An idea to address long term retention

[bluejam]

Velious: massive content, will keep people busy for a loooooong time, raiders and non-raiders alike. All those tiny and big quests, events, raids, fun zones to explore (ToFS <3). The old raid targets (classic + kunark) minus a few high profile encounters will be left alone by the top guilds, so lower guilds can explore new playing fields. Hell, Vox had been up for more than 3h today before she was killed.

Future of the server: it has been discussed at length already. Too lazy to look up the correct thread, but there are a few. I believe the best way would be integrating a customized version of Luclin and PoP. No fucking cats on the moon, no updated models, no bazaar, no PoK books, no guild hall (maybe). I did like the concept of AAs though. A modified version, a limit that makes you have to choose between additional skills would be a decent way to balance it, e.g. as a druid I could train my class-AA healing abilities OR make my dots more efficient.
Sadly many of the new zones don't fit in with the classic feeling from the graphics perspective, but I doubt there're ppl willing to fashion complete new ones (if that's even possible).

There are a lot of possibilites. It all depends on what the dev situation will look like in the next couple of years. I estimate we will see Velious earliest mid 2013 - though I've heard that quite a bit of work has already been done and there's not so much pre-revamp information to gather / fix.

Afaik the dev team wants to experience classic EQ from a player's stand point some time -hence the server duh- whether this means that they will drop all development once they're happy with Velious (patches etc.) and roll a new server to enjoy their sandbox by actually playing or they will play and think about adding new content on the side isn't clear yet, although Nilbog has already mentioned that he'd rather implement custom content than cats on the moon. [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

[Grozmok]

I think an intelligent move would be to wait until the majority of your playerbase is close to max level, THEN release your additional content.

Releasing it early will screw lower level players that need/want to group in some of the older zones since everyone is going to bail to check out Velious. It also screws the value of older items for the haves, but it makes things cheaper for the have-nots.

Just my 2cp.

[doacleric]

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

I'm going to suggest something very "off the wall," so take it or leave it: try Roleplaying.

I am one of those weird people who believe that roleplaying truly is the answer to progression in mmorpg's. But there is one thing that RPing requires in order to make it work: others to roleplay with. Without other people who are willing to accept your RP and work with it, you will basically end up being what One Tin Soldier described above - a crazy person running around in a world talking to himself.