EQ2 becomes more like EQ1 - Combat Changes

[shiznitz]

Since most people here do not play EQ2, I am not going to cut and paste the entire patch message. It is going to the test server today. Anticipated live rollout is Sept 12 in conjunction with the expansion. Rolling out a major combat change on the same day as an expansion is an obviously bad idea, but hey, I am just a customer.

Bottom line on these changes is that level and gear have become more important.

- If an item is equippable at your level, it is now 100% effective. No more "growing" into your armor. However, the rarity of items has a much bigger impact on its power: common > Handcrafted > Treasured > Legendary > Fabled > Mythical. Most item loot on group mobs is Treasured. Item crafters are taking a bit of a hit.

- Mitigation and avoidance are much more dependent on one's relative level to the mob.

I don't want to write an essay here, so I will stop there.

[schild]

Meh, seems reasonable and obvious. The current system was just convoluted and archaic. The growing into weapons thing should have died years ago, I never particularly liked it.

[Murgos]

Getting the best Armor you can afford is going to be even more important, no longer growing into it means that when you hit a new level of armor you can wear your defensive ability will SKYROCKET.  Which is good because it sounds like avoidance for plate wearers took a hit.

Scout melee damage for fighters is going to make dual weilding (more) popular.

[Strazos]

This basically makes crafting pointless, again.

The catasses win again.

[kaid]

Its still deffinatly a work in progress. Odd things are its currently far easier to cap mitigation than it is avoidance which has caused some tanks I know to start using high grade medium armor instead of high grade plate which you would expect them to use. The system so far looks like its going in the right direction but it still needs a lot of fine tuning which they seem to be doing at a very rapid pace.

kaid

[UD_Delt]

This basically makes crafting pointless, again.

The catasses win again.

Not in the least. Armor/weapons crafted with rares are Legendary level. If you expect to have a set of Fabled or Mythical armor you are sadly mistaken. At level 48 (and in a raid guild) I do not have a single piece of Fabled armor and have never even seen Mythical armor. Even decent treasured armor, that isn't useful just for a specific resist, can be hard to find. I'm currently in a mix of all player crafted Fulginate and Ebon for every day gear. I don't see that changing.

Not to mention that there are lots of other things to craft as well other than armor/weapons.

[schild]

Can you post a screenie of your high end armor? I want to see it but I can't visit other websites because of game and quest spoilers.

[UD_Delt]

Can you post a screenie of your high end armor? I want to see it but I can't visit other websites because of game and quest spoilers.

Not at the moment since I'm at work. I was going to steal the link for my char from eq2players but looks like that site is down. If it comes back up look up Lerk on the Grobb server. At the moment I'm in full fulginate (the standard cheap player made stuff) armor w/ ebon (rare player made) weapons. I still have to find a 49/50 armorer to get my ebon armor made since I just recently got a few ebons.

FYI... I know some of you are doing the free month/trial but if you make it to level 20 I would highly recommend the Splitpaw adventure pack. It is almost all instanced and part of it can be solo'd, most of it can be 3-4 personed, and almost all of it done with a single group. As far as I know there is only a single zone that takes 2 groups. That's the only zone that i haven't completed yet and from my understanding is the last step before 'winning' the expansion. Of course it is all repeatable should you find particular places you enjoy. I personally like the challenge of the Crawler's Next, it'll really test your groups ability to work together.

[shiznitz]

Crawlers Nest is great.

[Strazos]

EQ2Players is not showing you as having uploaded any shots of your character.

[UD_Delt]

Ahh you're right. I'll see if I can get a few screens uploaded.

Here's a gallery from one of my guildmates:
http://eq2players.station.sony.com/en/pplayer_gallery.vm?characterId=141288116

Although his bio is the dang gnoll illusion so you really can't see caster armor.

[Merusk]

So does EQ2 not have a quick key for turning off the UI, or is your friend just lazy?  You can't see anything except his UI and a big blue mass of name tags in most of those shots.

Screenshots are like photographs.. everyone THINKS they can take them, but 80% will always be crap with things like heads cut off or clipping or ugly interface shots.

[UD_Delt]

Damn my PC died last night. I think it's just a power supply issue but I wont be able to upload the screens I took till I get it up and running again.

[UD_Delt]

Crawlers Nest is great.

OK I take that back. Crawlers Nest is still fun but Anvil Paw's Grotto is possibly the coolest idea for a zone yet. You need 2 groups to pull it off so it does take 12 people which can be difficult to pull together if you are unguilded or solo. But the basic idea is that each group must go in a different direction. As one groups solves puzzles it opens the way for the other group. The second group must then solve a puzzle which will open up the way for the first group. Back and forth as you progress through the zone solving puzzles as you go so the next group can advance and then solve a puzzle for you to advance.

Unfortunately we screwed up at the end and didn't survive the final waves of mobs but the reward is supposedly always a master chest containing at least one Master level spell and some fabled gear. Looking forward to trying it again

[stray]

Reading up on this combat revamp is taking my interest out of the game....again (at least for a month). I have no idea what any of the classes are going to play like once it's live, and in turn, no clue on what I should make now. I can't even "play what I like", because "what I like" may just become "what I don't like" next month.

[schild]

That's why I don't base what I play on the developers at all. I.E. My master merchant/master smuggler I had in SW:G for...8 months. Seriously, play what you like. If they fuck your class of choice, just leave. At the moment, I'm enjoying scout (as I only play rogue types and necromancer types). If they fuck it, I'm gone. Just that simple.

[stray]

That's a hard thing to ask of me. It seems like the game is changing from the ground up -- a second launch, if you will. I'd be better off investing my time in something else now, then coming back to EQ as if it were new. After all, I'm still a newb anyways. I've got nothing to lose by pulling out (except $15 bucks). Might as well do it now before I get too used to things. That way I won't be too pissed.

[shiznitz]

More changes coming to Test, per Blackguard:

There are some changes that we'll be testing out on the Test server soon that we'd like your feedback on, both conceptually and functionally (when Update #13d hits Test). In short, shared experience debt is being removed and we are capping the amount of debt you can accrue at 50% of your current level. Here are the update notes:

- There is now a 50% cap for both adventure and tradeskill experience debt. You can no longer accrue more than 50% of your level in experience debt. If you have more than 50% experience debt when you log on after this change, any experience debt greater than 50% will be removed.- You will no longer share experience debt for the deaths of other members of your group. Only the person in the group who dies will gain experience debt. Please keep in mind that this will be in testing soon, and may not go to Live servers in its current form. If further changes need to be made, they will be (or on the other side of the coin, if the change needs to be scrapped completely, that is also an option).


As I mentioned, this may not be going Live in its current form. This change is not a knee-jerk reaction to a few complaints, it's something we've been discussing for months. Truth be told, group experience debt is frequently cited as a major reason players quit playing EverQuest II. We are constantly trying to improve the game and make sure it appeals to as many people as possible, so at least testing out this change seemed like the logical thing to do.

While group experience debt does help foster a sense of responsibility for group members, it can also create hostility or resentment. After this change makes it to Test server, we'll be paying close attention to your feedback to see how it plays out in practice. We have also discussed other options, such as making group experience debt sharing a group leader choice or limiting group experience debt sharing to a specific distance rather than the entire zone. Whether we keep this change in its current form or modify it remains to be seen, so please check it out after it's on Test and let us know what you think.

[stray]

I had no idea that was even part of the game.

But now that I do know, I'm glad it's gone  :-D. That got to be one of the most retarded design decisions I've ever heard of.

[Trippy]

More changes coming to Test, per Blackguard:

You will no longer share experience debt for the deaths of other members of your group. Only the person in the group who dies will gain experience debt.

LOL, finally!

[Margalis]

Wow...that is the DUMBEST idea I think I've ever heard in a MMORPG.

I mean, from a pie in the sky angle I guess the idea is it makes you try to help your party out more, since them dying is as good as you dying. But realistically speaking I cannot IMAGINE how frustrating it would be to be in a party with some dumbasses and be punished because they keep killing themselves like morons.

[Miasma]

Edit: Nevermind, I got my EQs mixed up.

[Murgos]

I broke down and ventured into the EQ2 Paladin forums to see what people had to say about the combat changes.  Aside from one or two notable over the top whiners the attitude seemed pretty positive.  One thread in particular had a guy who obviously spent a lot of time parsing data and I didn't really see anything there to be alarmed at.

[Furiously]

Wow...that is the DUMBEST idea I think I've ever heard in a MMORPG.

I mean, from a pie in the sky angle I guess the idea is it makes you try to help your party out more, since them dying is as good as you dying. But realistically speaking I cannot IMAGINE how frustrating it would be to be in a party with some dumbasses and be punished because they keep killing themselves like morons.

Yea - it was great to have someone die 3 times running to the group and then leave once they got their to join some "friends"

[shiznitz]

No reason to start a new thread, so I will complain here.

The latest combat changes will kill this game.

1) Mobs hit harder, both melee and spells. Much harder.
2) Armor mitigates less.
3) Resists have been cut in half.
4) Armor no longer grows with level so when you ding, your armor mitigates a lower percentage of higher damage from the higher level mobs (example: if your armor mitigattion is 130/13% at level 15 and you ding level 16, that same 130 level is now only 11.8% mitigation yet the mobs are hitting for more in absolute terms because they are one level higher at the same con. Double whammy ouch.)

Anecdotally, one of my guildies could not beat the level 9 Warrior quest encounter after 5 tries. You cannot ding level 10 without beating this encounter.

It is a game killer and it is supposed to go live on the 12th.

[schild]

I think I speak for everyone: "Eep."

[Furiously]

I'll complain when it goes live.

[Strazos]

At least the group xp debt is gone. That was a seriously demoralizing mechanic.

[shiznitz]

The new Producer's letter is up too:

http://eq2players.station.sony.com/en/news_archive.vm?id=582&section=News&month=current

Some choice quotes:

we wanted to place a greater emphasis on people's final Subclass selection, focusing less on Archetypal roles than previously.  As one example, very few people start a new game and think to themselves, "I want to be a Generic Mage!"   That's a fun stage to grow through, but not a destination in itself.

Translation: Our class system sucks. We should have stuck with what we did in EQ1.

Fighting orange and red creatures needs to be a Very Hard Thing, not the standard, and that system needs to make sense all the way through all of the /con's.

CoH purple nerf part deux.

More often than not, what happened in practice was that there was only one long-term option that was far and above superior for each profession – Priests required their cures, Pet casters required their Pets, and anyone who chose anything but "the good one" was left out in the cold. That's not much of a choice. A character who chose the less than optimal one would only be able to get so far into the high end of the game and had their effectiveness severely penalized on their way up.

Translation: Our class system sucks. We should have stuck with what we did in EQ1.

single-group encounters will no longer "hard lock," and in a way that doesn't open up the system to free-for-all kill stealing or infinite powerleveling...group experience debt has been removed.

Translation: Our encounter and death system sucks. We should have stuck with what we did in EQ1.

[Mesozoic]

Ahh you're right. I'll see if I can get a few screens uploaded.

Here's a gallery from one of my guildmates:
http://eq2players.station.sony.com/en/pplayer_gallery.vm?characterId=141288116

Although his bio is the dang gnoll illusion so you really can't see caster armor.

I just wanted to say that the interface shots make my eyes cross and  roll back into my head at the same time.

[Signe]

Well, my sub ends on the 12th.  No need to fiddle around so I cancelled, just in case.  If those changes go through, I'll stay cancelled.

[stray]

No need to point out why I canceled in the first place...


Oh wait.

[jpark]

Bah - missed Trippy's post on this above - no delete function so leaving as is:

There is an old thread in another forum where we debated EQ2 group debt exp penalty.  The arguement was whether a group that wipes confers more debt than if you had died alone soloing:

"Also in the update, group experience debt has been removed.  If you die, you take the death penalty, exactly as if you were solo."

This to me confirms:

1.  Group exp debt penalties saddled the player with the debt of all other players in the group.
2.  We consistently overestimate the intelligence of the EQ2 dev team.

These guys need to suck deep and hard and realize:  the only successful tweak of EQ is WoW.  Case in point: talent trees.  EQ2's current grocery list of traits etc. is a mess.

[stray]

Case in point: talent trees.

I'm not sure if they were "tweaking EQ" so much as they were following a similar formula that they used in Diablo.

[El Gallo]

I was thinking of messing around a bit in EQ2 as a break from WoW.  Are you telling me that it is harder/slower to level up solo/duo now that it was before?