MMORPG - Discussion

[Valdis]

So after some "debating" with Torrid in a different thread which shall remain nameless I decided to make this thread.

So that made me curious what aspects of games really draws peoples interests?

For me here's a list of the things I loved from the MMO's I played.

WoW - Instances, quest based leveling, UI, addon support, professions seem better then most but it still leave a ton to be desired.

War - BGs, and outdoor PVP are probably the best I have seen in the MMO's I have played, the guild system was great, Rift borrowed heavily on that

Conan - The combo system of combat was well done, the ability for guilds to build keeps.

EVE - The nigh infinite skill system was great

That's what I can think of off the top of my head.

[Aindayen]

I enjoy wow instancing but miss seeing people. Running into a random group camping an area for something. Having a zone with 4-5 areas that people camped with 1-2 areas that the crazy people went to. I do like how easily instancing has made groups in wow but from a community perspective or server standpoint I think it hurts the server.

I'm torn because the gamer in me wants difficult all the time, however time may not allow for such things. I want a game to instill some fear into me, so death has a form of negative rather than some minor complain that I may have to repair, as if having enough gold phases anyone.

I did enjoy the keeps built in AoC. I like the idea of a guild hall or common area that can be crafted/built depending on how able your guild is.

Ain

[Valdis]

I will agree with the grouping aspect. One of the things in War and Rift I love is the public quests, I used to get 20+ people all together and we would group quest a couple times for some gear/rep and then head over to the PVP and start tearing it up there.

[Forty]

Instances are nice, but there is something about having to race another guild to a world boss that excites me.
AA's are nice in that it gives you a reason to log in, eventhough the benefits weren't *that* great it was nice to have the little extra umph.

For me, it's the sense of accomplishment you get from defeating bosses that provide upgrades that no one else can get unless they also kill that boss. Games that have multiple ways of getting the same loot at the end game level are really deflating to me. Why spend the time and effort to kill a boss when you can get the same loot through currency (real or otherwise). Then have that loot wasted when the next expansion comes out and you kill a mob that drops a green better than what you have.

Tradeskills, I'm kinda torn on. I like the ease of leveling in WoW but also like the difficult of EQ's tradeskills in that you had to really work to get the mats and then there was that chance the combine would fail. The way I was screaming and fist pumping, you'd thought I just won the $100 million lottery the night I went 4/7 in making those damn bow's in EQ.

[Aindayen]

I love the thought of EQ AA's as well. Being able to invest in your main toon to make them a bit better regardless of the time sync. Now after awhile it doesn't make sense to keep plugging away on the main as you never see a true benefit.

Ain

[Torrid]

Not much point in my continuing to discuss this if Andaas is just going to delete my posts.

[depen]

I see video games the same way I look at music (and art in general). We live in the age of instant gratification. When I first started playing music you generally had to save up some money (time sink) to get to the studio to get that CD done (progress). Leveling and grinding AAs in EQ was much like playing shitty bars to make some money for recording time. You had to find other people and have skill. It was fun at the time. Eventually it grows old and you get sick of it after monotony sets in, at least for me anyways.

These days I fire up the laptop, jump right into a group in WoW with people probably not even on my server. Half the time I open up some tracking software on the other computer and work on tracks between pulls.

I still shop at an independent record store, but I probably looked it up on youtube first if its new. I probably downloaded the whole album to make sure it was worth the money. If its not on vinyl, I just paid for it on itunes.

Society in general doesn't have time to let oil paint dry. We like to photoshop that shit, print it out textured like oil on a Giclée printer. We download singles and ringtones. We don't have time to grind 1500 AAs (even though I miss em).

It isn't all bad, though it certainly isn't good. A lot more is possible these days and many many more people have reliable access to make shit happen that would've cost thousands of dollars to do 10-15 years ago. (Video editing, recording music, even making video games.)

I do miss albums and video games that literally took forever, but society in general is over it.

[Syana]

Not much point in my continuing to discuss this if Andaas is just going to delete my posts.

I'm pretty sure it wasn't Andaas who deleted the posts. But yeah, I don't think censorship is very nice. Certainly not how Hoss was suppose to be. We can tell each other to fuck off and still raid together and get shit done.

P.S. Jason, FUCK OFF!!

[depen]

I was trying to read it after work, I started looking at the thread earlier today. Maybe it was just moved to the Rift forum? I doubt Andy deleted it.

[Valdis]

Allow me to clear the air, I removed the thread and it wasn't due to Torrid's post. I had been enjoying my tit for tats with Torrid, hence my making this and inviting you Torrid. I wouldn't have removed it but things had gotten quite hostile and I didn't personally think it had anywhere to go but downhill.

So my apologies to you Torrid for making you think Fir had deleted your posts. But as I said I am interested in what makes you think EQ is still the best, also what did EQ2 screw up beyond the whole lack of account carry over?

[Torrid]

So my apologies to you Torrid for making you think Fir had deleted your posts. But as I said I am interested in what makes you think EQ is still the best, also what did EQ2 screw up beyond the whole lack of account carry over?

Just to clarify, as I mentioned before, EQ started going downhill after PoP. I think classic EQ is the best-- certainly not current EQ1 which is NOTHING like it once was.

EQ2 is a very different game. Only played the trial island a long long time ago. Hell I don't even remember why I didn't like it.

There are no MMOGs like classic EQ anymore, save project 1999. WoW's influence was too strong, and everybody infected their game with WoW-like features.

I already went into some detail as to why EQ had superior gameplay than 'modern' MMOGs in the Rift thread. If you want to see why EQ was better, just play on Project 1999. It is remarkably close to the original, and it's free. You'll be killing fire beetles 10 minutes after your client is downloaded. (just be sure to run the client in windows 98 compatibility mode, or limit the application to 1 core in vista/w7, as the client bugs out on multi-core processors)

If you want the full EQ experience though, you should convince 5 Hoss to roll characters on Project 1999 with you, and form the ideal group and just plow through the game. It's a social game so it's an order of magnitude more fun if you have friends to play with. I can set up an FTP server and PM my IP address to anybody who wants the client already configured for P1999 with only the zone files up to Velious. (P1999 will stop at Velious) Or just google project 1999 torrent if it's still being seeded.

Just roll a group of something like

5 magicians and 1 druid (my preference)
6 magicians
1 sk 1 cleric 4 magicians
1 sk 1 cleric 1 enchanter 1 monk 2 rogues

Any of those groups would have zero downtime and just obliterate any dungeon.

EQ does have its issues though. Class balance being a prominent one. Magicians are absolutely ridiculous in classic, but Kunark will nerf them a bit and buff melee. I'd seriously watch a group with 5 or 6 magicians level just for grins it would be so silly.

I don't expect you'll find 5 Hoss to play, (if anybody) but I'd port and bind you all so you could level together from the start, and give you all some fine steel or better if I have it, plus some spell money. If you roll magicians, I'll power you up to 4 at least so you can get your pets.

[Valdis]

That's the one thing I don't really understand you never explained what in the gameplay was compelling, the closest I can guess is death had a far more tangible effect on your character and that it forced grouping. But hypothetically those things could easily be done in any other game; is it just the lack of those things you miss about EQ?

Also WoW not implementing the AA they discussed 2 years ago was a big let down for me as I was probably more interested in that then any other aspect of Cata. But what benefits did you get from AA in EQ? You guys say they were fairly minimal impact wise but required time just curious what kinds of things?

I for the life of me can't remember if the AA in Warhammer that you could obtain through the Tome unlocks ever made it into release client. But the way War talked about working it was pretty cool.

[Kikiyo]

Ignorance here. What is AA?

[Valdis]

Ignorance here. What is AA?

Alternative Advancement. The Path of the Titans feature that Blizz culled out of WoW was going to be WoWs version of AA.

[Syana]

MGB KEI Inc! omg!

[Forty]

But what benefits did you get from AA in EQ? You guys say they were fairly minimal impact wise but required time just curious what kinds of things?

AA allowed you to gain a variety of stats (could add more str, agi, wis, int etc) to your character also allowed for faster spell casting and group buffs. Plus a whole lot of other things I've prolly forgotten about or they've added.

http://strategywiki.org/wiki/EverQuest/Alternate_Abilities

[Andaas]

The best way to describe how EQ was compelling is to paint a picture that removes a lot of the things people have come to expect in MMO's today.

As a player, you were encouraged to interact with every non-hostile NPC you came across; this was done with the "hail" button, to which some NPC's would respond to you with keywords bracketed (this indicated that they either had more to say, or perhaps had a quest or task you could complete for them). Quests weren't handed to you with a
!
flying over random NPC's heads; additionally, the quests themselves were not always clear on what you needed to do - players had to THINK on their own.

Of course, much of that thinking was removed by going to websites that carried solutions to the quests - but - those resources were all supported by user contributions and not direct data feeds from the publisher like wowhead.

Once you graduated from killing fire beetles in the newbie area, you finally move into more dangerous territory.

For me, starting out near Qeynos, I ventured into West Karana first. It was night, I was a half-elf at that time, and even with slightly improved vision in the dark, it was fucking scary. I made my way to the first guard tower, and then started killing wolves and other beasts in the vicinity.

After gaining another level or two, I decided to follow the main road to see where it led. I was running along, and I see a group of NPC's standing in the road -- thinking they might offer some quests for the local area, I walk up and excitedly press my "hail" hotkey, and say, "Hail, a bandit.". The 3 bandits then quickly attacked me and killed me in about 1 second.

I made my way back to my corpse, luckily, it was daytime and the bandits had moved on; gathered my belongings, and decided to continue on my journey up the road. I passed through a zone line, and found myself in North Karana... and followed the road onward. Several minutes later I see this amazing white stone structure in the distance; as I approach, some music kicks in that helps inspire how epic the structure is.

Of course, I'm now surrounded by level 15 creatures and I'm only level 7 and haven't got a clue what I'm doing. I did make my way back safely. Not long after, wandered into a zone called Blackburrow; Blackburrow was a low level dungeon zone that connected a few starting zones. I was standing near the entrance, checking it out, and suddenly this massive train of gnolls came running up chasing other players - it scared the shit out of me so I ran away and tried to take cover in this big tree stump ahead to my left.

I'll let one of the other EQ players tell you what happened to me next...

[Andaas]

With all that said above, I have NEVER had that feeling of being so insignificant in any MMO since EQ. EQ started me out as an ant in a world of giants; WoW lost most of that on me - I have never been in awe in an area, been scared about wandering off on my own... if something chases me I can just run away and it gives up.

[Kikiyo]

That's nothing. FFXI was unsoloable after lvl 20 and you delevel.

[Valdis]

I will say the single player RPGs I have played, I won't get into how many cause it's honestly frightening how many days on that genre alone I have lost, always appealed for the reasons you talked about. Granted the story generally pushed you in the correct direction where as it sounds like EQ was more of a hey go figure the whole thing out sorta feel. But I loved finding the various side quests and unlocking areas and finding if I talked to this one guy then 20 hours later when I got to this one area I would be rewarded with something.

I also know what you mean about the sense of adventure/danger I remember in the Elder Scroll series what it would be like when you would be wandering the woods and it would hit night time and all of a sudden it goes from a peaceful completely easy place to of fuck I need a town now.

I do really wish more MMO's would leave that sense of danger in, although I do remember having that sensation in my very early WoW days like when I found Burning Steppes the first time... I would also like more of the hidden quests to finally show back up, similar to the Linken quest line in Un'Goro except more hidden and more difficult.

However unless there is no client I don't think that will ever truly be the case again. Lets face it place like curse, wowhead, thottbot and allakhazam probably did more harm to the way you play MMO's then the simplifying that WoW did.

[Seraphina]

EQ was great because it was a multiplayer game. Games today feel more like single player games. I can do a WoW instance and never say a word and have no problem whatsoever. That would simply never happen in EQ of old. People knew each other, players had reputations, there was so much drama, within guilds, and within servers, and even between servers. It made for a much more interesting game. In EQ, you felt wonder, you felt fear, you felt emotions. In WoW, I've never had any fear. I've never had a moment where I was like "WOW!" Now, a lot of that has more to do with how I've changed perhaps then how games are different. However, I think the reason EQ lingers on in some of us who played it a great deal was that it felt more like a real world we were all apart of for a few years, rather than just a game we played for awhile. I still consider a lot of people I've met in EQ as real friends and people I did not like as true asses that I would not give the time of day to if I met them in real life.

[Lonskils]

That's nothing. FFXI was unsoloable after lvl 20 and you delevel.


EQ was/is unsoloable about the time you hit level 5. Had exp loss after every death. Mobs did not leash unless you either died or ran to a zone line and zoned. By that reguards, anytime you zoned into a zone you had to take into your thinking that you could be zoning into a death train left by another player.

If you were anyone other than a Wizard you had to bind in a city. When you died you popped up at your bind location, gear free, very much alive with no line drawn to where you corpse was. And a reduced exp bar. Sure you could try and find a Cleric or Paladin to rez you. But most times, that wasn't gonna happen. If your body happened to be somewhere you couldn't get to and no one would help or could help. You lost all your gear, your money, and the exp you had before that death.

If you happened to get into a death loop of where ever your were bound a mob popped your undressed body everytime you popped up you could have multiples bodies that would then need to be rezed in the right order so you could get your exp back. Oh and you didn't get all the exp back either from a rez. I think the best anyone could do and this was later was 94%?

Needless to say. No one wanted to die so you were constantly hyperaware.

Then anyone along the way that you ran past got said mobs and the circle continued. If you were a caster and needed to gain mana. You had to sit down with your spell book open which took the entire screen up so you could not see if something was coming or not.

Getting mana back was / is a huge deal. There was no other way to get it back then by meding. And meding took a fucking lot of time. There were/are no health pots/mana pots/damage pots/ etc etc etc...

[Lonskils]

I will say the single player RPGs I have played, I won't get into how many cause it's honestly frightening how many days on that genre alone I have lost, always appealed for the reasons you talked about. Granted the story generally pushed you in the correct direction where as it sounds like EQ was more of a hey go figure the whole thing out sorta feel. But I loved finding the various side quests and unlocking areas and finding if I talked to this one guy then 20 hours later when I got to this one area I would be rewarded with something.

I also know what you mean about the sense of adventure/danger I remember in the Elder Scroll series what it would be like when you would be wandering the woods and it would hit night time and all of a sudden it goes from a peaceful completely easy place to of fuck I need a town now.

I do really wish more MMO's would leave that sense of danger in, although I do remember having that sensation in my very early WoW days like when I found Burning Steppes the first time... I would also like more of the hidden quests to finally show back up, similar to the Linken quest line in Un'Goro except more hidden and more difficult.

However unless there is no client I don't think that will ever truly be the case again. Lets face it place like curse, wowhead, thottbot and allakhazam probably did more harm to the way you play MMO's then the simplifying that WoW did.


By allowing mods, blizzard opened the door to those sites.

[Andaas]

My Manastone still works!

[Lonskils]

My Manastone still works!


But you can only use it in old world zones...

[Seraphina]

I miss my old manastone. Amazing how good that thing was. Especially mid boss fight, haha, those were some good times, before they nerfed them.

[Lonskils]

Things I hated though were arenas. Casters by the time SoL hit were screwed. All the gear had major resists to everything on it. Plus all spells were nerfed to 70% of their damage in pvp. I'm told in Vanilla EQ this wasn't the case. But by the time SoL rolled around it was pretty impossible to even land a spell on anyone. That was something I liked about WoW. Even though they screwed everything up by just handing out gear to folks that wanted to afk in battle grounds later on.

[Seraphina]

This is also true in reverse with EQ. You felt insignificant initially, but as you built your reputation and as you got to know people and became a better player, people would recognize your efforts, and in turn make you feel more significant. The community within the game would know who you were within the game and that made it all the more satisfying an experience. You also enjoyed the accomplishments you made. Getting the first Cleric Clicky on server was quite a rush, and not something you forget about the next day.


With all that said above, I have NEVER had that feeling of being so insignificant in any MMO since EQ. EQ started me out as an ant in a world of giants; WoW lost most of that on me - I have never been in awe in an area, been scared about wandering off on my own... if something chases me I can just run away and it gives up.

[Mystrae]

things i hated though were arenas. Casters by the time sol hit were screwed. All the gear had major resists to everything on it. Plus all spells were nerfed to 70% of their damage in pvp. I'm told in vanilla eq this wasn't the case. But by the time sol rolled around it was pretty impossible to even land a spell on anyone. That was something i liked about wow. Even though they screwed everything up by just handing out gear to folks that wanted to afk in battle grounds later on.

manaburn!!!

[Lonskils]

manaburn!!!


They nerfed it to the point that the AA wasn't even worth taking. Sigh.

[Kakeku]

Playing EQ was a magical experience. It has much better sense of community and somewhat it become part of life. Although WoW has much better graphics and game mechanics, it is just another game.

[Valdis]

I was just thinking how much of the sense of danger that you didn't feel in WoW at the beginning was due to the graphics? If WoW had started as a darker more serious and more realistic game such as EQ2, Aion or Rift would you have felt more danger in places like the N.Elf starting zone when you were told to kill the named spider in the deep part of that cave? I remember some of those 1-6 lvl quests actually feeling hard on day 1. However the cartooniness completely works against any sense of danger, the most you usually get is appreciation for some of the cool, beautiful, and or well designed models.

[Andaas]

Personally, I don't feel fear running around in Rift. Not that I feel safe, it's just not scary. I think much of that is due to death being merely an inconvenience. When you die, you're a ghost and can safely recover -- the simple fact of making a corpse run in EQ placed you with no gear hoofing it back to wherever you may have died.

Sure, when I was level 7 and made my way to North Karana - I got lucky aside from my encounter with the bandits; but had I died way out there, I may have lost everything (not that I had much - but again, I also didn't realize I could lose everything yet).. because I was very new to the game and didn't know people outside of my level range, none of whom had gone out that far yet.

[Berae]

EVE: Online you should feel afraid wandering too far off the beaten path. Seems to be the only current MMO that is willing to punish you if you really fuck up. If you lose your ship, you have to buy a new one, if you die after losing your ship, you have to buy a new clone, if you die again without rebuying your clone, there is a very real possibility of having years worth of work vanish :)

Sure the NPCs don't follow you around, but there is always a fleet of players willing to hunt everyone in sight down.

[Torrid]

I was just thinking how much of the sense of danger that you didn't feel in WoW at the beginning was due to the graphics? If WoW had started as a darker more serious and more realistic game such as EQ2, Aion or Rift would you have felt more danger in places like the N.Elf starting zone when you were told to kill the named spider in the deep part of that cave? I remember some of those 1-6 lvl quests actually feeling hard on day 1. However the cartooniness completely works against any sense of danger, the most you usually get is appreciation for some of the cool, beautiful, and or well designed models.

Uh, no. WoW has zero danger. In EQ, if you're careless enough, you could die and be unable to reach your corpse and lose all of your gear. Realistically this won't happen on a mature server however, but I do recall a warrior losing all his gear in the Plane of Fear once because the zone wasn't cleared in 7 days on my original server.

Hell, a couple of weeks ago I zoned into Fear on my druid to see if the zone was spawned (which it was) and had to wait until the next day to loot my corpse after it was cleared. Also when my group was one grouping Hate, we had no wizard. So if the cleric couldn't camp out, we had to find an available wizard to port us up again, and then we had to dodge 30 minute respawn roamers once we were up there.

A more realistic scenario, however, is dying in the middle of a dungeon and needing to clear it to get your corpses. Invis (which has a random duration and may drop at any time with little warning) works in most dungeons, and even if it doesn't you can get a high level player to drag your corpses, but in the early days there were no high levels sitting around waiting to help you.

Running through Beholder's Maze before you have bind or invis or sow will put some hair on your nuts. Aggro a mob, and you're dead. Enjoy the run back from Qeynos.

From level one you have to watch out for aggressive high level mobs and con everything because you can't solo yellows yet. In Tox I was pulling mobs to the wall to avoid adds instead of merely charging up to mobs and killing them mindlessly. From level ONE.

[Valdis]

I think you misunderstood it's not that I think WoW has any true danger to it, it's that on top of that lack, the art itself also demonstrates that lack.

[Forty]

I think you misunderstood it's not that I think WoW has any true danger to it, it's that on top of that lack, the art itself also demonstrates that lack.

I dunno, in WoW you attack a mob and it dies pretty quickly. You still have over half health and never really feel threatened. In EQ, that same fight would have you down to near death with each spell or swing of a weapon making a difference on whether you lived. So for me, the graphics really don't play a part in the sense. It was the constant "omg swing the F%%^ing sword" as you dipped below 20 health.

[Parak]

I'm going to wave my epeen around a bit here as well, and say that for fear of death I don't have to look to MMOs. I just have to load up a roguelike such as nethack, crawl, or adom, which have full permadeath. The smallest mistake will make you start over from scratch, and even if you play perfectly the randomness will still find a way to screw you over. In particular, adom took me a good part of a year to beat, with death count (meaning, full restarts) in the the thousands.

The only fear that I've had in MMOs is the fear of failure. The fear of being the weakest link in a strategy that requires my full concentration. If I died, I couldn't care less about the penalties as they pale in comparison to the aforementioned. My real penalty would only be the embarrassment of screwing something up royally and costing others enjoyment of the game and their time.

[Aindayen]

Mana robe and wizard epic meant mana forever!

Killing a boss 23 times for 1 piece of your epic hoping to God it dropped.

Zoning into an area knowing you could lose all of your gear because nobody could help you get it back. PoF was fing nasty...

Ain

[Gheltire]

my initial fear in EQ was pretty much the same as everyone else who played that game before it evolved: death

we hated to die, hated to re run everywhere to find our gear, and then we hated the people who hated to die who trained us causing us to die at zoneins/outs...and THEY were the bastards:)


However, I dont think its easy death recovery that makes us not "tune" into these games anymore

Its the evolution of the MMOs from "HAIL" and /g conversations to "!" and the pure silence that is roger wilco/vent.


Cyrendel, myself, Kathris can jump into either the hoss server or Cyr's vent server and talk there. Ive got no need to talk to anyone. I solo most of the time (or duo/trio with those two in Rift). At best Ill say thx if someone buffs me or someone saves my ass in an event. But Im not lore questing or trying to feel people out to see if I want to join up with them, because I dont. SO I sit in an empty vent room waiting for one of my friends to show up.

Im older. Im established as a gamer (in my mind) since Ive been playing em for over a decade. So I might actually be a gamer snob, not liking the wow newbies, eschewing what look like camps because ive been there done that, and pretty much just doing the "leave me alone Ive already got friends" thing while I level.

How many of us actually participate in random game OOC? I dont. Because thats where people fight over the economy, Obama, sports, and sexual braggadocio. If its not "selling at the third torch" we tune it out:)


Case in Point:
DCUO
Im in a raid. Were lvl 25. 5 of us are ready to kill an OMAC boss (or something) and one of the party members asks "ok is everyone ready?"

I literally had to jump up and down in front of him because I couldnt do the usual / to bring up my chat window (its enter!). I made it to lvl 25 in the game, had obtained relatively good gear for a gadget character to have soloed all the content except for raids, and COULDNT SPEAK TO ANYONE :)

The new games, wow included, are console mentality driven, and meant to let you socialize in verbal, not text, means. We can easily replace each other with Kainen478_g and as long as he can assist, heal, or tank, we dont care. Could be Black Ops, could be meeting stones, its AI that can talk. Who wants to know them?

Used to be, I felt it was impolite to leave a party.

Wow taught me that once something is dead, if im still standing there typing /g Im in a solo party and everyone is outlevelling me:)

Now Im the first to drop a public raid.


The aelfwar event last night I actually had that blood rise that I havent had in years. I jumped into OOC to give a location of a sentinel. Waited until multiple people jumped into the area before picking out assist targets to keep mobs off of casters. Even kited! (btw the fact that my head tracks my target while I move is just awesome!). I died once, backed off, became tangible, and got hit with 3-4 buffs before I could even resummon my pet.

Maybe I put more in, maybe it drew me in, but I had that feeling last night that it got me to be social.

[Lonskils]

Yeah the head tracking is INSANE!!!!

[Peotr]

Re-creating the EQ experience would be hard. You guys have talked about the obvious things, like punishment for dieing, corpse-loss, long travel times, the strict functions of a group, etc.

I miss having real classes - a shaman, a cleric and a druid were all healers, and they were all different. A bard, and enchanter and even a shaman were all crowd control, and they were really different. A monk and a bard were pullers, and they were different. Necromancers and Mages were pet classes. A warrior, a paladin and a shadow knight were all tanks, and ... well, anything but a warrior was mostly useless, but we all loved Ashram, especially when died while trying to pull Phinigel.

A couple things were very different from WoW. First, quests weren't for leveling, they were for getting 'stuff'. Grinding was for leveling, and grouping was for improved grinding. Soloing to 50th level was a form of hell. Soloing to 60th level was only done by pet classes and a few snarers.

Gear was hard to come by, and it took years of expansions for gear to be outdated. Gear was also a great way to extend the abilities of your character - a monk with a Sap Encrusted Branch could snare, and that was huge. Manastones were huge. Potions were expensive and useful. A cleric without a noodle was incomplete.

And everyone knew what the gear was. People liked to inspect you. Gear was a matter of pride, a good set of gear was months or years of work.

Progressing through the content was important. Even when Planes of Power was released you couldn't just 'do PoP'. Most people had a list of useful stuff to kill all the way back to Kunark. We still killed in Velious and Luclin. And grinding remained important even after max level - Alternate Advancements were awesome, and again it could take YEARS to finish (if you could ever finish).

But the game was also slower. Pulls took time and patience. To be on the bleeding edge of WoW you have to have a high level of twitch. To be on the bleeding edge of the original Everquest you had to have a high level of attention. Clicking buttons quickly wasn't part of Everquest - knowing what was happening and what might happen was more important, and knowing what to do, what was going wrong, and what you should do about it separated the men from the n00bs.

I miss Everquest. Each patch release in WoW invalidates all of the content in the rest of the game. Releasing a new raid area means you throw away all of your armor and start over. Everyone has the same character, the classes are homogenized, and the world really isn't that big. And don't get me started on achievements, achievements are Blizzard's way of insulting every player in the game, and if you don't see it you're a true sheep. Achievements are just a cheap way for Blizzard to keep you occupied.

I just don't feel anything for WoW. The instances aren't dungeons, and they don't mean anything. Shit, even something as simple as being a helpful person doesn't mean anything in WoW.


P.S. Just joking about Shadow Knights being useless, Card! LUB J00!

[Stosh]

Of course, I'm now surrounded by level 15 creatures and I'm only level 7 and haven't got a clue what I'm doing. I did make my way back safely. Not long after, wandered into a zone called Blackburrow; Blackburrow was a low level dungeon zone that connected a few starting zones. I was standing near the entrance, checking it out, and suddenly this massive train of gnolls came running up chasing other players - it scared the shit out of me so I ran away and tried to take cover in this big tree stump ahead to my left.

I'll let one of the other EQ players tell you what happened to me next...

What happened next was that he fell down into an underground pool that was surrounded by level 15 goblins, some being spell casters that would nuke the shit out of you. He died. He didn't end up as a ghost, but naked at his bind point. If he was lucky, he was bound in Qeynos and only had a 5 minute run. Once he returned to the zone he had to figure out how to get his corpse that contained all his gear. You learned to make friends fast, and to determine who you could trust and who you couldn't. One option was to give somebody else the rights to loot your corpse, and once done it was totally up to the person to return your items or keep them.

I remember my first days in EQ. I heard that Rangers were a godly class, and that humans received a bonus to experience. (Turns out that halflings were accidentally given that bonus, and not humans. A mistake that I assume still exists today.) The problem with being human was that you did not have any night vision, but at the time I had no idea that I was more blind than everybody else. Human Ranger's started in Qeynos, because it was close to Surefall Glade. Surefall Glade was connected to North Qeynos by a twisty tunnel. If you had no night vision, about 100 feet into the tunnel you could not see a thing. My first time going through that tunnel took me 20 minutes of trial and error. Shortly after I learned about the awesomeness of a creature called a Wisp, who could drop various flavors of lightstones. I carried a lightstone with me for several years and my original greater lightstone is still in my bank.

[Lonskils]

Just buy pure luck I rolled a High Elf in EQ so I didn't have to worry about the night blindness. I put points into STR, because I thought I would be able to hit things better that way. Oh the noobness I was. I rememeber I befriended an ogre and we took the boat to Butcher Block. The Dwarfs didn't care much for him and he kept dying and it was the most sad I'd ever been in a game, because we had no idea what to do.

[Torrid]

Re-creating the EQ experience would be hard.

Actually in a way it would be easier. You don't have any dev time devoted to instancing the game. You make fewer items when you don't replace every slot every major patch. Content gets more use so you can get away with less world building. (although you would need a larger world without instancing) You would also be implementing FAR fewer quests.

This is why I have hope for some indie MMOG to come out of nowhere and come save me from this era of mediocrity. I also want to return to a game with a smaller community and that isn't fucking spoiled before the content is event patched to live.

Speaking of Phinigel, we just killed him an hour ago. No magician staff though :( But Coral got jboots tonight so :)

[Sleepie]

Speaking of Phinigel, we just killed him an hour ago. No magician staff though :( But Coral got jboots tonight so :)

LOL Jboots! Do you still have to carry an insane amount of coin with you and does that still affect your movement speed?

[Syana]

So, I logged on to Project 1999 for about 5 mins. The terribad graphics and UI made me cry.

[Ktul]

Speaking of Phinigel, we just killed him an hour ago. No magician staff though :( But Coral got jboots tonight so :)

29 kills till I saw a mage staff $$

I guess Hate staff is still a random in Hate?

[Torrid]

LOL Jboots! Do you still have to carry an insane amount of coin with you and does that still affect your movement speed?

3250 gold, and yes.


29 kills till I saw a mage staff $$

I guess Hate staff is still a random in Hate?

The fire staff drops from male revs. Got one off the first male rev we killed and saw a couple more rot. Innoruuk drops the earth staff until the epic quest patch.


So, I logged on to Project 1999 for about 5 mins. The terribad graphics and UI made me cry.

I played X-Com 1 for a week and Diablo 2 for like 2-3 months after the ladder reset last year. Graphics are nothing more than icing on the gameplay cake. If graphics are all that you care about, then go play Crysis or some console game Coral made.

[Syana]

I played X-Com 1 for a week and Diablo 2 for like 2-3 months after the ladder reset last year. Graphics are nothing more than icing on the gameplay cake. If graphics are all that you care about, then go play Crysis or some console game Coral made.

If graphics was all that I cared about, I'd be playing Rift instead of WoW.

Regardless, graphics is an important part of any video game. Although Everquest's graphics was good for its time, I certainly didn't think it was great. There are numerous other gameplay factors that I didn't like about Everquest. For example, I wasn't particularly a fan of the spell system but it was still fun to play with. The controls weren't exactly the most user friendly but we play through it. Playing a melee class was terrible! I originally started as a Rogue. After about level 15 or so, I rerolled as an Enchanter.

Still it was the best game at the time for a number of reasons, many of which you've already mentioned. Again, I doubt there will be another game like Everquest.

[Peotr]

I played X-Com 1 for a week and Diablo 2 for like 2-3 months after the ladder reset last year.

I STILL PLAY THOSE!

And Warcraft II! I like Warcraft II better than any of the newer stuff. And I still like Master of Orion I & II. I dust off Commandos: Men of Courage every few years.

You have to let them sit on a shelf until you sort of forget them, but there are a few games I still come back to.

[Aindayen]

It's more than graphics though for me. Just the other day Ktul and I were screwing around in Rift and just the sheer danger factor does it for me. Running into a mob that just WTF pawns you.

Perhaps it's feeling like a noob again :)

Ain

[Lonskils]

I still play Heroes of Might and Magic III. Graphics be damned. It is a great game!

[Ktul]

Yea I agree Aind. I need to remind myself I'm not uber!

Lons, have you messed around with warlock? Looking I'm starting to think pyro/warlock may be a good dps build. Not real happy with elemetalist pet dps. Their Mitigation is ok for earth but dps sucks.

[Lonskils]

Earth is a tank, not dps. The dps comes from you. Pryo/Elementalist is what I am. What ever is your bag go for though.

[Stosh]

Wow. Some real price gouging going on on Amazon and Ebay for copies of EQ Titanium. Is there a trustworthy torrent?

[Syana]

Yes. Search for Everquest Titanium on torrentz.com

[Torrid]

I set up an FTP server on my machine if anybody wants a preconfigured client for P1999. This client only has zones up to Velious so it's only 1.42 gigs, but my upload is only 230 KB/s so if you want faster, find a torrent.

PM me for my IP and ftp login

[Ktul]

Earth is a tank, not dps. The dps comes from you. Pryo/Elementalist is what I am. What ever is your bag go for though.

Ya Im aware and either I was unclear or you mixed the two parts. I'm not real happy with their (as in both I have currently) dps, only saving grace is earth mitigates well.

And the dps from casting point of view tells me I need a warlock mix in there. Still to early yet to be sure but I intend to play around with several builds.

[Ktul]

I loved the Orion series. Think I still have them somewhere in my cd's.

[Torrid]

No Rift in the EQ thread!

[Coral]

Speaking of Phinigel, we just killed him an hour ago. No magician staff though :( But Coral got jboots tonight so :)

Yeah, that was a nice piece of luck to get the camp.

I share a lot of sentiments that Torrid does when it comes to EQ vs. WoW and the latest generation of MMOs, but I do want to add two things. First, play the game you want to play. Sure, WoW is more of a single player game in which the in-game relationships don't matter as much (Dungeon Finder: Go!). So what? If it is the game you enjoy, I'm not going to criticize you or the other twelve million people.

And two, while I will always love and value EQ, I can't really say that it's for everyone. A lot of the value I pull out of playing on p99 is for nostalgia. Sure, I like the challenge and the forced social interactions, but if it wasn't for the fond memories of 1999-2004, I wouldn't be there.

I know I was usually an asshole in EQ, but ... I miss you all.

[Sleepie]

Hey Coral, long time no see! WB to the forums!

[Phaera]

Dammit. You guys are tempting me to play around with it again.

Hi Dave!

[Torrid]

Kunark today! Roll your Iksars. Even level 1s get a chance at some rare loot drops.

[Mystrae]

I know I was usually an asshole in EQ, but ... I miss you all.

Wait? Just in EQ? :D:D

Need to find some time for some xbox or something.. gf sucking all my time (in a good way!)

[Syana]

gf sucking all my ....

well then....

[Kallaill]

Man do I miss EQ....I'd play here and there again with some Hoss!

[Stosh]

I've been played a few days now, and I'm actually having a lot of fun. Even the drama is top notch and filled with screen shots from guild forum spies and assorted posts filled with lulz.

[Stosh]

Just to clarify, as I mentioned before, EQ started going downhill after PoP. I think classic EQ is the best-- certainly not current EQ1 which is NOTHING like it once was.

There are no MMOGs like classic EQ anymore, save project 1999. WoW's influence was too strong, and everybody infected their game with WoW-like features.


Not sure how this didn't get mentioned yet, but there is one place where you can still play classic flavored EQ, and that's the EQ for the Mac. EQ for the Mac has not changed content wise in 9 years, and they have not even had a maintenance patch since 2003. They are "stuck" at PoP. They have all the original zones meaning no revamped Freeport, Commonlands, Misty Thicket etc. They still have Hate 1.0, and Mischief is still accessed via that tiny fucking cube in NToV. There are no in game maps, no fancy target circles and you still have to check every item on the vendor to see what it is and what it costs. (Play this game for 5 minutes and try to recall how you originally played EQ without the fancy target circles.) Once a month Sony reboots the server, and that's all. Play a caster and remember what it was like to have to organize your spell book, because there are no saved spell loadouts. You can't even subscribe to the game by going to Everquest.com, the Mac server is not even acknowledged as existing. You have to actually know about it, and call or use live chat to ask them to activate your account for EQMac. Even the subscription fee is like it was, well, not the original $9.89, but still just $12.99 and not the current $14.99.

After getting annoyed with P1999 for several reasons, I remembered the Mac server and on a whim I went to Craigslist and bought a used PowerMac G5 which plays the game even better than a modern Intel Mac, due to running the code native and not through rosetta. The beauty is these old G5's have retained their value so well that even if I get sick of the game in a month I can resell it for what I paid for it.

[renshin]

Ok , I want back into EQ again :). What server are you guys on?

[Syana]

www.project1999.org

[deezy]

Does Hoss have a presence on that server?

[Aindayen]

Does Hoss have a presence on that server?

Sounds like several are toying with it DZ.

Ain

[NormetheGnome]

You say you will set the client up and all I ahve to do is download..post for permision and click the client? If you set that configure up ill be there.

[Amadis]

I just talked two old RPG friends of mine into EQ, and we're all going to play in P99. I'm going to reroll as a tank (class TBD), and they'll be Cleric and Enchanter. Not sure how hardcore they're going to want to be, but see you guys there. :)

[deezy]

I started up a warrior on there.

[Amadis]

What's your name? I've settled on a magician after all, his name is Gabble. Only one of my friends ended up playing, he went Enchanter.

[Syana]

Magician is pretty terribad in Kunark. But I suppose enchanter/magician is a decent duo while leveling up.

[Amadis]

Plan's basically to level the magician up. Once I hit high 50s or 60, if I really like it I keep playing it. If I don't, I farm myself a good twink set with the mage and play some kind of melee.

[deezy]

I made a toon named Outrider. I think we're in the same guild, Amadis.

[Amadis]

Yep, we are. If anybody else is playing in P99 and wants a chill guild that'll make it a bit easier to find groups (because they're literally recruiting anybody in the server that will click accept), let us know.

I am pretty sure that once I hit higher levels I will want something a little better (small and good), but for now this works.

[Vinen]

Wish I had the time to devout to P1999 :\ Tried to convince my girlfriend to try it out but she'd have none of it. Took addicted to WoW :(

[Aindayen]

Wish I had the time to devout to P1999 :\ Tried to convince my girlfriend to try it out but she'd have none of it. Took addicted to WoW :(

Are you still raiding Vinen? Happy Belated btw.

Ain

[Amadis]

I finally got some serious traction leveling up--38 magician, should be in the planes next week. I switched guilds, the new one is pretty chill but way better in terms of organization and overall player quality. Need more Hoss in P99...

[Lonskils]

Made a wizzy named Lonskils. It is so hard to get used to the way mouse looks in EQ as opposed to just about every game these days. And jumping uggg.

[Syana]

lol wizard

[Lonskils]

I was a wizard before, not sure why someone that played a chanter of all things would take issue with a wizzy.

[Syana]

I don't have an issue with wizard.. I'm just laughing at your decision to play wizard... again.

I guess some people enjoy torturing themselves :)

[Aindayen]

Once you've been the ultimate power, you can't settle for anything less!

[Syana]

Yes, ultimate power for 10 seconds then sit for 10 minutes.

[Amadis]

Once you've been the ultimate power, you can't settle for anything less!

You've never been a Gnome, so I'm pretty sure you know nothing about ultimate power.

[Syana]

Gnomebliteration. 'nuff said.

[Lonskils]

You've never been a Gnome, so I'm pretty sure you know nothing about ultimate power.

Aind is a Gnome in wow, but not in EQ /nod

And I just love being able to port myself and I hate druids, so wizzy it is!

[Torrid]

If you roll a wizard, you'll quit for sure. Wizards are even worse here due to resists and spell aggro being worse. Not only that, but this server is full of players who know the game well, so they will NOT group you. Wizards sit LFG all day. Don't waste your time.

[Amadis]

If you roll a wizard, you'll quit for sure. Wizards are even worse here due to resists and spell aggro being worse. Not only that, but this server is full of players who know the game well, so they will NOT group you. Wizards sit LFG all day. Don't waste your time.

I saw a human skeleton up in Karnor today, so I assume Concussion is in game. Does it make any noticeable difference in P99?

[Lonskils]

If you roll a wizard, you'll quit for sure. Wizards are even worse here due to resists and spell aggro being worse. Not only that, but this server is full of players who know the game well, so they will NOT group you. Wizards sit LFG all day. Don't waste your time.

Well that sucks, so it's a melee only game now?

[Torrid]

Pet casters were very strong prior to Kunark; but now that Kunark is live, melee is on top. Rogues are the highest DPS by a significant margin, and monks are not only 2nd in DPS, they also mitigate as well as a warrior, so you'll often see monks just tanking for groups. Real tanks are still desirable for harder content (Sebilis mainly) due to larger hit point pools on warriors and knight snap aggro though.

Magicians went from insanely overpowered to balanced. Magicians are still crazy good from 1-50. They'll do monk level DPS in groups after 50 if they don't slack. Decent DPS + mod rods + CoH gets them groups.

Necros are the solo kings now. Magicians were from 1-50, but after mobs hit level 40, they do a LOT more damage, so fear kiting becomes much more powerful. Also pet classes took a big nerf a month ago then they removed innate dual wield. Keeping a pet full time and simply healing it won't cut it like it does from 1-50. Necros aren't bad dps but they aren't typically as desirable as melee or magician.

Every group wants an enchanter. Enchanters have no real substitute. However after the charm nerf, you sort of need malo to use a charmed pet. You also need to not suck. If you can't charm, then the class sort of becomes a buff bitch, but as much as enchanters complain, mez is still extremely powerful/desired and makes the class more than just buffing haste and clarity. GRM and color stuns are also good.

Shamans are pretty good. I'd rather have a shaman than a 3rd dps, as their buffs + pet are some dps, and you pretty much have zero downtime with slows, regen, and sup heals. It's also much safer. They get groups.

Druids are terrible. Nobody groups them. CH is the only heal in the game for tanks after level 40. When your group's tank has well over 4k hp, 530 point heals that take 10% of your mana with a 12 minute med time ain't going to cut it. Druid DPS is also terrible for the same reasons Wizard dps is terrible. Although druids can sort of charm in Chardok if they are good, but Chardok has like zero loot so it's not frequented.

My druid is 60 only because charm was really strong for a few weeks before it was nerfed. It's still pretty good though. I play my warrior and magician for groups. My druid does come in very handy to port my friends around, powerlevel them, and sell junk in EC though. Druids can still solo very well if you know the tricks to it.

Also worth noting is that AoE groups do work here. However it's not quite as safe for a few reasons. One reason is that casting say, Color Flux (the level 4 color stun) which only lasts 4 seconds, right after the second enchanter lands an 8 second stun, will cause the mob to only be stunned for 4 seconds instead of 8. Another reason is that resists are a little worse here. Also, color stun aggro is a lot worse here, so instead of mobs just sort of hitting wizards and enchanters, they will only hit enchanters. AoEing is still quite viable though. Coril Syana and I got some great exp in EJ 3 man AoEing at level 52-53. I also AoEed Chardok some. But don't roll a Wizard to AoE. It's very rarely done. You need to do it with friends; the likelihood of a pug AoE group is nearly zero.

[Lonskils]

Is it stopping at Kunark though? Will they continue to move up or is this it?

[Amadis]

It'll go to Velious, but no further.

[Lonskils]

To bad, PoP was awesome.

[Syana]

I would suggest Cleric or Shaman if you want to play a wis caster. Enchanter, Magician, or Necromancer for int casters. Rogue or Monk for Melee DPS. Warrior or Paladin for tank.

[Maegwin]

I see u didn't mention rangers Torrid. I didn't start playing until laaaaaate Kunark...just before velious even. How are rangers? I soloed mine to about 40 as I recall before I started doing dungeons.

[Amadis]

It's a mixed bag. On one hand, anything that's class specific will be cheap because nobody plays them. Also, aggro isn't a huge issue because swing aggro is diminished in P99 and all the tanks use proccing weapons so you can just chop away with Lamentations or whatever and never need to worry about aggro control like you used to.

On the other hand, you're not very good DPS, you can't tank, and nobody snares because for some reason dying mobs run slowly in P99. So for anything you can do, somebody else can do it much better.

TBH if what you want to do is play your favorite class and have fun, play whatever you want. Just interpret Torrid's post as meaning that unless you group with friends you probably won't get a lot of Sebilis groups because people here really, really want the 'best' class whenever possible. At lower levels it's not such a big deal, I think this only really starts to become an issue after 50.

[Drakky]

Hello punks. Going to be a little blunt here.

WoW sucks dick. I hate it because all the quests are so similar, and theres no risk involved in the game. What made EQ so great was when I was a wee-little barbarian and I would be in Everfrost, heading to that gnoll area to fight the king or whatever it was, and die, and lose all my gear. I was scared shitless. You go into a dungeon, you risk your life, your gear, everything -- it was so exciting.

WoW looks like shit too. Fucking looks like a kids game, like whats up with the toyish graphics? Personally I like to feel into the game, and like guts and gore (age of conan was GREAT for this)

I was looking forward to Diablo III, until I realized they just turned it into another WoW. LMAO, every class can basically do everything... theres no such thing as "classes" anymore... hunters or w.e. dont even look like theyre using bows... everything fucking glows at the beginning of the game... like fuck I had to play for like 300 days played before I got a glowing weapon... they need to put an end to the early-game glowing shit it ruins everything. fucking D3 looks like WoW too... pos graphics...

[Aindayen]

Happy B-day drakky~

[Forty]

Happy Birthday, Crakky!!

[Torrid]

I didn't mention Rangers because Lons asked about caster classes. Rangers are fucking terrible. The only reason I can even think of to play one would be to sit on your ass all day tracking dragons in skyfire or DL for your uber guild. Not only do you do less damage than any DPS class and tank worse than a monk, but you also have a 40% exp penalty. There are very few rangers on the server for these reasons. EQ wasn't known for its exceptional class balance. Although they will remove the exp penalty sometime in Velious.

Oh, and they just nerfed DoTs to only do 66% damage on moving targets. So necros aren't as hot as they used to be solo.

They also just removed fungi staves, fungi robe regen, RoAs, RoMs, and NoSs from dalnir. Glad I bought my RoM and NoS when I did :D

[Maegwin]

All the hybrid classes have the xp.penalty right? Rangers, paladins, and shadow knigts?

[Amadis]

Oh, and they just nerfed DoTs to only do 66% damage on moving targets. So necros aren't as hot as they used to be solo.

I thought when the DOT nerf went in on live it only affected mobs running towards the caster, not away--so it only killed druids, not necros.

Is this a separate nerf?

[Maegwin]

I don’t remember there being a differentiation.

[Amadis]

All the hybrid classes have the xp.penalty right? Rangers, paladins, and shadow knigts?

And bards. The other classes are worth playing though IMO.

TBH, rangers sucked on classic and Kunark, and only really got partially "fixed" in velious. They finally became amazing with AAs.

I'm going to be the anti-Torrid here for a second and point out that this isn't a whole lot different from what live was like. The only actual difference is that here people are pickier about who they group with. If you were happy playing ranger then, go ahead and play ranger. People will make fun of you and you won't get first or even second shot at groups, but *that was happening in real EQ too*.

Only obsess about the class you play if getting the choice groups/camps/guilds is more important to you than playing a class you like.

What I personally did is postpone the decision of what to play exactly by just starting a Magician first. It's super easy to level them, they require no gear other than maybe a torch, and if I don't like mine in the 50s I can easily use him to farm gear and switch to something else as a new main. So far I'm loving it though (will be hitting 50 tonight).

TL;DR Torrid's right, but remember his values may not exactly match yours. If you really want a Ranger, just play one. If you don't care and just want to be an amazing class, follow his advice. :)

[Amadis]

I don’t remember there being a differentiation.

Ok, I guess this is a second nerf that I forgot about. I was thinking about the original kiting nerf, which according to Wikipedia came out a lot earlier (summer of 1999):

"Kiting was an extraordinarily effective tactic in the first several months after EverQuest was released, allowing players to kill monsters that "conned" red (on a scale of green-blue-white-yellow-red, signifying the level of the monster relative to the player's level, white being equal, green much lower and red much higher). In the summer of 1999, Verant Interactive implemented several nerfs apparently designed to make kiting a less viable tactic. The most notable change made damage-over-time (DoT) spells only 66% as powerful while the target chased the player. DoT spells, among many others, have since been revised several times (now do full damage to running mobs), and attempts have been made to promote grouping. Kiting continues, however."

Oh well. :) Necros are still pretty insane.

[Maegwin]

I think if I had to choose right now it would either be monk or shaman followed by necro.

[Amadis]

So what are you waiting for? :)

[Maegwin]

Haha, I play wow so I have little time for other games atm. But I may dabble here and there.

[Drakky]

thx forty and aindsadflskdf

crazy that ive known most hoss members for ......... 10 yrs? more? lol

[Phaera]

Hola Senor Pony. :)

[Torrid]

If you really want a Ranger, just play one. If you don't care and just want to be an amazing class, follow his advice. :)

Ok, but don't say I didn't warn you when clerics start needing to leave your group for some emergency after you join it because their exp rate is half the rate it would be otherwise. When a good group gets 5%/hr, not many people will be happy about taking drastic exp reductions just so you can indulge your bow class fetish.

And apparently fear doesn't reduce dot damage. However a common necro tactic was to simply not fear and kite the mob around-- especially at early levels. Necro snare is actually pretty good and better than druid snare at higher levels.

[Gheltire]

rangers were fine prekunark because the ac/defense/weaponskills were equivalent to a paladin and the difference between the DPS of all classes werent bad. Warrior actually sucked in original until they started tinkering with the defensive capabilities to make them more wanted than a paladin or SK.

I did just fine across original. When Kunark came out and things became "known" like the hybrid exp penalty, and the chain/plate gap widened, AND the mobs around karnors castle could lay a ranger out, it became pretty pointless to try and solo.

If you remember lyynch, hed box all the time in Kunark because he realized quickly that the ranger couldnt solo anymore. Andriana kicked ass but always had a good grp, and the ML guys were rolling along. But for the most part, kumark was when you knew all the high level rangers on the server because everyone else quit playing them:)

ranger down jokes started in kunark:)


BTW I was playing last night (yeah yeah i know) and its crazy to see all the guys out there who havent played since 04/05. Cant believe its been that long.

[Amadis]

I dunno, maybe you guys had a different experience than I. In Prexus we had literally two high level rangers pre-Kunark (well, three, but only two active at any given moment). Most rangers quit or idled after 35 when outdoor exp died down (Mistmoore and Cazic becoming mostly or all green), as without sow and harmony they were a pretty weak class indoors. Sure, things got worse in Kunark, but not so bad that it became untenable (mostly because Sebilis required snaring and most druids and necros were terrible, in Skyfire, or both) so the hardcore rangers largely kept playing their class.

[Gheltire]

fennin and then druzzil had a few more hardcore guys I think. I didnt even know the hoss guys I think I was 50 when we merged (been a while)

I did lower guk til my eyes bled green, then dinged 50 on the priest who guarded the fear gate in feerot.

could probably still run from live to dead via the waterfall in my sleep:)

[Maegwin]

Well, in classic (pre-kunark) Rangers had less soloing options. Once Kunark came out there were some viable soloing options to get up to 40 and even maybe 45. When I started playing in late Kunark I solo'd myself up mostly outdoors zones like Frontier Mountains and then in The Overthere.

I would kite the Cacti (Succulent something or other) in The OT with snaring and just shoot and scoot with my bow. I also solo'd the cougars that were in that zone, I think because didn't Rangers get some kind of Fear Beast? Yeah, I think we did because I remember using it much later to also solo in that one higher level zone in Velious to kill the ice cougars.

So you could just fear them, follow along and beat on them and as soon as fear wore off you could recast and continue. Had to be quick on the re-fears though, you couldn't tank them straight up for very long. It got a little easier later on when the Ranger epics gave us a slow :-p

<3 Earthcaller.

[Stosh]

rangers were fine prekunark because the ac/defense/weaponskills were equivalent to a paladin and the difference between the DPS of all classes werent bad. Warrior actually sucked in original until they started tinkering with the defensive capabilities to make them more wanted than a paladin or SK.

I did just fine across original. When Kunark came out and things became "known" like the hybrid exp penalty, and the chain/plate gap widened, AND the mobs around karnors castle could lay a ranger out, it became pretty pointless to try and solo.

If you remember lyynch, hed box all the time in Kunark because he realized quickly that the ranger couldnt solo anymore. Andriana kicked ass but always had a good grp, and the ML guys were rolling along. But for the most part, kumark was when you knew all the high level rangers on the server because everyone else quit playing them:)

ranger down jokes started in kunark:)


BTW I was playing last night (yeah yeah i know) and its crazy to see all the guys out there who havent played since 04/05. Cant believe its been that long.

I remember why I picked a human ranger quite vividly. I wanted to have the best of both worlds, melee and cast spells. Plus I was retarded and believed what I read on allakhazam, namely that 'humans get an xp bonus".
My first character was also human warrior named Conan. Very original. I knew Qeynos very well, so I figured why learn a new area. A human Ranger of Karana was born. Blind. I had no idea I was blind either. I assumed everybody spent 45 minutes "feeling" there way through the tunnel to Surefall Glade.

I stumbled upon a website that seemed to explain XP very well. I knew I had a penalty, but not how it worked. Like most, I assumed that XP was split by level, then I found out XP was actually split by total lifetime XP. So even when I was lower level then the rest of the group, I earned more XP. I took full advantage of this as most people assumed that if I was a couple level's lower then them, then I wouldn't "steal" their XP. Which is exactly what I was doing.

When Kunark came out, and the Ranger jokes began in earnest, I quickly realized I needed to make friends with key members of the holy trinity to get groups, hence my relationships with Selice, Tirsada/Ternada, Korona/Hali and Asilia. Make friends with people who the groups always seem to form around and ensure yourself a spot in the group, and in my case a wife. I was also they guy who volunteered to help everybody with their epic weapon camps to get groups. Need to camp something? Sure, I'll help, no problem.

[Elkwood]

Man i remember how bad rangers sucked. That was my primary class my entire eq career. I think they set the defensive cap on rangers at 215 and everyone else that mattered at like 250ish for the kunark expansion?? Been a long time

I would go out to pull for me and hankeys and he have to run out to heal me before i made it back to the group/or res me. His monk go pull and the mob be 2/3 of the way dead by the time he gets it back to the group. Back doing the ole wurmslayer farm days :)

Any of u rangers remember the big stage protest that came during that time ? Who was that guy from the ranger glade that did all that ??

Good times :)

[Loniel Bonewalker]

fennin and then druzzil had a few more hardcore guys I think. I didnt even know the hoss guys I think I was 50 when we merged (been a while)

I did lower guk til my eyes bled green, then dinged 50 on the priest who guarded the fear gate in feerot.

could probably still run from live to dead via the waterfall in my sleep:)

Hush up Ghelt, and get back behind your damn pillar! And remember to heal yourself.

[Loniel Bonewalker]

Ok, but don't say I didn't warn you when clerics start needing to leave your group for some emergency after you join it because their exp rate is half the rate it would be otherwise. When a good group gets 5%/hr, not many people will be happy about taking drastic exp reductions just so you can indulge your bow class fetish.

And apparently fear doesn't reduce dot damage. However a common necro tactic was to simply not fear and kite the mob around-- especially at early levels. Necro snare is actually pretty good and better than druid snare at higher levels.

Correct. Most necromancers reverse kite, keeping agro while mob chases u and pet eats away at the mob along with your dots. Fear kiting only had/has uses 4-50 or so and a oh shit spell if fear isn't resisted to begin with. But for the most part reverse kiting for the win. In Velious those otters were quite fun as well. especially in PoP and plane of tactics and plane of storms on the frogs. Though I spent my time 50-54 or so right in front of the fear portal on Cyndrellia. Hell i remember waking up a lvl higher with some exp into it as well. Mainly just in case If I did fall asleep (obviously it happened heh) she would spawn hit me pet would own her, I guess my regen for health was decent as I did not die. It was nice though afk the camp was mine heh. Oh the fun days how I loved em. Hell i remember that spot was nearly fought over quite a few times. well in the old world anyhow after Kunark came out. The other place was the furry/clops in Oot. Quaig maelstrom (sp) was a blast too, fun getting him stuck on the boat. Damn did not realize I would go on this much with a post, sorry. Like I said "sorry", but it seems when it comes to EQ1 I end up going on and on lol..

[Lasgo]

Anyone still playing p99 just started up like a week ago looking for some people that are playing also

[Amadis]

I haven't quit, but I have a one month daughter to go with my two year old son now so I'm taking a bit of a break. When I have time to play again I'll look you up.

[Lasgo]

Sounds good =)

[Maegwin]

Started an Iksar Monk named.....Zyklan! Level 2 aww yeah.