Alternate Advancement: Good or Bad? [Archive]

Ethanblack

06-02-2010, 12:54 AM

Now, apologies for playing another dumbass card so soon, but I was wondering about AAs.
I'm pretty sure that AAs didn't appear till Luclin or PoP, but I'm wondering what the community stance is on them.

I like to think that AA's can be very useful for helping to define a character's role (They help an SK make a more defined choice between tanking or DPS, for example).

On the flip-side, they can do a lot of damage to classes and really imbalance things (see the state of AAs on EQ live).

What do you think about AAs, and woudl you like to see some basic ones appear?

And, to any Devs that pass by; Would you ever consider adding some AAs?
If no, why not? (other than 'It's not in Classic/Kunark/Vellious' ;P)

mitic

06-02-2010, 01:04 AM

iam confident to see aas in game as soon sleeper is on raid rotation and there is nothing else to do

Ethanblack

06-02-2010, 01:06 AM

iam confident to see aas in game as soon sleeper is on raid rotation and there is nothing else to do

I certainly think that AAs would be a nice thing to be levelling once we're all max level and repeating content, hehe.

mitic

06-02-2010, 01:09 AM

I certainly think that AAs would be a nice thing to be levelling once we're all max level and repeating content, hehe.

uhm, lets do aas now then ...

btw, sky?

Jeebus

06-02-2010, 01:59 AM

I always loved being able to work on my character after he reached max level. Perhaps an AA cap though so you're not "60 soandso with 572 aas, LFG" or "LFM for exp group, must have 150+ aas"

Ethanblack

06-02-2010, 02:15 AM

I always loved being able to work on my character after he reached max level. Perhaps an AA cap though so you're not "60 soandso with 572 aas, LFG" or "LFM for exp group, must have 150+ aas"

Certainly. I think that AAs are very valuable in this capacity, and that prhaps eventually Nilbog could begin development of some that are unique to P1999.

For example, a nice melee AA would be 'Costs X Points: Increases 2 Hand Melee Damage by Y%, Lowers 1 Hand Melee by Y%'

(AAs that really define a character would be incredibly awesome.)

soup

06-02-2010, 02:48 AM

The concept behind them is good, as in tailoring your character to the specific role you want to fulfill. The execution is terrible though, in that there's no drawbacks or trade offs, just "more time = more AAs = better character"

Gorgetrapper

06-02-2010, 02:53 AM

AAs are a good concept, bad execution. If you had a LIMITED amount of AAs you could get, then it'd be fine, but allowing any class the ability to solo as well as a necro, druid mage etc... that just ruins everything. A cleric shouldn't be able to solo content easier than every other class (because of proccing hammer etc). AAs are just too overpowered and I'll be a sad panda if I see them introduced on this server in any way.

Ropethunder

06-02-2010, 03:00 AM

AAs are stupid. They ruin the core balance between classes and segregate players based on play time (how many AAs) rather than skill (everyone can get 50 eventually).

Senadin

06-02-2010, 03:12 AM

AAs are stupid. They ruin the core balance between classes and segregate players based on play time (how many AAs) rather than skill (everyone can get 50 eventually).

What balance? It is perfectly normal that someone who plays more than you should get more than you. If a guy at works put more hours and do more actual works he should get more....

Just as someone who raids will get better gear than the one who doesnt!

I dont understand why folks want it to be equal! it isnt!

It already isnt, some class arent the best at soloing but they got utility. Some are great at soloing but are dependant on gear, hps, mana.

Ropethunder

06-02-2010, 03:13 AM

Bad. AAs throw balance out the window and substitute skill with playing time.

Senadin

06-02-2010, 03:36 AM

People keep saying skills but is skill really a misnomer? Are folks trying to say knowledge?

It takes skills to juggle, it takes knowledge to know when to cast, heal etc. MMO's arent rocket science! Hit a button or several buttons. Maybe bards require skills? I've never really played one further than 36 or so.

You posted twice and have yet to bring an argument against AA. Simply saying or rather implying that someone who has tons of times will be necesarily better than you because he has more AA's than you.

You mention balance! There's no real balance! If a caster can solo better than me, is it balance? I can only heal myself with bandages and mend. I am not balanced with a cleric and nor should i be.

Each class has it's purpose and that's fine... i dont see how the balance could be broken with AA's when it already is broken and that's the way it should be. Without that imbalance we might as well each play a single player game. When i quit i think i had 700 something AA, that didnt made me a caster or a healer. I could solo a bit more but still not as good as a caster. Which is the same situation now without AA's.

Sparkin

06-02-2010, 03:40 AM

Bad. AAs throw balance out the window and substitute skill with playing time.

? Character power in all MMO's is based off playing time. Yes, there is hopefully a good measure of skill involved, but in the end most of a character's power is based off relative playing time. Even before AA's were introduced, power is based off playing time, only in the form of gear.

I'll take the AA's they gave us over none, but I agree with the folks saying they could have been better implemented. The OP suggests you had choices to make which direction you wanted to go with a char, but they were pretty short-term choices. In the end you were just going to get them all, which was pretty boring.

The biggest mistake they made with AA's though was always the ability for old / new players to catch up. There needed to be a system to help them do it a much faster manner. I guess maybe they did some things to help with that eventually? but only after it was too late. Or as suggested if there was some sort of AA cap where you had to make choices, it wouldn't have been an issue.

Aeolwind

06-02-2010, 06:45 AM

Turned EQ into Pokemon: Gotta catch'em all. I hated AA's. I liked some of the abilities, but having to grind that much XP for marginal returns was hell. I -hate- xp'ing now because of AA.

Ethanblack

06-02-2010, 07:14 AM

Turned EQ into Pokemon: Gotta catch'em all. I hated AA's. I liked some of the abilities, but having to grind that much XP for marginal returns was hell. I -hate- xp'ing now because of AA.

Well, to clarify, the point of this thread really is just to sort of seed the idea of new custom AAs with developers such as yourself.

The goal isn't to have Live AAs added, but instead to sort of encourage Devs to think long term abotu actually inventing their own sets of AAs that do what the old AA system didn't (that being encouraging specialisatio), whle avoiding the whole More AAs = Uber in every way' situation.

Uaellaen

06-02-2010, 07:29 AM

i loved some of the AAs ... especialy MGB!

rockhopper

06-02-2010, 07:48 AM

No one tailored their characters to specific roles using AA's. All classes had specific roles that weren't modified whatsoever by AA's. AA's merely enhanced those roles.

- Tanks prioritized tanking AA's
- Rogues prioritized DPS

Etc.

Just look at any class forum/site. Most had priority lists for AA, and whenever new people asked for AA advice, the same answers were always given.

Tallenn

06-02-2010, 08:55 AM

First of all, the claim of upsetting balance assumes that there ever was or indeed, ever could be, real balance between the classes. There never has been and I submit, there never can be, unless all classes are removed, and everyone given all identical abilities. One set of abilities can NEVER be made to perfectly balance against another set, not to mention 14 different sets to all balance against one another. It's just not possible. There is not balance- there never was any balance, there never can be any balance. So that is not a valid argument.

That said, I like AAs. That was the whole problem with WoW. Once you have reached max level (admittedly far easier than in classic EQ), the only way to improve your character is with gear. Now, getting all the very best gear can take quite a bit of time, but what if you don't want to raid, what if you don't want to do arena or battlegrounds, or whatever the PvP du jour is now? What if you don't really even want to group? I got my character to 80, did all the quests I could solo, and grinded out tons of cash to buy the very best equipment available on the AH. Ok, then what? Keep grinding cash? for what? There's nothing left to buy that would make my character better. Grind factions to get a different mount that's not going to be any faster than what I already have? Unless I wanted to start raiding or doing those mind-numbing daily heroics, I was done. I beat the game- as much as I was interested in doing, anyway. I went and leveled another character to 80, but got tired of that one even quicker. That's why I'm not playing WoW now, and why I probably won't until the next xpac comes out.

EQ without AAs is the same way. The only way you can continue to improve your character once you are at max level is by raiding, which I'm no longer interested in doing.

Let me be clear though. I'm not promoting the idea that AAs be included on this server. AAs were introduced with Luclin, and this server will not include that xpac. Therefore, there should not be AAs on this server. Period. I love AAs, but they do not belong on a classic server.

JaVeDK

06-02-2010, 08:56 AM

One of the few aspects of WoW that I actually liked were the skill trees (I'm aware WoW didn't invent the concept). If the devs are up to it, I would love to see some sort of AA skill trees implemented once the project is well into Velious.

YendorLootmonkey

06-02-2010, 09:04 AM

No one tailored their characters to specific roles using AA's. All classes had specific roles that weren't modified whatsoever by AA's. AA's merely enhanced those roles.

Pretty sure all rangers tailored their characters to the "long-distance damage dealer" role with EQ/AM3, a role they really didn't have before AAs (unless you count 2 mins of Trueshot disc every 72 mins.) Do tons more damage than I could with melee without aggro or having to be in AoE range? Yes please!!

Omnimorph

06-02-2010, 09:35 AM

Skill trees in diablo 2 i thought were fantastic. I understand that given there were only like 7 classes you had different branches of them, but this meant it was possible to have 2 different sorcerers or w/e useful for completely different things.

AA's became quite ridiculous with time, a new expansion meant a stupid amount of aa's necessary to grind. And it was a grind too. Some were fun, self stasis, BDB etc (chanter aa's) but grinding 5aa's to get +1 mana regen when i'm already regenning 150 mana a tick already? that's just pointless.

Hiragawa

06-02-2010, 09:41 AM

AA's were good up to a point. The first few Expansions that added them, added some very nice things but they weren't going crazy. But after awhile it got out of control and they started adding aa's that were just... yeah.

Mendrik

06-02-2010, 10:23 AM

The only form I would like AAs to be is, as someone posted earlier in this thread, if they were specifically designed for p99 and would offer customization. No EQ AAs please.

Excision Rottun

06-02-2010, 10:45 AM

The biggest mistake they made with AA's though was always the ability for old / new players to catch up. There needed to be a system to help them do it a much faster manner. I guess maybe they did some things to help with that eventually? but only after it was too late.

On Live now it is either your first 700 or 1000 AA are on a curve with an XP multiplier.

Where at first they come super fast and by the time you hit 700 or 1000 (whatever it is), the modifier scales down to 1.0

Malrubius

06-02-2010, 10:46 AM

We all know that they will never be on this server. Nor should they. /thread

Branaddar

06-02-2010, 11:03 AM

It's a multi-step scale for the AAs. I think 250 then 500 then 1000 have varying degrees of speed.

Anyway, I tend to agree that the first few expansions of AAs were decent. But going back to EQLive recently and looking through the thousands upon thousands of AAs I "need" to be an efficient monk... no thanks.

It's part of the reason I just can't get into EQLive anymore. Knowing that even when I hit the next level cap, there's still 1000+ more AA I need to earn in order to be on par with the people that didn't quit playing.

I was glad to have CA/CS 8, now it goes up to 25 or something ridiculous.

I'm not sure I like the idea of having "specs" in EQ. A monk is a monk is a monk. I shouldn't have to "spec" to be a good raid puller at the cost of being shitty DPS.

It's going to cause issues if there's no ability to respend points. A lot of people are going to spend on whatever makes them get XP and loot faster primarily, and then they want to raid and either guilds will deny them for being the wrong spec, or they'll be crappy at raids because of their spec.

Obviously not an issue for healers or DPS classes necessarily, but any of the multi-function classes will suffer from a need to specialize in one function. Bards, monks and enchanters come heavily to mind as classes that would suffer from further specialization.

The more I think about it, the more I think AAs could really hurt this server. Yes, there is a need to "do something" when we're capped and there's no more raid content coming. But I don't think grinding 5000 AA is the answer.

I like EZServer's RoA/Prestige system, where after you cap you can reset to level 1 and each time you do, you get an upgrade to a ring. But I'm not sure that would work well here. Guilds will rely on their raid members, and having people leveling from scratch all the time would just kill the ability to perform at raids.

Perhaps XP gained after your cap goes towards... something. An evolving item of sorts, or some form of earned points to be spent on low- to mid-grade raid equipment for the people that don't want to raid here, or to avoid the need to farm Halls of Testing for a month just to get half your guild 2 pieces of gear each. I dunno, just throwing ideas around.

I'd like to see this server remain as classic as possible, but without growing stagnant at the same time.

Taluvill

06-02-2010, 11:12 AM

The whole "what should we do after velious" question has ping ponged around the forums here more than anyone will ever know. Some have suggested aa's some have suggested custom content, some have even suggested a complete rollback.

I think it's only fair to give it a wait and see approach, tbh. Any solution that is discussed by anyone, with any developer input, will either lose or gain players by them knowing whats going to come at the end of the road.

Branaddar

06-02-2010, 11:16 AM

No doubt, Talu. I think it's fair to say the devs shouldn't announce anything until the situation arises. As you said, it'll do no benefit.

It's still fun to brainstorm a bit, though. Maybe give them some ideas.

Rollback is a decent idea. Would just suck to come into the server close to the rollback :P

YendorLootmonkey

06-02-2010, 12:13 PM

Rollback is a decent idea. Would just suck to come into the server close to the rollback :P

If rollback is a possibility, I would like to know up front before I invest my time any further in my characters. I mean, investing my time in a bunch of digital trinkets on a Emu server is foolish enough, but investing my time in the same knowing for a fact that they day will come where it's wiped clean... I could be spending this time getting laid. Or perhaps something slightly more realistic. :)

Senadin

06-02-2010, 01:17 PM

If rollback is a possibility, I would like to know up front before I invest my time any further in my characters. I mean, investing my time in a bunch of digital trinkets on a Emu server is foolish enough, but investing my time in the same knowing for a fact that they day will come where it's wiped clean... I could be spending this time getting laid. Or perhaps something slightly more realistic. :)

Yup, i definitely wouldnt be a happy camper to be rolled back in 2 years... or so.

Branaddar

06-02-2010, 01:38 PM

Yeah the only way I could see them not bleeding a lot of players is if there's an added bonus to the rollback somehow. Like you keep all your gear/skills or something. I dunno :P

Alleusion

06-02-2010, 01:44 PM

It's part of the reason I just can't get into EQLive anymore. Knowing that even when I hit the next level cap, there's still 1000+ more AA I need to earn in order to be on par with the people that didn't quit playing.

My problem is that I found that as soon as I reached the level cap and got near the number of AA's I needed, they raised the cap again. It was a viscious cycle. IDK, maybe I'm in a minority, but I actually liked Luclin. *ducks*

holkan

06-02-2010, 02:19 PM

Aeolwind

06-02-2010, 02:37 PM

While I can understand people not liking aa's because of their abilities or even because they were released in an expansion they dont like. Saying you dont like them because they're too grindy is LOL this entire game is one huge grind first a level grind then a gear grind.

I used to have no issues with leveling or XPing or whatever, but after AA made it a necessity I lost all interest in it. You used to have to grind out 10 levels and then relax as you raided & just killed shit. But, when it became expected to be on 16 hours a day, 8 doing AA and 8 raiding, it got old...fast.

holkan

06-02-2010, 02:41 PM

Alleusion

06-02-2010, 02:55 PM

Thats less to do with aa's and more to do with how fast sony released expansions. Aa's were just something to do when raid targets were dead or you couldnt/wouldnt raid and had the best gear you could get. While requirements for aa's came forth from min maxing just because you had 500 aa's and your friend had 800 aa's didnt mean you couldnt raid or group together unlike being lvl 30 and 50 or what have you.

Oh but sometimes, it did mean exactly that. Certain groups / guilds didn't want someone unless they had X AA skill. If you didn't have it, they could always find someone who did.

holkan

06-02-2010, 02:57 PM

Oh but sometimes, it did mean exactly that. Certain groups / guilds didn't want someone unless they had X AA skill. If you didn't have it, they could always find someone who did.

And thats the people not the game. There are some people in this game who wont group with the lower spectrum so they can min max IE a 24 who wont group with an 18 because they wont kill fast enough for his liking etc. Or doesn't want to group cause he doesnt have a gear up to his standard lol. You cant hate the game for that elitist mentality that players bring.

matahari

06-02-2010, 03:01 PM

I don't like aa's. That is my opinion.

Plus they came out with luclin obviously.

Omnimorph

06-02-2010, 05:17 PM

Well velious will eventually get old, people will leave if they're stuck on the same content for months and months. I don't see a problem with releasing luclin by then. It'll be like what the prog servers should have been like :)

Bumamgar

06-02-2010, 05:28 PM

My dream is that at the appropriate time post-Velious, Luclin will be released, but it will be modified to remove the Nexus spire translocators (keep the nexus portal spells of course for Wiz/Dru), and without the bazaar function.

My greater dream is that at the appropriate time post-Luclin, PoP will be released, but it will be modified to remove all PoK books/portals (other than the PoK port spell for Wiz/Dru, and the portal to PoTranq).

My ultimate all time dream is that at the appropriate time post-PoP, Gates will be released, but it will be modified to remove all instancing. All the previously instanced zones would be converted to static zones (including Tipt, Uquaa, etc).

My dreams don't include LoY or LDoN, but if they did, clearly they would be un-instanced versions of said expansions.

Realistic? Probably not... but a man can dream!

utenan

06-02-2010, 06:09 PM

Just another timesink

Glaena

06-02-2010, 06:27 PM

I have mixed feelings on AAs. For a long time, I hated grinding for them. For some reason, I never felt like getting more AA abilities was as satisfying as getting levels, especially when those AAs were more mitigation and avoidance, which are hardly optional for a tank, but aren't really fun abilities either (unless you count not dying as "fun"). You can really tell the difference between two tanks of the same level and gear when one has zero AAs and the other has a boatload.

And since you can get them all, it isn't a matter of customizing, but prioritizing the order you get them in. There are so many to get that catching up and feeling viable compared to characters played longer/more can be really daunting.

On the other hand, when I reached the point that I had 500 or so, which isn't very many these days, I felt like my characters had really improved and gained some neat abilities. I enjoy Army of the Dead on my necro, for instance, just because it is fun.

Meh. I think AAs would be overpowering for Classic (to Velious). We did it before in era gear and without AAs. If there's a point where people start clamoring for more to do, that might be the time to reconsider.

Alleusion

06-02-2010, 06:31 PM

My dream is that at the appropriate time post-Velious, Luclin will be released, but it will be modified to remove the Nexus spire translocators (keep the nexus portal spells of course for Wiz/Dru), and without the bazaar function.

IIRC besides the Luclin launch being one of the biggest clusterfucks of SOE history, the bazaar wasn't fully functional at launch. I entered end-game during this expansion, so some of my best raid memories were maid in that snake place (the spelling escapes me atm), and with Lord Inquisitor Seru.

BuzWeaver

06-02-2010, 08:05 PM

I had mixed feelings about AA's when they first came out. To me they are just an extension of the Skinner Box methodology to keep players pulling the slot machine handle.

Wrei

06-02-2010, 08:15 PM

I don't think it's really an issue, the grind will always be there in some shape or form. No one is "forcing" anyone to xp 10 hours a day to get max AA's etc... The hardcore gamer will go all out (and if so what is the big deal? since the aa trees are capped), those who invest less time will go at their own pace. The point is that every "activity" you do post 50 involving mobs will yield some form of character development reward.

My biggest beef with WoW was precisely this issue. When your character development is based on gear improvement it trivializes a huge portion of the content you did in order to get to the end game. Seriously, if you were decked out in the best raid gear there was NO POINT whatsoever to run any instances or do quests (other then random faction). WoW countered this issue by offering an alternate game (PvP BG,Arena) and by simplifying the leveling process to the point that everyone could hit max level on 8 toons in no time.

Some of my friends loved "starting" over a toon, lvl a twink from 1 to whatever level wow is at now, then redoing the process all over again. Why would they ever need to log on their main besides raiding? Alternate Advancement was not a perfect system, it's grossly unbalanced (depending on expansions) but it gave the purists a way to improve their characters other than gear.

Why is that important? First, it gives new life to all previous old content. Farming is nice but xp'ing is a better reward. Raiders currently don't do anything other then make new twinks or try to farm plat in some form. Classic is congested but by the time we get a few more expansions there will be lots of xp grounds available that will be utilized even after you hit max level. It gives new life to the game for those who do not enjoy alts in any shape or form.

Second, it gives a chance for those who can't raid (due to RL schedules) to improve their character through other means besides gear. I.e You don't need to be in the top end guild to get a powerful toon.

Lastly, your time investment (towards character development) feels less cheated should you need to take a break for whatever reason. Classic example of this in WoW:

Player A is the best tank on the server on the first 3 expansions because he invested 982392843 hours at the raiding game. His RL job situation changes which forces him to take a break for an entire expansion. Player A comes back on the 5th expansion and though he may be more "skilled" and "experienced" his character does not reflect the time invested as random noob player B (who started a month ago) ends up having a more "developed" toon based on gear level.

Think of AA's as character development that stays beyond expansions. I.e something that's worth grinding for (if your actually going to grind for something).

At any rate, I'm not advocating to implement the AA system as is (as the live system is pretty retarded). People signed up here to have a "classic" experience and not "we'll make stuff up as we go along" EQ so not having AA's will not be a big deal. It was just my two cents on the concept of character development besides the gear grind.

Reiker

06-02-2010, 08:39 PM

I like AAs, but I played a Shaman so my opinion is biased. Cannibalization was just a ridiculously powerful ability.

nicemace

06-02-2010, 09:51 PM

AA's are great. I prefer progression and keeping things moving, constant improvement.

playing a mmo is about progression and keep playing, not just stagnating when you max out.

you may not want to believe it but regardless of level limit (50) and lack of AA's ... time DOES = better char.

you guys going to bitch and moan about players who clear tov week in and week out and have far superior gear to you?? its exactly the same kind of difference as AA.

Sirbanmelotz

06-03-2010, 03:00 AM

Mleh

06-03-2010, 06:57 AM

I think AA's will be awesome! As so-and-so said, there must be a max. Like X amount in X tree, so you are able to spec your toon in a certain way. IE a tank is a tank, a tank can be DPS, etc.

Go P1999!!!

Neg. If there should be any AA should be limited to the innate (non-class) AAs only. All this mumbo jumbo about "specs" is WoW. Every single class would end up cookie cutter to maximize their dps or healing power. = stupid.

Acillatem

07-08-2010, 07:00 PM

AA's and the Bazaar were the ONLY things I liked about Luclin. Luclin turned the game from Everquest to EverTrek IMO. Went from fantasy to mixed Sci-Fi and I didn't like that.

I'd like to see custom content (whether that's picking and choosing from existing or brand new) and AAs as for post-Velious.

SOME things post-Velious were good. It just seemed as time wore on those things were fewer and farther apart.

Overcast

07-08-2010, 07:26 PM

The only form I would like AAs to be is, as someone posted earlier in this thread, if they were specifically designed for p99 and would offer customization. No EQ AAs please.

Not a bad idea, particularly if everyone had the same ones..

Stats, Resistances, Run Speed, Critical Rating - etc.

It would 'even' the playing field and make them pretty non-critical for grouping/raids.

Arclanz

07-08-2010, 07:35 PM

Malrubius

07-08-2010, 08:13 PM

garyogburn

07-08-2010, 09:05 PM

Turned EQ into Pokemon: Gotta catch'em all. I hated AA's. I liked some of the abilities, but having to grind that much XP for marginal returns was hell. I -hate- xp'ing now because of AA.

Isnt grinding for gear the same thing? Most gear doesnt give you new class dynamics, either.

AA's were simply one of the best things implemented in eq. I wouldnt want them implemented here unless luclin was released, however.

Dersk

07-08-2010, 09:40 PM

SOME things post-Velious were good. It just seemed as time wore on those things were fewer and farther apart.

I loved the bandolier. Everything else can burn in hell.

Lill-Leif

07-09-2010, 03:21 AM

On Live now it is either your first 700 or 1000 AA are on a curve with an XP multiplier.

Where at first they come super fast and by the time you hit 700 or 1000 (whatever it is), the modifier scales down to 1.0

Another kick in the nuts for those devoted players who did those first AAs without any xp multiplier. I never did more than 200 or so but felt ashamed to be given an advantage without any hard work to it. Another reason why I stopped playing live.

Overcast

07-09-2010, 10:34 AM

AA were introduced in Luclin to let players advance their characters less dramatically than character level.

If you want AAs in now, I'd say make them stat increases, resists, and run speed only; and make these hella expensive.

Or if the server gets big enough to split, you could have AA on one and not the other.

Or, if players are just bored at 50 then you could create some new pvp zone and they can duke it out!! Perhaps even to earn points to buy special items from vendors.

Devs are we keeping you busy enough? :)

Same thing I was thinking. Basic Stats, maybe tradeskills, run speed... Just that same across the board for everyone. Normal 'level' of experience worth. That kinda makes them truly an 'extra' and not something people would give up normal XP for.

Once Velious runs it's course, it would be neat to see something like that added. Maybe a revamped 'luclin' in tune with original EQ, of course with any luck - that's a few years off... ;)

I'd like to see LDoN in eventually too - with better 'tuned' gear to keep with the world. That one was the closest I seen to the 'original vision' - except for the mass inflated gear, but at the time it was only 'catching casuals' up to raiders.

Alcandre

07-09-2010, 10:36 AM

i enjoyed the AA's that came with luclin, after that it got pretty retarded. I really dont understand how anyone could think they were a bad thing

Critical Error

07-09-2010, 10:37 AM

What I absolutely love about AA:

They let you really customize your character. Everyone eventually has the same spells, and is going for the same gear. AA let you focus on what you want your toon to be.

They give classes more flavor. I remeber back in the day I got Slay Undead 3 on my pally. Was it overly useful? Not really. Was it worth the AA? Hell yes, it made you feel like a real pally in the unlikely situation that you were fighting undead.

Are there some bad ones? Yes, some AA completely change classes (looking at ranger). But Id take some bad with the whole lot of good.

Worst thing that can happen with AA? Groups get picky (ex. "Must have over 100 AA!!").

Overall, AA were a great idea not followed by many games later on. But they are great int hat they are progression after the lvls without necessarily being super powerful, but adding a lot of flavor.

Malrubius

07-09-2010, 12:10 PM

i enjoyed the AA's that came with luclin, after that it got pretty retarded. I really dont understand how anyone could think they were a bad thing

Sure, they were great. So is pizza. But neither will be on this server so it's kind of irrelevant. :D

odizzido

07-09-2010, 01:47 PM

What I like about AAs is that, for me at least, I can level forever with them.

I like leveling my necro, but right now he is capped in 50 and so unless I raid there is nothing I can really do on him even though I want to play him. And raiding isn't really the same thing as xping for me.

The main reason I am looking forward to kunark so much is because it will allow me to level my necro again.

Randiesel

09-17-2010, 11:34 AM

I used to have no issues with leveling or XPing or whatever, but after AA made it a necessity I lost all interest in it. You used to have to grind out 10 levels and then relax as you raided & just killed shit. But, when it became expected to be on 16 hours a day, 8 doing AA and 8 raiding, it got old...fast.

The bright side of it all that this is *just* an emu server.

Not that it isn't grand; I'm actually having way more fun here than i did in live, but I don't think we're going to have super strict guilds. Maybe we already do and I don't realize it because I'm only lvl 14, but people here have less vested. We aren't paying for it, you can't ebay your character (and if you did I think theres a much higher risk of it getting banned), etc.

I'm in favor of an AA system, I'm also in favor of finding a way to add more content, whether its going beyond SoV, or its some hybrid of old/new content like another thread suggested (adding the PoP zones off of existing zones and eliminating PoK? sounds good here), we're going to need something eventually, otherwise the high end will die out.

guineapig

09-17-2010, 11:41 AM

I like the concept of AA's after a couple expansions and a level cap increase. It seems like natural progression in a game without having to keep increasing the level cap, but still being able to make new content more difficult (thereby requiring that AA's be invested in).

What I don't like is having no limit, or an insanely high limit on AA's where by you are essentially forcing a player to spend every chance they have playing the same character for fear of falling behind the curve.

There is nothing wrong with having a reachable goal for an expansion like say (15-20 AA max per expansion.) Not only would this allow players to spend time playing other classes instead of mindlessly grinding exp. But it would also promote versatility within the classes. If you can only choose 15 out of 50 possibly AA points then your enchanter might end up much different from another enchanter.

Specialization is a great feature in any game.

Kender

09-18-2010, 04:47 AM

problem with aa's is they were introduced in luclin

if you brought them in any earlier they would trivialise the velious content. (the velious expansaion trivialised kunark content). prime example is in the halls of testing in ToV. monks had to really work hard to pull deep in that wing. with run 3 and reduced FD cooldown it would be too easy.

krforrester

09-18-2010, 11:31 AM

I just want Run 3, pet hold and suspend minion.

Reiker

09-18-2010, 11:48 AM

Specialization is a great feature in any game.

I posted about this in another AA thread, but I'll reiterate how specialization is a really bad idea in any MMO. Unless you offer like 3-4 classes at creation, any sort of "specialization" should end at character creation once you choose a class. Take a look at EverQuest, 15 classes when AAs were introduced. How could AAs possibly have offered specialization at this point in the game?

Warrior - Specializations would basically be for tanking or dps. Why would anyone choose the dps specialization over the tanking? Those people would have clicked something like Rogue or Monk at character creation.

Cleric - Who would spec in anything other than healing? What else could you spec in, uh, nuking? Anyone who wanted to spec in nuking were already "specced" when they clicked Wizard.

And so on.

The ONLY MMO that really did this correctly was DAOC, and was designed with class specializations from the ground up. This still had issues since one-dimensional classes such as Skald, Paladin, etc basically used the same cookie-cutter spec since there wasn't a lot of wiggle room. To make this successful Mythic basically made a list of abilities and randomly distributed them to classes. For example the main healers all had a heal and a buff line among all three realms. But Druids could spec in a pet, Clerics could spec in Smite (nuking), and Healers could spec in Pacification (CC). There were very specific circumstances that actually made this work, one being the PvP focus of the game and the three realm and large amount of classes between all three. And it still had issues (people creating buff bots since no one wanted to actually main a char specced in buffs for example).

WoW's talent system is so fucked. You have classes like Rogues that can spec in DPS, DPS, or DPS and then a class like Druid that can spec in Melee DPS/Tanking, Healing, and Nuking. Their entire class system is fucked pretty much beyond repair because of the spec trees.

AAs are pretty awesome in execution. The large amount of time required to max AAs really reinforced EQ's hardcore spend more time to become more powerful philosophy. And technically there's a specialization element depending on which AAs you prioritize over others, but you never actually are forced to permanently change the functionality of your class, which is essential.

Hopefully this is legible I'm pretty hung over and can't really concentrate anymore.

yaeger

09-18-2010, 11:52 AM

I'm all for custom AA's. Mostly AA's that do not directly improve your class.

AA's like reduced food consumption, increased illusion length, buff time extensions (recieved not casted) are what should be introduced. Things that don't directly effect the class, but add to it.

I agree that if they were added before luclin they'd create massive balance problems if tanks got more avoidance, dps got more dps, and healers could churn out massive heal numbers.

It'd also give us something to do besides rolling new alts once we hit 50.

Reiker

09-18-2010, 11:55 AM

A large amount of stock AAs still don't work on emu, good luck on seeing custom.

AA's like reduced food consumption
You mean the General tab AA Innate Metabolism?

Absentia

09-18-2010, 12:02 PM

Why are people constantly wanting to fucking change the game as it is?

yaeger

09-18-2010, 12:11 PM

You mean the General tab AA Innate Metabolism?

Yes. A mix and match approach. Keep the ones that will work, toss the others out, bring in new ones.

yaeger

09-18-2010, 12:17 PM

Why are people constantly wanting to fucking change the game as it is?

Cause some people have reached level 50 on 4 characters and have had nothing to do for the last 6 months while they wait for new content.

AAs are a way to provide new content, without actually adding new content. They're basically the option to gain something measurable from spending 4 hours in a group somewhere.

Absentia

09-18-2010, 12:20 PM

I play here because I don't want to grind AA's on EQlive, grind tomes on SoD, or grind emblems in WoW. If you don't like the content given, and are bored, find something else to do. But don't fuck up a good server with AA's and custom content.

Puyen

09-18-2010, 12:24 PM

only if there is an AA cap, more so that characters and specialize their class, tank or dps for example. No AA that can totally change the character or add massive change!

yaeger

09-18-2010, 12:26 PM

I play here because I don't want to grind AA's on EQlive. If you don't like the content given, and are bored, find something else to do.

That's what we're talking about. Introducing AA's that don't directly effect the class's primary purpose.

It'd unbalance the game to introduce AA's that give rogues more damage. But if they were given AAs like SoS, increased illusions, better pickpocketing, better bind wound.

Stuff that will never ever be required, but gives the option to stay on the server and still group once you hit 50.

Acillatem

09-18-2010, 12:26 PM

I'm all for AAs as long as you cap them. As people have said numerous times - the way the AA system was on Live - all classes were still the same - it just took longer for some to reach that goal than others.

For example - You can only spend 3 General AAs - It's still going to create some cookie cutter classes, but I think by limiting the number of AAs you CAN have - it will create more diversity than on Live.

Also some would need to be removed - ie Manaburn/Nexus Gate for example.

I mean if you think about it - even with gear - there's still a lot of "cookie cutter" choices out there....GEBS, Staff of the Wheel (Blue Crystal Staff), for WIZ etc....everyone pretty much agrees those are the best in slot. You can't change that.

All AAs would do really is give people capped on levels something to do for a little while longer, just prolonging the "damn I'm bored" part a little longer.

But I think it's worth looking into becuz they were an exciting aspect to the game in many ways.

guineapig

09-18-2010, 02:57 PM

I posted about this in another AA thread, but I'll reiterate how specialization is a really bad idea in any MMO. Unless you offer like 3-4 classes at creation, any sort of "specialization" should end at character creation once you choose a class. Take a look at EverQuest, 15 classes when AAs were introduced. How could AAs possibly have offered specialization at this point in the game?

Warrior and cleric, sure. You wouldn't want to mess with them too much but:

How about a druid that wants to specialize in healing and buffs for raiding purposes, versus an alt druid that wants to specialize in nuking and dots.
Or a shaman that wants to specialize in melee and general soloing survivability.
Hell even a cleric could specialize in being more deadly versus undead.
I can totally see the charm in being able to make a battle wizard to play around with versus just haveing a raid wizard that stands up, nukes and sits back down.
Lets not forget tradeskill alts or alts that are just made to farm shit. The option to specialize these characters for the purposes they were made for is a boon.

Not every person playing the game plays to raid. And even those that do make alts for fun. The option for variety is not a bad thing. Nobody is forcing a warrior to specialize in DPS versus tanking skills.

It's a hypothetical conversation anyway since we won't ever see AA's on this server. If I were playing on live today and had 7+ years worth of characters however, I would be bummed if every class I rolled up would simply end up like a carbon copy of every other character of that class ever made.

Reiker

09-18-2010, 04:20 PM

Or a shaman that wants to specialize in melee and general soloing survivability.

A shaman who specialized in melee over anything else would be gimping the fuck out of themselves. If there was say a Tanking/HP type path, and say a DoT path, then EJ-ist threads would pop up parsing which was the better way to go and everyone would just spec the same. Now you have a balancing nightmare on your hands. Certain AAs are just way better than the rest, no one would ever spec in whatever paths did not have the Cannibalization AA.

Hell even a cleric could specialize in being more deadly versus undead.

Lol yeah, Clerics are going to give up the one thing that makes their class awesome so they can offer a little bit more DPS on like 15% of the content in EQ. Sure. And I bet Paladins would have an undead path also and be 10x better than an undead specced cleric.

Everyone knows that in MMOs classes that can do 50% of one thing and 50% of another completely blow compared to classes that focus on only a few main jobs. Look at Druids and Rangers for a good example.

To the AA cap people: All this would do is ensure that x% of the available AAs were never purchased by anyone, ever. X depending on how large the AA cap was.

People seem to think that the original AA system is hardcore gamer-centric, but an "AA specialization system" would cater even more to the spreadsheet parsing minmaxers. At least the current way avoids people choosing a path that seems "fun" and totally fucking their toon up without the player knowing.

Ridic

09-18-2010, 09:20 PM

AAs will keep this game afloat after the velious content is done with. But i'm not sure how they'd implement them, since it would make velious raids a joke.

yaeger

09-18-2010, 09:35 PM

AAs will keep this game afloat after the velious content is done with. But i'm not sure how they'd implement them, since it would make velious raids a joke.

Do you guys even read the posts that other people put up?

If we implemented the same AAs that were used in live where they would add to a class's damage, survivability, or utility then YES. It would make previous content a joke.

However, why not add custom AAs that do none of these? Rather than Rogue AAs increasing Rogue damage, allow the Rogue to accumulate AAs that reduce exp loss on death, good consumption, illusion duration, and underwater breath duration.

Those were just some examples, but I'd like to see custom AAs that bring back a reason to play the class (any class) once you hit 50.

Ridic

09-18-2010, 09:42 PM

Do you guys even read the posts that other people put up?

If we implemented the same AAs that were used in live where they would add to a class's damage, survivability, or utility then YES. It would make previous content a joke.

However, why not add custom AAs that do none of these? Rather than Rogue AAs increasing Rogue damage, allow the Rogue to accumulate AAs that reduce exp loss on death, good consumption, illusion duration, and underwater breath duration.

Those were just some examples, but I'd like to see custom AAs that bring back a reason to play the class (any class) once you hit 50.

I just read the OP and posted. You're mad if you think i'm going to read anymore then that... what do you think I am. . . smart of something? srsly.

custom AAs will take a lot of work+will cause more problems then what they are worth, imo. Bad idea.

oldhead

09-18-2010, 10:28 PM

i'd be happy for AA's for rangers only to make them viable... or even a non classic change to make them ranged DPS with bow.

Oldfart

09-18-2010, 10:35 PM

AA points can suck it, stop trying to modify classic into something it was not, eq died with luclin , don't make it happen here to!

yaeger

09-18-2010, 10:47 PM

AA points can suck it, stop trying to modify classic into something it was not, eq died with luclin , don't make it happen here to!

Classic EQ died with Luclin, but PoP was the best expansion ever released in EQ.

Tons of challenging raids, excellent class balance, and plenty of stuff to do for the hardcore and casual. AAs were only a part of it.

God knows that after long enough in Velious with nothing left to do, people will want more. Just like what happened in Live.

oldhead

09-19-2010, 12:22 AM

Classic EQ died with Luclin, but PoP was the best expansion ever released in EQ.

Tons of challenging raids, excellent class balance, and plenty of stuff to do for the hardcore and casual. AAs were only a part of it.

God knows that after long enough in Velious with nothing left to do, people will want more. Just like what happened in Live.

then create custom content which could include AA's or wipe the server and start from day 1

Either way you are talking a looooooooooooooooong time from now.

AexDestroy

09-19-2010, 10:13 AM

If no, why not? (other than 'It's not in Classic/Kunark/Vellious' ;P)

lauremore

09-19-2010, 11:54 AM

All you whiners need to realize verant designed and finished most of Luclin before the sellout to SOE was formalized, and SOE took over. So stop saying SOL was not part of classic, because it was. If you don't like it, that is one thing, but saying it is not classic and /pooting all the time when it is mentioned is dumb, in whatever form you are doing it in.

Divarin

09-19-2010, 12:12 PM

In my opinion World of Warcraft stole a lot of good ideas from Everquest. I think the spec system in wow was inspired by the AA system.
It's another dimension in which your character can grow and become unique. That way not every druid is like every other druid and not every necro is like every other necro. every person is unique in their own way.

However, I think it should be possible to start earning AA points from the beginning not at level 55. It made sense at the time because they were adding a new level cap with every expansion and they wanted to have another way for players to grow and use experience points without increasing the cap.
But I think it would be better if you could start putting experience into AA right away, or at least at a much lower level.

KilyenaMage

09-19-2010, 01:45 PM

When Alternate Advancement FIRST came out (Luclin) they were definately a positive thing.

It wasn't until PoP and later expansions that they really started to get out of hand and make certain classes way too powerful.

I was playing on Tallon Zek (pvp-teams) server, and I STILL really enjoyed AAs....despite their giving the hardcore players a huge advantage.

God...SKs with max spell crit and max healing AAs were fu$#ing DEADLY -- Crit your Lifetap turning into a 2k Tap....then get SUPER lucky and crit the heal too and heal for 4k as a tank. lawls.

(Again though, that last example was during the GoD or OOW era -- well after AAs were first introduced -- and largely due to the fact that EQ was just getting out-of-hand in general at that point)

KilyenaMage

09-19-2010, 01:50 PM

It's another dimension in which your character can grow and become unique. That way not every druid is like every other druid and not every necro is like every other necro. every person is unique in their own way.

Also this....it adds diversity to the game. Those saying that there are no drawbacks are a bit wrong.

It would be a LLLOOONNNGGGG time before ANYONE was maxing out AAs without even Luclin Zones to Xp in (let alone PoP elemental planes where people REALLY farmed up AAs)

So essentially it would just be adding some diversity to the game. I loved the fact that my lil Dorf Warrior was maxed out in Defensive AAs while the other warriors were building for damage ( cuz we were on a pvp server).