Is Celestial Teachings locked behind the tradeskill mount?

I think Everquest II is just a money source for them, while they're working / developing another game, probably hoping it to become a new flagship. Kind of like what H1Z1 probably was looked up to once, before Daybreak's conservative tendencies, like putting a hard grind on players, put the latter game into the unfortunate position as it is now. Saw a review about it in an established German gaming magazine or two, they didn't leave a lot of polish on the game for sure...
But we won't know why EQ2 is getting done the way it is, fact is that it more and more design decisions get rather unpopular lately.

What game?

An interesting insight.

Can't recall the last time I saw a company so seemingly ok with constantly ticking its customers off, and I can't recall a group of customers who continue to feed a company their money while this is happening.

Makes no sense, no matter from what side you approach it.

P.S. By the way, no one should be surprised. This is essentially the same thing they did in KA. Same substance, just a different form.

KA - Journeyman/Expert/GM/Ancient - Gated behind RNG Drops. Adept/Master - Introduced 4 months in and gated behind a huge grind combined with RNG.

PoP - Levels 1-10 still the above ^ + Gated behind long Heroic Grind + RNG on Weekly quest. To get 5 spells, x6 tiers is 30 spells x 33% chance. That's only 90 Weeklies (33 weeks) assuming you get 0 dupes.


In all honesty, unless people stop actually paying DBC for them, they'll continue to do so. As a business if I knew I could get away with it financially I would.

This is where I look. They can offset the decline in paying players by making it hard to get the upgrades and bilking those remaining for micro transactions (which are not really micro).

They have pretty much eliminated, or placed behind ridiculous gates and blocks, anything that players used to get to help them progress if it is offered for sale in the shop. They put in walls, blocks and grinds to slow progress because the content is so small (or in the case of the TS line, just not there). They take the easy way out designing fights and instead of trying to figure out balance, they just have mobs heal or kill you if you DPS too fast. The only thing they really post on their forums are the patch notes and if they are selling anything.

They got me this time, I won't fall for it again.

I think some of these decisions make a lot of sense if you look at them from a different perspective than some people seem to want or be able to take into account.

Enlighten us with your wisdom Castegyre...

Again?

Of course!

Yup.

Well, to put it bluntly since I think getting banned at this point might be a kindness, I don't think CN ever cared about EQ2 or intended to properly support it. I would estimate that it is easily the least valuable title they have currently and wasn't much better off when the company was bought even if you include things like Landmark and Next. I've watched people buy businesses in the past intending for them to be write-offs. The way this game has been seemingly managed to fail looks familiar.

A lot of people here may not like that assessment. EQ2 has less potential for growth or expansion that H1Z1(s), PS2, or DC. It has worse (if any) name recognition for the most part than EQ and apparently takes a lot more to run in less well condition. If i had to pick something to sacrifice for the good of the company it'd be this game.

The game has been poorly resourced, poorly managed, over monetized, the community has been poorly handled, there's been essentially no promotion of the product, information has become increasing obscure, etc. Everyone gets the point by now.

It seriously reminds me of a guy I knew who bought one restaurant as a write-off and to drive more traffic to his other restaurant that sat at the opposite end of the parking lot. It also reminds me of a similar thing my uncle did back in the day.

If people assume CN saw a lot of potential in this game and really intended to make a go of it then it makes no sense, and I'm sure that's the perspective a lot of people here would like to have. If you look at it as an expected prolonged failure for any number of reasons a business might do that sort of thing for it makes a whole lot more sense.

Or it could be a failure pile in a sadness bowl of incompetence, but that actually seems less likely to me. CN likes money.

I said a while ago that I thought EQ2 was being written off, I am glad others are seeing that possibility also. I hate that for this game, but we can always hope for a Project 2018 to be started up this year... we can only hope and dream... though I was told that EQ2 at start up was a lot different than how it was UI and game mechanic wise a few years later. Nevertheless, we can still dream of it.

This expansion managed to actually break the EQ2 addiction for me. I really didn't think that was possible, but then I finished the signature line and realized that only grinding was left. When I log in, it's only for about 5 minutes. At that point, I realize there's nothing to do and I log off. I started playing at launch and it has been a good run, but it is clearly over.

I'm sincerely sad to read this post, Dude. An exit like this from a hobby you've enjoyed for so long isn't easy.

There is a big world outside The Bubble, though, and while you'll never find EQ2 again, there's a lot of fun to be had, whether in MMO's, MMORPG's, or single player games.

/salute

~Game On!~

Actually... They seem to be... At least, the ones that are "Invested" into video games.

Since, they seem to forgo the idea of "Investment" and go straight into the "Lets kill off our supply of money just to make a quick buck!"

It happens time and time again...

You want to earn millions upon millions of dollars? You make a thriving long term source. That would be, for a video game, a healthy game that seeks to retain players for as long as possible in addition to bringing in new players (With the idea of hoping they become long term players)

Instead, they try and milk people on the short term, killing off their long term fans, just to get a quick splurge of new blood to pay an extortionate amount and then leave after 5 minutes. Then the game dies and they stop earning money.

Like, a real world example:

WoW at its peak, had about 12 million players back in 2010. Each expac is ~$60 and there's a $15 monthly sub.

Had it retained these numbers, that would be $15*12*8 = $1440 per player in subs and $240 per player in expacs. For a grand total of $20,160,000,000 ($20 billion)

Instead, it kept losing players so it got far less subs, fewer expacs sold, fewer players to offer extortionate cash shop cosmetics to etc.

Literally, compare the numbers. Retaining 1 person for that time is $1680. How many new people do you need to grab in order to offset 1 loyal person? $1680/240 = 7. 7 new people, per 1 that leaves (Considering WoW was down to ~5 million players before they got too embarrassed to post the numbers, that means they needed to bring in 49 million temporary players...)

It honestly just boggles my mind, every which way you look at it, subscription fees > instant payments for gaining profit. I mean, the base numbers are every 4 months of subs, that person has paid an expansion's worth of money. You didn't even have to go through all the work of MAKING AN EXPANSION to get it...

Just because it takes a bit of investment (Gee, I wonder if there was some kind of Banking around Investments that would teach people how good investments are economically...) and thus time, business seem to forgo it, despite the fact that MMO's are literally THE epitome of time sinks where the idea is that you end up playing the same game for YEARS. Ask any MMO fan how long they've played MMO's for and then think about how much money you could have made from subs alone if they played YOUR MMO for that entire length of time (For me, that's 12 years. That's an easy $2160 that someone could have made had they held my attention for that length of time. Just in subs. Let alone Expacs - If annually that would have been $720. Or even cosmetics (I'm really a sucker for Fashion Souls... Could have made several k just from that >.>))

But no, get the "fast" cash from expacs, get the 5 people who still play your game to shell out $100 for the ability to play... Then watch them leave after 5 minutes...

Get your quick $150 per person... Forget the thousands of dollars you could have made and could still make per person had you not been a greedy moron who can't see anything but dollar signs...

MMO starts brightly with million things to do. Some people try to develop their character as fast as possible probably thinking that when their character gets to the top the real fun begins. No, what they find is mostly grind. Time to quit and find another MMO and repeat the same routine again.

I was looking for MMO that could break that cycle and I have found EQ2 that keeps my interest for years.
My approach to MMO: find something in game that will keep you from reaching end-game moment.
MMO should have stop experience gaining mechanics in it in order to achieve it.

But then again, spending 200 hours on MMO quit it and start a new one is quite attractive too. Good luck Dude.

To be fair, it depends on how the MMO is designed.

These days, they seem to mostly be funnelled into this "Get max level ASAP!" with then not enough new end-game content to hold off the grind...

But, some, there's more focus on the journey rather than the destination (Such as pre-WotLK WoW, GW2 back when I played it, Rift back when I played it (Actually, it died because they didn't have end-game stuff for a good while... It was entirely focused around the journey to max level... Throw in the fact that you only needed to make 4 characters to play any mix of classes and RIP playerbase xD), AO is such a long journey that it HAS to be one that is entertaining 220 levels (With the last 20 each taking longer than the first 200...) etc.)

Which, I think is a really big part of an MMO.

Like, one of the main things that draws me to MMO's, is they have massive persistent landscapes. It's so cool to explore them all, getting cool stories unique to each one (Essentially, like having a normal RPG title in each zone!) and then eventually reach end-game and start working on progressing your character. Much like how I quite enjoyed Kingdoms of Amalur RPG (I was the sad act that did every side quest... Though, a lot of the charm was lost when I overleveled things and accidentally made a super OP af build that literally 2 shot the final boss...)

Always sad to see leveling get pushed to the wayside... So many fond memories of just questing for questings sake. Rather than do a quest, get 2000 levels and start doing "End-game" that consists of a handful of dailies and dungeon grinding to lead to... Another handful of dailies and more dungeon grinding?

Especially when you think about the reasoning behind this theme "Because WoW did it!" "You mean, WoW after it started going down the toilet?" "Uhh... Yeah... I guess... Now that you mention it..."

Again with our bubble Tekka, I have truly believed you loved our bubble just as much as I do, but it seems lately you want people to burst it. I/We just cannot have that. Our bubble needs to remain intact.

I would so love if someone, perhaps KAITHEEL, would enhance our bubble by utilizing the systems we already have at our disposal. Systems like the crafting instances, the tradeskill apprentices, and many others could be shown some love. The instances that are already in could be left as they are or have some things added or updated in them, new instances to go with the newer lands could be added, they have added to them before. Tradeskill apprentices could have some new recipes added to them, we are not talking BiS items, the house items from them are fabulous and we all know decorators love nothing more than new house items whenever they can get them. Maybe a new TS Apprentice or two, I would love to see a Bloodytooth Goblin and/or a Sphinx, with new recipes. I could go on and on, but I won't.

Our bubble shall remain intact Tekka and you will be trapped with me inside of it for all eternity!!!!!!

Cyrrena

KAITHEEL FOR TRADESKILL/DECORATOR PERSON (in addition to events and holidays)

It is against forum rules for me to name the other game.

Ok, I will bite the bullet and probably embarrass myself. I started MMORPGs' with UO when it was in beta, I started with a single account, bought the game, and paid my monthly sub of $10 US. Within a year, I had 2 accounts, both had the base and the first expansion, and were subbed every month. By the time I finally threw in the towel, 12 years after my start, I had 12 accounts, all with the base ($55 US) and every expansion (11 of them at an average of $50 US), and all subbed at $10 US per month. I had 12 accounts from about the 18 month after release. I refuse to do the math, but its considerably more than your example. Had the "new" wave of developers not driven it into the ground and to a place where everybody I knew refused to stay, I would probably still be with that game.

On November 4, 2004, I bought EQ2, and I have had 2-4 accounts subbed since then, I played this along with UO. All the accounts have all the expansions until KA, only 2 have KA and PoP, and the 2 without KA or PoP are now subbed with Kronos.

During this run from 1997 to present, I have also played EQ, subbed for 2 years though and had the first 9 expansions. I have played WoW, uhmmm just no, even though I subbed that on 2 accounts for 2 years each. I played DAoC, another uhmmm no, subbed 1 account for 6 months and 1 account for 2 years. I played LoTRO, was alright, but just didn't give me the warm and fuzzy that I got from UO and EQ2, subbed 2 accounts though for more than 3 years. There are more, probably innumerable at this point in time, but again, the warm and fuzzy was not there for me.

If I play something though, longer than the trial, I pay even if a free to play model is available, everybody likes a paycheck, and servers are not free, they are not free to maintain, and they are not powered by the warm and fuzzy contained on them.

No gaming company in existence now, cares about the player like me, that finds that niche I belong in and will stay in it until I am pried out of it, and I pay, base, expansions, subs, and if the warm and fuzzy is overwhelming, I do it in multiples. Longevity is not what the gaming companies are looking for, they stopped looking for that in about 2007. That is when I can truly remember game changes and designs begin to cater to the new short term player and hoping that they were not destroying things so much that the player with longevity in their history is pried from their niche.

At this moment in time, I can feel the walls around my niche widening and I do not like it. I understand that things have to change and progress, but there is absolutely no reason that change and progress has to be done in such a way that alienation of those that have supported everything for many years has to occur.

Its pretty simple for me actually, I would prefer the developers to come right out and say, you and your playstyle is not what we want, nor support, here is a list of others that might want you as we do not, we want the player that will come, do free to play as long as possible and maybe if we are lucky will spend a total of $250 US before moving on to the next new shiny thing.

OK, I get it, I am old and my thoughts are ancient and outdated and the fact that I believe there should be loyalty and honor in all things is not valued. But I also do not have to be smacked in the head with a cast iron pan, I know the signs when its time to go, and when I see the last of those signs, I will go and my bank card will go with me. And when I go, I do not look back.

Cyrrena

KAITHEEL FOR TRADESKILL/DECORATOR PERSON (in addition to events and holidays)