Play own characters as Mercenaries

Discussion in 'General Gameplay Discussion' started by Powermax, Dec 23, 2012.

  1. Powermax New Member

    Hope this is the right forum to post on, if not pls move, looking to get this to a developer. I have the following problem, groups are hard to find to do heroic instances at most times of the day, and the current mercenaries are really bad (they are junk). I mean I can box any scout and do more then 3x the dps with just bow auto attacks and they don't stand in front of the mob and die.

    I was thinking of allowing us to play our own characters in a mercenary mode. What I mean by that is allow our own characters with better gear, spells, AAs to act as mercenaries. You must already have most of the code written for the regular mercenaries, so I don't think it will take to long to implement. You could restrict somewhat the amount of spells available (but they should be more then the current set to mercenaries). The way I see it work is if you want just do something like /mercenarymode then /follow <name> /assist <name>. We all know that there are many players using bot programs, and this would help put an end to that and level the playing field with the people who follow the EUA. You could limit or add restrictions to this like, under mercenary mode you can't gain expirience and maybe you can't have more then 3 players under mercenary mode in a group/raid.

    So what's the downside of this idea? Grouping with people, but that's hard to do specially in early hours of the day. What are the advantages? Allow groups of 2-3 people to do heroic zones with more ease, level the playing field with those who chose to break the rules, and allow people to enjoy playing the game and not wait for hours for friends to log or groups to form. For Sony, you would sell more subscriptions and expansions (maybe since I know most people already have more then 1 account), but also lower the amount of use of bot programs.

    Please feel free to add more ideas to this.
    Catbriar likes this.
  2. Seiffil Active Member

    Mercs aren't meant to replace players in a capacity where you are just as well off with a player as with a merc, which is why in some cases they really seem to underperform. What you're asking for is not a mercenary you're asking for is for sony to basically make your own toons into bots for you.

    Now if they were to come up with something that would potentially allow a player to log in multiple toons from one account simultaneously where both could be played that is one thing, just not this.
  3. Powermax New Member

    I run zones (ToF, Dreadcutter, Chelsith, ST, etc) with my wife with a Zerker, Illy and Troub and 3 mercenaries (2 healers and 1 dps). I can tell you that this is better then some pickup groups I've been in. What I want to do is the harder zones that people with 6 bots can easily do but with mercenaries it's impossible. Sony isn't doing much to discourage the use of bot programs allowing them to be used for groups and raids ~ just asking to level the playing field.
  4. Kindle Heartforge Active Member

    Which bot programs are you referring to?

    I don't know if perhaps you are confusing "bot" with "box". Bot implies automation, which is strictly against the EULA. Box programs are allowed as long as they do not, in any way, support or enable automation of a player character.
  5. ColbyJack Well-Known Member

    Sure, let's go ahead and make a shuffle towards a more soloable game. I'm waiting for the day when people complain that it's hard to find enough people for raids and to enable duoers/moloers to do them as well since it's not fair.
    If you want to box, that's fine. If you want to use mercs, that's fine too.
    But please don't find more ways to dumb down the content even more.

    If your idea is enabled, ie: two people can do Harrow's End with ease, then yes... I suppose it would make it easier for people who cannot find groups. It also gives you no reason to form up a group any longer for the zone.
    Terein likes this.
  6. Powermax New Member

    No I mean bot programs, and I'm not going to list them, and yes I know they are against the EULA. Google and you come across a bunch of them. Some are so sophisticated that know how to joust, target, follow, cure, heal in groups and raids (not to mention out dps real human players). Someone was looking if people were interested in a script to do the entire UD zone with all 6 bots automatic last expansion. Just because something is against the rules, don't be fooled by thinking they don't exist.
  7. Regolas Well-Known Member

    I'm sorry but making the game easier to do without utilsing other people is bad in the long run.

    You have already admitted you seperate yourself from the rest of the playerbase and choose to run heroics with 3 people (or is that just you and your wife playing 3?) rather than invite others.

    If you really need to do the HM versions and don't want to bring others into your group, then upgrade your PC, buy 3 more accounts and run 5 accounts at the same time with the boxing program.

    Making everyone more able to do things without others will make grouping even harder to do.
  8. Neiloch Well-Known Member

    I know what happens when they make mercs viable player replacements, I see it in EQ1 every day. Group size goes from 6 people to 3 unless the players in the group are charitable or just ignorant or the players wanting to join are decked out in good equipment. More often than not the fully upgraded mercs perform much better than players themselves. This has led to people simply 'moloing' most content. "leveling the playing field' against a small minority that use botting programs is a bad idea.

    I would rather see them put some actual effort and thought in making the DF better so people will group up more. One that at the very least puts together reasonable groups instead of ones with 4 tanks and no healers. Frankly EQ2 just needs to copy/paste a lot of Rift's grouping systems imo.
    Terein likes this.
  9. Estred Well-Known Member

    Tbh if they did this it would kill grouping even more than CoE already has. Mercs were a very bad thing for grouping and never (imo) be summonable inside of a group or raid instance. If you want to solo that is what Mending Adornments were for which also were reduced so hard they were unviable.

    Superior Runes of Blasting back in SF a 1.2K proc was actually good damage (Tanks had only 22-28K hp)
    Superior Runes of Mending back in SF just like Blasting was a sizable heal.

    Astral versions... we have 60-80K hp as tanks alone and scouts have more than tanks in hp. Mobs have millions of HP these runes are worthless by comparison to the 2.5% CB adorns we can put on Primary, Secondary and Ranged items. To be Viable these runes would have to be hitting 12K heals and 8K procs like yellow adornments to even be a choice over the Increased Critical adornment.
  10. Finora Well-Known Member

    While I would be one of those who could greatly benefit from improving mercs or some other thing, but I think it is something that is unnecessary. As someone else stated what really needs to happen is improvements to the dungeon finder, not overpowered mercs. As someone else said, it sounds like what you really want is a SOE approved way to bot.

    If you want to do group instances, either get really good at using your mercs (really can't just set them on follow and let them do their own thing) or boxed alts or find some other people to group with. If you find groups impossible to find in your normal playtime, perhaps its time to investigate a different server that has people who actually play when you do.

    If it's loot you are after, run the solo ones & hope for fabled drops. Those are really very nice. There are also items that have been experimented on easily available if you take the time to look or ask around, some of those are extremely nice as well.
  11. Buffrat Well-Known Member

    Bots do not outdps human players.
    Balbasur likes this.
  12. Erszebeth Active Member

    While I might normally be inclined to agree with that statement, I've been with a number of groups where the human players didn't know their *** from a hole in the ground when it came to playing their character, too many people hitting end game, getting gear and not knowing anything about their toons.
  13. Estred Well-Known Member

    Blame the "anit-Powerleveling" XP adjustments. They just made PLing more desirable because now you HAVE to pull 30 mobs and kill them in 10 seconds or less just to gain decent XP.
  14. Balbasur Active Member

    Should make dungeon finder cross server except for contested zones.
  15. Estred Well-Known Member

    Except Dungeon Finder is dead. I believe SOE even announced at Fan Faire they were not going to continue development time on it as players quickly stopped using it (because it was broken)
  16. Neiloch Well-Known Member

    Dungeon finder is dead and SoE killed it.

    As bad as people like to dump on SoE I can not imagine they genuinely thought that iteration of DF would work. I still think it was a way to sabotage the whole idea so players would stop bugging them for it. They basically made EQ2 players think DF's are bad so they would 'get over it.'

    DF's are a great way to get people to group more. It has been proven in many MMO's doing as well or better than EQ2. they just have to implement it correctly. If the DF put together decent groups I don't think it would even need to extra little reward for finishing a DF dungeon.

    If they just made it put together proper groups based on class and equipment and possibly cross server, it would instantly be a hit. Gear might not even be a problem since no gear drops that would be considered 'below par' at this point.
    Lempo likes this.
  17. Estred Well-Known Member

    Pretty much. I didn't even like the little rewards, as too frustrated having to put on a lot of self-heal gear just to get my group though. Though forget doing Guk Spire with a half-arsed group.
  18. Handbanana New Member

    z

    I still have a screenshot of a EQ2 GM telling me botting was allowed ingame, so long as the botters weren't impeding quest advancement by slaughtering all of the available quest monsters.

    That was in response to a ticket i submitted about him botting, ontop of the quest monster spawn, and the GM also told me to go kill the quest mobs at one of the other spawns.
  19. Wingrider01 Well-Known Member

    Partially right - if you are using automation software to control the other players and it is detected you will suffer the consequences of violating the rules of the game, I multi-box all the time, but have multiple monitors on the single machine and run all the instances off of the same box. I utilize the ingame macro's to control the other instances but the macro's sit on that instance, there is no cross instance communications for control
  20. Obano Well-Known Member

    I think the idea of using player characters as mercenaries is great idea. Though I have my own twist on it with a true mercenary system. When I think mercenary mode it should be about hiring your character out to other players when not logged into the game.


    Only should allow one character per account to be mercenary though. The idea should encourage players to buy and maintain their 2nd and 3rd accounts.
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    Guiscard likes this.