Hey, new expansion thoughts?

[IradinTepes]

I caught a link of the new expansion and I was wondering what actual EQ players thought about it. I personally think it looks good and thats saying a lot considering i'm a recovered EQholic. The new froglok models look greats (I wonder if they'll update the old ones..). Anyways, so whats your opinion?

[Brigette]

Hiya!

I have moderate to no interest in it. I also do not plan on purchasing it. But then again I said that about Scars of Velious, Shadows of Luclin and Planes of Power! Hee hee!

[FeriosNoncedo]

I'll be getting it. More bank room

[Spanmaster]

I agree Fer...
More bank room...yay

[Kalthanan]

Already prepaid.

Froggies with backflips? I'm there.

[katyannaK8]

im lovin the froggys! Im prepaid!

[Yadeda]

Ima already prepaid too....lmao...courtesy of Talmis who auto signed me up for it ..:P

Katy hun, i LOVE yer sig!!!

[Talmis]

<Sigh> <looks very guilty> :( Well I still feel bad about that... Was an accident on my part... Was in a hurry to log in lol. Anyway I'm gonna sign up for it! It'll be cool to have the extra features! The sig's great Kat ;) :cool: :P :D

[Lungki]

Your not alone, Talmis! I made that mistake as well. :(
Kal didn't seem to happy when I told him, but I think he didn't care, we were gonna get it anyways! :haha:

The :princess: Princess

[Sinter]

I tried to prepay that day, it said validating then kicked me back to logain, does it mean it worked?
Sinter

[Kalthanan]

If you don't see "Pre Order" on your login screen, you bought it.

[Elemental Ninja]

I'm getting it for sure! Too bad Frogloks can't be Beastlords though, just think of it, a warder the size of The Mugglewump in The Warrens!! Or what a Froglok Monk ... Tongue Slap skill :D I think I'll start a Foglok Paladin or Wizard :P

[Ramsus]

Melee players have formed a protest to not purchase this 'extension' until such time as the issues listed are looked at.
In support of them, I will not be purchasing it at this time.

[Swordmaster]

Why is that Rams? what's going on?

[Ramsus]

Here is the post that started it. This will give you the facts. It is very long, and well worth the read. I attempted to have a conversation about this but was attacked by the casters who said i was whining. You read it and decide.

The marginalization of the pure melee classes in PoP (long)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I have serious concerns about the marginalization of the pure melee classes, starting in Luclin and becoming a serious issue in PoP. Looking back, there was a time (eg. late kunark/early velious era) when melees were far more powerful than casters. SOE realized that casters and especially hybrids were inferior to their pure melee counterparts, and sought to enchance them in new and creative ways, sometimes by making them more powerful in combat, sometimes by giving them new utility where they had none before. While I commend SOE for doing an excellent job in making hybrids and casters viable classes again (people actually want to play paladins, rangers, mages, and necros!), I believe the pendulum has now swung way too far and it's time to back off a bit and reconsider class balance as a whole.

There is no one single change that SOE made that caused this. Rather, it's been the cumulative effect of many small changes in game philosophy and implementation that have served to drastically alter the balance of the game today. There are two main factors in PoP that we need to look at. First are the environmental factors -- facts about the places we fight in and the things we're fighting. Second are the competitive factors -- facts about how one class stands up next to another and the strengths/weaknesses we bring to the table. I will try to focus on the environmental factors as much as possible, lest this turn into a caster vs. melee flame war.

Speaking generally, the classic balance between the offensive capabilities of melees and casters has always been that casters can do burst damage in exchange for being mana limited (and thus excel in short fights), whereas melees can provide a steady stream of damage at a consistant and mostly unalterable pace, not limited by anything other than staying alive (and thus excel in longer fights).

The classic balance in environment has always been that zones vary in terrain and mobs vary in their capabilities, giving different classes opportunities to shine at different times. Some zones require or influence the use of particular utility functions (eg. lev, EB, lock picking, disarming traps, COTH, etc..). Some zones have had mobs that have special characteristics or qualities, such as being undead, highly magic resistant (or resistant to one type of magic), poison or disease or curse attacks, have high mitigation, etc... This encourages a wide variety of tactics.

PoP, more than any other expansion, brings with it a change in design philosophy. Fights tend to be shorter and more intense, exping is faster and less dangerous, CRs are easier, environments are less cramped, getting around the world is easier, and other small changes were made that generally make the game more fun (or at least less tedious). PoP also, far more than any other expansion, presents us with a very hemogenized view of the world as far as environmental factors go. The mobs tend to follow the same design patterns, as do the zones, and these patterns almost exclusively are to the detriment of the pure melee classes.

Now, let's get into the specifics.

One of the most major changes in PoP was the change in how mobs were made tougher to stay competitive with the ever mudflated playerbase. In previous expansions, the philosophy was "make the mobs hit slightly harder and have slightly more HP" to account for mudflation. In PoP, the mobs hit MUCH harder, and have less HP compared to their velious/luclin counterparts. This fits right in with the "shorter and more intense" philosophy SOE sees as the way of the future -- and rightfully so. Hour long boss fights are undeniably boring.

In exp groups, mobs having less hit points doesn't make much of a difference as far as caster vs. pure melee goes. If the mobs die faster, in the absense of other factors, groups will just pull faster to compensate and keep the same approximate ratio of uptime. However, for boss mob fights, the effect of this change is enormous for the pure melee classes. Caster classes (and some hybrids) now often find themselves with more than enough mana to last an entire boss mob fight. Pure melee classes, once relished for their ability to produce consistant damage over the long term of a fight, no longer have a long term to work with. The net result is that casters (and some hybrids) can use their burst damage capabilities for the entire fight, while the pure melee classes are left doing a comparitively insignificant amount of damage. It is not uncommon for me to see casters outdamaging their pure-melee counterparts by a ratio of 3 to 1 or more on such fights!

As a counterbalance to the mobs having fewer HP in PoP, mobs were made to hit much harder. The reasons for this change were obvious -- if the mobs had less HP, then need to hit harder to remain a suitable challenge and keep the fights intense. However, this change ends up favors casters in both exp situations and raids. Mobs that hit harder require melees to be healed more often, and mana used for healing is mana that is not going to make the mob dead any faster. Effectively, that means that harder hitting mobs causes melees to increasingly lower the effectiveness of the priest classes in doing damage themselves. The second effect of this is to requires more sturdy tanks, effectively making classes that could tank sub-optimally before (eg. monks and maybe rangers and rogues in a pinch) not able to as much any more. The practical end result in PoP exp groups is that the pure melee classes MUST be supported by a solid tank (unless you're a warrior, in which case you are one), a good healer (necros don't generally cut it), and a slower/haster. Casting classes are not subject to the same constraints.

Wait a minute, you might be saying. Isn't that only true for the first melee added to the group? Regardless of how many melees are added to the group, as soon as there is one, the infrastructure (healer, tank, slower) must exist to support them. No infrastructure, no group, and the none of the pure melee classes has the tools to solo (or even duo?) in PoP. Further, due to issues of agro (flip flopping the mob) and lag, issues like riposting, enraging, and rampaging become increasingly large problems for melee classes as mobs hit harder, and these things affect all melees in a group. Even as a rogue, when I am standing behind the mob most of the time where it can not riposte me, I still take a fair number of them when I catch agro, the mob flips for any reason, etc... And classes that use fast weapons (eg. rogues, monks, and rangers if they're meleeing) tend to get the worst of the riposte issue. This requires additional healing. In an exp group, this is not generally a significant problem -- however, when mobs riposte hard and often, it has the unintended consequence of turning monks into rogues who can't backstab.

On raids, it's presumed you have all the necessary support classes available -- however, raid mobs also hit MUCH harder than exp mobs and turn the riposte, enrage, and rampage issue from a minor one into a major one. As an example, some of the boss mob giants ripose for 1500 damage in the Plane of Storms, a tier 2 PoP zone. I've been killed before because someone flipped agro and the mob riposted me two or three times in quick succession before I could turn attack off. Even taking one riposte from such a mob means a pure melee needs a large heal, reducing the effectiveness of the priests around him, whereas casters are not affected by this. If nothing else, I firmly believe ripostes need to be toned down in PoP.

To make matters worse, many boss mobs were also given heavy hitting short range AEs or AE rampages. This was perhaps the most devistating change to the pure melee classes, as there is no effective way to avoid these. While casters and some hybrids can sit outside of the range of the AE and do full damage, the pure melee has to stand inside it and take it's effect. The end result is that melees end up either having their effectiveness reduced further (if the AE is a stat drainer), or require additional healing support (that possibly would be better used just nuking!). A good example of a design that looks good on paper but doesn't work so well in practice is the recuso house in HoH. Mobs there have 3 types of AEs, depending on the type of mob. They either stat drain (reduce atk and AC), drain mana, or put a large dot on that can kill a non-warrior melee without healing. This seems pretty reasonable in theory: the stat drain effects pure melees and hybrids, the mana drain effects casters and hybrids, and the dot effects everyone. However, in reality, the stat drain affects pure melees and meleeing hybrids, reducing their effectiveness. The mana drain affects hybrids only because casters simply stay out of it's range. The dot affects pure melees and meleeing hybrids only because again, casters stay out of it's range. Thus, it's the melees and hybrids who eat the effects of the dots, lose even more efficiency, and require additional caster/priest support, while the casters continue on like they always have.

As far as other environmental factors go, the generally wide open, mostly-outdoor zones benefit soloing-capable casters more than melees, as it gives them room to kite (if they're a kiting class), solo, and charm (negating most of the downsides of charm). All casters and hybrids can benefit from the extra mana regen from the use of a horse, and rogues benefit slightly since mobs aren't pushed into walls so much. Even the indoor zones are more spacious, with mobs spread farther apart, making pulling a less difficult task, especially in conjunction with the new lull spells. Monks are not happy about this. Also, the increased space gives casters a lot more options in regards to positioning, the most important by far being the ability to stay out of AE range of most mobs.

In Luclin, AA abilities were introduced, and it is worth noting that casters and hybrids were given marked boosts to their offensive capabilities (mostly in the form of more mana efficient and high powered spells), but in the cases of rangers the new archery skills and paladins the cleanse undead skills. In some cases they were added given utility as well. The pure melee classes got mostly defensive abilities, the offensive abilities were minimal to the point of being trivial, and at least as far as rogues go, most of the added utility was deemed completely and utterly useless (the one exception being escape, which is self-only utility).

In PoP, 5 new levels and 2 tiers of AA skills were added, giving everyone new advancement opportunities. However, from these, casters again benefit more than the pure melee classes. First off, the addition of 5 levels brought with it new spells for casters. While the method of distribution of these spells is undoubtedly frustrating and casters/hybrids have good reason for complaint, there is no doubt that these offer a reasonable increase in damage capabilities, flexibility, and/or utility. For example, the new magician and shammy pets are awesome DPS machines. New nukes for the offensively minded caster classes offer either higher damage for the same mana, the same damage for less mana, or more damage for more mana, which increases their ability to burst damage over a short period of time. As far as utility goes, the new lull spell capabilities are very nice (even post nerf) and reduce the utility of the monk class in some situations. The charm spells are powerful to the point of being broken. When an enchanter in your group can charm a mob that does 4 times as much damage and is 10 times harder to kill than any of your other group members, something is wrong). The lifting of the stat caps also gives casters a larger mana pool, which can translate into more damage depending on the length of the fight.

Melees, on the other hand, got no new disciplines, a marginal increase to primary hand damage, a few HP, and theoretically a new damage table. The end result, in my estimation, is about a 10% increase in melee damage at 65 over level 60, and zero added utility. As a rogue specific issue, our minimum backstab went from 120 at level 60 to 130 at level 65, which is pathetic. When I hit level 60 I felt like it was a huge deal. I could feel the increase in damage I was doing, and I got assassinate (which has since been totally trivialized since it's level cap hasn't been raised) -- at 65 I didn't get anything I felt really helped me. It was very anti-climactic. The entire climb from 60-65 was totally and completely anti-climactic as a pure melee.

The AA skills that came with PoP in my understanding were fairly low-key for all classes. My understanding here is incomplete so I will not speculate outside of my own class, other than to say that once again melees were mostly neglected in terms of offensively minded AA skills (at least ones that add more than 2% dps). As a rogue, the Shroud of Stealth AA skill is very nice for getting me from point A to B while I'm watching TV and eating dinner and not really paying attention (yes, that's humor folks). The rest of the AA skills are uninspired and generally just extensions of the lackluster Luclin AA skills we got. Perhaps someone else can fill me in on this area -- I'd like to learn more.

Focus effects were initially an awesome idea to boost caster power and give them more variety in gear, now overdone when put in conjunction with other caster power boosts. Between focus effects and AA skills, casters receive a tremendous boost to both their damage producing abilities, healing abilities, and mana pools (in the form of spells that cost less). When combined with new forms of mana regen (eg. better spell regen, new item regen, more FT items, horses, etc...), this makes for casters that suddenly are a lot more efficient -- they nuke often, nuke hard, and don't run out of mana, even in longer fights. While undoubtedly they needed a boost to become competitive with melees, the fact that all of these boosts stack together have produced casters that probably more powerful than intended.

Speaking as a rogue, I find PoP also ate most of our other utility -- CRing is not necessary with graveyards. I love graveyards, by the way! GREAT change! But it takes away from my class. Pickpocket was effectively nerfed by making most of the stuff we'd want to steal magic. GREAT change in terms of game balance! But it takes away from my class. PoP is totally lacking in locked doors and traps. GREAT change because these things are horribly misimplemented and it is NOT fun to sit there for an hour repeatedly clicking while your raid slowly moves through an area. But it takes away from my class. About the only utility we have left is as a scout (through Shroud of Stealth), and an Eye of Zomm can do that almost as well as we can in many cases. For monks, with the plethora of outdoor zones, well spaced mobs, and new lull capabilities, pulling is no longer what it used to be for them. With the hard hitting mobs and mitigation nerf, they can no longer effectively tank like they used to. For warriors, they are no longer the best taunters, as hybrids have become formidable tanks themselves and can hold agro better through use of spells. Pure melees never had much utility anyway, and now what we do have is worth even less.

Also, consider the gear dropping out of PoP. Unlike previous expansions, which had a plethora of gear dropping (the early expansions were melee-centric, Luclin imo had the balance a lot closer to right), PoP seems to have relatively few drops, and what does drop seems to be weighted towards casters. Part of this is undoubtely due to the lack of raid zones available to non-uberguilded players in PoP. Furthermore, most of the melee gear dropping in the Tier 1 through Tier 3 zones is INFERIOR to the stuff found in ToV and Ssra Temple off mobs as easy to kill as Rhag 1 and 2. Especially the weapons. Although melee gear is finally starting to show up in the Tier 4 zones, and some of it is very nice, it's fair to say the majority of players will NOT be seeing these zones. Ever. Even a not-so-uber-guild can take out Rhag 1 or 2, or make a foray into ToV these days. Flowing thought gear has been sprinkled throughout Luclin and PoP, yet vengeance and atk gear remains almost unheard of outside of Vex Thal and the elemental planes... It's also rather amusing that many of the 2h weapons dropping in the 4th tier planes are sub-28 delay, negating the extra damage bonuses that were added to 2h weapons to make them competitive in the first place.

Other non-PoP specific issues have become prevalent as the game has advanced. Pure melees are all "specialized" in doing consistant damage over the long-term. Not only has the PoP philosophy been "faster and shorter!", but the increase in caster/hybrid offensive power means old-world mobs that used to take 20 minutes to kill now take 5, pushing yesterday's long battles into todays short ones. The nerf to mod rods and the subsequent rebalancing of high end mobs exaggerated this effect further. Pretty soon there will be no long battles left. The long battle, if not dead, is dying. While I do not lament it's passing at all (as I said above, long battles are tedious and boring!), I can not help but wonder what role is being left for pure meleers.

Now don't get me wrong -- I'm not calling for a nerf of casters because THE PROBLEM ISN'T THE CASTERS! The problem is the recent game philosophies that have been used in designing PoP for the level 61+ crowd are almost universally anti-melee and melee utility has been reduced across the board. In exp groups pure melee classes still do good damage with the proper support classes, but are often outdamaged by a number of other classes that need less maintainance/healing -- so why take them? And what about next expansion, where the mobs hit even harder, further exaggering the effects mentioned above? On PoP style raids, the damage all pure melees do compared to casters/hybrids before the mob dies (or more likely, the pure melee does) is trivial compared to what casters are currently capable of. So why bring them? There have been recently circulating stories about mobs in the elemental planes that riposte and AE rampage so hard the rogues and monks sit around and throw daggers at the mob for 5 minutes (doing 20?DPS in the process) from outside of AE range because that's the only way they've found to contribute without dying! That's not inspiring, nor is it balanced (and if someone who's actually been there can enlighten us all on the truth or falsehood of such things, I'd be much obliged). If it were just a few encounters or a few zones, that would be fine -- but the mold with PoP has been homogeneality, and these anti-melee-damage patterns are ubiquitous. If the next expansion is like this one, I suspect you will see an awful lot of warriors, rogues, and monks quitting to play casters and hybrids. I sincerely hope this is a one time occurance -- but SOE has always been behind the player base in realizing where potential problems are.

Rogues, monks, and warriors (and other classes where partially appropriate), we're all in the same boat together here. Let's put aside our past animousities and tensions, work together to identify the sources of our mutual issues as pure melee classes, and ensure that we are not inadvertently obsoleted from the game. Three classes together are much harder to ignore than one.

Speak and be heard.

Seredin
65 Rogue
EMarr

[Ramsus]

In response, what has been suggested is that folks preorder the extension and then the friday before it comes live, they cancel. All at once.

I support it. Something has to be done to get the attention of SoE. The only thing they listen to is the dollar sign on the bottom line, so that's where you aim.

I truly expect little support for this from anyone except the 3 pure melee classes. But that's enough, if we all stand together.

[Elemental Ninja]

About the Graveyard bit this person mentioned, I totallya gree with both things he had to say, about it being great but yet it also does take away from the rogue. BUT, here's where a little imagination is needed, you are basically in the God's homes, and thus, trying to face/defeat their "direct" (by this I mean the mobs before the Gods themselves) minions and possibly the God themselves. So, if one should die, most Gods WOULD have to respect their courage/insanity to try that, and so the Graveyard is there for the fallen warriors. About the corpses being summoned there, (MUCH more imagination needed) like I said, you are in the home of the Gods of Norrath, and they don't want a trashy home, so the Graveyard is there to act as a "trash can". Just my 2cp there, I can get ery imaginative hehe.

[Ramsus]

"Speaking as a rogue, I find PoP also ate most of our other utility -- CRing is not necessary with graveyards. I love graveyards, by the way! GREAT change! But it takes away from my class."


Maybe it's because you are a caster but, you read all of that and you focus on the graveyard. Interesting.

[Janari]

As of today,Hal and I have not ordered it. I play Janari a pure melee character, and although I also play a mage and a druid, I do feel that something needs to been done to even it out a tad.

Jan

[Spanmaster]

Speaking as a rogue, I find PoP also ate most of our other utility -- CRing is not necessary with graveyards. I love graveyards, by the way! GREAT change! But it takes away from my class.
Takes away from Necros and SK's also.
For monks, with the plethora of outdoor zones, well spaced mobs, and new lull capabilities, pulling is no longer what it used to be for them. With the hard hitting mobs and mitigation nerf, they can no longer effectively tank like they used to.
Were Monks ever intended to be tanks? Don't think so.
For warriors, they are no longer the best taunters, as hybrids have become formidable tanks themselves and can hold agro better through use of spells.
Meet Emberdin. I know he has alot of AA's, but that is what PoP is all about.

[Ramsus]

And a hybrid with the same AA's does better.

[Gref]

bah rams is a tank...he was the only person able to keep aggro off me and he didnt need spells :)

[Ramsus]

It's a whole different game now.

From a monk's point of view it's pretty simple. Our job has always been defined as "Best DPS from any position". But as we started losing ground on dps, we found our tanking ability got better. 90% of our pre pop AA"s were defensive in nature. For them to work, the mob had to be hitting you. It seems to go right in line ability to tank, second to the warrior. Then they took our defense from us and told us our job was DPS. Except, now, almost everyone does better dps. Rogues are in the same boat. They never had any tanking ability but were by far the best DPS. Sadly, that is no longer true. Warriors, who had the best tanking ability are just messed up all over.

Im relaly glad casters can play the game how they want. Solo, group, raid. Whatever, doesnt matter. They can find a spot for themselves. Pure melee don;t have that option at all. They cant solo for exp. They require certains upport classes in order to join a group, and just fit in on raids. While they tend to stack better on raids tan most classes, those days are slipping away also as the new boss mobs are extremely unfriendly in melee range. Now melee are being told not to attack until the mob is at 60% while casters stand around corners and nuke away.

[Boldara]

gonna have to disagree with you ram.

I'm saying right here, I did not read the post but...

Doing what you guys are gonna do. Is like threatening your parent when youre mad by saying, "I'm going to run away." They know youre not gonna run away, so they dont care.

[Ramsus]

That's fine. Noone asked you to agree with it. And like I said, from the abuse taken in my own guild just when bringing up the topic, I dont expect alot of support from anyone not affected by it. People are locked in their own view things and that's to be expected.

But I think you might be surprised by who actually does leave over it.

[Falax]

I have no intention of ordering the new expansion. I understand the melee point of view in this thread. This is another reason I will not be purchasing LoY.

PoP cured the mudflation and made clerics needed again. - great

However, I still need a group to kill 99% of the mobs dark blue or greater. I sit for 30 minutes ( my decision to not sit more than 30 minutes) in PoV many nights lfg along with 2-3 other clerics, only takes 6 clerics in the zone to populate it.

Yesterday I sat in the IC camp with a 65 Sk, 65 warrior, 2 62+ rogues, and a 64 mage. All I needed to do was a CH once a fight and nuke (inadequately) the rest of fight. The rogues were crying for shammie buffs, I really think they wanted a shammie over me. Afterall, a lfg cleric can ress a wiped out group at the graveyard.

Warriors / monks are not really looked for in the PoP groups I am in. Folks want a big SK or pally for pulling and tanking. Rogues are always wanted though, very fast dps contributed by them.

Priests are not balanced as SoE's Rich Waters' promised. Melee are not balanced. SoE took a poll when PoP was released and said the results were people wanted existing content fixed/upgraded. What does SoE do? Responds with another expansion to infuse their pockets with money.

Not my money, I am done with expansions.

[Boldara]

Originally posted by Ramsus
That's fine. Noone asked you to agree with it. And like I said, from the abuse taken in my own guild just when bringing up the topic, I dont expect alot of support from anyone not affected by it. People are locked in their own view things and that's to be expected.

But I think you might be surprised by who actually does leave over it.

- We're reviewing the tanking ability of the various melee and hybrid classes to be sure each class is competitively balanced with the others. The main factors we're considering are the ability to take damage, deal damage, and the additional abilities of each class. The goal with this review is to find any issues where melee classes are not "bringing enough to the party" when comparing their package of abilities. We're paying particular attention to the avoidance-focused classes such as the monk, to be sure things end up where they should.

Taken straight from your news cast.

You win :-P.

[Brigette]

WOW. That was definitely alot of reading.

I tend to get very long-winded on responses such as these, but will attempt to just keep it from the Ranger viewpoint. Yet, my first part will focus on what EQ is..a product.

EQ is a product. SOE must establish a way to maintain interest and thusly retain revenue from its customers. After releasing PoP, SOE has no way to viably maintain further interest for classes past lvl 65. The addition of AA's has become a career "job" enough, as PC's continue to strive to achieve to be the best than can ever hope to become. SOE has seen a limit will occur. What better way to retain marketshare is to introduce, once again, another race subscribers to choose from.
Unfortunately, too many people view LoY as "cool". All this does is ensure that SOE continues to generate cash from more hours of dedicated playing. There are already too many ways to PL characters fast. SOE actually encourages 2 boxing because that is more money for them. Yet, how long will it really take to get a Froglok to 50? 2 weeks? Perhaps one for those truly dedicated to "showing up" others? Whatever the time frame, it only becomes a slight distraction from the truth and issues that currently exist. BUT, SOE will have already achieved their goal after those several weeks of LoY release..they have YOUR money.

Sure, its not that much to you or me. But the total revenue can be amazing for SOE. Then all the issues mentioned in this intial post will be evident again. EQ has already reached the point where ADDING abilities to players is not the answer. Either is TAKING away from characters, because many have already strived to achieve the AA's. Remember the excitement of your characters early accomplishments? Where is that now in PoP? OK maybe you can add some things to the pure melee classes in an attempt to balance them to other classes. Yet, too many things exist.

Seems silly for a Ranger to continue (or start for many) 2HS to avoid the various Ripostes that occur. So Rangers (along with other melee) are forced to fight behind a mob. This endangers/intereferes Rogues as mobs rotate around because of aggro. Speaking from the Ranger standpoint, I cannot even fight "full out" in melee/casting on mobs even in PoV. This is not bragging. It has become the truth. Even reduction aggro spells as CinderJolt are not enough. Too many times I have found myself turning off attack while waiting for the Tank to regain aggro. Because of various additions to casters, they have the same problem. They have the mana to burn, but if they did, WHACK aggro swap again. It becomes more obvious that pure melee needs something more. The only thing keeping Warriors in business, is the fact they have more Hps. Monks and SK's remain the best pullers because of FD, but even that has become a noticed hazard. (especially for Monks).

So now we face the obvious. No Chanter/Shaman in group..means NO group. Sure beastlords can slow some, but to players that is being desperate. The new LFG feature seems nice, but you almost have to advertise yourself in an attempt to gain a group. Most common shout/ooc has been "Group LF Slower" Second to that is Cleric. So to see more regular action you should play a Chanter or Shaman. Sitting around LFG doesnt seem to bother SOE, you already paid them for the month. Make enough friends or being in a great guild is not enough anymore. Groups have to have a slower to play comfortably. As mentioned in the initial copied post, Pallies and SK's are even sought for over other melee, sometimes over Warriors. Yet again, Monks left out in the cold.
I guess your playing experience is left up to your enjoyment of playing your class. It just might result in not playing in groups as you might want to, but heck you can always work on Tradeskills which has been a resurrected way for SOE to keep people on line and paying while you spend hours obtaining items.

Yep, I did not go over every issue and tried not to ignore them. EQ comes down to the fact that YOU choose to pay and play. I hope everyone enjoys playing as much as they have done in the past. Indeed, various issues are out there. The next step is proposing how melee classes can possibly be changed to help make the experience more enjoyable. Bottom line for me is, as long as you have good friends to play with, you should be having fun. Does not seem true anymore though does it?

To me, SOE has to retain its current audience. New blood coming to EQ just is not going to happen. LoY is their way to keep cash flowing in. Any game can have its problems, how much are Warriors/Monks/Rogues going to continue to play and have fun seems up to them to decide.

Hee hee! I didnt solve anything, nor did I expect to. More or less I just typed how things appear to myself. Rarely do you see any shouts/ooc for any melee. They are just sitting around waiting for enough Slowers or a Cleric to log online.

[Viccar]

I keep coming back to this post trying to figure out how to respond. In short, it seems like with each expansion, EQ becomes less and less fun. I've strived to make my char the best I can by leveling and getting AA pts, and in return as a reward, I now get to sit LFG for hours hoping that a higher level monk doesn't come along to make my wait longer. Some people choose to play alts and there is nothing wrong with that, but for me, I want to make my main even better. I know the thought of walking away from the game once again passed through my head this last week-end in one of my long LFG/self-meditation sessions, and who knows, maybe this will have to happen. :cry:

I know when I do find a group now, I feel like I am more of an afterthought. With my speed of attack, I can't afford to fight in front of the mob because any reposte hurts really bad now that VI decided to nerf a monks defense. If there is a rogue in the group, many tend to get upset when others are attacking from behind.

I don't even have any idea what VI can do to change things. They are the ones that have created the issues, but they then seem to almost ignore them. Only thing I could possible think of is increasing the amount of agro casting a spell that causes any kind of damage. VI always says it's a risk vs reward type thing. Well, make those nukes more of a risk to the caster since many of us mellee are right in the thick of it while casters can sit back and nuke from a distance.

Anyway, those are some of my thoughts. LoY don't mean much to me since most of the zones are probably gonna be geared towards the lower end of the game due to the new race being introduced. Only advantage I see out of it right now is the increased bank space.

[FeriosNoncedo]

SOE has three kids.......one has been crying for a candy bar so they give him a candy bar. . the other two kids are crying because they didnt get a candy bar....most parents wouldnt have given the one child a candy bar and not the other two in the first place, but if they ran into this problem they'd go get a knife and divide the candy bar into three equal parts or go buy two more candy bars. SOE takes the candy bar back and gives them all a tic-tac.........it's better than nothing but it's still not a damned candy bar.

[Ramsus]

Even worse is.. they took my candy bar away and gave it to that girl. Yeah, i know shes my sister.. but damn.. that was my candy bar :(


With the latest news from the developers, it looks like they know about alot of the issues people are complaining about. I dont expect a fix that will make everyone happy. But i fully expect them to make some steps in the right direction. Hopefully it wont cost anyone their candybar.

[Elemental Ninja]

Ok I finally see what you been trying to say Ram, and you got a pretty damn good point... BUT, it is not EverQuest/SoE/THE GAME that is making this game not fun, it is the *bleep* that play the game just to be all uber and all highan' mighty. They want SPECIFIC peeps in their groups and are gonna be a bunch of stuck-up cry babies if they don't get what they want, or just give up, which then makes everyone else un-happy because we got a cleric that didn't get that shaman he/she wanted so badly.

So, what do we do? Suck it up and drive on, then try to improvise.

Me being a Beastlord with only a 30% slow spell would know what it is like getting turned down for the enchanter/shaman, because they both have better slows, and enchanter has better mana regen, so what? I didn't get angry (ok a little) but I wasn't crying about how my class now sucks in PoP, I went on and tried different things, different combinations of people in groups.

I have had a group of a Monk, Cleric, Wizard, Necro, and two Beastlords do LCY in PoD and ya wanna know something? We had a great time owning everything the monk pulled! Ok, we had a rough start in the beginning, but the people stayed and tried it out and by the end of the day, two people leveld and 3 of us got atleast one AA ding, the necro got two AA dings.

Basically, if you can't get a group because of what people say, just try to have fun anyways, and forget about that uber camp you wanted. You can get it later.

Also, I think I got off topic, but I hope this is post is helpful.

[Boldara]

and theyre looking at Charm yay..

[Ramsus]

Fina..

The tier 1 zones are great. If you havent done a tier 2 zone yet.

For example, the other night I was in PoN and Clothos was in POV.

In the same amount of time I got 10 percent in regular xp at lvl 61 with 100% going to reg exp.

She is also level 61, but only had 90% going to reg exp. She got 60% exp.

It's really hard settling for a pickup group in PON when a similar group in PoV is getting 6 times the exp. SIX TIMES. After that, you just feel like you are wasting time getting exp anywhere else.


Just insane exp. And I hear it gets better and better the higher you move.

[Elemental Ninja]

I agree, the exp IS nice there, but sucky exp is better than no exp at all isn't it?

Need help with trials?

I'll drop what I'm doing and join a group if you need DPS and an experinced person, or if you just need buffs send a tell saying "Get your puny, no good for nothing, annoying arse here and buff us NOW!!!" And I'll come a runnin' =D

[Ramsus]

nah.. we're just pushing folks through as they show up. got 3 more thru last night. We were the only folks there. Makes it easy :)

[Janari]

On that Note, Gratz Scmoo, Axel and Hal for getting Flagged Last night.


Jan

[Tavrn]

That is great you guys congrats.

[Viccar]

Sorry to reopen this subject again, but I thought a few of you would enjoy this story. While at work this last week-end, I got in a discussion with a friend who has a 65 mage on Stormhammer. Eventually we started talking about the caster vs mellee balance. He kept telling me how he felt that there was no problem in the game and then went on to talk about how he will go to PoN and solo. I then told him that I don't think I could even solo a L blue mob in PoN. Once I said that, he didn't have much else to say.

[FeriosNoncedo]

I'm somewhat confused as to the melee and caster balance. I didnt know melee were suppossed to be able to / were ever intended to solo. I suppose they could make it so every single class could solo, and that would be fair. Let's make it so they can all CH too... and port...feign death...hide/sneak...I know it's bullsh*t when they give someone an ability and then take it away through nerf...and I'm not saying all the classes are balance by a long shot, but every class shouldnt be able to do what every other class can do, i.e. solo. I would never solo if my necro could get a group, but it's hard enough getting a guild group. /guild anyone use a necro .....*crickets* 3/4 the time the only groupage I get is with other necros.

[Playmaker2]

After reading all of this, I thought I would throw my 2 cents up here for good measure. Now, I remember when the big monk nerf came out. What happened is that VI decieded that too many monks were too powerful because they could melee and tank, so they cut down on our ability to tank. I was fine with that. I'm a monk, not a warrior. Sure, tanking is fun from time to time, but it's not the class I chose to play. Then, VI said we were too good at fighting, so they nerfed our ability to melee. That's when I made my paladin. After I blew off some stem and played the pally, which I enjoyed(thanks Janari/Halile/Jardean for the PLing:) ), I went back to my monk, like I always do. Now, out came PoP. I went, I saw, I died, and died again, went LFG for a few weeks, got some groups, and then, I got flagged for PoS/PoV. Now I know what Ramsus is feeling because it happened to me. I had friends that were flagged before I was and they were saying how they would get an AA point every hour or so, while I was in PoN/PoD/PoI grinding away very slowly. Then I managed to get flagged for PoV/PoS. I went from level 62 to level 65 in 3 days. Then, everyone else got flagged. And with that, the need for a monk just kinda drifted away. Now, it's that much harder to get a group. Most groups need a chanter, a cleric, a rogue, a shaman, a paladin/shadowknight to tank and if none if available then a warrior, and then whatever else they can find. Sometimes I get lucky and that whatever else is me. However, there are many other "whatever else" people LFG, so it's hard to get a group. So, I can't get a group. Well, I can't solo, that's for sure. So, while I'm shouting for a group and praying, I'm listening to druids who get an AA every 25 mins soloing, the wizzy who quad kites, the necro who solo's.... all of them get more exp in an hour than I will in a night 90% of the time. Maybe I should be a druid....

Now, I know that my message jumped around alot and my point wasn't clear, so let me summerize it for you: Monks used to be a great class. Then they became a lame class. Monks got pissed, so VI is saying they will make us a better class than we are now, but not what we used to be, which is fine. Meanwhile, while we wait for VI to stop making us suck, almost all the other classes surge ahead of us. And VI wants me to spend more money..... Where do I sign up???? *Sigh*

BTW, grats you all that have gotten flagged for PoNb and PoS/PoV. :)

[fuzzyfoot]

In my opinion, the classes that aren't really "needed/wanted" in a group as much as the pure tanks, pure healers, and slowers/mezzers should be able to solo, since finding a group is harder for them. While the classes that ARE needed/wanted in groups more often, can't solo as well (as part of the balance). I think the game is pretty balanced, and no darn way will there ever be even remotely a totally balanced game. Every class will have it's nerf at somepoint, if not I will be very VERY surprised. That's why I have about 4 level 30+ ALTS (just in case they nerf ma druid)!!! :nana:

[Acantar]

Thought i should put my 2cp in:

I preordered - want the new slot - the extra bank space - new places to explore because if i wait i prolly wont get it for a LLOONNGG time like scars of velious(i still dont have it yet)

I agree but i dont think they made us to much better(ranger) - im currently level 51 still suck for HP - AC and cant take crack for damage - but i shure can basum good with my arrows now - gotta luv that double damage =p and i find it VERY hard to get groups - so 90% of the time im not useing my bow and when i usualy get into groups i start running out of arrows after the 3rd or 4th hour of playing and when i dont find groups - i go to jaggedpine and solo and i dunno what u guz are complaining about i think the other monks with bad armor have left a bad trail for you to follow - cuz my 26 monk can solo - group and be MT - hand out damage - and everything inbetween but thats prolly cuz he isnt 51+ and while i wait for groups - i play my PS2

VI is working the best they can - its a game and its constantly updateing such - its constantly unbalanced - bugged - crashes and somewhat impossible to keep classes balanced with all the cool new things they have been adding im fine with my ranger class hardly ever getting groups and horrible XP in jaggedpine is fine, at level 46 it made me angry but i passed it on and just accepted it knowing later im gonna be realy powerfull - now i get around 1/2 - 1 blue bubble at 51 an hour - while i watch my wizzie friend at 63 ding - and get 50%+ in two days while i only brag 1 and 1/2 yellow for the first 50% in my level the best XP i was seing was raid XP - and thats sad

And when im very bored on EQ - i play the free first person shooter Americas Army Operations and blow some steam snipeing down some mafia dudes or blowing them to bits with frag's