People that never played classic EQ

[Eliseus]

Well the issue with those comments has been addressed. There has been many times mentioned that EQ isn't "hard" based on things like that, it is just time consuming. For example, I camp the bandits in lfay as a lvl 15 mage. Send my pet, throw out like 8 nukes to completely deplete my mana and kill it all. Afk till repops, go make a sandwhich or something. There isn't any real skill involved in the afk process lol. This is actually where a lot of the issues arise on the difficulty of EQ vs other MMOs is the lvling process and how fast is can be done in other games, without any regard into how HARD actually is the lvling process on a skill basis.

[kruptcy]

So how exactly do you define the difficulty of an MMO?

[Nubben]

You're just proving forensic's point with this post. You're right, camping the LFay bandits as a level 15 mage would not be hard. But do you know what is hard? Going deep into something like Befallen at level 15. So of course EQ can be easy if you take the easiest path through the game. Camping 1-3 spawns in the safety of an outdoor zone is not in any way indicative of EQ's difficulty level.

[Eliseus]

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

No, it can't. MC is the only raid that can be compared to EQ raiding, in my opinion. Though there was an imposed limit of 40 players, that was far too high, even in starter gear. The only difficult fight was just a gear check for basic fire resist gear that you could gradually remove the more raid loot you received. I'd say Nagafen and Voxx were a lot harder and when you wiped you couldn't just spirit form back in and try again within ten minutes.

That's all fine and dandy, and I completely agree (though I do admit I'm better than the average player at probably all games I play). I do have to say though that this assumption is obviously false, even more so given the evidence I showed where most peoples memories would contradict your opinion on the difficulty of classic, well, in this case, MC specifically since you guys try to hold onto MC only counts as classic. Nagafen and Voxx hard? I don't even, what? Zerg fest on 32k hp mobs was hard? 1 group of mages sending in pets was hard? What? Please explain more. My ignorance may be getting the better of me, but in terms of what people considered "classic", it wasn't till Vealious that people had any real struggle with raid encounters and stuff wasn't limited to 32k hp, but, since you guys are trying more and more to limit the discussion to try and prove you are right, that wouldn't even be relevant.

I would have to say that eventually end game won't even matter in the conversation anymore in terms of difficulty, or anything else at that and will strictly be revolved around the lving process. Even then, the skill required to maximize the performance of your character is still much higher in WoW. Eventually all aspects of WoW in this argument are going to be removed though for some of you to try and keep arguing that EQ is harder by trying to argue that you lvl up only off quests, never touched a single mob, and did it naked and can max dps with 1 button in WoW. When we eventually do hit this road, I will concede that EQ is harder, but not off the pretense that it is true, but based off the fabrication that some of you EQ fanboys have created to not deter your love for EQ (which your love is perfectly fine, but some of you are so inept, you don't realize how wrong you actually are).

[Grizzled]

My self and a friend of mine had this conversation the other week. Our conversation consisted of the things we had to do versus what we could do. I played a bard, he played a wizard. All the camps that were good for exp or loot were always taken on live. You eventually get to the point you dont even try anymore. So now you have to get creative. This is were the real difficulty and skill come into play. To go out and do things no one else does. One easy thing we did was after bard pulls a single drop mezz and let it auto rehit. notify wizard when the mezz hits and count to 5. this is when he starts casting his nuke. His 6 sec nuke will hit 1 sec before mezz repops. The mobs graphical animation goes from arm down at sides to at a 90 degree angle. Basically it barely moves. We cleared alot of LDON dungeons this way. Wizard never left his mount.

The wizard appropiately gear was able to speed kite HoH hallways. he could never get a basements, so he said screw it. He never used snare. and he would clear every mob not in a basement that doesnt summon.

The second one wizard did was speed kite veksar. The goblins in the front were done the same way as hoh hallways, except shamans got nuked down before the kite. This involved ladders and narrow ledges.

Once you get accustomed to EQ's play style, the game is not hard. But it does make others seem easy. Skill in EQ comes from things you have to do out of need.

Of the classes bard was the most difficult. AoE dot kiting took skill, until the range AA affected it. Yeah it got nerfed. The drums from BoT would let you run around a pack of mobe so fast there swings fell behind you, this was the easy mode. Mass charm kiting took a bit to learn but after that was easy. Being able to tailor you self to each groups needs took quite a bit to learn. Timing chain pulling, trying to convince tanks they need to assist the bard when the mob is at 10% so they get a 2nd mob on them. Getting boned on raid gear because war/clr/pal/sk, armor was more usefull on them. But hey look at this awesome flute that dropped. "Why would i want that? So i can invis better? No thanks i have my epic"

Everything about EQ becomes easy with patience and practice. Newer MMO's skip that and go right to "whack-a-mole" button spamming.

[Glenzig]

What's harder? Creating a modern art painting? Or the Mona Lisa?

[Eliseus]

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

You're just proving forensic's point with this post. You're right, camping the LFay bandits as a level 15 mage would not be hard. But do you know what is hard? Going deep into something like Befallen at level 15. So of course EQ can be easy if you take the easiest path through the game. Camping 1-3 spawns in the safety of an outdoor zone is not in any way indicative of EQ's difficulty level.

I was giving an example of the mana regen comment for krupt. I'll bite though, why would you ever put yourself in a dangerous situation and claim the game is harder because of that? So you are claiming EQ is harder because you are dumb? If I was lvl 15 in WoW, I wouldn't go walk into MC, then complain that no one knows how hard this game is until you try to run past a golem in MC @ lvl 15.

[Eliseus]

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

So how exactly do you define the difficulty of an MMO?

Well that is the biggest issue in the argument. How do you define what is considered difficult or not. Maybe it is hard for someone to sit there forever regening mana, they just don't have that patience, so yes, EQ would be the hardest game in your life (personally, I still think FFXI has EQ beat there, but that is another argument for another day). I like to base my idea of difficulty on what is required of me to maximize the potential for my character. That is why I point out stuff like even though you lvl faster in WoW, it still requires more out of you vs EQ to be succesful in it. Sure there is bad players that can still lvl, but it is the same idea as just getting a PL in EQ, but that is why I also mention maximizing the potential of your character. There is a huge gap in performance between a bad player and a good player in WoW. The severity of this gap is a lot less in EQ, except a job like enchanter (which I've already pointed out).

I also base it off of the mechanics presented to you, for example, commonly referred to as twitch mechanics, but not limited to. These are present at ALL levels in WoW, and even more so in End Game. In classic EQ, in comparison, are basically non - existent, and this is me being generious, I don't think they are existant at all. So excuse my ignorance here, because lvling to max lvl didn't have anything, and due to the nature of end game stuff and being zerged, it didn't matter if anything did have said mechanics.

There is a few other things, but those are the big ones.

[forensic]

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

I was giving an example of the mana regen comment for krupt. I'll bite though, why would you ever put yourself in a dangerous situation and claim the game is harder because of that? So you are claiming EQ is harder because you are dumb? If I was lvl 15 in WoW, I wouldn't go walk into MC, then complain that no one knows how hard this game is until you try to run past a golem in MC @ lvl 15.

TO BEAT THE GAME YOU HAVE TO FINISH ALL THE CONTENT

IF YOU HAVEN'T DONE ALL THE CONTENT YOU HAVEN'T FINISHED THE GAME

In EQ classic when you created your character there was a screen that would tell you "This class/race/religion combination is HIGH difficulty" or "LOW difficulty" etc.

Most EQ players found EQ SO HARD that they would skip 99% of the content and stick to easy zones and easy classes. They did this because EQ is HARD, not because it is easy.

In EQ you had a way to change the difficulty of the game, just like in Doom or Quake or every other retro game.

Mages camping outdoor spawns have always been easy mode and everyone knows it.

So you are intentionally setting the difficulty dial down to "easy", FAILING to complete the REAL content (which occurs in dungeons: Blackburrow, Qeynos Catacombs, Crushbone, Befallen, Minotaur Caves, Runnyeye, Unrest, Najena, HHK, Splitpaw Lair, Upper Guk, Lower Guk, Cazic Thule, Kedge Keep, Permafrost, Solusek) and then claiming that because YOU AVOIDED ALL THE ELITE CONTENT THE GAME IS EASY.

Playing an easy mode mage and avoiding all the hard content is probably still harder than playing an easy mode mage in WOW and avoiding all the hard content. WoW is just a game of mash the buttons until you win.... and if you die just keep mashing and the random number generator will work out in your favour eventually.

"Camping" isn't even EQ classic anyway. Camping is an invention by people who found the game too hard. EQ is meant to be CRAWLED. The proper way to play EQ is to crawl a dungeon with a 6 person group when the mobs are mostly blue to you with occasional whites, yellows, and reds.

No shit if you exploit bugs in the game (camping easy outdoor spawns) you can win. In Doom if you use cheat codes or exploit the wall pathing hacks you can make the game boring there too. If you exploit simple bugs in WOW that game gets even MORE easy and boring.

You haven't beat EQ classic unless you've killed every MOB in every dungeon at an appropriate level. Many many people have beat WOW this way, far far fewer have beat EQ. This is because EQ is hard and people are scared of it.

I had a group in upper guk on my level 15 enchanter the other day. We had a group of 6: Warrior, Cleric, Shaman, Enchanter, Monk, Mage or something like that. We were all veterans of the game who had multiple level 60s who have raided and so on. But after trying upper guk and getting lost in the dungeon or wiping due to very difficult encounters being mobbed by frogloks and so on the warrior started complaining: "I could be getting double the XP in Oasis right now where the crocs that /con KOS are too bugged to actually aggro you. Oasis crocs are such easy and fast XP, but crawling or even camping Upper Guk is so hard. Why do you guys want to do this? I want to go back to EASY MODE BECAUSE THIS DUNGEON IS TOO HARD."

So the warrior left and his shaman and mage buddies left with him. EQ was TOO HARD for them. They FAILED to complete level appropriate content and had to tuck tail and run away to a BUGGED CAMP in and EASY MODE outdoor zone.

Crocs are an exploit. Deepwater crocs /con KOS and should gang up and murder anyone trying to kill caimens.

If you go exploit the game to make it easy mode...

If you choose EASY MODE ACCORDING TO THE CHARACTER CREATION SCREEN class/race/religion combos...

then you can't complain that the game is set to easy mode.


Even still. Camping Oasis crocs is still harder than button mashing lions in the Crossroads in WOW. Equating whack a mole with skill is very stupid as demonstrated by the difference in skill between Texas Hold Em and Whack-a-mole. More whacking DOES NOT MEAN more skill.

Game knowledge is a HURDLE and camping a spawn still requires GAME KNOWLEDGE for instance the knowledge to EXPLOIT SPAWN POPS!!! This is an exploit in a game that was designed to be crawled.

[Eliseus]

So in order to beat a game, you must do stupid things? That is what your post says. No wonder people like you think lvling is hard in EQ. You intentionally make your life harder. Based off this knew found information I'll concede. You are right, EQ is harder when you are an idiot.

Edit: Also, the players create the game, you can argue what EQs intentions were all you want. That doesn't mean that is what is going to happen. My intentions are you will stop being ignorant, but that doesn't mean that is how life works. To try and justify the difficulty off of an assumed intention of a random player would be and is absolutely absurd.

Keep finding even more stuff to laugh at. Camping outdoor mobs is now considered an exploit? I'm sorry, I love to have a discussion about everything and anything with people, but your post I wouldn't even find appealing to someone who does think EQ is hard. I'm probably wrong though.