Issue with Instancing: Does it do enough?

[Venkman]

As much as I think EQ2 has vastly improved since beta, the one thing I still find troublesome is how they handle instancing. And yes, I'm going to make the WoW comparison.

• WoW instancing is handled by group or raid. It's your own boutique content, designed and balanced (in theory) for the group or raid that goes there. This actually solves a few long-standing issues with public-zone content in old EQ1: people holding rooms, stealthing to bosses to kill them. Nobody but the intended group is in that zone, so only an asshat already in that group can mess things up.
  
• EQ2 instancing seems to be just about population load (adventure packs notwithstanding). This doesn't really solve anything except, well, load balancing issues. People can still stealth to bosses other groups are legitimately trying to adventure to. Zones can still be overcrowded, particularly the heavily-corridor-based ones. It does some some issues: Trains are not much of an issue, encounters are locked, and corpses and chests still linked to the people who got them. I just think it could do more.

Players do not enter a zone like Stormhold looking for a group. They enter with one, having been formed in various different channels most likely while they were in public outdoor spaces. Teen levels and beyond adventure zones take just enough time to get to most are not likely to just wander in and hope to find a group.

As such, everyone else not in their group is either a minor nuisance, or a major hassle.

Thoughts?

[Murgos]

They have the other type of instance zone also (Firemyst gulley for one, is splitpaw?).  The community aspect of some of the dungeons is fine on occaision, I do think that they should have a few more, or at least more obvious, group instance zones though.

[Sky]

My opinion is old on this topic. EQ2 doesn't do nearly enough with instancing to make the game more playable, especially by casuals.

Click on dungeon entrance, you should be met with these options:

Solo instance (available if solo)
Group instance (replaces solo instance option if grouped)
Raid instance (available if grouped)
Public instance (open dungeons as they currently are)

Content scaled for each type of instance. If you like the community aspect of the open dungeon, play there. If stealthing ninjas bother you, play in the group or solo instance. For guild nights, everyone can play along in the raid instance. That's how you make a fucking dungeon accessible and fun for the most players possible. I'm tired of reiterating this very simple point, apparently people want people to play their way or hit the highway. I want everyone to be able to play their own way, in the same game world, if not the same game space at all times.

Mmo should be definition be friendly to many more playstyles than just the regular grouper who can achieve in crowded zones via attrition.

Or more directly, our guild group night should not be dependant on how many people decided to go camp SH that particular night. Too many and we sit around killing hallway trash or are restricted to one or two rooms waiting for the 'big' spawn. That's retahded.

[Sauced]

Splitpaw has an instanced "Upper Tunnels" zone, which gets you to a non-instanced "Splitpaw Den" hub, which has zones to 3 instanced solo dungeons/arena, and 3 instanced group dungeons/arena.  The instances scale to your level.

[Nebu]

Splitpaw has an instanced "Upper Tunnels" zone, which gets you to a non-instanced "Splitpaw Den" hub, which has zones to 3 instanced solo dungeons/arena, and 3 instanced group dungeons/arena.  The instances scale to your level.

Ah, the solo instances in splitpaw. Talk about casual unfriendly.  Go into one as an inquisitor.  If you die, you can't go back in for 8h.  If you go in and have to leave the game before finishing it, you have to start all over.  Did I mention that I've spent 2-3 hours in one of them and still wasn't finished with it?  That was not a happy moment when I found out that not only would I have to do it all over again, but that I couldn't reenter it for 8h.

Does SoE really hate adult gamers that can't spend 6 consecutive hours online?  Seems like it some days.

Note: My inquisitor can solo just fine... it's just a SLOW process. 

[Venkman]

I'm getting KoS tomorrow with a gift-card purchase, but it's mostly irrelevant to me aside from the AAXP thing. I think I'll be buying Splitpaw to check it out.

Solo instance (available if solo)
Group instance (replaces solo instance option if grouped)
Raid instance (available if grouped)
Public instance (open dungeons as they currently are)

That's pretty much how WoW does it, though it only has Solo by virtue of being way above the level of a place :)

My message to the EQ2 team would be that population management is more than just load balancing. People working the same place for different purposes leads to crap people quit EQ1 over. EQ2 obviously has the horsepower needed to handle instancing an even better way.

[HaemishM]

What Sky said, only with more pigfucking.

[Miasma]

Yeah, I wish they did what Sky said.  I wouldn't even care if the loot table wassn't as great for the solo/private group instance.

Nebu: It is my understanding that templars/inquisitors wander around with a change of cloths, literally.  If you switch all your +wisdom gear to +intelligence your damage output is greatly increased while your healing suffers.  This is perfect for soloing though as you should only have to heal yourself once in a while and have no where near the same number of hitpoints as the tank you would normally be healing.

[Nebu]

Nebu: It is my understanding that templars/inquisitors wander around with a change of cloths, literally.  If you switch all your +wisdom gear to +intelligence your damage output is greatly increased while your healing suffers.  This is perfect for soloing though as you should only have to heal yourself once in a while and have no where near the same number of hitpoints as the tank you would normally be healing.

That's a solid suggestion, thanks!  I don't know why that never occurred to me... Oh, I know... because I'm too lazy to min/max.  I'd also be willing to bet that most of my spells are like Apprentice 1.  I hate spending money to upgrade them just to get a new spell in a couple levels. 

[eldaec]

They need to move every damn named quest or rare drop mob into a fucking instance. Today you fuckers.

And they need to not give a shit about immersion arguments or any other other rubbish people suggest as a reason not to instance.

Respawn timers are not a fun or interesting or immersive game mechanic.

Spawn camp queues are not a fun or interesting or immersive game mechanic.

Placeholders are not a fun or interesting or immersive game mechanic.

Anything at all where I expect to regularly see mobs respawn in front of me is never a fun or interesting or immersive game mechanic.

MMOG designers should be required by law to have that last sentence tattooed onto their damn foreheads before they are ever allowed to take a paycheck.

If the quest should be hard or the object should be rare then you make the mob hard to kill and require a specific strategy, that can be as complex as you like so long as it remains logically deducable from information available to the player. None of this trail and error shit thankyou. I don't give a fuck whether other people can look it up on the internet as a result.

My initial assumption about EQ2 was that it you'd spend a significant proportion of time inside EQ:LDoN or CoX style instance missions. Opportunity missed.


So to answer the original question : no.

[UD_Delt]

I believe there are at least 2 instances off of most main zones. I know antonica has at least 2 instances (one for sure is solo but tough), TS has 2-3 instances (rumbler caves, pirate something or other, and I thought one more). I believe the same was done for common lands and nek but all my chars are goodies so don't play there as much. These instances though do not scale.

There are a TON of group instances available at most level ranges. There are even more raid instances available around 48+.

The only scalable instances are in Splitpaw.

Going from 58 - 60 I spent most of my time in higher level group instances most have an 18 hour lockout except for one that has a 4 hour lockout (Cazel's Mesa).

My main complaint would be about the lack of load-balancing instancing in the expansion areas. The reason most people used instances any more is that most of the upper level zones are largely unplayable since the server merge. PoF is ok up until around 80 people then it instantly starts to lag. The KoS zones all had 100+ people in them and there was a 3-4 second delay on all spells/CA's. I have no idea why the don't open new instances of these zones but it really pissed me off last night. I was looking forward to working toward level 61 and instead had to go play an alt because all of the zones that were available were overcrowded and laggy as hell.