in as dungeon are gonna be very rare at the beginning.I can see some large casual guild just in case you see somebody who's trying to block you.

Name the huge number of zones you can get decent exp in 40+ and try to tell me there are enough classic zones to satisfy the population a tlp will have..

its funny everyone is saying "add instances" or "only 2 hour lock outs on classic raid mobs"...you guys clearly didnt play in REAL classic EQ. this game has become a hand holder of a game its stupid easy now.

i dont think they should do any of that if you want the true classic experience then experience it the way we did.

i started during Kunark, my first toon was an iksar SK...and if anyone remembers back then iksar could not wear plate. only chain...not only was this a pain, but is what made it fun and challenging.

and leaving kunark to go and explore the rest of norrath was a pita just getting to a boat.

so stop complaining and be happy all you people got a classic/progression server.