Specialty Server Types? (Question Inside)

To be clear, I never said I hated pvp. My favorite servers have been RP-PVP because, yes, sometimes PVP makes sense from a RP perspective. That said all you need to do is look at other MMO server breakdowns to see that there is a good number of people who choose to play on specialty servers of all types. Rather than making a server open to everything, there are some real customer benefits to setting up some rule-based servers. Nothing stops a person from RP on a straight PVP server (for instance) but dedicated servers give people who want a common experience a place to go to (RP, PVP, PVE, ...)

There has not been a sandbox MMO for ten years. Sandbox MMOs are much different then themepark ones, I've actually never seen a Sandbox Game that separates PvP/PvE/RP because it really doesn't make sense to begin with, if you do that you throw consequences and cool game mechanics like the one I described (Punishing the Guilty), (Punishing Criminals), (Punishing Evil Acts). You remove all of those cool features, and if you make a PvP server you actually encourage things like 12 year olds just ganking and attacking you. Your basicly saying: Well all pvp should go here!

The thing about is, the second you add a "PVP" server, all PvP from every other server is removed. You literally took out so much roleplay and immersiveness from the game because you basicly said: I don't want people to feel like they can be evils, criminals, heroes or paladins.

There are customer benefits to setting up ruleset servers. However there are also negatives, your making your game too much like every other MMO. Why buy EQNext when "X MMO" has it better? The day you make EQNext unique and different is to say: Hey... EQNext has X nobody else has! That is cool!

I can name 15 MMOs that separate their rules, and the customers for all MMOs are dropping rapidly. MMOs are actually becoming less popular.

Here is what I see from you: You don't want meaningless PvP where griefers roam. You want PvP with meaning, consequences and a story behind it.

If you separate servers, you will never get that. That is from OLDER MMOs which never had rules.

Is it just me that would like a "Dark Souls" server?
Not actually Dark Souls of course, but it would have a lot of elements like that on the server.

• Death penalties.
• Difficult NPC's.
• No maps.
• Environmental traps.
• Traditional classes.
• Longer day/night cycle for immersion.
• No double jump.
• Heroic movement toned down slightly.

I could imagine that the way they've developed the armor and voxels, they could really pull off that 'heavy' rough and tumble feeling you experience in Dark Souls.

So I haven't played Dark Souls but it sounds like you are asking for almost a new game within EQ Next. I'd imagine that, unless there is a really big pull, this number of rule /game changes would be challenging to implement. That said, what do you see as the benefit from those rules?

• Death penalties. --> We don't know what it will be yet. How far do you want to push it?
• Difficult NPC's. --> Ditto
• No maps. --> Just don't look at yours?
• Environmental traps. --> What do you mean?
• Traditional classes. --> This goes against everything EQNext is trying to be. Of all your asks, I think this one is not implementable.
• Longer day/night cycle for immersion. --> How long? It sounds like they've researched a fair bit to figure out where people want it to be.
• No double jump. --> Why restrict this?
• Heroic movement toned down slightly. --> Since we don't know how Heroic movement will turn out after balancing, this seems premature to be looking for.

I'm pretty sure this is what he/she means and if not please correct me:

• Death Penalties --> re-spawn naked (no armor, no weapons essentially nothing on you) and do a "corps run" to get your gear back
• Difficult NPC's --> i'm going to assume no quest markers (talk to every NPC)
• No maps --> literally no maps at all, forcing the player to map out or guide themselves via markers (think of moving clouds )
• Environmental Traps --> if a tree is down and its across a massive gap in a mountain, the log may give way.
• Traditional Classes --> I agree its going to be hard for EQN to do this if anything most likely impossible
• Longer day/night --> real time day and night
• No double jump --> no double jump (unless your class specifies it i.e. a Mage could technically double jump with magic but a warrior should not be able to)
• Heroic movement --> slightly less of a jump or teleportation or taking some damage from a rocky slide etc.

I think 3.will be good no matter the server ruleset.

1. and 2. could easily be added into a 'mixed' server ruleset population by hard creation flags akin to the RP/PvP/Gen toggles mentioned elsewhere. Most of the time a request is made about hardcore rules like 1. and 2. people need the server to keep them honest. For instance, I originally got Skyrim on the PS3 but when I found out I couldn't *accelerate* my progress to skip the leveling I ponied up for the Steam version which saved me hundreds of hours of non-story consumption time.

Not using features like quest feathers and improved maps / waypoints are just too hard not to give in for most players which is why there are repeated requests for a compulsory server although technically EQN could have its cake and eat it too.

Hardcore players could exist with non-hardcores on the same server (1. and 2.) by creating a menu of hardcore options (like a checklist you pick and choose) that are a permanent flag upon character creation. Only shared global variables like 4. would be off limits. Obviously important flags (RP/PvP/Gen/HardcoreDeath/NicePlayer/Leetist/ etc.) would need some kind of visual cue (name color, gibberish to non-similar players, etc.) to make it so a player 'gamestyle' need not create segregation where it is not needed (non-RP-ing, non-PvPing, etc.).

This would help hardcore players keep themselves honest (challenge) but not force a server to exist with 500 players that have scattered login frequencies.