Resolve is still terrible and getting worse.

What people seem to be getting confused about, is that Zek's resolve requirements were balanced around the gear currently available and the gear obtainable in Zek... Eth gear, RTT gear, resolve mounts... none of this was possible for players to grind out when Zek was released. No amount of grinding heroic/T1 gear would allow a raid of 18~20 members to have a shot at the higher end of T2 content.

Claims that people need to stop complaining and just gear up, makes no sense to me. Content shouldn't be designed where players have to wait ~6 months for future uber heroic gear, to handle T2 and have a chance against T3 raid content. If there's an achievement for killing a mob with 20 players, that means it is designed to be done with 20. (Yes, it does mean it will be harder, and require extra farming to obtain all the available gear at the time.)

This whole thread is probably pointless in the first place, since we all know we were guinea pigs and Zek was simply their Resolve beta test for Kunark Ascending. The problems we see with resolve right now (yes, there are problems), might already be fixed or have been tweaked to work better... Should just wait to see what they've done differently for this expac, as it's probably too late for them to make big changes at this point in time.

2 cents - the whole resolve mechanics is pisspoor way to slow down progression
Better solution would be harder scripts or/and DPS/HPS checks (similar to what EQ1 has)
Kraelatus and Mushroom have no resolve attachment to it but how many guild actually beat them?
DPS check + script is very reasonable and legit way to deal with it - Captains are great example (if you raid force can't dispatch in time sureshot and royal guard your raid force probably need some DPS adjustment ). I do remember how long took us to learn script and accumulate enough DPS - first kill took us whole 8.5 minutes
The whole argument that resolve is good because it do not affect anything kind of odd.
Look on Venekor - before the whole stupid resolve adjustment that mob was EASY beatable by group of 5 people (yes been where done that) and probably even smaller group. So what was solution? simply bump resolve on him so now you need more like 2.5 groups and resolve ONLY reason why you need that many ppl - this is classical example why resolve is bad
Another example from GU101 - Crab - if this mob did not had resolve attach to it ... it could be easy done with 5 people - all you need 2 tanks good healer and a little DPS with splash damage

Sorry, I assumed that you had more experience with raids guilds. I guess I can try to explain why I don't blame resolve or even care if people are leaving the game because they don't like gating mechanics in raid content.
In over 11 years of raiding I have been in at least a half dozen guilds that have folded because they hit a wall in progression. Sometimes it caused some of the better players to leave for other guilds which set the decline in motion. Sometimes people just stopped showing up because they got tired of fighting the same mob for hours. I was even in two guilds where the best 10 to 12 players left and started a new guild because the rest of the raid wasn't up to performing at a high enough level. I've personally seen these guilds fall and it all happened before resolve was a thing. It happened because those guilds could not over come whatever the gating mechanic was at the time. I've seen or heard of guilds failing due to nearly every gate that has been put in the game. I once saw a guild fall apart because half the priests couldn't find their cure curse hotkey (maybe I should have started a thread on why cure curse was killing the game). My point is I have grown callous to guilds falling apart because it is just going to happen. People can cry out that the sky is falling all they want but I've heard it all before. It is highly likely that the guilds you are talking about would have gone under whether it was resolve or some other gate that was designed to stop progression until the raid force had the numbers, gear or combination of the two. I hope you would agree that no matter what the gate was, if these guilds zoned into zek and couldn't come close to beating one of the first couple mobs, I mean so far away that they knew there was no way they could beat it with their current raid force, they would be in the same position.
Therefore your issue is not with resolve specifically but with a gate which halts progression for raid forces that aren't nearly full and/or have great gear. So I'd like to know if it is gating mechanics in general or the requirement to have a near full raid force and good gear in order to clear the highest difficulty encounters.

Gating mechanics are fine, when used properly.

There's been plenty of cases of poor gating over the years, Resolve is just another one to the list.

I am pro-Resolve, just not with the current implementation...

I've mentioned many suggestions back when it first went live... from changing how the buff stacks, changing it to group only, changing the values on gear, adding high resolve options that hurt personal stats, and a few more that I can't remember at the moment...

I don't want resolve to go away, but I do want how we obtain and use it to be changed or tweaked.

I appreciate your approach in all of this.

We are saying it was put into the game at the worst time; and during an xpac where the disapproval rating seems a bit high,based on the rate decline. The negative impact on the the population may be superficial and temporary, but there is also a good chance that this may be permanent, based on the cumulative responses and testimonies of many during the course of this xpac.
Lets hope it's superficial. I enjoyed the chemistry and approach my guild's raid force had; and if the bulk of those players ever return to the game, there will be more than enough to fill our raid force.

With the exception of you Errrorr, and a few others, there are way too ignorant comments that dance around what's been pointed out by some of us.
This thread is more about bringing awareness to this "community" regarding the negative impact resolve (combined with other changes) has had; and more importantly, to anyone up DGC's chain that is willing to take a serious look at solutions that will replenish the traditional server populations-especially since the devs have no intention of merging servers any time soon.
I don't think there is a single person asking for sympathy. If people, then they are approaching this the wrong way just as the apathetic clearly have.

It's likely that most of us would continue to work hard at raid progression despite this intended speed bump (as has been pointed out) for those of us that struggle with the attrition of an otherwise steady, yet tolerable, decline in player population.

I can't think of a better way to reiterate this.

I don't have a problem with resolve but I can see how it would be another negative in a long line of negatives for some guilds. I have my own issues with the current state of the game that have led to decreasing my play time substantially, if resolve had a negative impact on me I don't know if I'd put in the work to overcome the obstacle. It's not that I'm unwilling to put in the time but rather I don't enjoy the game as much this xpac. As it is I only log in for raids and to grind out stuff in RTT.
On a side note, have the people struggling with attrition considered a raid alliance just until the xpac comes out. It's late enough in the xpac that loot doesn't matter as much (it will all be replaced in just over a month) so you could just random it. I know that raid alliances can be tricky but most problems are due to loot/dkp issues (i.e. people don't like the idea of losing dkp or loot going to other guilds) but none of that would really matter because the alliance would just be for the next month and after that hopefully both guilds could go back to raiding on their own. Also while you have the alliance you can try recruiting hard and training new raiders. It is nearly impossible to recruit raiders when you aren't currently raiding. It's not ideal but if it gives people a chance to raid it would be better than doing nothing and it may increase the number of raiders in some of these guilds.

There's a big difference between 10, 6, years ago; even a year ago vs.today: a population to successfully recruit from.
I challenge you to build a raid force with off-the-street players (no poaching) right now. That would shake the ignorance out of you. Thinking that this was just the "summer slow down" is cute; wrong, but cute nonetheless. Wouldn't look so cute down here. You've never experienced this kind of cumulative impact from game mechanics. Of the detrimental changes contributing to the situation, resolve is what continues make lower tier and guilds struggling with roster numbers even brittle.

If you don't care about it that's fine. It's a convenience those on the winning side of resolve can afford. I'm somewhat jealous as that is part of the human condition. I'm also happy that part of the raid population is completely insulated; and need only absorb from the population that is affected. It restores some of my faith that raiding will be around for a while in this game.

That said, you could have saved us from all your convoluted, out of touch, drivel by saying: "I can only offer apathy and ignorance to this thread...that is all". So I guess I said on your behalf..

Finally. Someone who has walked in similar shoes, has given a unique perspective, and also gave a contrasting point of view worth consideration. There have been individual contributions but I don't think we've had the hat-trick in one post.

Thank you.

Someone in here recently said we should blame players resembling your situation and reaction, instead of changes in game mechanics. On this scope, I disagree; as i feel this xpac was a perfect storm of ill-timed changes to the game mechanics as a whole.
I haven't see a successful raid alliance on Maj'dul yet; though I'm not saying they don't exist. I know people are filling spots in other raid forces while staying in their own guild(s). I've seen a couple guilds put together from guilds that collapsed, but they don't appear to be doing much better. That could be for different reasons.
Brigades will probably.be a bit more popular with resolve acting like a band saw on guild raid forces struggling with filling slots.

Yeah, I've probably seen more alliances fail than succeed. There is usually a sort of our guild vs. their guild mentality that people just can't get passed.
Another thing you can try is to form pick up raids as a way to keep raiding and try to recruit people that show promise. I don't know what your numbers are looking like but if your guild can put together a decent MT group, a few good DPS and maybe a couple of utility classes you can fill up with whatever you can get and still have a good chance at killing stuff. Just random the loot. I wish I had a solution that I knew would work but if I did I would probably sell my services as a consultant.
I hope your guild is able to recover when the xpac comes out. My advice for that is start building the hype now. Personally talk with everyone left in your guild, communication is key. I don't know your exact situation but I bet I've been in a similar place so I know how you feel.

Guys many still missing a point
Gating and progression is GOOD thing (I do remember Plans of Power in EQ1 progression - probably best of all I have seen) but resolve is not an answer even as many pointed that by the end of the x-pack its barely affecting raiding. 2 problem is here mixed in 1
a) Resolve as a mechanics - I gave 2 examples Venekor x4 (in Fabled Cazik) and Crab x2 - BOTH mob would be doable in group of 4-5 people who know what they doing so instead of creating smart way to gate those mobs Daybreak implement resolve and you need about 2.5 group for Venek and about 8-9 person for Crab for NO OTHER REASON but resolve and mind you this 2 mobs are still hold some value for raiding for many mid tier guilds
b) Problem with assembling 24 person for raid and necessity of having full raid force. This is all together different issue not really related to resolve. Yes game is aging, population shrinking (no one I guess would argue that). Recruitment not likely a problem only for top say 10 raiding guild WW - mergers are not an answer, alliance (or PUG raids) works only on specific targets what is an answer? I don't know many be introduce in game x3 encounters and more x2 and shift raiding content toward those encounter leaving on T3 at x4?
c) Raid itemization - basically a reason to go raiding. Lets face it - this xpack was total disaster before GU100. I'd prefer MC gear over most raiding gear. Before Krealatus and Golem loot update only 2 items were actually worth raiding - The Hammer and Ring of Pure Terror - THAT'S IT. Ok nowadays situation somewhat better - Zek trash IS worth of killing (130ish CB/PoT is 30% gain over any other sources), jewels somewhat worth of going after them as well, Venek dropping BiS chest/leg pieces. But what about any zones outside of it?

Yeah I lack experience. I've only been founding and leading guilds since Ultima Online was released in 1997 (and a highly successful quake 1 clan in 1996 before that) where I founded the longest surviving guild on the Chesapeake server. Then was a founding officer of one of the first raid guilds on The Rathe (in 1999) server in EQ1 and later became the guild leader of a top raiding guild on Zebuxoruk and now lead an EQ2 guild that is sometimes 2nd sometimes third on my current server. So ya, not much experience, even though I've been founding and leading successful guilds since you were probably in grade school. I've got you beat by almost a decade.

Look if you don't get that devs introducing a mechanic that so severely impedes shorthanded raid forces will cost this game players, there's no helping you. And again, my guild generally has plenty of people on deck. We're getting by well enough. Especially since we absorbed members from two guild which folded due to resolve. But a bunch of people from those two guild just left the game for good and that's bad for us all.

Ya? Well the back of my hand brushed Michelle Obamas butt. Accident ofcoarse.

With the expansion the resolve amounts on the buffs will not be changing (as of right now) but the amount on items will be increasing. So, the buffs will not matter as much as personal amount of resolve from items.

Same with fervor?

I'm confused on how buffs are somehow going to matter less, just because gear will have more.... unless you're saying we're going to have options to get gear with really high resolve, that sacrifices stats.

IF the max currently obtainable solo was 160, and the devs plan mobs based on a raid having 240 resolve... that means things would be based around 400 as the maximum.

If gear doubles, and new max for gear we could obtain is 320, buffs would still be at 240.... so the total a raid could reach would then be 560...

Sure, buffs are now a smaller percentage... but missing 1 buff will still have the same impact on a raid in both examples.

The gear increase just means older content won't require 24 people to do...

Resolve is the mechanic used to gate us into new gear. No level increase and I cannot imagine a drastic increase in statflation, so the only way to "make" characters use new armor is resolve.

I think we are going to have to see how it is played out but if the last few expacs are any indication, adv solo gear in KA will be better than ToT heroic, with KA heroic being better than ToT Raid gear, and KA raid gear, theoretically, being the best. Some T2/T3 geared raids had been able to clear T1 new raid content with that gear. Maybe this will change. Too early and too many variables right now.

I am not a huge fan of resolve since it handicaps shorthanded raids, but I do understand the intent behind it: get new gear by farming said gear to clear new content.

Good point, the loss of a buff will still be the same straight % loss to our effectiveness. Perhaps moving the buffs to 5/10 would make it less steep.

This mechanic is horrible. There's literally no reason for it. Here's what you do if you really NEED a mechanic like this. Take off the buff part of it, and basically make it item level scores for raids. I.e make the gear have all the resolve needed for YOU to do your allotted amount of damage, not be handicapped by the other players whether they show up or not.

I think this is the best solution to the resolve cancer, but, I think there shouldn't be anything like resolve or item score. It's stupid.

So basically, you're not actually fixing anything. Gotcha.

Gninja.

You guys removed Crit Avoidance going into an expansion because people griped that it was an unnecessary wall and made groups/raids essentially a giant stat check and little else more.

So why do we suddenly have Resolve, which is really no different from Crit Avoidance, and how many expansions can we expect it to take for you guys to remember why Crit Avoidance was removed?