Annoying

[jman]

So far I love playing again. But the one thing I so far am very annoyed about is all the freaking tweaks and power levelers. Im new to the server. Paladin decked out in patchwork and leather. Tarnished weapon. Trying to level. But all the good spots are perma camped by tweaks that can chain pull everything faster then I can. (Bards mostly) or High level people (bards moslty) who are PLing friends and leaving nothing for me to kill.

I know people want to help there friends level. But your killing it for the rest of us who dont have high level bard friends. At least take the players someplace where low levels are not trying to level up. Its hard enough being a paladin. But with nothing to kill its very slow going.

[Tanthallas]

Its hard enough being a paladin.

[Dirtnap]

Its hard enough being a paladin.

[jabberwocky]

It's rampant and it sucks. PLers should stick to less frequented zones, not really feeling the bard ganking all of the orcs in crushbone or the high level shammie camping his monk in the throne room.

[myxomatosii]

Yeah this always bothers me, not plvling, that's fine.. but the timing.

If you're going to plvl in a high traffic zone, do it on off hours.

Second, you're plvling so the whole world is basically open to you.

Try to actually learn the game: RE, Najena, sola.. or hell if you want to use a zone pick a big one where no one will notice you like upper guk on the live side zoneline, Paw.. maybe even Freeport sewers? I should explore those actually, I only know the Qeynos catacombs.

There are options, but no.. prime time, CB, UR, Kurns, ruining the playtime of 5-10+ players so two or three players can save time.

Here is the thing, if a new player experiences the game via plvl then their character has a tendency to mean less to them as they didn't work for it. Being a guild leader and watching a lot of new players level up I have noticed that those players who are the poorest, die the most, and receive the least reprieves somehow tend to be the ones who hang it there and end up being solid players and guild members.

So don't introduce the game to your friends through the barrel of a plvl but instead teach them social conventions and how to work through a dungeon.

Honestly there are multiple compromises I won't get into and shouldn't have to. Over half of this server is semi-aware of the game. If you were in the shoes of the players complaining, and the ass in the zone was someone else, whose side would you be on?

[Itap]

You mean twinks?

[Cecily]

So far I love playing again. But the one thing I so far am very annoyed about is all the freaking tweaks and power levelers.

http://i.imgur.com/fYjNn4q.png

[myxomatosii]

http://i.imgur.com/fYjNn4q.png

"Gnaaahahahah! I pulled out my hair!"

[Lyra]

The one thing I'm very annoyed about is when people make rant threads in server chat.

Not really, but it's the same thing. You are not playing the way I think you should be playing.

You can only control yourself. So if there is someone in an area annoying you, do what you need to do to change that. If they are breaking a rule, petition. If they are not breaking a rule, move to a different area.

[Halfelfbard]

I PL the shit outa people! Sometimes ill pull the entire zone just to save time, then i can just go somewhere else faster.

[myriverse]

I can understand PLers getting annoying.
Don't understand being annoyed with twinks. It's their prerogative.

But leave the Tweaks alone! He never did nothing to no one.

[eqravenprince]

It is annoying I agree. Unfortunately, EQ never put in any kind of code to combat this. Best thing to do is get into a group and stick to a known camp. Against camp rules for the high level player to take any mobs out of your camp. But if you are wanting to solo in outdoor zones and fight animals, then unfortunately if a powerleveler shows up, currently there is no known server rules against them rounding up everything.

I would change two things on the server if I could. First thing is if a mob is trivial, I would make it so the mob flees instead of follows. Second thing, if the mob is not trivial, I would limit how many can follow. Or change how Bard aoe songs work, like if you are running away, they do no damage. But, the "shit's classic" crowd will cry a river, so change will not happen here.

[Itap]

It is annoying I agree. Unfortunately, EQ never put in any kind of code to combat this. Best thing to do is get into a group and stick to a known camp. Against camp rules for the high level player to take any mobs out of your camp. But if you are wanting to solo in outdoor zones and fight animals, then unfortunately if a powerleveler shows up, currently there is no known server rules against them rounding up everything.

I would change two things on the server if I could. First thing is if a mob is trivial, I would make it so the mob flees instead of follows. Second thing, if the mob is not trivial, I would limit how many can follow. Or change how Bard aoe songs work, like if you are running away, they do no damage. But, the "shit's classic" crowd will cry a river, so change will not happen here.

Everyone is always against Bard PLers until they can afford to hire one. Then they're all about that shit

[shams]

Just out of curiosity, OP, where are you hunting at that this is a problem? I only ask because I never really seemed to have an issue finding mobs to kill when I was leveling up. That was a little while ago though, so maybe things have changed.

Keep in mind too, as a Pally you're not exactly a solo king, though you do make a great tank for a group. Try giving that a shot perhaps.

[fadetree]

It's annoying, but its a big world. Go somewhere unusual.

[eqravenprince]

Everyone is always against Bard PLers until they can afford to hire one. Then they're all about that shit

Probably to a lot of people. But I personally never enjoyed being powerleveled. Oddly enough I enjoy powerleveling others though, for FREE.

[Fregar]

The coin has two sides.

Good side about all of this is that sometimes peoples who's been here for a long time will give you free stuff.
Most of the decent gear I have on my char comes from nice unknown peoples.

You may be right or wrong, but complaining will do you no good.

By the way, what is that zone full of bard twinks? I didn't see this yet.

[myxomatosii]

The coin has two sides.

Good side about all of this is that sometimes peoples who's been here for a long time will give you free stuff.
Most of the decent gear I have on my char comes from nice unknown peoples.

You may be right or wrong, but complaining will do you no good.

By the way, what is that zone full of bard twinks? I didn't see this yet.

Prob OT & DL, but gear isn't really needed for this style of play.

[sulious]

Try hunting indoor zones- less kiters.

[Velerin]

The one most annoying thing with the bard AE kiting isn't even that they're taking all the mobs in a zone. It's that the pull takes so long between rounding everything up and then slowly AEing everything that it monopolizes the zone for soooo long.
If some high lvl blasts thru every gnoll in BB it sucks but the zone will repop in 20 min or whatever.
When a bard starts doing an OT roundup it means no mobs for maybe an hour.

[Vohl]

I've thought this over a bit, and I'll throw it out for consideration.

A powerleveler is not engaging mobs in any sort of legitimate sense. Anything he pulls is intended to be KSed by a specific other player or group of players. A soloing or swarm-kiting grouped bard, on the other hand, should be seen as legitimate.

As such, a case could be made for engaging mobs that are being monopolized and not engaged -- in other words, the powerleveler's train.

This will lead to all sorts of inter-player nastiness, of course. If the powerleveler gets ticked off and zones, you're pretty much going to end up training yourself.

[DrKvothe]

So the power-leveler problem is really a symptom of a more ubiquitous problem throughout the game, and simply put it is this:

1) Camps are claimed on a first-come, first-serve basis, regardless of player's level.
2) Roamers can not be camped, and will predominantly be tagged and bagged by better geared, higher level players.

If you're going to keep that 60 druid from hunting in the 10s dungeon, you've got to keep him from hunting in the 20s and 30s and 40s dungeons too. Or you could have instanced dungeons, so everyone gets a shot at whatever camp they want. But then loot becomes common and devalued.

The system works fine. Disappointment and difficulty are part of classic EQ.

[fishingme]

You guys must hate it when i take my 50+ cleric/shaman/druid into cb and buff the entire zone

[Laugher]

On live bard powerleveling (recently, not sure about PoP and earlier) involved pulling as much of the zone without it getting tethered (a WoW mechanic later added in to prevent large trains by having mobs return to their designated area) while the low level pbaes the crowd as the train dies to ds..

One way average (non PL) lowbies dealt with this that I often saw was that they would pbae the train for more damage, thereby gaining themselves a free trains worth of experience :p

Its already KSing to bard PL, right?

Perhaps if there were more train trolls on 99=less people angered by PLs and more people getting the xp they want :p

whenever I've PLed people here before I've noticed the strain (especially in xp bonus week) that my work puts on zones, and while its not my intention to do that for extended periods of time I could see based upon that where having a bard along is 10x better for some and 10x worse for others lol

[Eslade]

I'm not in favor of this idea at all, but why not make mob run speed increase for every mob over 4. It wouldn't affect quad kiting and bards could still kite to a certain extent. But this is not classic and the server would be down to 3 bards.

[Aerar]

On live bard powerleveling (recently, not sure about PoP and earlier) involved pulling as much of the zone without it getting tethered (a WoW mechanic later added in to prevent large trains by having mobs return to their designated area) while the low level pbaes the crowd as the train dies to ds..

One way average (non PL) lowbies dealt with this that I often saw was that they would pbae the train for more damage, thereby gaining themselves a free trains worth of experience :p

Its already KSing to bard PL, right?

Perhaps if there were more train trolls on 99=less people angered by PLs and more people getting the xp they want :p

whenever I've PLed people here before I've noticed the strain (especially in xp bonus week) that my work puts on zones, and while its not my intention to do that for extended periods of time I could see based upon that where having a bard along is 10x better for some and 10x worse for others lol

This is actually quite an interesting concept. By virtue of the bard low hp kiting and the people being PLed essentially KSing the bard it would actually make the entire train fair game for anyone.

I would have to then assume it is ok if you are able to AOE down the bards train faster than the people being PLed you would not be punished for this.

Of course all the bard would have to do is notice this and sing regen and effectively convert the aggro to you then goodnight.

I kinda think swarm kiting is just an accepted aspect of the game and that those who get swarm kited dont really want to experience the game between 1-50.

Honestly swarm kiting is only effective in zones that arent that great xp for people grouping anywhere, with ZEM OT is really not the best place to go - try a dungeon.

Ive rambled too long

[Bidoof]

The problem with the KS argument is that its up to the kiter to report someone KS'ing them. Who will they report: their buddy that they're PLing, or the guy who aoe's his train?

[Arteker]

you got no idea what was getting aa xp with a bard aoe kitting hohb. 14 aas per kite nothing less nothing more.

[Sirken]

as far as dungeons go, they are made up by camps. no person or group is allowed to own more than one camp (unless theres no other players around contesting the zone/camp). so if you are in Crushbone, or Mistmoore, or Unrest, or any dungeon, and a PLer is claiming more than one camp, the PLer has to give up one camp (as chosen by the person that owned both). if the PLer refuses to give up one of his multiple camps, you should /petition in game and then take a camp.

as far as swarm kiting bards, some earlier poster hit the nail on the head. the problem isnt that bards round up a hundred mobs; the problem is that it TAKES SO LONG to round up and then kite down the mobs, and as previously mentioned, can prevent anyone else from seeing a pop for over an hour. ive seen this in OoT, DL, and OT entirely too often, and i have told players repeatedly that if you can not find a mob because some one is kiting more than 4 of them, feel free to peel one off. no staff member is going to give a player grief for peeling 1 mob off a bard thats kiting an entire zone (or an entire island in the OoT situations).

[Aerar]

The problem with the KS argument is that its up to the kiter to report someone KS'ing them. Who will they report: their buddy that they're PLing, or the guy who aoe's his train?

But here is the deal "technically" they arent KSing him as he doesnt actually hold aggro he is simply low HP kiting, if you were to heal the bard he would lose aggro and the entire PL party would die. Can you be punished for "healing" someone?

Let me make it clear however, I dont care about swarm kiting in the least in OT, I have zero intention of ever going there and I doubt I will ever see swarm kiting in the zones I want to level in. I am just making a point about how the game mechanics are working

[theguyy]

Yeah it's pretty stupid. I made a warrior awhile back and started hitting freeport yard trash with my starter *Sword when this idiot 30 bard comes in the zone and pulls the entire yard to his lv 1 buddies for the next hour. Takes a special kind of scumbag to screw over lv 1's lol.

[reborn649]

The one most annoying thing with the bard AE kiting isn't even that they're taking all the mobs in a zone. It's that the pull takes so long between rounding everything up and then slowly AEing everything that it monopolizes the zone for soooo long.
If some high lvl blasts thru every gnoll in BB it sucks but the zone will repop in 20 min or whatever.
When a bard starts doing an OT roundup it means no mobs for maybe an hour.

Whatever bard takes longer than 30min to roundup and kill everything needs to not be swarming in the first place bcuz they're failing pretty hardcore. I have swarmed in pretty much every zone possible and it should never take longer than 30min if you know what you are doing. Granted thats still a possible 30min without npc's, but like many others are saying there are a lot of other places to level that give a ZEM and would be way more efficient in the long run to crank out those levels. Just my 2 cents! Sucks having the zone occupied by a bard, but theres plenty of other places to find zero bards/plvlers.

Kedge Keep ftw!

[Tenlaar]

This is actually quite an interesting concept. By virtue of the bard low hp kiting and the people being PLed essentially KSing the bard it would actually make the entire train fair game for anyone.

I would have to then assume it is ok if you are able to AOE down the bards train faster than the people being PLed you would not be punished for this.

How do you come to this conclusion, that it isn't technically ksing? The mob "belongs" to the first person to agro it, and it's their decision who is and is not allowed to kill that mob. If you kill a mob that is agro'd on somebody else without their permission, that is KSing.

[Sadre Spinegnawer]

get in the habit of finding or starting groups. It is where the fun is, imo. You can tank with newb gear. You just need to get into the group aspect. Do the circuit of dungeons. Befallen, Najena, upper Guk, etc. The dungeon zones suffer less from the problem you are encountering.

[Mandalore93]

He's talking about healing the kiter and transferring the hate. Not killing the mobs. But for most classes making a bard angry is not the best choice.

As for the mechanic...bards have always had sick leveling methods even well past this time frame. Really anything that does not summon has always been bard bait with either aoe until LDoN orswarming. Hell, if charm swarming worked you'd have even more zones with bards although charm swarming didn't create long mob droughts usually.

[kylok]

I have only ever PLd on a monk and I have two very small pieces of advice to give.

1) Talk to people in zone and be polite - this goes much farther than you can imagine.
2) PL/get PLd in Kedge - best zem in game and the only problem I've had in the zone was that there were other people PLing in my spot some times.

--Mobilevortex

[indiscriminate_hater]

can we get confirmation on whether or not the ZEM in kedge keep has been unnerfed? i can't get or find a straight answer

[Tenlaar]

He's talking about healing the kiter and transferring the hate. Not killing the mobs.

The posts made so little sense I didn't want to read them again and quoted the wrong one, meant to be replying to him saying you could nuke down the bard's mobs faster than the PLees with no repercussions.