Test Update 12/06/2013

“- The Dimensional Warrior Belt now has a Type 7 socket instead of Type 13 and Type 21 sockets.”

There shouln't be anything in those slots since no type 13 (purity) or 21 (ornament) augs are designed for WAIST items.

/camp in the Guild Lobby works great, camps you right out to char select. I like it.
/camp in the old GuildHall works just like Lobby.
/camp in the new Guild Hall has the 30 second timer.
"/camp desktop" works ... fast! About 3 seconds from being in guild lobby to desktop.

Others asked for a popup confirmation. That would be ok, I guess, but maybe we could get a /fastcamp command without confirmation? I like how it works right now but I can see misclicking the camp button being irritating since you are immediately camping out.

Or, simply reducing the time to camp from 30 seconds to 5 in non-combat zones.

But, for myself, I think it would be fine the way it is, and I just log in again on the relatively rare number of times I camp by accident.

And a fast "/camp <otherchar>" would be really great. I tried that but just got the char select screen.

The solution seems simple enough to summoning mobs. Just give all classes an equal ability to tank. Then we can all solo the same way - just stand in front of it and hit it.
Of course then melee will cry about not being able to cast - so give them the ability to cast.
In fact - the best thing to do is just get rid of all classes all together and give everyone the same ability to do everything - that way we can all just pick what we want to do in groups and raids.
Actually then - why even have mobs move at all? They should all be perma-rooted and just summon players to them. That would solve all those pesky train issues and probably solve lag too.

Feerrott, the Dream - Lizardman mystics; Tae Ew ritualists, invokers, and disciples; froglok spirits; blighted gorillas; and orbweavers now summon players at 97 percent health.

Making the lizards summon does not actually stop rangers who are geared and have AA. - they die almost instantly. The temples already summon and I clear those without issue. This is much more of a nerf for kiting classes. I haven't kited with my ranger since I got headshot.

Honestly, I think it should be adapted to "Rest Mode" in combat zones, as well, personally...that's just me, though.

If you are in resting mode in a combat zone, allow this to happen. Otherwise, 30 second timer.

On that note, I hope they do add an option in to have a confirmation box you have to click (as well as a /fastcamp - /fastcamp desktop - /fastcamp server command) added in, so that we don't have to worry about accidentally hitting the camp button and going straight to character select or something of that nature.

If they don't do this I'm going to just have to un-hotkey camp altogether (i have it moved to ctrl+d as it is, but I still hit it by accident fairly frequently, heh).

Any chance this can be extended to the dragorn courier that needs to be escorted through Old Bloodfields in "Deliver the Message"? Never mind the ambushers, with all the zone trash alone it would sure be nice to AE without aggroing the wuss dragorn as well.

The summoning and the preincarnation nerfs really don't affect me much, but this is a real eye-opener for me. Sony has jumped off the deep end on this when there were much less drastic measures that would have had the same intended effect. Couple this with the complete "swing-and-a-miss" on the death bloom fiasco and it really has me worrying.

I have lost all faith in Sony to react to unforeseen issues in a reasonable and fair light. I just fear for when they come after warriors.

I think a couple of my accounts are going to have to be cancelled in hopes that they see that they missed the boat completely here.

Grohlok the Tyrant in Freedom! quest is now bugged to where he will not spawn add mobs when he goes invulnerable and repeats the cycle from 70 to 100% health to where you can't kill him and finish the quest. Needs to be fixed!

I'd rather have the hDex on the rogue daggers. HStr doesn't really do much.

This is an amazingly stupid move. Ever since I have come back to EQ I have seen all these melee classes abusing abilities to mass kill entire zones. Shadowknights swarm pull, rangers headshot, berserkers decap, rinse repeat. Feerrott2 has been the domain of headshotting rangers on my server for a long time. All the shadowknights like to swarm Thalassius, Fortress Mechanotus, Mechamatic Guardian (instance). Berserkers decap huge kite-swarms in The Grounds. I've seen a warrior mass swarm pull in Field of Scale like it was nothing. Even a monk friend of mine is planning out which places he will swarm pull with riposte abilities.

And all the while I have said OK, that's fine, let them abuse the system, because a least I can kite. I am proud of my necro triple kiting ability in places like Shard's Landing. (It's triple and not quad kiting because the first mob dies before I finish casting DoTs on the third.) I am a necro, I should be able to kite, and do it well. I have always believed enemy summoning should be reserved for named mobs and raid bosses. Why should some stupid little trash wyvern in Shard's be able to summon me? Why should I be forced to pop a cleric merc to pet tank? My pet heals often cannot keep up with most mob damage in 95+ zones, and I certainly can't be DPSing when I'm spam healing my pet. I am a SOLO class and I want to be able to SOLO how I want to. I have been a necro since 2006 and there has always been a decent place to kite. Upon returning this year I was pleased to find there were still good kiting areas in places like Shard's. When I found that most things summon in Ethernere Tainted West Karana, I decided not to spend much time there, and have been sticking to Rain of Fear zones. Now this completely nonsensical and insensitive mob summoning change? ARE YOU KIDDING ME?

Someone in game made me aware of this devious you're planning, and upon reading about these changes here I promptly cancelled my recurring subscription to EQ. I thought you were through screwing with necros after the Death Bloom nerf, but I was wrong. And still people say that our Epic 2.0 from god knows how many years ago will be nerfed next. AS far as that issue goes, if we want to sacrifice a ton of hp/mana to use an old 400 hp weapon for its focus benefits, that should be OUR CHOICE.

You are taking away player choices, and I am tired of nerfs. Take care.

Oh well. Kind of a bad move.
Playing a mage as main char myself, I have to say I expected the Beam Line to be nerfed so the
annoying part of players lagging a zone out would just stop.
Beam is fine for farming grey-con TS items, but it's not necessary at all.
It's just handy and not necessary at all to "enjoy the game".
I never beamed for XP, nor sold PL's - and I'm brave enough to say that 99% of the mages who
play a mage as a main char on AB did the same - leveling/xping as intended without using
stupid Beam Line.
It mainly were the Melee Classes PL'ing a mage and selling Beam PL's, lagging the zones out and
annoying the hell out of the casual players who weren't able to complete quests etc. just because
"someone" decided to be a jerk.
If those would have done it in instances instead of live zones, it would never have been an issue.
So now we are here - having all those mage hate, plus devs making a weird decision and ruining
the game for kiting classes, just because PL'ed jerks can't stop with this BS.

Like it was said here before: The jerks will move on and find other zones to sell their PL's.

So please, stop it finally, skip that test update and just nerf the Beam Line.
Give the spell a target limit and done.

So people can start thinking of a new strategy to behave like a jerk in live zones and hunt
another class down the nerf threads and leave us main mages alone. Thanks.

Oh, look! It's started!

I got an earful from a friend last night on Skype. She was ranting about getting run over by a mage. She confronted the trainer, and he said he was looking for a new place to hunt cause mobs in his old hunting grounds are getting changed.

I sincerely hope you're joking and if you aren't. I want this patch pushed to Live just so you quit.

At first I was in total agreement that nerfing all classes just to dispose of one thing that needed to be disposed of (mage beam kiting) was beyond overkill but, now knowing that it will get rid of players with your mindset, I support it 100%.

Bring on the summoning mobs!!!!

Actually the cheapest solution of all, which will least impact everyone, save the players trying to control the bazaar prices, would be to instance every zone but city ones. That way, only you or your group would be present and enjoy the zone without others inside it training you and whatnot. That means:

1. You can actually do the dailies without others keeping the daily mobs cleared from the zone.
2. You would then have the choice to camp and kite in your favorite spot whenever you want to.
3. The instances would persist and be linked by being in the player's group, so if a person joins the group from outside the zone, they would correctly zone into that specific player's instance. So the group leader would have to stay in the zone instance but an alt or another player can leave to sell and come back.
4. Anyone actually against the idea is living in the stone age: there are too many problems with players doing their own things and trying to hog spots and resources to frustrate others. This simply eliminates any bottle necks. Players can still group and raid but without interference. Training others is not enjoyable, keeping daily mobs camped so others cannot do them is not enjoyable, and having specific mobs needed for epics and specific quests continually camped is not enjoyable. Instancing every zone solves all of the issues.

So it is time that the developers embrace zone instancing and stop messing with the game mechanics and let us enjoy playing the classes!

Additionally, and to SOE's benefit, the number of petitions and problem load will drop drastically to just the bare problems with technical issues from glitches - not other people.

if every zone was instanced, where would the playing together part come in?
have you never been hunting and actually met a new player and assisted, was assisted, or grouped with them?
if everyone just mass swarmed in whatever way in their little instances with their box toons....why the hell play an old mmo, why not just play some fancy dancy game on your computer or playstation.

[quote
- Blood Drinker's Coating now has a 10-minute recast time, a 3-minute duration, and a description of what the effect does.
[/quote]


I really don't get the point of this change. Has the % been increased? It worked fine as it was.

TL;DR Nerfing abilities such as beams is worse for player freedom than fixing content

So the dev team had two choices. Nerf abilities or fix content so the abilities work as intended.

So let's examine the first option (nerf abilities):

Many people are saying nerf mage beams. If that's the problem, then any ability that allows mass killing is a problem. So Headshot, Decap, and Assassinate should all be reduced to grey con mobs. Also any ability with an unlimited number of defensive procs (since swarming is also a mass killing ability). So a few SK abilities, maybe some paladin ones, and shining from clerics has certainly got to go too. Then we can start to look for what will be used for mass killing next, and look to nerf that.

That's a pretty draconian solution. And much more limiting to players than the second option which we chose.

Instead the team went with the second option (fix content).

When we fix content to add risk/challenge to mass killing we allow players to continue to play using the abilities with knowledge that there may be limitations or risk. These zones should have had some mobs that summon the whole time, now they do. You can still mass kite (in certain areas), or regular kite (in almost all areas with limitations on what mobs you can kite). You can swarm pull (again, in appropriate areas), or root rot (paying attention to what you are killing). You just can't do everything everywhere.

It's by far the smaller change and the one more in line with allowing players freedom and creativity in the use of their abilities. These changes haven't killed kiting, they just mean that people that want to do it may need to make adjustments in what they kite. Similarly root rotting is very viable still, just pay attention to what you are root rotting.

I guess I just see this as:
"Instead of only hurting classes that swarmed in various ways, we are going to hurt them, and anyone else that kited normally ".

The way I kited ( which was not swarming ) has now greatly been reduced as to where I can reliably do it.

Druids don't cherry pick a mob here and there and DoT it down to get worthwhile xp. Druids dont "regular kite" ( if regular means 1 mob at a time ). Druids do not root rot at 100 for worthwhile xp. Druids do not mass kite ( they do not beam, decap, etc masses of mobs ). They are in the middle ground of needing at least 5, but ideally 10 ( 15 when burns are up ) to use the spells we have been given to the best of our abilities. I do not consider 15 to be swarming.

Now, there is only 1 place to do this that I am aware of released in the last 2 expansions.

What is wrong with leaving a couple of options?

Why are other people's freedom greater than mine?

Why do I feel like I am getting limited for other people's use of mass pulling?

If you look around more there are other viable spots. And I'd seriously consider going back 3 expansions, which opens up a ton more spots (for about the same experience over time). You can still kite.

Is it aggravating having to switch spots? Yes. Should the zones have had the summoning mobs originally? Yes.

3 expansions, that would be VoA.
Beasts Domain lacks mobs in quantity. It is a good starter area for people gearing up.
Windsong needs an instance to be viable.
CoB was viable.