Questions about the red recruitment movement

[luno]

I have considered playing on red lately, although I haven't been playing blue long enough to get into the raid scene (judging from all the posts I've seen it sounds awful). I'd mostly be playing PvE solo, occasional grouping when time permits.

If the lower spawn/raid competition is the main benefit of playing on red, is there a point at which the server will reach some critical mass and the recruitment posts will stop? Are there any people on red who already think the server is approaching too many players?

Also, how big a deal is the griefing on this server? Are all these posts about switching to red just a thinly veiled attempt to seed the server with new players so you can roll them on your twinked-out alts? [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

[khanable]

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

From what I have seen people come to blue and offer to sell their red plat for half its value in blue.

The conversion rates these days seem to be approximately 3:1, that is, 3pp blue to 1pp red. For example, 3k blue for 1k red.

Anyway - I'm not the best person to answer these questions but I'll do so based on my observations:

1) Probably. If red had a population similar to that of blue, especially at the high end scene, we would have 3-5 guilds attempting raid targets (at known times, due to lack of variance), with approximately 100-200 people. That's a fucking massive PVP battle, which I'm sure the thought of gives many on red an erection. As for people who think there may already be too many people - depends who you talk to. I'm sure some there think there is already too many. The common theme that I've noticed is that pvp=fun, and more pvp=more fun.

2) I don't think "griefing" is that rampant on the climb up. People are more interested in grouping for the phat xp bonus. You'll have a time where some geared as fuck SK or rogue will try to fuck with your group, and they may succeed in taking out one or two, but power in numbers! Keep an eye on who is in the zone, and avoid solo'ing in popular areas and you really shouldn't have much issue. With that said, it's a pvp server, expect to get dead a few times on your climb up.

[Swish]

If you ask someone who never played on red if there's griefing, they'll tell you you'll make a character at whichever starting city and at least 3-4 people will be waiting at your starting point to make sure you're going to die, and more will be waiting at your bind point as they swing their high damage weapons and spam /laugh until you quit the server.

If you ask someone who actually plays on red, the answer is there's relatively little griefing if you stay away from the well trodden blue path of Unrest/Mistmoore/City of Mist/KC etc.

There is a significant XP bonus on red for grouping. There's a passive 50% XP bonus for playing solo, but add players and the XP gets quicker and quicker per member (up to 290% bonus for a full group iirc)... so that encourages the vast majority of leveling players to cooperate and level together towards the 50s.

Some cold hard facts: It's a pvp server. If you can't take a couple of corpse runs from pvp deaths, you won't last long. Yes, corpse runs suck... but particularly if you're grouped, you'll still be well ahead of your blue counterparts in terms of how quickly you're leveling.

It's a learning curve if you've never dabbled in EQ pvp before, but it's fun and it's different. Don't trust the forums as the opinion of whether or not you will like it...actually make a character, spend a few hours on red and see if you enjoy it. Make friends with others in the starting area (Gfay is the best populated) and group up.

People do hand out items sometimes. If you're used to leveling on blue with an abundance of cheap twink gear from EC it'll be a shock to the system [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

[Pikrib]

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

1) Probably. If red had a population similar to that of blue, especially at the high end scene, we would have 3-5 guilds attempting raid targets (at known times, due to lack of variance), with approximately 100-200 people. That's a fucking massive PVP battle, which I'm sure the thought of gives many on red an erection. As for people who think there may already be too many people - depends who you talk to. I'm sure some there think there is already too many. The common theme that I've noticed is that pvp=fun, and more pvp=more fun.

Not gonna lie, I got a chubby.

Big battles are a ton o fun. It is something that everyone should experience at least once while playing this project. If you haven't been in a big battle on red it is super easy to get to that level with the xp bonus currently going on. Get in on red now before we got 500 people on the server and they nerf the xp rate.

[fadetree]

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

Not gonna lie, I got a chubby.

Big battles are a ton o fun. It is something that everyone should experience at least once while playing this project. If you haven't been in a big battle on red it is super easy to get to that level with the xp bonus currently going on. Get in on red now before we got 500 people on the server and they nerf the xp rate.

I will never play red, but as far as general PVP MMO experience I could not agree more. It is breathtakingly amazingly fun to participate in huge PVP battles. My personal experience was on Warhammer online. The fucking thing wasn't even finished and it was still amazingly fun. Actually seiging a castle and bashing the god damn doors right down in their faces over a two hour battle : priceless.

[Samoht]

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

If you ask someone who never played on red if there's griefing, they'll tell you you'll make a character at whichever starting city and at least 3-4 people will be waiting at your starting point to make sure you're going to die, and more will be waiting at your bind point as they swing their high damage weapons and spam /laugh until you quit the server.

If you ask someone who actually plays on red, the answer is there's relatively little griefing if you stay away from the well trodden blue path of Unrest/Mistmoore/City of Mist/KC etc.

and if you've asked someone who tried to play red and then quit red before leaving the starting zone, they'll tell you that you'll make a character at whichever starting city and at least 3-4 people will be waiting at your starting point to make sure you're going to die, and more will be waiting at your bind point as they swing their high damage weapons and spam /laugh and that's why they quit the server.

[luno]

Oh hmm, well I already rolled a char there to lvl 10 with no incident one night. It was pretty empty, but I was in Innothule which has got to be the worst starting zone ever, so...

I dunno, I just mean like, I've played DAoC and other games with large scale PvP, and it is definitely fun. Unfortunately, and I think especially in EQ's case, between poor class balance and ganking/twinking...I'd expect there to be a lot of frustration in that you probably get rocked a lot in unfair fights.

Basically I want a casual classic server. That would be amazing...faster XP, raid targets with high respawn rates, lower population. Clearly red is not that server, but maybe it's closer than blue?

[HippoNipple]

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

screenshots or it didn't happen.

But seriously though are you trolling or have the devs said this?

The devs never said they are going to nerf the exp but they put it in to help because of the lack of groups. It is just assumptions and logic that they would take it out if the population got too big.

You will never hear anyone complain about a player not having enough gear, being the wrong class or not being happy with a hybrid being in the group because of the current group exp bonus. Every player added to the group helps the exp. Groups of 6 clean up.

With your earlier comment about valuing the currency from red/blue you are misunderstanding the concept of currency value.

With your logic Mexico is better than the US because when you convert the USD to Pesos you get more.

Red plat is worth more than blue plat

[wwoneo]

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

If you ask someone who actually plays on red, the answer is there's relatively little griefing if you stay away from the well trodden blue path of Unrest/Mistmoore/City of Mist/KC etc.

This is true, but only because there aren't enough people to grief you all day on R99. If pop. levels were as high on R99 as blue, you bet your ass you'd be griefed all day every day (this is even shown in your conditional statement if you stay away from the most populated zones: unrest/MM etc...)

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

There is a significant XP bonus on red for grouping. There's a passive 50% XP bonus for playing solo, but add players and the XP gets quicker and quicker per member (up to 290% bonus for a full group iirc)... so that encourages the vast majority of leveling players to cooperate and level together towards the 50s.

This is great as long as you can find people to group with. However, the only time you even have a chance of grouping with people will be in one of the aforementioned griefing zones...

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

Some cold hard facts: It's a pvp server. If you can't take a couple of corpse runs from pvp deaths, you won't last long. Yes, corpse runs suck... but particularly if you're grouped, you'll still be well ahead of your blue counterparts in terms of how quickly you're leveling..

I agree. You will level faster on red unless you had access to being PLed on blue, but NOT on red, and even then you still might level faster on red. The EXP bonus is insanely good.

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

It's a learning curve if you've never dabbled in EQ pvp before, but it's fun and it's different. Don't trust the forums as the opinion of whether or not you will like it...actually make a character, spend a few hours on red and see if you enjoy it. Make friends with others in the starting area (Gfay is the best populated) and group up.

Spending a few hours on the sever won't give you a good idea if you'll enjoy red more than blue. The game play changes so much at higher levels on red than early levels.

[locrian21]

red 1 to 50 - the pks aren't bad. it happens, but not consistantly. groups are easy to come by and most prefer to group over pking.

red 51+ - different game, groups are much harder to come by. pks are way more abundant.

Best advice I have for you - Only play on red if you enjoy pvp. If you go to red only for the xp bonus, you will get plenty frustrated.