Lack of excitment

[Spikela]

Originally Posted by Glatius2

Could it be because a raider in the amount of time it would take them to purchase the very best LDoN has to offer can get two or three upgrades for the same slots by raiding? If that's not true, if raiders aren't gaining better gear faster by raiding than by doing LDoN, why aren't more of them doing LDoN?

Not really intending to argue with this... but maybe they don't like LDoN? Some people actually ENJOY raiding (I don't count myself among them). I still think EQ should have an alternate path to all the hgh-end zones, that this 'glass ceiling' shouldn't exist. But it does. Deal with it, and either leave the game or make the most of it. EQ is your money, spend it how YOU want to and don't whine to ME about it when you make a bad choice.

PS: Alright fine, if someone got you EQ as a birthday present and it sucks for you, you can whine to them, but even that is bad ethics. It's the thought that counts right?

[Madronedorf]

Quest's dont count as progression flags (For PoP)

[Glatius2]

Not really intending to argue with this... but maybe they don't like LDoN?

You may be right, but two things to consider.

1. If the best and fastest loot was in LDoN, wouldn't raiders be gearing up there in order to improve their raiding regardless of their like or dislike?

2. If raiders don't like LDoN, why should it be one of the primary progression paths for non-raiders, or aren't they allowed to dislike it as well?

Deal with it, and either leave the game or make the most of it. EQ is your money, spend it how YOU want to and don't whine to ME about it when you make a bad choice.

Actually, I'm not whining to you about anything. I'm expressing an opinion in hopes that someone somewhere in SoE might get the point. But the easy solution for you not wanting to hear about it is to simply stop reading threads like this one. No one is holding a gun to your head making you suffer through it after all.

[Vikken]

Originally Posted by Frostpaw

On a side note Im not sure I agree about where you say the glass ceiling is in EQ. In my opinion you aren't even close to that glass ceiling with Vikken. Yoiu can level to 65, get many more aa's in a wide variety of places, Improve your gear significantly with just single group stuff, and do a great deal of progression through early PoP, LDoN, and then GoD. Anyway, not saying a ceiling of sorts doesn't exist for non-raiders, but I dont think you can claim to have hit it at level 55 with no aa's.

It's true, that I'm not as geared up as I could be, but if you look at my dream profile, you'll see I have realistic goals setup from making my character better. The point is that after I've gotten those item, it won't be long now, there are very few significant upgrades from me to be looking forward to without grinding forever in LDoN. I could do that, but it is my OPINION that the rewards do not fit with the time involved. I've expressed this eslewhere, but I do not thing that the reward scale well with the time involved.

Raider have to do flagging event, learn new encounter, but after that is all said and done, they hit farm mode and start cranking out those drops. There is a payoff to your hardwork.

I'm not here to argue about raiders vs non-raiders. The point I was trying to make was that I miss being able to quest, really honest to goodness quest, for upgrades and be able to go out and fight in the zone that I play in and get upgrades from there. And maybe, just, maybe, be able to tell a difference after I complete the upgrade.

Unless 1300 AC is a magic number (I'm not far from it), I doubt I'll see much of a differenence when I'm tanking PoP. And BTW, Vikken is 55 for a reason. It is the level that my guild is lacking xp tanks is quantity. Aeriwen is 58 for %heal that comes at that level, otherwise I happen to like be able to xp in more than a few zones and have to fight over camps. Yes they are both working AA.

[Vikken]

Originally Posted by Dakryn

Hi, raiders dont get to turn in the gear they spent dkp on 2 months ago when they upgrade. Casuals do need to be able *reasonably* keep up with the expansions, and there does need to be content relavent for them.

But whining because "ubers" get to see zones you dont etc is BS. You didnt put in the work,dont complain because you dont have the reward.And saying its not the time but the path is just as much BS.
If I drive for an hour towards point A, and you do the same to point B, dont whine because you arent at point A.

The diference is that LDoN is a progressive quest, or at least should have been. Noone here is whining about anything, just stating an opinion in the hope that some good changes will come about. If it were not an issue then how come it strikes a cord so well wehn the topic is brought up on all the class boards?

I do like that analogy though, minus the whining part. However there better be a whorthwhile alternative at A compared to B.

[NinjaBurger]

Originally Posted by crystalmatrix

The diference is that LDoN is a progressive quest, or at least should have been. Noone here is whining about anything, just stating an opinion in the hope that some good changes will come about. If it were not an issue then how come it strikes a cord so well wehn the topic is brought up on all the class boards?

I do like that analogy though, minus the whining part. However there better be a whorthwhile alternative at A compared to B.

Progressive quest my ass.

Like Ridefort said, the way LDoN lore is handed out is less effective than shaving your ass with a keyboard.

[rysingsun1]

you know what i think it comes down to is a misjudgement on the part of soe first of all followed by sony.

when kunark came out i seriously expected the level cap to be raised to 70. it was 60. when velious came out i lowered my expectations to only 70. it was aa. when luclin came out i hoped for 70. it was squat. when pop came out we finally got a whopping 5 levels. ykesha ldon and god gave us no levels at all.

we should be at level 200 by now. but i really think they designed much of the coding in the early days to not easily expand up endlessly in levels so they probably couldnt do it even if philisophically they thought it would have been a good idea.

but of course they really would love us all to play for years and years so they can keep bringing in revenue. so what do they do? they make the progression slower and slower in order that we would not be able to exhaust the content before the next expansion comes out even though our gains in power from one expansion to the next is trivial compared to how fast we were able to progress in the early days. remember in the early days before kunark it was typical to get a level every 4-10 hours or so online. and a level back then had the same effect on our "power" as 3-6 months worth of work today. 3 months assumes you play a LOT.

no wonder we are all getting bored. not everyone is bored by this system but i think its undeniable that eq seems a lot more like "work" today than it did 4 years ago. those like me who do a lot of ldon get to spend a year to get 2 anger augs one breastplate 5 10-ac augs and .. well sometime this week i think ill get leggings finally too and increase my hitpoints by a whopping 40 or so. those who do raids spend months getting flagged for the new content of whatever expansion they are working on at the time and a few more months getting their 1000hp upgrade that the new content opens up. we all have one thing in common. we are all investing HUGE time to get rather modest gains compared to what we had in the prekunark days. so yeah it does seem like rather dull work no matter what your strategy of progression is.

[Gerick]

Originally Posted by Dakryn

Hi, raiders dont get to turn in the gear they spent dkp on 2 months ago when they upgrade. Casuals do need to be able *reasonably* keep up with the expansions, and there does need to be content relavent for them.

But whining because "ubers" get to see zones you dont etc is BS. You didnt put in the work,dont complain because you dont have the reward.And saying its not the time but the path is just as much BS.
If I drive for an hour towards point A, and you do the same to point B, dont whine because you arent at point A.

bullshit, when you first went thru the content you didnt have to deal with 6 or 7 jackholes like sam farming the fucking zone to hell, you also didnt have to content with as many assholes training you to steal your named OR COCKBLOCKS dont fucking tell me we can do it because you did because the trail you blazzed has gone from a walk in the park to a russian deathmarch

the game is to crowded.

[Isk]

yeah, they just have to deal with buggy/untuned content for the first time.

there's advantages and disadvantages to either approach.

[Brabble]

For real life reasons, I've had a dramatic cutback on the time I can spend in EQ over the last few months. Progression is pretty much at a standstill, at least compared to what it used to be like.
Luckily, I'm in such an old-school and casual guild I'm not letting anyone down. Play when I can, do what I can, don't sweat the rest.
I'll tell you what I've found is interesting: go to newbie and low-level zones and find people who are new to the game and who are not asshats. They'll be fighting things and not begging and not wearing twink gear. Talk to them. Help them a little (I tend not to give them twink gear, but I'll help them get better gear or make it very difficult for them to die if they want to try something new). Go to mid-level zones and, if you see a corpse, /who all corpsename. Offer to help on the CR.
Watch what other people are doing. My server has a number of people who are long-time players (I mean since 1999 or early 2000) who don't have any characters over lvl 60. Some of these folks are odd, but interesting companions.
I frequently get tells from folks I've met and helped, sometimes years ago. Often they are much more powerful than I am now. But usually the fools will forget me and the cooler players will remember.
Progression alone will not keep you in this game.

[Casai]

For me it was combination of things. Personally I didnt mind raidin, but I raided to improve my character so I can do some crazy ass stuff with friends who were non raiders.

The thing is that ever since pop items were upgraded too damn much. Gear that was available in PoP made ALL previous expansions trival to me. Thats not good. Not good at all. Basicly all my fav zones like revamped CT or Sebelis, HS, Veleks(not spiders) became useless to me. There was no point going there anymore. XP started sucking by PoP standards, they no longer provided a chalenge. So now like anyone with a brain I was hanging out in good xp zones that are only avilable in latest expansion. Which limited me to CoD, Tactics and robots in PoI. Out of those 3 I only like CoD and Tactics and its resonably hard for me to get a group going for CoD. So whole single zone was left for me to have fun in! Whoopy.

Thats how the game got screwed imo. None of this raider/non-raider stuff mattered. Basicly SoE shot themselves in the foot with pop. They kill any and all uses for lvl 60+ player to be anywhere but in pop.



PS

when kunark came out i seriously expected the level cap to be raised to 70. it was 60. when velious came out i lowered my expectations to only 70. it was aa. when luclin came out i hoped for 70. it was squat. when pop came out we finally got a whopping 5 levels. ykesha ldon and god gave us no levels at all.

this is incorect. Kunark - lvl 60. Velious - nothing(if by nothing you mean the best EQ expansion made). SoL - AA. PoP - 65.

[Groovdog]

Originally Posted by Dakryn

Hi, raiders dont get to turn in the gear they spent dkp on 2 months ago when they upgrade. Casuals do need to be able *reasonably* keep up with the expansions, and there does need to be content relavent for them.

But whining because "ubers" get to see zones you dont etc is BS. You didnt put in the work,dont complain because you dont have the reward.And saying its not the time but the path is just as much BS.
If I drive for an hour towards point A, and you do the same to point B, dont whine because you arent at point A.

Didnt put the work in? You arrogant self-absorbed ass. I play more than most raiders I just dont raid due to time (of day) constraints. Hell I probably play more than you. But I guess its in your self-righteous nature to define what "work" is (i.e. if you dont raid you dont deserve shit). Try putting up with 115 LDoNs (and about 40 hrs or aaxp farming since the LDoN xp sucks so bad) in the last 4 weeks. Talk about frigging boring. The only challenge I have is to see if I can hit the 45 minute cap or if I can get more than one named mob. If I could be Uqua flagged with 30+ hrs a week of play time (but not certain play times, i.e raids) then I would be. Now I am stuck rounding out the weak pieces of my guys stuff with LDoNs and one groupable mobs.

After seeing some of the best casual (defined as non raiding) players leave the game, (Romidar on PoN who I respect more than any other casual player for example) I hope you guys like your raid server with 140 Time guilds (they better instance that puppy). Dont think it will happen? Wait till the servers consolidate because the 75% that are casual leave the game cause they cant see much of the content (or get whacked when they do). This shit is coming to a head and from your stance its clear you are moving on to WoW because only someone stupid would look down on someone wanting better than a VGGS because it comes too close to his DBotW.

And one final point, there is a reason why raiders dont bitch about not getting anything for their old stuff. THERE IS NEW STUFF TO GET. THE AMOUNT OF NEW GEAR FOR NON-RAIDERS SINCE LDON (AND EVEN THAT IS PRECIOUS LITTLE) HAS BEEN SMALL. Oh my pally got a velium gemmed great sword in the bazaar so some raider who farms (I know the seller) Kod Taz level mobs for loot got it and made a bunch of plat off of me. NP I have nothing else to spend it on anyways SINCE THERE IS NO NEW STUFF.

Oh and I forgot, but my upgrade path for LDoN is at a halt because they are going to add elemental level stuff and not do full refunds, so I get no progression until that point unless I just decide to eat the losses.....

[Lorre]

You just have to face the fact that EQ is a raiding game. LDoN tried to turn that around but the point system on it sucks imo. They should provide cheap medium class upgrades for folks who are hurting in the total wealth accumulated group. The exp there isnt that great, and people are doing it just for the items, augs, etc. So it's just one big farm zone that you spend endless hours trying to save up enough to get ONE upgrade.

The only thing left for EQ is raiding. When epic quests and flagging just to get into new zones require 40,50,70 people then the game is a different monster all together.

I use to enjoy leveling pre 40's and looked forward to some upgrades I could make. Some of the old world zones were pretty nice, but then the leveling slowed down and it seemed more like work than playing. When you log on and have to do something you dont want to for hours on end (just to get the next upgrade or better stuff), then the portion of the "game" is gone. Why play it if you dont have any fun or it seems like a longer part of your work day.

Most of us have full time jobs and we dont have the time to spend playing these games. It stopped being a fun game to play when I had work the next day and a big raid until 2-3 o'clock at night.

Ive jumped around games for a while (DAoC, SWG, AC2) and EQ does have a LOT of content. The problem is that a LOT of it requires a large portion of time raiding with 60 of your buddies to try to even get into it. I would prefer something that I can log into for 3-4 hours and feel like Ive accomplished something or just had fun. Hopefully WoW will fill those shoes.

[Gerick]

I play as much as any one of these fucking uber people who think they are the child of man or something, we all put time in, your not special.

I mean, I put in 40 hours per LDoN upgrade, have to go thru 10 xanamech raids to finally get a shim choker, 15 blizzard raids for a GBoS, 10 xana raids and counting to get the hammer(still working on that)

The only differance is you dont mind stabbing your friends in the back as soon as some hive mentality guild has a spot for you, fuck the guild and friends that got you the gear and requirements to join the guild you like so much.

[Deathdealer]

LDoN is a joke of an answer to the casual EQ'ers issues of lack of content - with its' cookie-cutter zones, crap gear, and a point system that is 10 times worse than Chinese water torture...what casual gamer really considers LDoN as the answer to their problems? I'd say a very small few...if any. LDoN is a BS expansion and was a shoddy patchwork job by SOE to ebb the flow of the casual gamers from leaving EQ altogether. LDoN is kinda like putting a band-aid on a sucking chest wound. It didn't work...people are still leaving.

Yep, EQ has evolved from Everquest into Ever-raid. The direction of the game has been a slow evolution and gradual change that has been more and more raid focused with every consecutive expansion. Now, once you hit levels 60+, the only thing left beyond that "ceiling" is to join a raiding guild and start raiding. There is nothing else for you to do after that point. It's just a simple fact. To say otherwise about the state of the current game is to deny the obvious - Now it's simply raid, raid, raid...and when you're done with that...raid some more. I could have once been described as a serious raider...or hardcore raider...whatever you want to call it...but endless hours of mob clearing, backflagging, keying, etc. just doesn't appeal to me any more. Raiding 6-8 hours 4-5 days a week isn't fun...in fact, it F'ing sucks. But what else is there to do in EQ? Eventually, you come to the conclusion that alot of people have come to recently...if you don't want or can't raid, it's time for you to quit EQ and move on to another game. And it's sad to say good-bye to a game that really set the standard for on-line gaming and provided me with some serious fun and adventure, not to mention all of the on-line friends I've made over the past few years. But the current state of EQ is not fun and provides very little, if any adventure. The good ole days of EQ are exactly that - good old days. That old game is a far cry from the current game.

Time for me to get a new addiction going and, hopefully, WoW or CoH is the new drug that will replace EQ.