we should definitely introduce variance.

[Kergan]

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

1. More competitive server (top raid force will be required to invest more time/effort to continue getting as much loot as they currently do).

This is the classic strategy of people asking for variance and it's getting old. You have yet to describe with any reasonable detail how making the top guild put in more effort makes this server more competitive. The top guild already puts in the most effort, that is why they are the top guild. You also conveniently leave out it will require the guilds currently putting in the least effort to put in significantly more effort. Which is more likely to happen, the guild already committed to putting in the most effort puts in more and keeps on rolling, or the guilds already proven to put in less effort somehow start putting in a bunch more to compete?

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

2. Raid targets will die with less average people present each time (since there won't be a globally known, static timer associated with any raid target any longer). This will make the pve encounters and whatever pvp contesting occurs for pve encounters more skill (and less zerg) based.

Nearly every raid target in this expansion can be killed with three groups. It's consistently done with double or triple that (even when Azrael was doing it). Raids in Kunark have not and never will be a challenge and using that as a pro-variance argument shows lack of understanding of the end game. Variance or no variance, targets will be zerged, if you're defining zerging as killing a target with significantly more people than what the minimum required force is.

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

3. PVP will be more spontaneous (ie less predictable) since 95% of lvl 60 pvp occurs around raid bosses. Since bosses will be spawning less predictably (ie more spontaneously), the PVP will be less forced/staged and occur both more continuously and more spontaneously.

95% of PVP does not occur around raid bosses. In fact right now 0% of level 60 PVP occurs around raid bosses. Also, spontaneous PVP over a raid target heavily favors the larger guild as no matter what people say EQ PVP is more about numbers than skill when it comes to large scale battles. Think about this for a moment. VS pops, nobody in zone. A trackbot for the smaller guild notices it is up and sends out the batphone. People from the larger guild notice a spike in how many small guild players are online.

It isn't hard to find where people are going. Who is going to kill that mob 99.99% of the time? The guild that can batphone 30-60 people into the game within 10 minutes, or the guild that needs 90% of their active members to login to kill a raid target? The smaller force gets wiped out and the raid target is killed by the larger force.

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

4. Guilds will be rewarded more for their ability to detect, mobilize, and quickly execute a boss as opposed to setting up raid times one week in advance for their entire guild to prepare and recruit for. More people will still translate into more power (don't worry Nihilum), but there will be less of a double/triple/quadruple incentive to stack players for pve and pvp strategy (since timers will not be predictable down to the second).

Variance adds the need for additional players not the other way around. Implementing variance will lead Nihilum to recruit MORE people and become larger. People act like Nihilum has 50 people logging in on Saturday repop day and nobody around the rest of the week. We have 40+ showing up nightly for planar gear clears bro. There has not been a night in the last month where we don't have a raid force online capable of killing any target in the game.

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

5. A more competitive server will attract more players and more guilds, and take some power away from the "zerg everything" approach, allowing guilds to care about more than just pure size/numbers. Again, greater emphasis will be placed on a guild or group's ability to detect, mobilize, and quickly/cleanly execute as opposed to brute-forcing an encounter they have a timer of a week in advance.

Another argument based on zero facts. EQ raiding is about brute force. We haven't even hit the zerg phase of raiding yet, 50 becomes the minimum size raid force in Velious. People who've played this game at the high end know this. There is a reason 95% of people interesting in raiding app to Nihilum the second they meet the minimum requirements - because they know Nihilum is the only guild who will even have a chance to kill significant raid targets on a consistent basis in Velious. Variance only furthers the advantage of greater numbers and therefor furthers Nihilum's edge on the competition. This will lead to even more recruits and greater size. What you're proposing will quite literally have the opposite effect of what you're trying to achieve with it.

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

6. Implementation of variance will make Nihilum cry more than they do now just at the prospect of variance.

It took all the way to #6 for you to present the only argument that matters to the pro variance crowd - to piss off the people on the server you don't like. This is exactly why it's never been implemented, because the staff sees through the bullshit.