I decided to give EQ2 another shot since most of my time has been freed up from the pandemic. I started at launch and left around the time the spires were being rebuilt so my understanding of the game is extremely out of date. I didn't realize just how much until I used my instant level boost to 110. I can't emphasize how lost I felt upon entering this stage of the game. It was so incredibly frustrating that I considered just cutting my losses and admitting you really can't go home again. These are my impressions and I recognize im ignorant of a lot of things that pertain to the game since I've been gone for so long. I only post to hopefully learn something that will help me get up to speed or that a developer sees and keeps things in mind during the next team meeting. 1 - Stats are inflated to an unmanageable degree Apparently we have continued using the same stat progression since launch. Now players have millions of hit points, damage is dealt in the millions and player stats are measured in thousands. I try to check the damage my guy is doing but there are so many numbers flying off the screen that I felt like a cat chasing a laser light. Did I just hit for 16,739,825 or 16,739? In another expansion or two am I going to be hitting a billion? Where is this going? And what stats at what levels do I need for instances? For raiding? 2 - The different equipment tiers make learning about infusers, reforming and adorning difficult This seems to be a result of simply leveling so fast that I hardly get a chance to modify anything. The lack of experience leaves a lot of confusion. I have a red adorn but I don't want to stick it on a piece of gear Daybreak gave me thats no trade/no value because I'm leveling so fast. I leveled up and got an entirely new freebie chest of armor that invalidates everything I had been wearing. 3 - Tradeskill is an absolute headache A kind and bored fellow gifted me some platinum after we grouped in one of the Tenebrous zones so I made plans to get my Expert spells made. It wasn't until I hit the level 110+ spells that I felt absolutely stunned by the needless complications in recipes. Instead of one type of rare for a tier, I needed 3. Which 3 did I need? I had no clue. The person making them didn't know so she had to look in her spellbook at each spell. Whats more is that not every spell required the same 3 rares! Sweet Jesus! So much wasted time trying to do something that used to be routine. If I could have looked at the recipes beforehand that would have saved everybody time and frustration but there were no tradeskill books on the broker for me to look at and there was nothing online. What happened?! 4 - Soloing an instance is like a 1 man raid I am used to shaman not being dps machines. I used to play clerics back in the day so being able to solo safely at the expense of swiftness was nothing new. But I entered the first tier instance and I can kill stuff but at the rate I do I'm going to be lucky to get 2 in an evening. Each trash mob is an exercise in tedium because im not losing HP and barring mana drains im not losing mana. I leveled up a swashbuckler because I wanted to compare how each did. To my surprise the swash was not much faster and occasionally ran into power issues. 5 - I hate ascension classes I chose a healer because that's the type of game play I enjoy. Now we are required to level up ascension classes that give us all the same damage spells. I tried using these to help dps instances faster and it didn't seem to help much. The only thing that made this not a big deal is that it auto leveled itself and quickly. I hope the ascension classes won't be continued in future expansions because id rather do dps through my class than the same 5 spells everyone else has.
That was your biggest mistake, though a completely understandable one, since you want to be involved in the same content everyone else it at. Most of us tell people returning to the game to start at level one, find a class that you like, re-learn how to play that class as you also learn all the new, crazy mechanics in the game, like reforging, infusing, prestige AAs, panda, barding, mercs, familiars, ethereals, potency, resolve, and fervor. Or we tell you to join the TLE server, which has its own issues, but at least it's at a lower level cap and stats aren't insane. If you want to keep playing the game in spite of the frustration, I would recommend taking your boosted character and going to Planes of Magic or Myrist. You'll level to 120 in a few hours, and then the BoL content should be easier to tackle.
You would be better off finding a guild that is active during your playtime. And get some help. There is an enormous learning curve for returnees who have been gone for years. Actually talking to people will level / shorten that time. As far as soloing and killing everything around you on a shaman? Yep. you can do that on pretty much every class these days without a merc...IF you are fighting mobs at your own or below level. I typically fight & quest in zones with yellow/orange/red mobs on my lower level alts...up to 8 lvls above whatever my current alt is playing. It is better xp and more fun.
I agree with Carynn. The worst thing is use that boost. If you have a character already started, pick it up, chrono back a few levels and then proceed and relearn your class. Relearn the territory and after a day or two you can return to your actual level and proceed. I hear people in general all the time tell returning players to 'use the boost' and I send tells saying "don't, you will just be frustrated and lost". Personally, they should remove those form the game. It doesn't take long anymore to actually work your way up using quest. But that is just my opinion for what it is worth.
If you're only intent on soloing, using the boost is fine. The problem becomes getting your spells/ascensions up and learning the mechanics. The problem with the boost if you're intending to group/raid is that all of a sudden, you're at the level, but that's all you are. I've seen people use a boost to create a "needed" class and then they show up wondering why they suck. Apprentice spells don't cut it in current content. Heck, expert spells just get you in the door for some of the content. Spend time learning your class, getting skills up and knowing what you're doing. There's nothing more chilling to hear in a group than telling the tank, "use your taunts" and the response is "what's a taunt?", usually followed by "what's it look like on my hotbar?" (True story).
I can agree with most of your points but you must not remember having to craft subcomponents before being able to craft final products if having 3 rares needed bothers you. That was easily more of a hassle. You'd need to remember what threads and bobbles and widgets the finished product needed and then know what materials each of those needed.
I have been playing since year one and I have no idea what is going on past level 110 even though I have a couple dozen level 120s. There are so many features available that it gets really confusing if you don't have active guild members to explain things to you. I find levels 110 and up tedious so I only do what is absolutely necessary to level up and then spend my play time with lower-level characters. However, if you like a lot of complexity, this game will give it to you once you reach 110. Hopefully, if you like that sort of thing, you can find a good guild to join as you will need it to do anything but basic stuff.
It seems like they could definitely stand to collapse stats and potency and OMGgheewhiz down into fewer procs, locks and whatever other mechanic of the day has been added over the years. Probably drop stats and damage by several orders of magnitude as well.
Use ACT to figure out how much damage you are doing. Ask a friend in game if you have trouble setting it up. A guide on installation: https://www.absolutefate.com/mobile...3/id/32875415-act-install-guide-trigger-files Here is a guide for current content stats. https://forums.eq2wire.com/threads/stats-all-classes-should-have-in-luclin.234584/#post-2357098 Resolve Values: T1 Heroic Resolve: 3185 (trash) 3205 (named) T2 Heroic Resolve: 3405 (named) T1 Raid Resolve: 3520 T2 Raid Resolve: 3740 T3 Raid Resolve: 3865 T4 Raid Resolve: 3970 T5 Raid Resolve: 4075 You won't do much damage until you hit 130/150k potency on both solo/heroic Adorns can be removed with a scribeable adornment removal spell from your class trainer(in your home city). Feel free to put them on cos you can pull them off easily. Also purchase the singular focus ability from them as well (it is a situational spell where if you don't want to hit other mobs with a melee auto-attack you use, it will decrease your dps if you keep it on, so only have it on when you don't want to hit other things with melee autoattack.). Each level tier will basically reset gear. 90, 92, 95, 100, 110, 120. Use this: https://u.eq2wire.com/ Look up your character, and click spells. You can then click on the spell tier to see the recipe. Look up other peoples characters too to see what they are doing. There is an unseen mechanic called potency mitigation. You have to exceed it to start doing a reasonable amount of dps. BoL is 130 for solo and 150 for heroic I believe. There is about 10 or 12 abilities per ascension class. Their spell tiers can only be leveled Further information can be gleaned from here: https://eq2.fandom.com/wiki/Ascension Note: Give the adornments section a miss. You can also get some catch up items from the Panda quests: https://eq2.fandom.com/wiki/The_"Travels"_of_Yun_Zi_Timeline Specifically you will be looking for the Divine Potency Divine Stamina Divine Crit.Bonus Celestial Mastery Primer Daring Tol'Ren Adornments and light blue adornments. At a later point you may want to have an improved in game UI. I would recommend Darqui. Hope it helps.
More potency is good, of course, but the solo dungeons can be done with reasonable speed with potency well under 110K. Of course, after you are spoiled by having high-potency characters what you consider reasonable speed and what I consider reasonable speed my be drastically different. Note that the fixation on potency and resolve is a significant oversimplification. Yes both are extremely important but getting your abilities from apprentice to at least adept or expert also makes a big difference. So too does getting an ascension ability to level 20 and raising some of those abilities above apprentice. I recommend etherialist especially for a class with no good power restore class ability. A level 19 etherialist spell fills in this gap somewhat. I agree in all respects with the OP about ascension - it destroys the distinction between classes. But the way the game is designed lower damage classes simply have to use it if they want to get through things in a reasonable time frame. At least until their potency and resolve is way above basic levels.
It's actually 'combat mitigation' and it mitigates a lot more than just potency I'm afraid. Try dropping your crit bonus under say 5k in BoL heroics and see how much damage you do. I believe fervor is also mitigated, and I'm suspicious about some others too.
Combat mitigation and potency mitigation are different. Combat mitigation can be reduced. Pot mit cannot.
It's a very overwhelming game to return to, which is why many people aren't making it very far if trying to come back. Pair that with a shrinking community and lack of good resources to read up on everything new makes it a pretty daunting task. Bad systems like Ascension should have been completely removed the next expansion. Instead, they continue to add new systems each expansion without tweaking or get rid of the broken/bad systems from prior expansions. An expansion that focused on stat squishes even level squishes might be needed here. Return to the basics instead of developing weird new systems. The successful MMOs out there are dropping failed systems with each expansion so it isn't as overwhelming to return and just makes the game more enjoyable. Looking at WoW with artifacts, corruption, etc, all removed after each expansion because either the playerbase didn't like the systems or it was determined too much of a grind for a new player to return to. Recycling broken TLE servers can only keep the game afloat for so long. We're going to continue to see server merges and a shrinking playerbase unless a lot of things change.
I think you'll find combat mitigation actually encompasses all the hidden mitigation. So when you debuff combat mitigation (like with Prismatic Distraction for example), you reduce mitigation of potency, crit bonus, maybe crit chance, fervor etc. That's why it's such a powerful effect. You are maybe thinking of physical mitigation, which is different. Easy mistake to make.
I was P'O about levels in a vial but after learning the cost of them think the are workable, ''expensive and the xp still needs to be earned by someone, so a good way to make you play other characters at say 90 (my self imposed cap) soft cap you might say. The isle is back, house actors, not all changes are bad...from me this is saying something: Turns out I still love you eq2.
I understand your frustration. The thing for me that made EQ2 so exciting when I first played was how expansive and how much there was to learn. I felt I would never accomplish half of what I wanted to. I think that returning after many years away I have that same feeling. Which for me is a positive thing. I don't want a game where I can learn all there is to learn and beat it in 40 hours. And the challenge of the heroic zones is not necessarily the fights but how to overcome and win those fights with the group that you have. You change one class for another and the fight completely changes. I feel like there is definitely a class system in EQ2 again. There are Crafters, Harvesters, Shiny collectors, Solo zone toons, Heroic zone toons, Heroic Expert Zone people, Raiders, Power raiders, and more. There really is something for everyone. All while keeping to the same story of the original EQ2. So I certainly understand the frustration of having so much to learn and do, I would encourage you to learn about what interests you in the game and figure out what you like doing in the game and do it. Trying different classes is always fun too. Happy to answer any specific questions about the game if you have them.
Here's my notes on returning after leaving (right about the time Guk was popular... 2009). - My former guild (Shattered Moon) was still standing with a single active player. (you have no idea how helpful that was). My first challenge was typing with /2 in front to do the global /2 chat... lol - Everything I had mastered/learned/forgotten since 2009 is fairly irrelevant. It's all different, although the basics are similar. Yes... you will be hitting for billions soon... - All those Raids that we used to spend 8-10 hours plus on now take about 20-60 minutes solo. The latest ones are a bit tougher, but you will notice: a. Figuring out areas is gone... you use the web or follow someone familiar... nobody is in this to spend a great deal of time socializing any longer... b. If you're an old school completion type quester... you can solo EVERYTHING that you were struggling to finish before... and you can use the Chrono feature (use "/2" and type... wtf is Chrono... if you don't understand) to mentor down to the level you should be (albeit... you'll hit like a champ... single shot almost everything including EPIC x 4 bosses). I am almost at 3100 quests now... c. Some crafting is pretty well a waste of time now. Being able to craft skill books, food/drink, adornments and some tinkering are super helpful, but the game is not like it used to be where you could earn cash by making/selling armor/weapons, etc... It's all just... super different. d. There are some super great house items that are available that make the game very much easier for crafting, etc... but all that is usually in a guild anyway... (if you have a decent one). I store my collectibles, Lore items, harvestables and fuel in my home for home crafting times... e. DO get to 120 asap. Do all the Luclin bloodline that you can so you can fly everywhere, do the daily/weekly quests and start gearing up. that's just a smattering of what I have found... the game is still fun... but it is immensely different in that the roadblocks are mostly gone. It took me a month to adjust, but I am enjoying it now (except the server downtimes...)
Oh.. and a note... The old questlines were are very well crafted (mostly) and very artistic. They required strategy, planning and character building. That's gone. They are rehashing old areas, ignoring the deep lore and interaction and creating instances/areas that are basically "run-throughs". I am guessing because people are less time involved as they were before... I still go back and quest at level 40-85 because the story and layouts are so original and creative. Just my musings...
lol. If the original poster read all of this advise, I can only guess they are really confused. Lots of good advise only it would still be confusing to me.
