Does "Classic" mean a few dozen hold thrawl? Or why every mob should pop every 6 hrs

[Ruinous]

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

That's the thing though.

High end loot in Classic WoW is not a pinata because it is significantly harder to actually get than in EQ. Classic WoW raid encounters are immensely more complex than Classic EQ raid encounters.

The biggest difference, perhaps the one you are referring to, is how mid-range gear in WoW is much easier to come by. But again that't nothing to do with complexity of encounter (which in WoW is generally more involved and difficult) but with stupid rareity which - and lets remember this - turns out not to have served the purpose it was intended to.

Rareity in WoW was created because the Game Designers believed that lacking rareity would kill the game. We know today, from countless of examples, that it is not true and if anything, the exact opposite. Rareity kills the game.

I never said anything about classic WoW. I simply stated WoW, which is in reference to the game in its current state, which has evolved to cater to a much broader range of players as nearly every current-day MMO has. And let's get something straight - rarity hasn't been phased out due to the reason you're claiming, else this project wouldn't have been as successful as it has been over its years running.

Rarity was phased out to cater to MORE players thus making a BIGGER profit. Period. It's a marketing strategy, plain and simple.

Now, I don't for a second deny that raids in present day MMO's are more complex in nature. They've increased difficulty through making game mechanics more involved and complex. That's fine, I agree.

But that's NOT classic EverQuest. EverQuest's difficulty came largely in part from the sheer amount of time it took to accomplish anything. It's a commitment that separated the casual players from the hardcore raiders and it's part of the appeal of the game for a lot of people. Getting to kill such and such a target or finish such and such a quest feels like a much bigger accomplishment.

Personally, I do enjoy not having to invest so much time in newer MMOs. But I also knew exactly what I was getting in to when I came back to this project, and you should have too. This is classic EverQuest.

And that's not even touching on how increasing spawn rates like this would affect the economy.

[Ravager]

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

I never said anything about classic WoW. I simply stated WoW, which is in reference to the game in its current state, which has evolved to cater to a much broader range of players as nearly every current-day MMO has. And let's get something straight - rarity hasn't been phased out due to the reason you're claiming, else this project wouldn't have been as successful as it has been over its years running.

Rarity was phased out to cater to MORE players thus making a BIGGER profit. Period. It's a marketing strategy, plain and simple.

Now, I don't for a second deny that raids in present day MMO's are more complex in nature. They've increased difficulty through making game mechanics more involved and complex. That's fine, I agree.

But that's NOT classic EverQuest. EverQuest's difficulty came largely in part from the sheer amount of time it took to accomplish anything. It's a commitment that separated the casual players from the hardcore raiders and it's part of the appeal of the game for a relative minority of people. Getting to kill such and such a target or finish such and such a quest feels like a much bigger accomplishment.

Personally, I do enjoy not having to invest so much time in newer MMOs. But I also knew exactly what I was getting in to when I came back to this project, and you should have too. This is classic EverQuest.

And that's not even touching on how increasing spawn rates like this would affect the economy.

Corrected for accuracy. How the end game was handled on your server on Live wasn't the same as how it was on all servers on live. So what you call classic is just an arbitrary choice of all of the classic server options that there were in that time. For many people, rotations were classic.

[Ravager]

Not to mention on classic Live, because of all the server choices, you didn't have to stay on one if you didn't like how the guilds were operating at the top, there was more room and opportunity to find what you liked. No such choice exists here so the majority are forced to play like the minority want, because the GMs want to run things with as little oversight as possible, and I can't say that I blame them.

[Kaziel]

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

There has never been any reason, whatsoever, for raid end mobs to be rare and spawn on such a long time scale. The thinking (back in 99 to the early 2000s) was that players would simply quit en masse if they achieved end game encounters. .

The thing about this server is that people SHOULD be quitting/moving on. People didn't back in the day because there was something else coming. I agree with your sentiment of letting everyone have a go.

I don't even understand what people are "competing" for here.
Do they honestly not see how serial-killer insane it is to be so obsessed over it?

[Kaziel]

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

When you go to a game like WoW, where it's practically a loot pinata waiting for you around every corner.

Yet WoW has a huge subscriber base. If you're claiming just anyone could rock up to a heroic raid and clear it then you're doing it a massive disservice.
I know everyone wants to hate on WoW, but saying high end gear was a loot pinata is just bullshit.

[FatMice]

+1 OP.

Oh wait... would this mean that BDA would come back?

[EdTuBrutus]

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

Yet WoW has a huge subscriber base. If you're claiming just anyone could rock up to a heroic raid and clear it then you're doing it a massive disservice.
I know everyone wants to hate on WoW, but saying high end gear was a loot pinata is just bullshit.

I've noticed that the comparison's between Classic EQ and WoW tend to be about current WoW and not Classic WoW, which seems unfair in comparison. As you say, in Classic, WoW didn't hand out end game loot freely to anyone.

While I haven't done a raid in WoW in 6 years, I suspect that even if its current dumbed down form of class design, the raid encounters are still massively more complex than anything EQ ever did.

[Dolalin]

The majority being frustrated by a few top-end guilds monopolizing all content is pretty damn classic.

[maskedmelon]

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

Now go get the Cleric Epic which requires you to camp a spawn for up to 12 days. Not hours. Days.

Oh and when it pops you need 20+ other players to turn up and engage before someone else gets their 20+ other players there.

What exactly are you talking about here?

Also, on topic, you can very much play very casually and see endgame content. The top two guilds are very easy to join. Pick one ^^

[raato]

If we wanted as accurate classic gaming EXPERIENCE (not mechanics) as possible, like P99 advertises itself on FRONTPAGE, we would have to take original EverQuest subscription base and divide it with server count available back then and compare it to the p99 subscription base and adjust raid boss spawn timers to reflect to original player count.

This wouldn't make any item more "common" than it was back then, because we have to take in consideration that instead of one server, there was atleast 32 servers back then. So in fact there was 32 times more content and items available.

For example (pulling these numbers out from my hat since I dont have time to search history or have access to the p99 data):
- Original EQ (2001): about 300k subscriptions on 32 servers means about 9k subscriptions per server
- P99: about 25k (just pulling this out of my hat) active accounts within few months

-> Original respawn time of raid mob 7 days
-> P99 respawn time of raid mob (7d / (25k / 9k)) = 2,5 days

And with limiting 1 kill per raid boss per guild per original spawntimer (7d for example) to make it so not a single guild can abuse lower spawn timers.

And if we want to get even more accurate top end content, we could compare 60lvl chars on live back in 2000 (might be harder to find info on this) and on P99. I remember that there was times of day when on live at the server I played there was under 20 60lvls online, top end content was contested by 100-150 players, not 700 players that we have on P99 contesting.

And then there is also restrictions what servers were capable of back then, I bet 200 players in zone is something that wasnt possible back then because it will desync zones on p99 too.

And since AoE nerf went live on P99, it has been clear that GMs are willing to make the non-classic mechanics to ensure classic EQ, I just hope they make the step to make top end content more classic too.

Change like this would make top end alot healthier: Top end guilds didnt have to recruit every mouth breather and asshole on the server to make sure they get 50+ ppls online at any time of day, nobody would have to stare at the wall for 16 hour variances to see the top end content, raid rules would not be needed for most parts. If top end guilds had to compare their e-dicks, they could compete on who killed mob with less ppl or fastest or whatever makes them feel superior.