The EQ2 Time-Locked Server Discussion Thread

Discussion in 'General Gameplay Discussion' started by Vinyard, Jun 4, 2015.

  1. Aazzlano New Member

    My most fond memories about the earlier days in EQ2 were just being able to progress through the content as I leveled up. Nowadays if you had yourself at 90% to AA you still would outlevel a lot of content before you finished that tier.

    I'm very curious about the itemization.. personally I like the current system as far as clarity... you can distinctively tell what gear is going to be better on your character (for your playstyle) based on what stats you need or want. Gear with +2 STR, +7 INT, +4 AGI, +1 WIS, and +4 STA is just messy and yeah if you had that on like a rogue you could get some nice poison damage bonus with the INT... but its just unnecessary IMO. So I like the current itemization as far as that goes, BUT it is obviously clearly overtuned for the old content. I don't know what could be done about that.

    EXP rate of course has to be cut dramatically, but that is a given. One concern I have though, is that the introduction of AA randomly during the course of the server will just make it feel like a grind for already maxed characters instead of an ALTERNATE advancement path, which bothers me. Personally I REALLY enjoyed (prior to the auto-AA grants upon leveling up) rolling a toon, pumping the AA slider up, and clearing all the content I can (dungeons, heritage quests, achievements) in that tier before moving up to the next tier. The mix of leveling up and the AA gains and speccing in the AAs felt like true character progression. I would like to retain this but I don't think it would be appropriate to have those AAs until the xpac that they were actually released in.

    As for some of the tedious things, I'm really not a fan. I'll take each of those points individually. And I don't know which if any would/could even be implemented anyway, but I'll give my 2 cents on each anyway

    Soul Shards: ehhh.. I'd rather not, but if they were to return, it wouldn't be so bad. Much better than old school corpse runs..

    Shared XP Debt: NEVER AGAIN

    Boats to travel: Sure. Lack of just being able to bell anywhere instantly makes the world MUCH bigger, which is really important.

    Zone flagging: Yes! Locking zones like Feerrott etc. until the quest is completed is great. Brings more feeling of progression.

    Heroic Overland Zones: Not really sure. They were great during their time but I can see the need for solo areas to be available and the whole overland solo/dungeon heroic setup works fine. But I think that something needs to be tuned so its not such a steamroll with new gear.

    Spell Rank Research: With a completely new economy, having the research system along with Daybreak Cash purchases for research time reductions to get masters early is a bit pay-to-win, so idk. Otherwise, it takes quite a while and if you are spending like 20% of an entire expansions time waiting for an single Expert to upgrade to Master, I don't think that is that big of a deal.

    AA Trees Layout: Current trees are fine. Especially if we keep the itemization closer to how it is now.

    Idk can't think of many other things. But really I think everyone is concerned with the difficulty level as a result of the current itemization... I mean as it is now with some decent gear you could easily kill the early content raid mobs on-level with just a few people, not to mention the solo or heroic content lol. Leveling as a scout nowadays you can literally 1 shot yellow ^^^s through most of the mid levels and even up in the SF xpac areas with your bow if you have your gear specced correctly, though that takes reforging but still, that is absurd.

    I think a beta server would really help this, as we don't know how fast things will be downed and how much the content, items, and exp rate should be tuned in order to make it nontrivial like a few days after release.
    Aeneka and Iadien like this.
  2. Hreysti Member

    I don't care personally about the ruleset if its just current EQII with some zones tuirned off.
    Lateana and Aazzlano like this.
  3. resonate Active Member


    Pretty sure they scale loot tables back to as they were at launch
  4. Xevran Well-Known Member

    I mean if they could that would be great, but I'm not seeing an easy way for them to accomplish that. It's much easier just to give everything more health and make them hit harder especially considering AAs are going to become the bigger of the two problems very quickly.
  5. Hreysti Member

    What a great MEMBER of the community!
    Aeneka likes this.
  6. Aazzlano New Member

    The problem is that I don't believe they actually have the files to match how it was.
    And with current itemization, all the content is trivial pretty much any time you match the level of the mob.. or even sooner... but yeah. So in some manner that needs to be addressed. Whether its the scaling up of mobs to make them more like the mobs you see in current end-game overlands/heroics so they actually at least take a bit to kill if you aren't horribly overgeared/overleveled compared to them, or the scaling down of gear, or whatever, idk.

    Another thing to consider is that we likely will not have any AA for a while, so that is a huge amount of power taken away from the toons. Take out reforging and masters you bought on the broker for irrelevant amounts of pocket change, and basically only be able to go with the gear you can hunt or quest for, and it might actually be somewhat of a challenge. To solo them. Grouping will still trivialize the content I think... so either way something needs to be done.
  7. Xevran Well-Known Member

    I agree to a certain extent.

    They have to make some changes, I realize they can't change everything back to the way it was but some things NEED to change or fact of the matter is I would rather just run with a progression guild on AB.
    Aazzlano likes this.
  8. armawk Member

    I think if you lock level, AAs (MOST IMPORTANT), zones incl dungeons and races (no faydark and no fae/emo fae/neriak until eof time) to each expansion you may be on to something. Obviously halas is going to have to be there but that doesnt really cause any problems I guess. I think you should also restore the access lines for higher zone levels in the original game.

    Not meaning to be a dick about it, I'm not sure that adding a starting area back on the isle would be all that difficult to do, it is just a zone you already have and the mobs are all in game, and quests were not that complex..there is a bucket of content still in qeynos and freeport for the crossover to antonica and commonlands. I think the juice might be well worth the squeeze on that one.

    The freeport and qeynos rebuilds represent a problem, because the storylines that make the quest zones there make sense don't make any sense if we are back at the start.
  9. Windstalker Executive Producer

    I posted in the pvp thread and the same will apply here so I'll add it.

    The thinking right now is only slower ground mounts (no flying, leaping, gliding), no guild halls, no AAs in original release, no prestige housing, no BGs, and a growing list of stuff. While we are using the game as it exists, we want to keep features locked by their release timelines. No spell research and stuff!

    The feedback is great! We have a bunch of stuff to look into and it is for you, so keep it coming!
    oakmiser, Aeneka, NrthnStar5 and 5 others like this.
  10. Aazzlano New Member

    yeah I think the Isle of Refuse will be a huge point for a lot of people.

    that being said, IDGAF whatsoever about the Isle, I just want the slower leveling pace, and the actual feel of progression and purpose in a group setting during the older content.

    I wasn't in the raiding scene at all until like RoK, so I didn't get to do on-level Djinn Master's Prism, Emerald Halls, MMIS, etc. so being able to relive those would be great. I mean eventually getting up to VP and raiding for epic again... oh god. I remember when I got my first mythical, on my Inquisitor, I was crying lol. It took so many attempts to kill Nexona but when it was finally downed it was amazing. If somehow it could be made so you can progress through the raids and gear up to kill the next nameds or the next raid zone, that would be perfect.


    EDIT


    Sounds great. Any current opinions on locking zones until you key/quest for them? Or the spawn rates/tier of mobs such as Ladon in Commonlands, who used to be Epic but is now Heroic? Or that Crab in Enchanted Lands? Will those be reverted back to Epic or remain Heroic?
  11. Fuzzy New Member

    Since its impossible to redo the old class progression quests, Would it be possible to just have a cap at 10 and 20 where you cant level past those levels until you complete a re-made quest that mimics the old ones?

    Gear also has to be looked at, We don't need over inflated stats at the start of the server making stuff even easier then it will alrdy be.

    Also, Avatars need to be a thing again.
    Alenna and Nicolos like this.
  12. resonate Active Member

    I'm not the one who came to the thread being a negative nancy
  13. Nicolos Active Member

    Concerning the islands; you guys obviously still have the old zones archived as far as art and props go. I also understand that rolling something back like that could potentially break tons of stuff, but could it be added to the game as a new zone just as if you were adding a new area with an expansion? What I mean is, the zone is built, the models are there; it all still exist. Would it be feasible to just treat it as a new zone by populating it with the models that were previously there? I realize redoing all those quests would be time consuming but maybe just a few of the more popular quests? Perhaps a single quest line that moves you through the zone and not worry about the side quests. The rest of our time there could just be grinding mobs or go ahead and leave for FP/Q.

    Along those same lines; returning the sub cities in the same way even if we had to access them through the bells versus their doors. I just can't imagine my starting days without Longshadow Alley and Willow Wood. . I know that request would probably be considerably more time consuming but I had to ask.

    I know you guys have your hands full but honestly, if the time was taken and it was done with care, you'd bring so many people back to this game. I haven't played seriously in years but talk of this instantly had me wanting to return.
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  14. resonate Active Member

    At least the Ratonga who says "You withered the seas well, traveler, But are you fit enough to serve on the Isle?"
  15. Iadien Active Member

    Is turning the NPC difficulty back up, at all a possibility? To make the leveling experience and quests a tad more challenging again.
  16. Trasor Active Member

    I would really appreciate it if the developers reached out to some of the veteran PvPers and tried to talk to them about what they feel would be best. This is a tremendous opportunity, I can't believe this is actually happening.
    Aeneka likes this.
  17. Xevran Well-Known Member

    Just out of curiosity how are they starting people off since all the current starting zones were added later? I assume they will leave Halas and Neriak in as starting areas?

    I think working the Isle of Refuge back in might be a better idea honestly. People will dislike the newer zones being on the server and the Isle returning would be a great selling point. Then you could disable it with EoF since it adds both a good and evil starting area. Then again I have no idea how difficult adding a new starting area would be, I mean it's not like Halas and Neriak are the end of the world.
  18. Xevran Well-Known Member

    This is a tough one, Bloodlines is grey at 50 for the most part is the only problem with a delay in my opinion. On the flipside adding Splitpaw early might mean people can level super fast without the need for grouping, in which case a delay would be worth it. Fallen Dynasty though I firmly believe should be it's own separate progression gate, it's plenty big enough to justify it.

    About the Froglok quest... I personally think all or at least most free content added after an expansion should come out with a delay, it'll help keep things fresh.
  19. Tabytha Member

    First, thank you for announcing the new TLP servers and discussing it with us. This is something I had always been hoping for since around TSO. I've been playing on Ragefire (EQ1 TLP) but always knew for years I would jump to an EQ2 TLP in a heartbeat. Some things I want to talk about, which have already been mentioned by others here, are the starting areas, mob difficulty, and how the Neriak/Halas/Gorowyn/Kelethin starting areas could compromise the order of progression.

    I know right now the devs only want to talk ruleset, but I definitely think the Isle of Refuge would be an excellent draw to the server. Even if we don't have the resources to bring back the original cities (Longshadow Alley, ...), we still have the Isle of Refuge zone map (which is even still used for Darathar), so populate it with some of the mobs we remember, a banker and merchant, and add in a few quests for people to do. Especially with the hype recently on the return of the ruined Isle of Refuge in the latest expansion as well as the Isle of Refuge Prestige housing, this would finally be a huge drawing point to the server.

    Upon leaving the Isle, the starter zones, being that they are still in game (at least some of them, the last time I checked), can be accessed via city bell. You can then allow player progression through these starter zones if desired (Sunken City, The Ruins, The Caves, The Graveyard, ...) and then into Commonlands or Antonica. I'm not sure if all of these are still available, but providing some sort of player progression might be worth looking into without throwing players into EoF+ content and compromising the classic experience. Non-instanced dungeons might be worth tuning up as well, but I don't think these are riddled with as many solo mobs as the overland areas. There are also a number of contested epic mobs that were nerfed to heroic that need to be addressed.

    On that note, I think it is also imperative that mob difficulty be tuned up to be more in line with the heroics that populated many of the zones prior to around RoK. Recall back in EoF/RoK when most of the overland mobs were nerfed to solo level to make it easier for soloers to level. I believe this was Smokejumper's plan to make the game more soloable upon release of F2P/EQ2X since the early game was so dead. We need more heroic (^^ and ^^^) mobs in zones like Antonica to make for viable camps, like the famous beetle and scarecrow camps. Overall, the mob difficulty needs to be tuned up (as prior to the nerfs to heroic mobs down to solo). I would hope that the developers do not intend for us all to be soloing our way to max level. The majority of EverQuest 2, especially until EoF/RoK was very grind based. I do not think that many of us want to quest or solo our way to max level this time around. The change in mob difficulty would require some work for sure, but definitely worth looking into to improve the appeal of the progression experience.

    Including the Isle of Refuge and/or starting in Qeynos or Freeport helps apply to the ruleset I would prefer, which would have us begin at classic (level 50 max, no AAs, only classic zones available [no Neriak, Kelethin, Gorowyn, Halas starting areas]) and unlock new expansions as end bosses are defeated, in a similar fashion to the Ragefire and Lockjaw ruleset for the new EQ1 progression servers. I know this would be technically difficult, as already stated, but please do consider sticking to classic zones only, including starting areas, so as to not mess up the order of progression by having to include the new starting areas.

    In summary, here's my opinion:
    • Ruleset: Max nostalgia: starting at classic (level 50 max, no AAs, only classic zones available [no Neriak, Kelethin, Gorowyn, Halas starting areas]) with progression to new expansions voted on after end bosses are defeated. Adventure packs should be included in this also somehow, perhaps voted on according to their release, but with a much shorter period compared to expansion packs. Races introduced later in the game (Froglok, Fae, Arasai, Freeblood, Aerakyn) should be locked until appropriate. The more nostalgia, the better.
    • Mob difficulty needs to be tuned up, including overland solo mobs (which were once heroic before being nerfed to make the game more soloable and F2P friendly) and the number of contested epic mobs which are now heroic. Make the game less solo friendly than it's current state, given the change in mob difficulty upon going F2P. The game was much more group oriented and grind oriented prior to these changes.
    • Isle of Refuge should come back, because Neriak, Kelethin, Gorowyn, and Halas could mess up the progression quite a bit. Would all of these expansions be unlocked off the bat, or just the starter zones? It doesn't quite make sense, especially with Kelethin which is connected to zones 50+.
    • Class progression (Priest -> Druid -> Warden) with a quest for each transition spun up would be simply amazing, but I believe the previous points are much more important than this tedious task.
    Lateana likes this.
  20. resonate Active Member

    Yeah and Bloodlines came out before splitpaw. I could see bloodlines at launch splitpaw a little later in. The only thing with the Froglok quests is if it's in at launch that means you need to level a guy to around 25ish to do it then reroll to make a Froglok. Not sure if that really matters too much to people and if making them wait will be worse

    But the Isle would need to come back in some form whether Queens Colony or original. Not just because everyone wants it but how else is there going to be any starting place unless you make another new one. I'm also concerened about racial cities, Scale Yard, Big Bend, etc. If those are able to be put back in that would be amazing as well
    Charlice likes this.