Endurance

[Chushque]

I posted a thread on this right as the forum jumped to here, so I am posting again.

There has been a problem with the ENDR bar while using 2hs or heavy weapons. I never remember having to deal with endurance unless jumping caused the bar to go down.

I have noticed that I can only kill 2 mobs before i am in the 50% penalty area, which causes the worst part to happen. I had a Two Handed Sword with 50dly on it and the thing would take at least twice as long to swing. My group thought I wasn't even attacking ...it was that bad.

Just thought I would bring this to your attention..big problem for 2 handers especially non big classes.

[Villert]

I never noticed this, playing as a monk until I used a 2hb weapon.

With 1hb weapons (4.5stones or less at least) there seems to be no loss of endurance. Once I switched to a Fine Steel Great Staff, however, I also noticed the loss of endurance, and it became a big problem.

I feel for the classes who are more dependent on 2h weapons, as the endurance penalty really does make a huge difference in attack speed.

[Danth]

Endurance suffers some glaring problems.

First, and most importantly--endurance doesn't regenerate anywhere near as fast as it should. The yellow bar shouldn't take very long at all to fill up from zero, a mere handful of ticks.

I did a little test shortly before writing this post. I ran myself out of mana, then ran myself out of endurance. I'm a 22 Paladin.

From zero of both, it took me 4 minutes to regenerate my mana to full. (15:47:07 to 15:51:11). It took me 5--FIVE--minutes to regen my endurance to full (15:47:07 to 15:52:12). Yes, you're reading this correctly, a 22 Paladin's mana actually meditates back up about 25% more quickly than his yellow bar!

Second--and probably related to the above-noted complete lack of regen--weapons which should not cause stamina loss, do. A fine Steel 2H sword never in the history of any of my EQ Paladins caused net loss of stamina. On P1999, however, it does. Likewise, ~7 weight 1H weapons do the same, and shouldn't. I believe this may be due to the lack of endurance regen--if endurance regenerated anything like its classic level, such weapons would probably cause no net stamina loss.

Third--there's a strange attack rate penalty for running below 50% endurance. This should not happen. Nothing more to add here, it's just wrong. Penalties for running low on stamina should not occur until you're virtually out (say 10% or less).

Fourth--during testing, I noticed a harmless, yet amusing quirk. Swinging on an INVULNERABLE target (in this case, a willowisp with a non-magic weapon) caused no endurance loss no matter how many times I attacked.

-----------------------------------

For an idea of where "it should be", I never knew a sub-10 weight weapon to make the stamina bar move. This is on characters with as little as 70 stamina. The only weapons which caused net loss were a handful of extremely heavy, relatively fast (for their weight) weapons such as the Deep Six Cutlass, Wurmslayer (particularly when dual-wielded or hasted), Axe of the Iron Back, and such items--all of which have weight well in excess of 10.

In classic, the yellow bar was a total non-factor the vast majority of the time. Spells such as invigor were often regarded as near-worthless. The endurance system as it presently exists on P1999 in no way reflects the reality of classic-era Everquest.

Danth

[Grouch]

I wanted to thank Danth for the informative post, which I agree with everyone here.

It makes one wonder:

"Why ever use a 2hander?"

Endurance needs to be reconsidered and "fixed".

[Danth]

I don't ordinarily "bump" threads, but I was told this was the sort of issue Ladoth looks at and wasn't sure he'd seen it, so--bringing it back to the first page.

Edit: I'd also be happy to assist in any way I can with making this seem 'feel more classic'. I play a Paladin. I only ever played Paladins. I made probably 10 or 12 of them over the years, all leveled to the upper level ranges (if not always making it to the cap). It's what I do. My gear on P1999 is almost exactly identical to one of my historic characters, and broadly similar to several more. In this specific case, my own memory is a very useful resource.


Danth

[Feittin]

I just want to bump this and mention that I am having the same problem. My 17 warrior is DWing bull smasher and crookstinger. When grouped, I have to ask the clerics to cast zing on me after every fight if they have the mana. Usually even after the zing I am still only around 70% or so as each fight will take 40 - 50% endurance. Shouldn't need a zing after every fight.

Usually I end up having to use shield instead of DWing (still drains my endurance btw, just a little more slowly), which makes me sad...

[Smashed]

I also wouldn't getting some confirmation that at over 100 stamina, this slowdown no longer occurs? like on live?

[Lenowin]

This seems to be a signifigant problem on my alt monk as well. He runs out real quick, and it takes quite a while to regenerate it back to 100%.

[stormlord]

Having looked through some allah pages for different 2 handers, I'd say that 15wt is when players are going to need songs/spells to recover stamina at a respectable rate without having to repeatedly rest to recover it. This is the way it was in at least 2001, but I am not sure how it was in 1999. Anything below 15wt will decrease it, but the pace will be so slow that you'll make up most or all of it when you sit down to regain mana or hitpoints. It should scale too. A weapon that weighs 8 should require more stamina than a weapon that weighs 6, and this also applies to something that weighs 15 as opposed to something that weighs 12.

I know that in at last 2001 you did not suffer stat or attack rate penalties until you were out of stamina, and then only if you had < 100 stamina (the stat). So suffering penalties at 50% seems wrong, but I could be in error.

Whatever changes you make, be sure to not make the stamina heal spells useless. Make us consider the weight of a weapon when we buy it in regards to how much stamina it's using. Anyting else wouldn't be classic.

[Danth]

"It should scale too. A weapon that weighs 8 should require more stamina than a weapon that weighs 6"

At least on a non dual-wield class, neither of these hypothetical weapons should even make the yellow bar budge. I know this is a mere example, and you could easily change the numbers to something more accurate (say, a 10 weight weapon requires less stamina than a 12.5 weight weapon), but I point that out so as to prevent any confusion about how things should be.

I must reiterate that on Live spells such as invigor WERE regarded as worthless the majority of the time--there were only a relative handful of overweight weapons (I listed a few above) which could cause problems.

Danth

[stormlord]

"It should scale too. A weapon that weighs 8 should require more stamina than a weapon that weighs 6"

At least on a non dual-wield class, neither of these hypothetical weapons should even make the yellow bar budge. I know this is a mere example, and you could easily change the numbers to something more accurate (say, a 10 weight weapon requires less stamina than a 12.5 weight weapon), but I point that out so as to prevent any confusion about how things should be.

I must reiterate that on Live spells such as invigor WERE regarded as worthless the majority of the time--there were only a relative handful of overweight weapons (I listed a few above) which could cause problems.

Danth

What I was saying is that the formula should make sense. I agree that a weapon that weighs 7 will use very little stamina, but it should use some. It'll use so little though that you won't notice. I wasn't trying to say that weapons that're lightweight should cripple you and make you rest every 3 minutes. I was just saying that the formula should scale.

I browsed allah and some other caster sites and by what I could see.. stamina heal/regen spells were not worthless at all. This is especially true for dual wielding classes that were using big weapons like the wurmslayer, but it's true for even 2 handers that weigh 15 - they would eat up stamina (albeit slowly, but noticeable). I gave the 15 wt number because I saw it on several allah pages for 2001/02/03. Doesn't matter whether it was 1h or 2h.

Here's one example of an allah page:
http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=432

april 2002:23/48 is still decent for a warrior, 2 less dam than an exec axe but also 2 less delay. The hideous 15.0wt will drag that yellow bar straight down though, but the proc IS a useful one. The one on the PGT saved my warrior's butt plenty of times in those younger days...

Here's another one:
http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=12629

december 2002:Only complaint I have is that it is heavy. My STAM gets drained, but as a pally, Invigor keeps me swinging without downtime. I love this weapon.

Another:
http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=4500

jan 2001:well the more the weapon weighs the faster your stamina is drained. A weapon like this would drain your stamina like crazy in a fight cause its fast and heavy.
True, but doesnt do you harm..
Only if you equip it on a low or mid level twink that isn't grouped with an enchanter and doesnt have invigor...
i think the more stam you have the less this is a problem. I have a level 19 sk troll I've been screwing with and it has most weapons on it which are weight 10 - 15. Its sta never goes down much really at all in a fight. Of course Its sta is pretty darn high also, I think at like 140 with a couple of crustacean shell armor pieces and some other stuff.

This would be a larger concern for dual wielding classes also. I'd bet especially a ranger can get fatigued fast with a couple heavy weapons.
Augment (lvl 29) has good Sta regen, a Bard has sta songs, Rangers and others have Invigorize spells, etc etc. My 51 Ranger often fights with WS (15lbs), has 30% haste cloak plus Swift or AQ (Speed buffs) from the Ench u usually have in group at that level.

If there's no ench with Extinguish Fatique around then he casts invigorize on himself in mid fight if really neccessary, takes you out of the fight for like 6 seconds...

Weight on weaps is overrated.

Another (non-allah):
http://www.monkly-business.net/forums/archive/index.php/t-4707.html

july 2003:I've been soloing a monk through his 30s using a zekhas and a SoS and its been going fine. However, I noticed that most monks at the highest level are equipped with 2hb and I had neglected the skill. Luckily I hadnt used any practice points and managed to buy it up to 81 still leaving me well short. I managed to get hold of an original 19/20 RFS to get fast raises but my stamina bar empties faster than the ranger's cleric's mana bar!

IS this the norm with 2handers and if so whats the solution?
One thing to note about stamina drain is that the amount you lose with each swing is proportional to the weight of the weapon you are swinging.

Another:
http://www.eqclerics.org/forums/archive/index.php/t-6179.html

december 1999:Extinguish Fatigue is useful in certain circumstances. Certain MOBS in Mistmoore Castle have a spell effect that causes the STA of your tanks to drop to zero. (It will say in the chat window 'PaladinBoy looks faint')

When their STA goes to zero, theie attacks drop to virtually nothing, so you need to hit your tanks with this, and then they are rough & ready to continue the fight.

Also, I recall one really tough night in the Unrest basement when we had a massive train, which we fought and did not run from. (YAY for us!) The fight was long and brutal, and somewhere in the middle, out dwarf warrior tells us that he's down to nothing on STA (He is tired), so I memmed this spell, got right up, casted, and he was swinging like a mad man again.
And if you ever adventure in Kedge or fight sharks in Erud's Crossing, you'll keep ext fatigue memm'd up. Even in smaller fights if the pulls are constant (6 or 7 mobs in a row) a melee'er with haste effect equipment like a sash or a mith 2h will start to tucker out a bit.
If you have ever been to new Paw and seen some of the trains there, you'll realize this isn't that bad of a spell to have memmed. We had a fight where there were just a constant flow of mobs. We clear the 3 Gnolls we pulled, then clear 3 more that were trained to zone, then in comes the next train, and again. Had to use Extinguish fatigue couple of times on the tanks. I've seen that MM thing too, but not often, so if a tank loses fatigue i sit and mem it really quick and then cast it.
Is there a difference between invigor/extinguish fatigue? Never bought the second, as i figured nothing more than maybe a faster cast or less mana (is that possible?) But invigor i do use quite a lot now with the higher level mobs, stuff with over 2k HP with mostly melee types comes to mind, seafuries, LDC's, imps, etc
Extinguish Fatigue – Used it a couple of times now, looks pretty sad vs the Bard Invogor song.
Extinguish Fatigue- ive had to use this spell regularly in 2 occasions... #1 ALLWAYS in kedge keep, your constantly swimming so your constantly useing sta, and the tanks use it up even quicker. #2 last night with a lvl 50 bard, with there song nearly halfing the dly time of all weapons, tanks where out of sta in no time. Extinguish is much better then invigor for 2 reasons, it is not a linger spell.. it charges your sta as soon as it hits, and it will fill your sta bar compleatly unlike vigor. And the extra mana it uses is VERY small, its what 25mana?

Another:
http://www.thesafehouse.org/forums/showthread.php?p=166188#post166188

august 2004:As far as I know, no, there are no spells in production EQ that will do so. The old stamina regen spells have no impact at all on end regen.

There was initially a shaman ward with GoD whose description implied that it would regen endurance of those within range, but it only ever healed health, and the description has now been changed to match.
I know that after they nerfed all of the invigor line of spells to stop end regeneration there was still that lvl 3 bard song jaxons jig of vigor or whatever, that id have a bard i grouped with sing every now and again, did wonders. nfc if they fixed it or not yet.

There's more but i'll stop there (more allah too). I just wanted to give a broad picture of what's out there.

Could it be that the stamina spells and songs aren't working like they did in classic? The reason I ask is becaus soe removed the stamina/regen effect from stamina spells in 2003. Another thing to notice how people correlate haste effects and fast pulls with draining stamina - something less likely to happen in solo situations.

I agree that something is wrong with stamina use and stamina penalties. A 9 wt 2-hander should use less stamina than a 15 wt 2-hander, but it looks like it doesn't.

There's no reason that they can't go over it and make it work reasonably well. The trouble is getting it right. YOu can't just go on what one person says. If they did that, they'd be changing things that shouldn't be changed. Every single one of us remembers the past incorrectly. That's why this requires more than one person and some kind of backup evidence (net), preferably.

[Jameus]

I think that it could perhaps use some tweaking. I also think that having stamina drain is important to group dynamics. From my limited experience on the server so far I've noticed that the pace of groups is usually right on the verge of to quick based on mana regen rates. If we don't have enough reduction in stamina the melee classes have no reason to slow down pulls. It's my opinion that with slowing down the pace of pulls, you'll allow classes which rely on mana, to regenerate it! With enough mana clerics can cast invigorate and nullify the stamina loss. In our race to 50, we're forgetting that the pulse of the group was intended to be a tad slower than what we're used to as of late with newer games and incredible gear in EQ over the years.

So to wrap up, slow things down, tweak stamina slightly and carry on :) We have the tools to deal with the intended setbacks. Lets use them as they were intended and have fun!

[stormlord]

Looks like stamina loss was removed from weapons. On all my characters they no longer use stamina. I thought it was an interesting dynamic. Oh well.

I'm going to take a break from playing until the bugs are fixed and they know what's what. Right now things are changing so fast I don't know what works and what doesn't.

[Danth]

Jameus, you're proposing the introduction of a non-classic feature for the sole purpose of making life harder for melees. You're welcome to your opinion, of course, but suffice it to say I disagree.

The recent fix to stamina seems a fair compromise. Stamina was a non-factor the overwhelming majority of the time on Live, and the few exceptions which exist likely aren't numerous enough to spend a large amount of time coding for. That being said, if the devs wish for any assistance in making things as exactly spot-on as possible, I remain happy and willing to assist in whatever way I can.

Danth

[Datante]

Great thoughts all; I agree Danth that the current 'no endurance drain' is an improvement over the original p1999 model of big penalties. But stormlord makes some good points (and it is always good and interesting seeing those source information and old forum posts--important for making informed decisions).

As a paladin back in the day (1999-2000), I used my Invigor line of spells fairly regularly when in a chain-pulling group, as my endurance would eventually sneak down below 20% (maybe after a constant 5+ minutes of fighting, even with my Darkmetal Holy Water Sprinkler). It seems like the only natural endurance drain I am seeing now is from jumping (fighting nor swimming nor running encumbered drops the value).

Even from the perspective of a melee here on p1999 (pally again), I think it is reasonable to bring endurance back into play to some extent. To give even more power to the stamina statistic, perhaps a high stamina can greatly impact endurance regeneration speed. The invigor line and appropriate bard songs would also find new life.

[Danth]

Keep in mind that Invigor doesn't even *work* here anywhere near as well as it did on Live. Extinguish fatigue is even worse. That reality is likely part of the reason for the current compromise.

When I had that mace you mention on my own historic characters, it never caused my yellow bar to so much as budge. A Wurmslayer would, though.

Danth

[Datante]

Hiya Danth,
Aha, if the invigor line and other endurance regen sources are malfunctioning, then the current no-loss situation makes sense.

[stormlord]

I hope it comes back. I really did think it added something to the gameplay. It did make me think more - which I like. Now I don't even have to think about whether i'm using a 2 hander or a 1 hander or it's heavy or it's not heavy. In my book, that's just boring. I love character development. And the spells are needless too. Figuring out how to produce an effective character is half the fun. The rest of the fun, for me, is just wasting time doing things unrelated to normal leveling. I know there're some people who like simple games, one or two stats, but I don't. Those are just boring to me. I like lots of dynamics going on, and hard choices that have to be made. It's fun.

[Danth]

This isn't a flame by any means, just an anecdote. In another game many years ago, (and not even an RPG, but an MMO flightsim), I recall a bug discovery. Turns out that planes lost speed much more quickly than they were supposed to, badly affecting their performance. Nonetheless, once the bug was fixed, there was a small subset of the player base who wanted it un-fixed. They liked the way the bug, even if unintended, made the game harder.

I don't want to have to make choices that only arise because of broken implementation. That doesn't strike me as fun, only as nuisance. Each to his own. I respect your right to your opinion, but I hold the opposite belief: The present fix, while imperfect, feels worlds better to me than the prior implementation. It is closer to right, even if 'right' in this case is simpler/easier than the broken situation. Likewise with melees taking less damage now--it might make the game a bit easier, but it's also closer to correct.

Danth

[stormlord]

This isn't a flame by any means, just an anecdote. In another game many years ago, (and not even an RPG, but an MMO flightsim), I recall a bug discovery. Turns out that planes lost speed much more quickly than they were supposed to, badly affecting their performance. Nonetheless, once the bug was fixed, there was a small subset of the player base who wanted it un-fixed. They liked the way the bug, even if unintended, made the game harder.

I don't want to have to make choices that only arise because of broken implementation. That doesn't strike me as fun, only as nuisance. Each to his own. I respect your right to your opinion, but I hold the opposite belief: The present fix, while imperfect, feels worlds better to me than the prior implementation. It is closer to right, even if 'right' in this case is simpler/easier than the broken situation. Likewise with melees taking less damage now--it might make the game a bit easier, but it's also closer to correct.

Danth

Nevertheless, ever since noticing that stamina didn't drain I haven't played. Just have no desire. Bad taste in my mouth. Project1999 just too buggy. I'm not trying to flame you or start something. Just letting you know that I hope they fix this such that:
a) stamina drain still happens
b) drains to the amount we experienced in classic

No drain at all isn't classic. It's not a fix. It's like removing encumberance because it encumbered too much. Look at one of the links above. There's a comment that a 14 wt 2h weapon was draining someone's stamina.

I was fine with the melee fix, btw. And it's not the same thing. They didn't remove melee or make it so mobs always miss.

They didn't even comment that they were planning a fix (after disabling it). That would have helped a lot.

[stormlord]

Hiya Danth,
Aha, if the invigor line and other endurance regen sources are malfunctioning, then the current no-loss situation makes sense.

Ya. If heal spells were underperforming, it would make sense that players don't lose hitpoints when they're hit. :0

Right now we're getting a free ticket to use 2 handers over 1 handers and shields for the increase in dps (2 handers do more damage than 1 handers, but dual wielding 1 handers does more than 2 handers). A free ticket to dual wield heavy weapons too. Before this "fix", my monk couldn't dual wield 2 cracked staff's without losing stamina. I was looking forward to leveling up so that hand to hand could be used instead (it uses very little stamina) and it would also save me a lot of weight. Now he can dual wield them without losing any. This removes one of the drawbacks of non-h2h skills (bigger stamina use because of heavier weapons). You don't have to do anything for this. It's free. You don't need lots of stamina. You don't need stamina heals. You don't need to switch weapons when stamina is lower. No thinking involved. No strategy. It's all automatic now. Autopilot. This is considered a fix.

I want a real fix. There's no fix right now. Not even a comment in the announcement thread to elaborate. Sloppy.

[guineapig]

So basically I should not bother trying to research Invigor for the time being???

[runlvlzero]

Ya. If heal spells were underperforming, it would make sense that players don't lose hitpoints when they're hit. :0

Right now we're getting a free ticket to use 2 handers over 1 handers and shields for the increase in dps (2 handers do more damage than 1 handers, but dual wielding 1 handers does more than 2 handers). A free ticket to dual wield heavy weapons too. Before this "fix", my monk couldn't dual wield 2 cracked staff's without losing stamina. I was looking forward to leveling up so that hand to hand could be used instead (it uses very little stamina) and it would also save me a lot of weight. Now he can dual wield them without losing any. This removes one of the drawbacks of non-h2h skills (bigger stamina use because of heavier weapons). You don't have to do anything for this. It's free. You don't need lots of stamina. You don't need stamina heals. You don't need to switch weapons when stamina is lower. No thinking involved. No strategy. It's all automatic now. Autopilot. This is considered a fix.

I want a real fix. There's no fix right now. Not even a comment in the announcement thread to elaborate. Sloppy.


I hate to say this but the free ticket analogy is poor always since day 0 in EQ a few things have been true.

2handers are more dps then 1h and sword except for special pallly/sk weapons

Dual weild always more dps

Dual weild always better agro

this is regaurdless of situation

now...

as for fatigue you could totally use a very heavy 2hs, or dual wield heavy 1hs for soloing or combat with anything more then 30 seconds of downtime, it took 4 ticks to regen a full stamina bar and it took less then a full stamina bar to kill any mob you could kill without it killing you unless in a group situation with constant considerable pulls.

I was there...

Yes I like stamina it was a cool mechanic, but it was also not really game changing. So again i'm gonna say your "lets not use stamina because its a free ticket" ideal is stupid...

lets tweak stamina so its a consideration for people chain pulling and fighting mobs with heavy and fast weapons... and so its not a handicap to a solo warrior killing a blue/lightblue, or a mess of greens. that is HOW IT WAS. No free tickets needed bro.

not to mention anyone with over 100 in the stamina stat didnt even need to worry about the stamina bar except for pulling and jumping.

[Uthgaard]

So basically I should not bother trying to research Invigor for the time being???

We understand how it works, it just wasn't working anywhere like it was intended.