New AAs appearing already - new numbers now appearing

[Beafly]

[Unmei]

[Tugela]

[Tugela]

[Unmei]

[Beafly]

I understand people like to solo, but since when has any significant progression been available to soloers in Everquest? This is a community game. It is the interaction with people that makes it so powerful. There are far better games available if you want to play by yourself (subjective I admit). And this is not about looking down at anyone with some elitist attitude. You're reading far to much of your own bias into my statements. It is about providing everyone, casual to hardcore and soloer to raider, with a leveling experience that that is more rich and rewarding than playing whack-a-mole.

Pros I see in a Task/Quest based leveling system:
It forces people into the expansions and to experience the content.
It will create groups because people will be actively seeking to complete these tasks in order to level.
It might actually narrow the gap between the hardcore and the more casual. In the current system I can earn 5 levels in 23 hours while it takes some folks 6 or more months. In a task/quest oriented system completion of the story is the key, not huge quantities of kills. It may take a hardcore player a little less time to complete an individual mission because of gear/aa/skill but the difference shouldn't be significant.
It would give players a clear meaningful path towards advancement.
Reduce the number of outright powerleveled players because the next level would require you succeed in the missions. It would ensure that anyone achieving level 80 had a base skill level sufficient to complete the solo/group/raid tasks/quests. These common skills would help devs tailor the next expansion since everyone will have the same experiences.
Better retention of the hard-core players that have made max level/aa/progression and are bored.

Cons:
Soloers might have to actually find a group to complete them.
Unmei will think you're an elitist if you make level 80.
Loss of some people that find tasks boring/difficult/stupid/can'tfindgroups/can'tmakegroups
Leveling will be acquired differently than before forcing the playerbase to re-train the way they play the game
People without sufficient gear/aa'd to complete a progression mission might have to take the time to obtain gear appropriate for their level before leveling.
Raiders might get pissed because they can't go kill 69.1 spiders for 23 hours straight to get max level again.
People are adverse to change.

[Finori]

[WaringMcMarrin]

[Galelor]

[Unmei]

[Beafly]

[Galelor]

[Finori]

[Galelor]

[jdthomas]

I seriously doubt they'll revamp the eq levelling system after 8 years to pander to the whims of the few.

[Retron]

[Tugela]

No one goes back to old content for the xp, thats not the point. They do it it to beat things they haven't beaten before, or couldnt. Or, they kill old raid mobs with low numbers for the thrill. If you play just to get xp you move from creators to MMS to where-ever they are now to where-ever they will be at 80. Keeping the level the same won't make you go somewhere else, it won't even let you do what you can't do now. If you aren't doing it right now, in all probability without a level increase you wont be doing it in November either.

[Tugela]

[Retron]

[Galelor]

[Veril]

[Galelor]

[WaringMcMarrin]

[Finori]

[WaringMcMarrin]

[Draglin Stoneshield]

[Tugela]

[Tugela]

[Kianor]

[Ughbash]

[Funi]

Tugela, those ideas of yours might be a good idea but I think your forgetting who owns/writes this game. At the beginning of this thread you had some pretty good logic, which was based on what they had done in the past, as to why there would be a lvl increase but this double progression thing is well.... Lets face it, Sony will do what they've always done. Yea sure they CAN do things different but do you really think they will based on past experience with Sony? I'm personally indifferent to this lvl increase. When TSS came out I got a new Focus, Sta, and Agi line of spells that yea, made me more powerful. I also got new DoT's and a new heal which cost more mana and where less effective.

In the end game Raiding zones Shaman are very seldom in a group with some one else that can help heal unless you count Rangers or Beast against trash mobs that hit for 5k dmg. Basically mobs hit harder and faster but my heals remained the same because I was forced to use the same ole heal I had before the expansion. This went on for months until I was able to get the Shaman arms with a healing focus. I don't expect this to change this expansion either. I will believe this "reduced sting" when I see it. My goal as a Shaman is to boost the DPS of my group members but I also have to keep them alive because a dead monk does "0" DPS. Sadly to combine this problem a lot of DPS classes sacrifice ht pts for offensive mods to be able to maintain such high DPS.

My mind set on this is that at the beginning of the expansion things will suck a bit because I'll have to grind to 80 in a week get new spells and wait for the new focuses to drop. The part I hate the most is I just finished getting EVERY single focus to lvl 75 except cold/disease and I really don't look forward to doing it all over again. For Melee they only have to loot two items (weapons) to increase/maintain what they had before. Shaman have 13 focuses which effect their performance. I replaced 11 which is a lot of DKP. I didn't replace my disease focus cause we didn't get a new disease DoT and I didn't replace cold cause I don't use it much(less now). If a Melee was max accuracy/combat effects last expansion they are max accuracy/combat effects this expansion on day one. My only grip is that Melee don't have to work as hard to stay at the top of their game and they will ALWAYS welcome new lvl's because they are more powerful on the very first mob they kill when the servers come up. Casters performance goes up much slower and is more dependent on guild progression.

All and all I know I'll have to work my butt off but I also know I'll get there so I'm really not all that concerned. As for new ppl starting the game new...forget it. When I created my Shaman there where thousands of lvl one characters and there where characters of every lvl in masses. Thats just not the case any more. In fact most lvl 25 characters you see are standing next to a lvl 75 character being boxed and Plvl'd. The biggest complaint of new players is difficulty in finding a group. Next time you log on do a "/who all 25" and see what you get. This game is a lot harder for ppl starting out than it was when I started. AND the game has gotten some much easier. How is that possible? When I started it took the ave play a week of grinding to gain a lvl Now you can go solo 3 reds (exaggeration) and ding at low lvls. This game has changed a lot since 99 and players have decided will decide to change with it. Everquest is no longer Everquest. The only question is how will each person deal with the new changes.

[Unmei]

[Brohg]

[Deranged Hermit]

[jdthomas]

[Deranged Hermit]

[Brohg]

[Draglin Stoneshield]

[Brohg]

Class armor sets, Sol Ro Temple had a couple items for casters. There were "true newbie" quests for low level (1-5) spells. Every one of them was the same format. Go get one or four items and bring them back to me. Every item is either random/rare, or from a rare named. Sometimes hours of camping, sometimes days. There are isolated standouts, but sooo vanilla overall. Worth noting, too, I think, is how trivial the exp was for doing those. Hell, also worth noting is that oldtimey Devs will tell you about how many quests still haven't been done to this day because no one knows about them. Talk about useless content, when players can't even find something when they look for it.

[Funi]