Pack ponies won't be able to collect new tier?

No matter what angle I try to view this situation from it doesn't put the development team in a favorable light. That, to me, is all I need to know to see that there is a serious problem.

His argument stems from some folks that were concerned that not only would they be unable to gather enough materials to level themselves (something which is STILL an issue, according to the beta forums, even after adjustments) and help provide for friends and guildmates who didn't have as much time to harvest.

He then suggested that those friends, family and guildmates should spend what little time they do have in fruitless harvesting competition, and stop being moochers.

And went on to assert that those who use the ponies that they earned were abusing them, and claimed that a dev statement supports him (it does not, in fact the full statement negates his assertion).

I'm not sure what sort of crafting activities he engages in, but judging by his posts, it's not at all community oriented.

I highly doubt he'll respond to me here, since he was already thoroughly debunked elsewhere. Folks here still feed him, though.

I agree.

OK, let me put this to bed once and for all.

It doesn't matter if an account has twelve crafters with twelve ponies, because they need twelve times the harvests to support twelve crafters. Do you get it yet? 12 ponies for 12 crafters is the same as one pony for one crafter. Your little guy is in the same boat as every other crafter out there. Right now, we're all little guys.

Yes, being a crafter should mean more than working at a guild hall amenity. But that's all the devs gave us! Except they decided to make it even more difficult for those who like to craft by manufacturing a harvest war, an almost PvP like environment.

Caith's wanting to get people out seeing the zones is specious. As many have already said, harvesting still needs to happen to get rare materials in any decent quantity. And harvesting's only available one zone; if they really wanted us to see the expansion they would have scattered nodes throughout all the zones, so people would travel to all of them to harvest. No, this "wanting people to see the expansion" is a lame cop-out, because they don't want to admit that due to lack of developer resources, they had to pick one playstyle to screw over.

every drop helps, you seem to think just because there is the possibility of the devs changing it, that the change is justifiable, because it doesn't effect you.

every drop in the ocean helps, you claim to be a crafter yet show ignorance of actual crafting, your whole argument boils down to "if the devs want to change it it's justified" and "i don't have as many tradeskillers as them, so please nerf them to level the playing field, because they have put more time and effort into crafting then me"

you don't like that other people have spent more time and effort into crafting and it goes against your personal opinion that crafting is a competitive sport (and because you aren't at the top, they should 'level the playing field')

you are the first and only person i know to consider crafting 'competitive'

'fair' doesn't exist in the real world or here.

Well I NEVER!! How DARE you use actual facts and logic, sir! I demand you stoop to the level of the opposing view and resort to mind reading and blind bias!

You are right, though. For each pony and goblin there is a crafter that needs materials. For each guild harvester that won't be upgraded, there is still status and coin upkeep.


(not that it matters that you're right, he'll keep regurgitating the same flawed argument over and over, ad nauseam because it's all he's got and refuses to admit he's just flat out wrong)

Not quite, but that was an obvious attempt of obfuscation deployed by pack pony supporters early in discussions on this topic.

Yes, in a community oriented environment, I would expect the community to contribute, rather than rely on people with 12+ pack ponies.

If players were not abusing ponies, the Devs would not feel any need to cite people with 12+ ponies on revolving doors being one of the reasons behind the decision. Your assertion that the full statement negates my assertion is an assertion that I would be interested in assessing further

Quite the contrary, I am more for the actual community, and seeing more activity out in the game. The less that goes on behind the doors of guild halls and player houses, the better. I will not know until PoP goes live, but it feels like harvesting supplies and combine demands will be easier to meet in PoP than it was back in T5.

I was thoroughly debunked? I give you bonus points for humor.

you claim to be pro community, yet you falsely claim anyone that doesn't harvest, but gets items from friends that are crafters are 'moochers' when they can and do assist crafters directly or indirectly in non harvest ways.

in other words by your definition of 'moocher' anyone in the world not involved directly in ether harvesting foodstuffs or resources is a moocher.

providing resources is NOT the only way to meaningfully contribute in real life and in a game.

You will not know until POP goes live lol.. well in beta there is ONE OVERLAND. You should probably have tried beta before commenting like most people have in this thread. They did double the nodes and reduce what was needed for tradeskills, however it still isn't enough with the TS line not being incorporated until much later. T5 had at least 2 maybe even 3 (its been a while) overlands to harvest from. You see the activity from those that like to tradeskill by the times they put into decorating homes/guild halls, making foods/drinks and whatever else is needed for guildies, and selling stuff on the side to make a profit for themselves. Players are not abusing ponies, especially since most that have that many have that many crafters to use them for. Here's another clue. Devs gave us HOME depots and portable TS items to (gasp) TS in our homes if we so choose. This has nothing to do with abusing ponies. People had to still get out there, most of them back when harvesting was slow and you got one item from each node, and ran that long quest of harvesting from each and every tier, then running all over the place for little qho for the upgraded pony. The time invested for people to do 1 pony is enough to say I've completed the line give me my item and let me use it. Them not upgrading the ponies is like them canceling the combat mit reduction on your epic. Everything about the epic is good still and you can use it, however it doesn't reduce the combat mit of mobs and you will have to change it out with something because all those mobs have huge mit increases in the next xpac. That's a stretch to say that, believe me, I have both adventurer and crafter both maxxed and I do harvest while I'm out, but I too like to be able to have the supplement on the side.

1) False. That assumes you can read the minds of the posters, you have simply projected your own inclinations onto them. Tighten your tinfoil hat.

2) I'm not sure what sort of friends and family, or community you are involved in, but in a cooperative one those who can, do. And no one said those friends and family NEVER harvested or contributed, just that they had less time. Your charitable nature is truly astounding.

3) YOUR abuse claim is in no way supported by any dev statement (as was pointed out to you, more than once, in your debunking elsewhere), unless you would care to share one other than the one you already have. Because the one you've quoted, to the point of being tiresome refutes YOUR abuse claim by stating that the ponies WILL be updated. If was an abuse, as you claim, no update would be forthcoming. Good on ya for sticking that false claim out, though!

4) Nothing you have said supports the kind of cooperative, friendly community that crafters have built up over the years. It has, in fact, been quite the opposite.

5) And yes, you ARE thoroughly debunked, both elsewhere and here. Every single point you regurgitate has been proven wrong, over and over. That you continue to regurgitate the same FALSE claims - based on nothing but your own personal feels, bias and resentment doesn't make you any less demonstrably wrong.

I give you bonus points for your attempt at condescension, and when the time comes, you can pat yourself on the back... you'll be the only one left to do it.

1) False. One does not need to read minds to see obvious attempts of conflation, and contradictory nature of claims made in desperate attempts to justify pack ponies being able to immediately collect in PoP.

2) If, as some people claim, materials from auto harvesters is only a drop in the ocean, then guild hall depots should see little/no difference in PoP. So those who can, still will. Those with less time, will still be able to craft, be it perhaps a drop in the ocean less than they did before...

3) Yes it is, by proxy of the very statement being made. The noun for abuse is improper use of something. If no one ever sent out more than 3 ponies, I would be very surprised if the Devs made the decision they did for the start of PoP. Unless your position is the pack pony was designed with the intention of encouraging people to cycle through 12+ ponied alts to collect materials, YOUR position is sorely lacking.

4) In the early days of crafting in EQ2, things were cooperative, mostly friendly, and crafting communities flourished. 13 years on, there is still people I play EQ2 with that I met while out harvesting, or chatting in crafting halls.

5) You have debunked nothing, here, or elsewhere. It would seem you desperately wish my claims were false, but no amount of wishing will save you.

enough drops of water put together can fill a cup or a pool. you think the amount gotten from ponies is so insignificant justifies removing them, yet you whine that those insignificant drops are adding up to something worthwhile, even when the resource needs are increasing the more ponies someone has due to needing more crafters to get more ponies and this needing more resources to level those charaters..

make up your mind ether the amount is insignificant as in it's not worth your time to argue for removal or you consider that it adds up enough to be helpful to a single crafter toon.

Yeah, see, if you actually presented any sort of fact, evidence, numbers... well anything except your own opinion and bias this might mean something. Heck, if your arguments were even more than a one trick pony it would be something... but they're not.

I said that you have been debunked, proven wrong, on every single point you make - not just by myself, but several others as well. You refuse to accept evidence. You don't even offer legit refutation, you drag out the same old tiresome circular arguments.

Edit: You also refuse to address any evidence that refutes you, which is outside your extremely limited ability to illustrate your narrow talking points.

I wish the crafting community, as a whole, would get the attention that it deserves. That is my only wish. The single purpose you serve to me is to point out how your kind of self centered bias is going to kill what's left of the game.

And with that, I bid you good day. As I've said before - it's impossible to have a productive discussion with someone who would rather believe they are right than be correct - to the detriment of all else.

(you guys are welcome for that)

I don't think it actually matters how many ponies or goblins or guild harvesters there are in the game. It doesn't matter if they're being used by how ever many individual characters or different accounts or how many different players are sharing these resources with each other.

Perhaps the devs did notice a trend they don't like or think is unhealthy for the game as a whole over time. Perhaps the devs decided that something needed to be adjusted or changed to compensate for this trend. Perhaps we take them at their word and accept that something needed to be done.

Even if we ignore everything else and accept that this is the case then the devs have still clearly failed. They failed to communicate the problem or their plans to address it in a timely and comprehensive way. Based on every bit of feedback I've seen they've also failed in whatever attempts they've made to implement their changes. This is not how you keep a sizable portion of your player base happy which amounts to borderline incompetence in a situation where the game clearly cannot afford to drive off any more players than it already has. The road to hell is paved with good intentions as the saying goes. Even in the best light this looks ugly.


Something to keep in mind as other games are being shut down around us, SOE isn't a thing any more. No one is really left to protect failing products here, and I doubt CN sees this title as anything more than a product. Once it stops meeting whatever benchmarks have been set for it, for whatever reason, I wouldn't expect any kindness towards EQ2 just because the bubble here seems to think it might be somehow special or deserving of it.

one of the ways a friend of mine helped my characters was to go out while my low level adventure high level crafters did the Gathering obssesion he went as a body guard in the high level zones while they harvested.

How to shut down the debate:

1. Go to Fallen Gate server
2. Attempt to harvest rocks on a weekend in Sinking Sands
3. Learn what utter jerks people are, as they run up and /harvest the node you are harvesting/

(P.S. do not tell me that mechanics prevent #3. People will actually click repeatedly on the node you are harvesting to get it during that in between time of harvest 1/3 and harvest 2/3, while waiting for other rock node respawns.)

(P.P.S jerk harvesters will also call on their guildmates to lock down the scant other locations to harvest rocks if they feel you are stealing /their/ nodes in this competitive environment, so you are SOL.)

The ponies' importance is vastly increased for this expansion precisely BECAUSE of the lack of a TS quest line. With writs currently being the only way to level and large numbers of materials being needed to do enough writs, coupled with the fact that harvesting nodes are going to be rarer than rocking horse output in the relatively small and overcrowded single overland zone, upgrading the ponies, goblin and harvesters would have been the obvious solution to help alleviate the problem. ALLEVIATE. Not solve it, because the automated harvesters have never returned enough materials in a fast enough time frame to replace the need to go out and harvest.

I completely agree and would like to add that:

people will hotkey-spam /harvest at a distance while running towards the node to ensure they get it even if they are not within actual range yet - to prevent someone who is closer from getting the node.

I can't count the number of times I've experienced this and thought it just wasn't worth the hazzle it and logged out of game to do something different.

It is not fun to compete for nodes, period.

I use my pack ponies a lot across various characters, but the pony only gets a set amount, takes several hours to do it to. I also go out and do it myself since I know I will get more and better luck in getting rares. Besides I like getting out of the EQ2 house and breathe that fresh air of Norrath..

I kind of hope they upgrade the pack pony, though I dread chasing Qho "the Menace" through the new zones.. never wanted to toss an NPC over a cliff till I entered his web of deceit.

Never? "Have you seen a Gnoll before?"