Improving Our Alternate Advancement (AA) System

Really, the AA system was fine the way it was for adventuring.

If you want to fix AA's fix the TS AA's. You get some from lvl 10-20 and then nothing until lvl 95-100.

It would be nicer to spread them out a bit to cover the gap from lvl 20-95, 75 levels of no AA advancement for Tradeskillers.

If there was a server like that, you would most likely be the only one on it. You can choose to do only questing if you like though you would still end up with some exploration experience, just consider it a bonus from going where your quests take you.

I know this is going to sound like a trivial question, but I have a lot of toons and I've been playing long enough to remember previous changes to the AA system. Do you think we will log in on Thursday to find that our AA trees are empty, and that we have to reselect our AA choices? We have had to do this before and it's an arduous task to assign all those points again.

No.

If you're worried about it, login and Save your AA specs on each of your characters to a file. Then you can load them back later. You can also download AA specs on EQ2U.

Huh? This isn't an improvement, it's a handout... If you have people complaining about having to earn 280 AAs cuz they didn't earn them by using their AA slider while leveling, so what? Why even play the game at lower levels? Why not just strip the lower than level 85 character content out? Because that's what this is about; people choosing to create level 85 characters and then complaining about having to *actually earn* their AAs to match that level. Having that option *really* kills the lower levels of the game. It's not all about end-game. And allowing people to jump right to 85 in the first place, creates *very poor* end-game players. How can it not?

My level 75 character has 134 AAs and now you're going to dump a crap load of AAs into my character? The AA system is already extremely poorly implemented. I spent hours organizing my AAs and learning all of the junk in there... I made a mistake early on and now I have to re-do probably about 50% of those points... I just think it's a very poor choice of an "improvement", I think you cannot call this and improvement, I think it's poor game mechanic decisions like this that leave such a bad taste in my mouth for this game, compared to the original mechanics of EQ1.

An "Improvement to the AA system' would be to fix the problem of last in -> first out AAs across all pages. Just let me click and unclick AAs and if I *want* to do a custom in-advance build, give me the option, but *also* give me the option to move AA picks in and out of the AA stack to any point in the AA stack. The AA system has been a major source of frustration for me in this game.

Man I must be getting really old, since I am so clueless as to what the problem this change will be. I have mostly all 85 + toons, So as far as I can tell none of them will be effected unless they have less then 280 aa at which point SoE is going to give me a bunch of free AA with no effort on my part. Ok, cool, liking that, especially the part where all the experience that would have gone to leveling up AA's will now go to toons adventure level. Are there really people out there saying don't give me free AA? My goodness if you are upset that getting a bunch of free AA is going to mess up your perfectly groomed current AA setup, here's some help, don't spend the new AA then, kinda simple there folks. For those who know me, I'm normally against most big changes to the game, I prefer the small changes, but this is a no brainer. If you don't want the free AA then don't spend it. Either way, you might want to take Feldon's recommendation and download your aa setups for your toons before this change takes place. I know how SoE intends for this change to be implemented, but... well stuff happens by accident occasionally. Again, maybe I don't understand the complaints because I'm too old, haven't had enough coffee yet this morning or because I'm just stupid but so far I'm ok with the changes.

PS. Realize that the AA trees for all the classes need serious looking into, but that's not what this change is about.. at least I don't think so.

My lack of timing is impeccable.

Some time back I ran into the '280 AA needed to move past level 90' wall; I had 260 when I hit 90. Since I had not read up on it before, it was a bit of a shock. I've spent the last few months (I'm very casual) mentored down doing stuff I out-leveled early on, catalogue quests, tomes, etc. I finally hit my 280 AA two days ago. Just in time for the change that would have given me all that AA anyway. My timing, as I said, is perfect.

I don't really see a problem with this change. This way a player will get what the game developers have in mind as the minimum amount of AA desired for each level, but they can still get more if they wish to, using the slider. If you switch off the default auto-AA builds the points won't even be applied; you can just bank them up until you're ready to select a build.

Agreed wholeheartedly. I'm not 100% happy with the welfare aa's this new implementation introduces, sorting the wheat from the chaff is a good thing game wise but not always the best from a financial point of view. Soe has to do what it believes is best to keep people playing, and the sad truth is most that play now don't feel the need to play or just want to cherry pick the best bits with least effort. It's mmo microwave style, and eq2 may be the last bastion , albeit faltering and sliding slowly down the edge of the cliff that is mediocre gaming, of games worthy of the term. Every game eventually has to cater and succumb to the average, and the average becomes more expectant of the quick meal, cheap and tasteless but fills a corner until the next new thing entices them but the short term effort to keep them happy hastens the end of the previous with increased perpetuality.

My wife and I play together about twice a week. It's a time when we can feel young, when we played before having a kid and getting 'real' jobs.

I moved my AA slider to 0%, from 50%. It had always varied in the past, based on balancing levels between my wife and myself. Now, I expect if I get behind, I will feel pressured to play solo some, to ensure my wife doesn't have to turn her exp on, to ensure we stay at relatively the same level.

We would also sometimes, set AA to 100%, to finish content and ensure it didn't grey out. I am afraid we are going to skip content as a result.

Read this stuff yesterday - and having slept on it have some concerns re my play style, and what I get out of it. I play an alt army - I don't have a "main", I don't like "end game" content etc. My sense of achievement as I adventure is character development. This system effectively just hands that to me. Through level locking and doing heaps of quests (I don't mind repeating) most of my low level alts have 100 - 200 aa, and quite a few more than that. I wouldn't mind the earlier idea of being granted the minimum of either the new "by level " system or what you have already earned, but be handing out the combination of both, I will have a heap of characters on or near 280 soon. Yes I know there are still 70 to go, but the main measure of my advancement is being radically altered (not improved or enhanced, altered). To have but not allocate the aa seems like a pretty stupid way of getting around this.

I really don't see why everything has to be focussed on getting to end game - as to me "end game" DOES = the end of the game.

I wrote a quick program to give the actual numbers per level, in case anyone wants the cliffnotes version...
Level 10 --> 5
Level 11 --> 8
Level 12 --> 11
Level 13 --> 14
Level 14 --> 17
Level 15 --> 22
Level 16 --> 25
Level 17 --> 28
Level 18 --> 31
Level 19 --> 34
Level 20 --> 39
Level 21 --> 42
Level 22 --> 45
Level 23 --> 48
Level 24 --> 51
Level 25 --> 56
Level 26 --> 59
Level 27 --> 62
Level 28 --> 65
Level 29 --> 68
Level 30 --> 73
Level 31 --> 76
Level 32 --> 79
Level 33 --> 82
Level 34 --> 85
Level 35 --> 90
Level 36 --> 93
Level 37 --> 96
Level 38 --> 99
Level 39 --> 102
Level 40 --> 107
Level 41 --> 110
Level 42 --> 113
Level 43 --> 116
Level 44 --> 119
Level 45 --> 124
Level 46 --> 127
Level 47 --> 130
Level 48 --> 133
Level 49 --> 136
Level 50 --> 141
Level 51 --> 144
Level 52 --> 147
Level 53 --> 150
Level 54 --> 153
Level 55 --> 158
Level 56 --> 161
Level 57 --> 164
Level 58 --> 167
Level 59 --> 170
Level 60 --> 175
Level 61 --> 178
Level 62 --> 181
Level 63 --> 184
Level 64 --> 187
Level 65 --> 192
Level 66 --> 195
Level 67 --> 198
Level 68 --> 201
Level 69 --> 204
Level 70 --> 209
Level 71 --> 212
Level 72 --> 215
Level 73 --> 218
Level 74 --> 221
Level 75 --> 226
Level 76 --> 229
Level 77 --> 232
Level 78 --> 235
Level 79 --> 238
Level 80 --> 243
Level 81 --> 246
Level 82 --> 249
Level 83 --> 252
Level 84 --> 255
Level 85 --> 260
Level 86 --> 263
Level 87 --> 266
Level 88 --> 269
Level 89 --> 272
Level 90 --> 280

I would like to preface this with; I'm not trying to diminish any particular play style. I feel this game can be played however a person chooses. That said I've been reading this forum for a couple of days now and see an overwhelming number say that this change "ruins" their casual play style. I suppose I could be ignorant, but can't you still set your AAs to 100% and grind just the way you did before this change? Granted, you wouldn't get the "free" AAs after 280 so you will not receive any more free ones after that, but you can still grind them just as you do now. I don't see how this promotes skipping content, I see it as if you level a character and hit 90 you can just keep going to experience the content and not have to stop and go back or stay still for days or weeks depending on the server population. I'm sure this post will get twisted and misconstrued by the masses, but I put it to you anyway... It seems to me that people aren't mad about getting the free AA, it's that if they play their way they won't get them after a certain point. You can still play your way, you can still turn AA off and level how you wish... it's just now probable that you will end up with more than 280 AAs by the time you're 90. Again perhaps I'm just ignorant, but I am most definitely confused by the outrage at the free AA scheme. I understand that it's something people earn, and I myself have spent countless hours on 6 accounts to earn them, but this change makes bringing up alts easier, and I can still make a new character and go through the quests and have fun... I never have to stop and grind Skyshrine ("because...").

so it sounds like if you bought the SC bauble and use it before Thursday - including having already used it - then you get 40 AA less than if you saved it and use it on Thursday and beyond.

anyone gonna have chars that end up using two baubles?

the net net of all of this is no more "i hit L90 and now i'm stuck there until i get to 280AA," as anyone who is L90 will have 280AA, then? fair enough, i suppose, as that was a pain in the butt anyway.

I honestly can't believe how many people are against these changes. Yes, its "free" aa compared to what we're used to. Yes, now you may "miss" content. But are you actually missing anything? I'm sorry but clearing the quests for every zone repeatedly just so I have all the aa required to hit 91 isn't fun when you're on your fourth alt, or you're a returning playing coming back at nearly 90 with 230aa. You can still experience everything if you want to, in fact I'm already thinking of a few different paths to take on new characters. As an old school "grind out XP to level" player, I missed crawling around in dungeons and leveling that because if I spent two hours in ruins of varsoon or RE, I just out leveled entire quest series....now I can do an old school dungeon crawl and not be penalized. Maybe all this "old content" will be used more, in fact I actually saw a few other people in stormhold last night, a place that I doubt many new players even know exist.

Well, see, here's the funny part as well....

You can now get away with skipping zones you don't feel like dealing with, then re-doing them chronomage'd for bonus AA later >.>

So what's the "improvement"?

No more 280 wall.

Davs said:

"1. Starting at level 10 until Level 90:

• 5 AAs granted upon reaching level 10
• 3 AAs for each level (16, 17, 18, etc.)
• 2 Additional Bonus AAs for every 5 levels (15, 20, 25, etc.)
• 3 Additional Bonus AAs at level 90 (for a total of 8!)"
  

Why not just simply this and make it 4 AA's per level or something everyone will remember?

Because they want you hitting 280 AA's, not 324 AAs (81*4). They are trying to get rid of the wall that all content 90+ is balanced around, not give you ALL 350 AA's.

Go into Eidolon Jungle, Obol Plains, or Cobalt Scar with only 160 AAs spent (The average for peeps rushing through content on purpose) and see what happens