Wish i hadn't read about XP Penalties :(

[eqgmrdbz]

As a 49 Ranger, just grind and grind and grind, I have been doing it solo, and its taking forever, but hey i get to play a game i enjoy, and you can always try another class that's not so hard...you sissy girl [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

[Psykes]

XP penalty is not all that noticable unless you are solo'ing which you will not be normally as an SK. Furthermore, the reason why the xp penalty exists in the first place for hybrids/races etc is because they are more of a utility class and can do things other classes cannot.

[NZV]

The penalty is spread among party members so it's really not bad at all if you stay grouped. And if you play an SK or Paladin, you should have a relatively easy time finding them. They're so much better at tanking while leveling than warriors that it is absolutely worth taking one over a warrior every time, even with the troll/iksar SK penalty.

I've gotten the urge to get back into EQ twice, and both times I started with the live test server. But over there you just hit relatively high levels in a few hours after only seeing a very small handful of areas and without interacting with anyone. I don't have any interest in post-luclin content so what do you do at that point? Hang around deserted old zones full of green mobs that offer no challenge? That's not really fun in the way that actually getting groups and partaking in those dungeons on p1999 is.

As for red, I dunno. I've recently been trying it out, and I adore the group exp bonus. It makes things less of a slog, but it's not too fast, and it really encourages everyone to group in pretty much any circumstances. You're not gonna get turned away just because you aren't an ideal class, and if there is a group around they usually have room. But that's the big "if". There aren't many people on red so you aren't gonna find anyone to group with a lot of the time. I was the only one in crushbone earlier this afternoon, and when I checked unrest I think there was one other dude. These are by far the most populated low level areas - everywhere else is a 24/7 ghost town. The community also has some real issues. Global /ooc on red is far worse than WoW barrens chat ever was. It's a nonstop barrage of garbage that you have to keep enabled if you want to see LFG/LFM calls and auctions. And the only pvp I've found so far is twinks slaughtering people who don't stand even the tiniest chance. EQ1's classes and mechanics weren't really built for pvp at all either.

One other thing that's kind of interesting about red is that you often have to improvise in weird ways due to poor group composition. Since you're just grabbing whoever shows up regardless of class, you run into a lot of situations where you don't have a tank, healer, real dps, CC, or any combination thereof. That's both a good and a bad thing since it can change things up a bit, but some class setups can be a nightmare to deal with.

I think my ideal server would be blue with a somewhat lessened version of red's group exp bonus. Too many people soloing on blue, and too many people are picky about class selection. That aint classic. Back in the day we invited wizards all the time because we didn't know how useless they were.

[Psykes]

Originally Posted by NZV [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Back in the day we invited wizards all the time because we didn't know how useless they were.

Before mana bar was implemented into groups, wizards would just say they were OOM,and AFK for like 30min before anyone noticed....my buddy had a monk and FD'd all the time into walls to leach xp for hours as bard normally pulled

[Swish]

Playing a dark elf SK on blue, and its really not noticeable versus my rogue (or maybe I don't look hard enough).

I'd almost say play something with an XP penalty first, because once you adjust to ez mode halfling warrior rate, you'll never roll a troll SK.

[Estu]

Originally Posted by Swish [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Playing a dark elf SK on blue, and its really not noticeable versus my rogue (or maybe I don't look hard enough).

I'd almost say play something with an XP penalty first, because once you adjust to ez mode halfling warrior rate, you'll never roll a troll SK.

Well the thing is it's a lot less noticeable as a person who's grouping than as a soloer since the penalty gets spread around. You can say halfling warriors/rogues are EZ mode but if you're spending all your time grouping as them, that EXP bonus is truly negligible. Whereas if you decide to solo a halfling druid versus a troll shaman, you might actually notice a difference in how much EXP mobs are giving you relative to how much you need to level (although of course the bigger issue would be that druids EXP faster than shamans, period).

[Rhayne05]

After a long decision making process, i landed on Half Elf Bard, starting in Qeynos. Screw the penalty, I always wanted to play a bard but never got one very high. Got him to level 3.25ish in about 2 hours, maybe more. Some of that time was spent trying to navigate the maze that is Qeynos [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.] So used to playing a Dark Elf on live i got used to Neriak!

The name is Airren, I'll be hanging around the zone line of Qeynos Hills from Qeynos for a while [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.] Hope to see you guys around!

[Clark]

Originally Posted by Rhayne05 [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

This is killing my wanting to play this game. I know, it really shouldn't bother me, but the penalties are hefty, not just 2% there, 5% here... So i've limited myself to non penalized or +% only and i just can't decide [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Ugh, guess I'll have to wait for Velious and check to see if they've been removed.

I really want to play on this server, but i just can't decide what to commit my time to.

It's just a hybrid. It'll be okay.

[Tewaz]

All the hybrids are fantastic on the PVP server. I highly recommend it if you want to play an SK, Pal, or Ranger, and noone cares about the penalty for exp.

[Trelaboon]

Your exp penalty is shared with any group you have. If you're grouped with an Iksar Monk (which is very common) you'll have more penalty added to your exp grind than if you were a Shadowknight alone.

The penalty in my mind makes such little difference, because you're often suffering from it with other group members anyway.