I run a casual/family guild not a raid guild but I actually suspect the number of raiders is much higher especiallly if you look at All Access accounts only. Though these numbers are a little fuzzy as only the top two raid guilds on my server exclude non raiders from what I can see. Due to the falling player population a lot of raid guilds seem to be opening up to non raiders just to keep their numbers up and in the hope some non raiders who join will eventually raid. The group game on my server is suffering at least as far as real guilds go exlcuding all the single player guilds out there which its hard to get a number on. The other reason the group game suffers is the raid guilds are getting desperate for members and lean heavily on trying to farm the casual guilds left. Daybreak doesn't realize that there is more then getting groups to having a server merge. I have noticed things getting more and more cuthroat as raid guilds scramble for members. A server merger would ease this problem and let things simmer down some. Right now its turning into a shrinking fish pond with all the guilds being fishes.... the more it shrinks the more they fight to stay in the remaining water. I do agree though that group content suffers because group players are much less fanatical or extreme about the game and do not speak out nearly as much. Part of the issue is that it is harder to get group players to stay updated on the latest expansions. I see a split in my own guild where some keep up to date and others don't and it decreases the grouping opportunities. I have discussed the issue with some devs and one of my thoughts is that more incentives to get the latest expansion should be offered. I know TBM was an attempt to make gear look so much better it would lure groupers in but people who wait find out there are tradeoffs on that stuff. TBM gear still needs work and they refuse to do that so it is what it is. Some group players are relatively hard core and will always keep up with expansions and want the best gear. Expansions need to appeal to others who are not so hard core and more needs to be added to expansions that give them reasons to get it. Large bags, mounts, extra features are more likely to appeal to to the more casual groupers. Even if more giveaways with expansions ended up cash neutral for daybreak (with less marketplace sales) it would get everyone at the end game expansion which will make for a healthier game. But coming way back to the topics thread I agree a deeper expansion that is going to have at least some content to appeal to the more casual gamers would help things. Up until TBM I have generally been into the expansions pretty fast and gone through them then helped guldies. TDS took me a month to get into.... TBM I still have not done extensively except for open TBM raids and thats on only one of my all access accounts. TBM just didn't seem as fun. As they make expansions leaner and leaner giving the bare minimum to make the hard core players not happy but at least willing to pay for the expansion they lose out on the casual folk. Obviously Daybreak feels that this is the way to go for the best profits. I think they could make their money and do more but I don't have the numbers to back me up and they do. *shrugs*
Yes. That's what they have been doing for the last few expansions. Taking existing zones and repurposing them for the new expansion. . . . Sometimes it's just an updated version of an existing zone with higher level mobs, new items and/or new raids and sometimes they reuse the zone layout and make an entirely new zone out of it. I'm OK with that, given the limits they have, but other people don't like it at all.
Personally I would love for them to start using expansion content like SOD and COTF in order to revamp older existing zones........ For instance use OGH to update Qeynos Hills integrate Surefall Glade into a the new Qeynos Hills (OGH version) like they did when they combined Oasis with South Ro.....these type of updates would be highly welcomed and received I believe. Another would be to completely replace Black Burrow with the newer version SOD "Old Black Burrow"
I Guest raid with three different guilds, I agree with your assessment that EQ probably has a higher population of players who raid or raid exclusively that many other games. What I see when I'm guest raiding is a number of players who are rarely on outside of 10 minutes prior to the start of raid, they stay the entire raid, and then say goodnight. They have their friends they like to see every raid but as far as the group content goes, they've kind of been there done that, and are now done. I have no idea what the population of players doing this is, and I'd suspect it would be a small quantity, but still when you add this to the population that raids and groups it makes a higher portion of the population.
