Exactly who was AOM designed for? (Instance Dfficulty)

I've had groups ask about my DPS before inviting me to a group before. It irritated me enough that I passed on their invite and found another group. Some grumbling to myself about providing a freaking resume to play a freaking game usually ensues.

I think, and this is coming from a casually hardcore player, that this expansion was initially designed to be just a bit too rough with the scripting. It was intolerable in beta, not being able to get past the fast talking Duncan dude just to get my sig quest update. When the expac first went live, the zones were intolerable, like a mini-raid, and I can see how that would kill the fun for a lot of people. Things are much more toned down now, and the difficulty level seems just about right. I still would have preferred toned down and challenge versions of heroics - you know, so I could still PUG in the toned down zones, while being challenged with my guild groups in the harder versions. But what it is now, to me, is better than what it was.

I'm certain its incredibly hard to balance what "min/maxers" want with what the "mere mortals" (eyeroll) want, with what middle of the road people want, with what the crafters want, with what the soloers want with what the... you get the picture. I wouldn't want to be an eq2 dev.

In TSO, Shard Armor was an alternative to drops, roughly the same quality as Dropped Items and were implemented to make sure people were rewarded for playing. This continued in Sentinels Fate where Mark Armor was just below Heroic, it was enough to run almost any Heroic though and more than enough for Overland (which still existed in long quest lines that weren't Signature Only).

Then in Destiny of Velious we had the option to craft Token Armor but, at least for me, since I was in the Raid Scene fairly far I had Kael/Raid armor pretty early on. I believe people used Token Armor here but I did not interact with the Token System in DoV anymore than Pure Primal Shards.

During Skyshrine we had an amazing introduction of Heroiccrafted and Raidcrafted gear. These items were very good for their slot and only available to maybe 3 slots max per character. People wanted these and traded the parts to make them. It also saw more people in the Contested Zone to farm these RNG-Drops to then sell. However, since it was pure RNG and unable to be Solo'd easy (Unlike Clefts) it wasn't farmed to heck like Overlands are now.

It was when CoE/Cobalt Scar came around that it started to go downhill. Heroic Zones became overscripts and felt like Raids except the rewards were... bad. Obol-Gear from the Drinal Merchant became the expectation since nobody wanted to run anything but Harrows End, Dreadcutter and Temple of Abhorrence.

ToV capped it off by making Etyma (Gem Buying) the only way to get gear. The Heroic Zone Gear was "bad" by comparison. Thus people began Alt-Cycling and those of us who only played 1-2 toons were at a large disadvantage over those who had five. At least in ToV if you had Gemmed Arcane Gear you were accepted in all but Vulakaerr's Dominion.

Now, in AoM everything is gated behind resistances so much people want WAY overcap just to make it "simple" to them. Gems are a mess.

What I'm saying is, I should be able to say TO THE GROUP, "This mob needs to be dispelled," and the swash should know their abilities enough to think, "oh hey, I can do that!" Who cares if there's also a mage or defiler or warden or brig or whatever, that swash should still say, "oh hey, I can do that!" I shouldn't have to be like, "yo swash, hit Tease." It's not fair to me to have to micro-manage zones.

I have no problems helping or teaching, but like... I've sat in zones for 4+ hours with people because I only have one mouth and can only tell so many people which buttons to push at "x" time. And for real, after each wipe, I spell out what went wrong and what each person needs to do... and then fail again... and repeat... and fail... and then the 5th time after I say the same thing, someone is like, "oh? really?" And it's all I can do to just laugh and find the humor in it... because it's really just beyond lols.

It's gotten a lot better now that everything's been nerfed to the point of turn and lols (but, the nerfs make me sad since the zones were pretty fun when the scripts couldn't all just be burned through). I honestly don't see how anyone can still be complaining that the content is too hard.

I don't remember there being armor drops in TSO that were equivalent to void shard armor (which could be crafted too, btw, same with Mark armor). Sentinel's Fate IIRC had certain armor slots that were drop only. But my memory is hazy. I don't mind things being on the RNG, but I would prefer a balance between that and at least having an option to earn it via the long route for those (like me) who traditionally have seemingly gained the ire of the loot fairy.

I am really not a fan of the gem system at all, either. It's created a myriad of gear tiers with overlaps, and I can only imagine how confusing it must be for new players. I also dislike having something like 8 or more different sets of gear to choose from (when I'm only interested in 1, maybe 2 at most), most of which aren't any real use to me. Yeah, I know choice is good and all, but realistically there isn't much choice when it comes down to it. Most people reforge out of half their stats anyway. And the token system has gone backwards IMO. It kind of peaked around SF/DoV, and since then it's gotten bastardized, and now all tokens are really good for are gems and runes.

But still, if we want to go back to random drops, the gear itemization has to be toned down. It's very frustrating when you know what piece of gear you want, but 9 out of 10 times get something from the 7-odd sets you're not interested in. And I don't find the shard exchange system a very satisfactory compromise.

It's been so dang long since TSO for me I could very well be wrong. I may be mixing Shard/Raid Drops since I did both Heroic/Raid TSO at the same time since I reached that content long after it was relevant. I agree with you that the Token System was best during Sentinels Fate and Destiny of Velious Era. That system I believe can best be summed up by RNG Supplemented by Tokens.

SF Raids had 4 Tiers of Armor. Each Tier had 2 parts to a Set (For Fighters IIRC). Meaning for whatever Tier you were going for say a named dropped T3 helmets (Maalus Shadowfire Imbued). When slain he dropped:
1 Primary/Secondary
2 Necks
3 Helmets

Of the helmet pool there are
4 Plate Helms (Tank Plate/Tank Leather/DPS/Healer)
2 Chain Helms (Scout/Healer)
1 Mage Hood

That is unless they were split but memory serves that only Fighters had 2-sets of gear. This did however mean that Scouts kinda got shafted because they not only had competition from Fighters on Jewelry but also had to fight RNG with Healers for Armor.

because I would have trouble remembering on a givne toon of mine which spell I use just 1 for alt+1 cntrl+1 etc.

strange how the game worked fine like that the first few years though isn't it? Grouping already provides a ton more loot given the same average playtime. It is better gear, as it should be. You get chests on every named, a final box for everyone, plus your mission crate. While a soloer gets only one. I won't even count the solo mission crate because it always gives a junk adorn.

I'm happy for you that you like it the way it is.. but I'd rather see the population that we used to have.

I've been playing 4 years, this is the only game I've ever played, and I play every day, and read wikis and zam and other pages nearly every day, to learn how to play the game, because almost nobody wants to take the time to explain. They'd rather insult you for not automatically knowing.

I see about 8 things mentioned here that I do not know what the poster is talking about. What is a det window? do you mean "detrimental window"? the little window beside the maintained spells window that shows if you are poisoned or snared? I am just guessing, I have never heard the term used before. How do you check the buffs on a mob? How do you check the buffs on yourself? Do you mean to look in your maintained spells to see what you just got from other group members? What is a debuff? What is RNG?

Why does someone say that Tease is the dispel for Swash? I thought Tease was one of the Swashies taunts. How is a taunt a dispel? what is a dispel? I have never heard the term dispel used before.

If you are wasting time writing out reams of text, complaining bitterly that some players don't know these things, and yet you don't explain what they are, then maybe you are part of the problem, not part of the solution! Maybe these players you complain about are slogging through these 30 pages of 99% QQing, just in the hopes of learning something! I know that I am, and when I finally get all the way through...taking it a few pages a day because frankly, the complaining is tiresome..I'm going to come back in and read all the way through a second time, and take notes. Yes I also take notes. I have several notebooks full of info I have found by chance on chat or hunted up on wikis and other webpages.

So here is my challenge to the complainers. Every one who posted a complaint that some other player didn't know what X was, but you did? Come back here in the thread, and clearly explain what X is. Do this in every thread from now on. Never complain that a player didn't know X, unless you then go on to clearly explain what X is.

Because some players, like me, read these long boring rant threads in the hope of learning something new. And from some of you, all I learned was that I should know X, and if I dont automatically know X, I must be a casual, or lazy, or ought to know to ask, when I dont even know what the question is! You know, but you aren't telling me, are you ! Mwua ha ha!

I also make this challenge to every raid guild or other guild that has a webpage and wants pugs or raids to know strats. Put up a tutorial page, and explain the strats of every dungeon you plan to ever run. Tell players to look it over before the raid. It shouldn't be too hard, you can probably lift most of it straight off the wiki. Thank the gods for the wikis, and Zam, and Feldon, and Naomi Denmother, and all those players who have explained things and contributed to the wikis over the years. Thank the gods for those players who explained about the strats in this thread. Thank you.

I can't believe you have been playing this game for 4 years and you don't know what the term dispel means. Dispel refers to removing benefical effects from a mob. The Swashy spell Tease is defined as: Infuriates the target towards the swashbuckler, increasing hate towards the swashbuckler, interrupting them, and dispelling magic and mental-based benefits on the target.

I think learning comes from doing more than reading. I am not referring to you specifically, but most players power level to end game and don't know how to properly play their classes and then spend their time playing catch up and blaming knowledgeable players for not going into detailed explanations of every thing. A great example of this is a Templar that joined a group I was in and then asked what the praying hands on his toolbar meant.

How many heroic fights in the last four years have required something be dispelled? It's not that unbelievable. Dispels have by and large been restricted to raid encounters.

Another example is heroic opportunities. There's very little documentation explaining what a heroic opportunity is, how to complete one, what beneficial effects come from them, etc. If you weren't around when they were popular you have basically no way of knowing wtf to do unless someone else tells you.

I am certain that any one that has played this game for any length of time has participated in groups or raids at some point and has had an occasion to use a dispel or has witnessed it being used. It is not at all an obscure function.

I mean... I could... but... when I pull up said ability... it lists what it does in the following order: dispel, interrupt, increase threat. Now, you've managed to deduce that "increase threat" = taunt despite it being last on the list of things the ability does... how'd you manage to skip over the first two bullets?

Also, you've just admitted to not reading... so... htf would posting out more reams of text help? But, if you insist:


So when you "dispel" you are making "x" levels of arcane beneficial effects on the target go away or end. Before you ask, beneficial effects are things like buffs, heals, things that are beneficial to the person they are on. Also, "x," in this case, refers to the mob's level. So, this level of tease will only work on mobs that are lvl 41 and below... you'll need to scribe higher tiers of tease to dispel from higher level mobs.

But...
Challenge Accepted (Also, I already made write-ups for most of these zones... any other requests? You need breakdowns of shortened lingo like "det windows" in a chart form as well?)

You can say that, but it doesn't make it true. If it's so abundant in heroic fights, give us some examples from the last four years. I honestly can't remember ever having to hit mine in heroics until this expac. I can immediately recall a few times it was needed in raid zones though.

The point I was trying to make is that a player is going to encounter that term (dispel) at some point while playing this game. Also, these terms are defined and can be found on sites such as EQ2 Wiki (I just looked and dispel and heroic opportunity are explained in great detail). The person I was quoting/replying to said they use sites such as EQ2 Wiki and EQ2 Zam frequently. There are plenty of resources for players to use if they don't understand something. Also, just asking in general chat always works too.

Ok, but not everyone that plays this game raids. You just assumed they did. So if a mechanic that was almost exclusive to raid zones shows up in a heroic zone, why is it unbelievable that a purely heroic player who has never raided would be unsure what to do? And how would they know to look up dispel on wiki prior to needing it? Or HO's? You're demonstrating spectacularly exactly what the poster was talking about. You expect people to just know about things they may never have encountered before.

I knew it. The first person to answer a question, and they just had to include some taunt that I should have known it, and saved them the trouble of having to explain! And after some of you insisted that there are no dumb questions, and that any person in the group who has a question should just ask it! I'm sure that if I were in your group, I'd not ask another question ever again, and risk being sneered at in front of all the other players again. Probably other players feel the same, which is why groups keep wiping. Would it really have been so difficult to just explain what dispel does, without insulting a player for not knowing? Yes I have played the game for 4 years, and no, I have never heard anyone explain what dispel does. Though I have heard raid and group leaders constantly warn Swashies to NEVER STEAL AGGRO, EVER! or it will be your own fault if you die, and you wont even deserve to get rezzed! so as a Swash I would never have used Taunt in a raid, ever, because it increases Hate towards the Swash, and steals aggro.

So how is a Swash supposed to know when it is expected to use Taunt, dispel beneficial effects on the mob, and risk stealing aggro from the tank? How am I even supposed to know what the beneficial effects are on any particular mob? How do you find out? Does the Swash get to decide for himself? Oh, I can see, now, by some mysterious process as yet unexplained, that this mob has more beneficial effects than he should have. What beneficial effects they are, I don't know, but I guess I will now risk getting yelled at by the raid leader, and decide to use a Taunt, and steal some hate, and dispel them.

And yet some of you still complain that it takes a few wipes and a learning curve for new players to "get it"

Of course I don't expect new players to know every thing, but 4 years of playing isn't new. You can't expect to solely rely on other players to teach you every thing about the game. There are many ways to gain information if you don't understand something. That is the point.

You wasted more lines and words, indignantly complaining that I should have learned it somewhere else, than you did explaining it. Technically, you did not even explain it at all. You just reposted the description of Tease, and left me to figure it out for myself. 4 posts from you, now, sneering at me for not knowing, and yet you still havent really explained. Nezette did post some info, but with a healthy heaping of scorn and taunting to go along with it.

Is this how you answer questions in group and raid? Sneer at them for not knowing, and tell them to read a wiki or ask in Gen Chat? And then complain that players don't know what to do, and are afraid to ask? Sneer at them, and ask if they need any other stupid questions answered?

quite alot require dispels in heroic zones, most just have other people do it. or most don't even require dispel to make things happen really, first name in Dom is an example, it has a dispel that you can do that should make it so the tank takes less damage, but it's almost non noticeable, but it's there!

First of all if you play a swashbuckler, you should know what each of your spells can do. You said that you thought Tease was only for taunting. That tells me you didn't read the spell. Knowing when to use certain spells comes with experience in playing your class and in doing different zones. Also, most tanks will let the group/raid know when to dispel. If it is your first time in a zone, let the group know that going in.