Raids and the games before them...

[Righ]

Also, not all "explorer types" are exploring the same things.

[hal]

I think you guys are really close to the "core" here. Its in the nature of humans that we approach from different angles. And as we can we observe other approaches. The reason we see this as fun is this is core to being a human. This is how we survived as a species (As a spices..Gawd spell checker save me ). Heres a core element. We like what we can succeed at.

The spell checker let me down here. Prolly not its fault.

[Rithrin]

I think you guys are really close to the "core" here. Its in the nature of humans that we approach from different angles. And as we can we observe other approaches. The reason we see this as fun is this is core to being a human. This is how we survived as a species (As a spices..Gawd spell checker save me ). Heres a core element. We like what we can succeed at.

The spell checker let me down here. Prolly not its fault.

I understand that everyone approaches a game at different angles. The problem becomes when people who want a certain angle start changing games to only be fun for them.

[Venkman]

I think you guys are really close to the "core" here. Its in the nature of humans that we approach from different angles. And as we can we observe other approaches. The reason we see this as fun is this is core to being a human. This is how we survived as a species (As a spices..Gawd spell checker save me ). Heres a core element. We like what we can succeed at.

The spell checker let me down here. Prolly not its fault.

Not sure if you've read Raph Koster's book "A Theory of Fun", but another core element he posits is the human desire to learn and experience new things (patterns) until the point where they've fully understood that pattern. This is one of the reasons I think a lot of players get all pissed off at 60 in WoW for example. They realize the only way to continue is not only a time investment beyond what they've spent, but to be doing so in the same experience again and again, where the only difference is whether someone is on their toes or not.

So we could say we like we can be successful at learning.

[Azazel]

There's lots of land that's effectively empty but surrounded by steep mountains, Stormwind only has one side, the airport near Ironforge has a bunch of NPCs dancing but is inaccessible and so on and so on. Could it be fixed? Probably. Would it be worth it? Probably not.

You can actually get up there. There's a tunnel that seems to go down to IF (blocked off), several of the usual-template-type buildings (all with closed doors), a Flight point with griffons and a couple of NPCs with e different type of <subname> which I've forgotten. You can also jump down to those farms in the mountains south of Menethil. There's another tunnel there (that leads to falling off the world) and much of the area is barely textured, but you can get to the top of the hills where the orcs hang out in the pass from Loch Modan to Wetlands.

The airfield looks pretty much ready for use. They'd just have to open the tunnel to IF, (or finish the interior), open the buildings, and fix up the tunnel near the farmhouse.

[Jayce]

There's lots of land that's effectively empty but surrounded by steep mountains, Stormwind only has one side, the airport near Ironforge has a bunch of NPCs dancing but is inaccessible and so on and so on. Could it be fixed? Probably. Would it be worth it? Probably not.

You can actually get up there.

Care to share how? :)

[Azazel]

http://www.wowwiki.com/Ironforge_Airport

There's a video link, that's your best guide. I watched it through once, then alt-tabbed between the game and the video in steps.

[Rithrin]

I've made it up there a few times. Its cool once, but then its really pointless. It used to be open in beta, but then they closed the tunnel that goes down to IF for release for some reason. Would be cool if it had something to do with the flying mounts...

[jpark]

I've read most but not all of this thread.

In comparing WoW vs. EQ in terms of player mindset I think of it less in terms of difficult per se and more in terms of "safety".

EQ and Shadowbane are not 'safe" games.  In the latter you can be mercilessly ganked in the former you can make mistakes that can cost your character very dearly (e.g. falling into the giant pit in EQ where corpse recovery is not possible for those < 50 which I did at level 23).

In Wow you can complain if someone screws you in a trade.  In EQ it is up to you to appeal to the resident gaming community to eventually get player justice (example:  A paladin accidently gave a quest component for his epic in the trade window to another player in the raid - after a week of jeers in the bazaar at the recipient player he returned the goods).

WoW has guard rails, cushions and danger signs.  EQ does not mark things - and leaves you to your own devices.

In this sense EQ is more of "world" than WoW.  The safety provisions of WoW protecting players from the game - and even from griefing by each other - are equivalent to the invisible terrain barriers none of us liked in Guild Wars.  Arbitrary barriers - affecting the actions of our played characters - make the world less immersive.

I love WoW.  But in some ways EQ is more of a "world" because it is unsafe - and truely feels (or did) uncharted.

[Engels]

I agree with ya, jpark. For someone who's primary interest in MMOs is the immersion factor, the alarming tendency in MMOs since EQ2 to corral you into safe paths without true world geometry breaks the illusion for me. Let's not blame WoW, however. DAoC and AO started this trend.

[damijin]

I enjoyed the danger in EQ. Very seldom was a zone "level 20-25" or "level 34-38". Zones had multiple camps, multiple points of interest, and often HUGE level differences. Because of this, my favorite zone in EQ was probably the Lesser Faydark. On my newbie ranger, I really enjoyed hunting the level 11-14 mobs in that area, and using my tracking skill to find the rare Crookstinger, or the queen spider, or the fairy chick that dropped that neat bow. All the while, avoiding agro brownies (insta-kill hit and run squirrelpeople), and that damned black horse.

The way that games segment themselves today, making one place clearly for this level, then you move on to the next place, then to the next place, never really experiencing danger unless you over-step your bounds and go somewhere too high level (after which you'll go back to the place that was designed for people of your level). It provides "safety", which has been the theme in these past few posts, but humans are kind of strange in the way that we value safety and danger.

One of our basic desires is safety. In fact, according Maslow it's our second most important need. So here we are challenged with the fact that danger is "fun", but our basic need is for safety. So I suppose the best way to do this is to create safety somewhere inside of danger? Using EQ as an example again, traveling was often dangerous. However, once you found a camp somewhere inside a zone you were pretty safe. Finding the camp was the dangerous part. This satisfied both the need for danger to have fun (explore at your own peril), and safety as a human need (sit at the same camp for catasstastic long periods of time).

Perhaps the danger in WoW is being ganked while in your safe little corner of the world? I'm not sure. I never really played WoW so I can't comment.

[Morfiend]

Perhaps the danger in WoW is being ganked while in your safe little corner of the world? I'm not sure. I never really played WoW so I can't comment.

There isnt a ton of this in WoW, but they did add some higher level mobs to some areas. In Silverpine, the second Undead zone, there is a level 24 Elite mob called Son of Aurgal, a big ass werewolf. Since the zone is aroun 11-18, he would just fuck you up. Also, he wandered over a very large portion of the zone. It really gave the feeling of being hunted while you level there. When I was level 35 or so, I went back to the zone and spent several hours hunting him down and killing him as payback for all the times he killed me as a lowbie.

[Morat20]

Perhaps the danger in WoW is being ganked while in your safe little corner of the world? I'm not sure. I never really played WoW so I can't comment.

There isnt a ton of this in WoW, but they did add some higher level mobs to some areas. In Silverpine, the second Undead zone, there is a level 24 Elite mob called Son of Aurgal, a big ass werewolf. Since the zone is aroun 11-18, he would just fuck you up. Also, he wandered over a very large portion of the zone. It really gave the feeling of being hunted while you level there. When I was level 35 or so, I went back to the zone and spent several hours hunting him down and killing him as payback for all the times he killed me as a lowbie.

From what a guildie said (no idea if it's true, of course) there's a level 35 gold elite named "Mor'ladim" or something like that that has the most kills in the game. He wanders the graveyard at Raven Hill, where the mobs are mid-20s. He's got an insane aggro range, and he's right in the middle of a bunch of things people need at. I spent a LOT of time running away from him, and he follows you a long way.

[MisterNoisy]

Perhaps the danger in WoW is being ganked while in your safe little corner of the world? I'm not sure. I never really played WoW so I can't comment.

There isnt a ton of this in WoW, but they did add some higher level mobs to some areas. In Silverpine, the second Undead zone, there is a level 24 Elite mob called Son of Aurgal, a big ass werewolf. Since the zone is aroun 11-18, he would just fuck you up. Also, he wandered over a very large portion of the zone. It really gave the feeling of being hunted while you level there. When I was level 35 or so, I went back to the zone and spent several hours hunting him down and killing him as payback for all the times he killed me as a lowbie.

From what a guildie said (no idea if it's true, of course) there's a level 35 gold elite named "Mor'ladim" or something like that that has the most kills in the game. He wanders the graveyard at Raven Hill, where the mobs are mid-20s. He's got an insane aggro range, and he's right in the middle of a bunch of things people need at. I spent a LOT of time running away from him, and he follows you a long way.

I thought Gadgetzan Bruiser was #1, though I can definitely see Mor'Ladim being on the 'top 5' list.

[Morat20]

I thought Gadgetzan Bruiser was #1, though I can definitely see Mor'Ladim being on the 'top 5' list.

What aggros him? I know I've never fought that guy. Mor'Ladim, on the other hand -- anyone questing in Raven Hill has had to run away from that guy. I suspect most have died at least once to him.

If he was a level 28 gold elite, wouldn't be so bad...

[Koyasha]

I enjoyed the danger in EQ. Very seldom was a zone "level 20-25" or "level 34-38". Zones had multiple camps, multiple points of interest, and often HUGE level differences. Because of this, my favorite zone in EQ was probably the Lesser Faydark. On my newbie ranger, I really enjoyed hunting the level 11-14 mobs in that area, and using my tracking skill to find the rare Crookstinger, or the queen spider, or the fairy chick that dropped that neat bow. All the while, avoiding agro brownies (insta-kill hit and run squirrelpeople), and that damned black horse.

The way that games segment themselves today, making one place clearly for this level, then you move on to the next place, then to the next place, never really experiencing danger unless you over-step your bounds and go somewhere too high level (after which you'll go back to the place that was designed for people of your level). It provides "safety", which has been the theme in these past few posts, but humans are kind of strange in the way that we value safety and danger.

One of our basic desires is safety. In fact, according Maslow it's our second most important need. So here we are challenged with the fact that danger is "fun", but our basic need is for safety. So I suppose the best way to do this is to create safety somewhere inside of danger? Using EQ as an example again, traveling was often dangerous. However, once you found a camp somewhere inside a zone you were pretty safe. Finding the camp was the dangerous part. This satisfied both the need for danger to have fun (explore at your own peril), and safety as a human need (sit at the same camp for catasstastic long periods of time).

Perhaps the danger in WoW is being ganked while in your safe little corner of the world? I'm not sure. I never really played WoW so I can't comment.

That's an interesting way to consider things, and I think I agree.  One of the things EQ introduced, starting in the Planar Age, was invisible guard-rails.  A lot of zones had invisible barriers that prevented you from falling or going places beyond the normal design of the zone.  Eryslai, the Kingdom of Wind (the Plane of Air) was probably the most notable contrast of this, especially if compared to the Plane of Sky, where falling is a constant danger, and the only way back up is to get a wizard to port you back.  Not to mention, back then, zoning out deleted all your keys, so you couldn't just get a port back up and use the keys that you'd gathered to get back where you were.  In Eryslai, all possible places to fall off are ringed by invisible barriers that prevent you from doing so.  It gives the appearance of danger, but as soon as you learned you couldn't fall, it felt fake, instead.  This trend continued all the way up to Dragons of Norrath.  Depths of Darkhollow once again reintroduced the danger of falling, as does Prophecy of Ro.  There are again zones where you can fall off the path, the Hive and Dreadspire Keep in particular.  Hopefully they've gotten rid of the guard-rails for good.

Mor`Ladim is an interesting observation in WoW.  Raven Hill did feel a little more dangerous than most places in WoW, primarily because the only graveyard was clear at the other end of the zone.  Dying in the Raven Hill cemetery meant a run across the entire length of Duskwood to get back to your body.  PvP tended to feel more dangerous despite the fact that you lose even less when dying in PvP.  On the other hand, the lack of a penalty sometimes made it feel unimportant, while other times it was more fun.  I'd say the severity of the penalty in that case is very subjective and situational.  In some situations a penalty is good for the experience, in others it's not.

The segmentation of games is also an interesting factor that I'd never really considered.  Besides EQ telling you that the world is dangerous and dying is a bad thing, it also seemed more like a world because there were dangers all over, instead of every area being clearly sectioned off for your particular level range.  Lesser Faydark is one example - the Plains of Karana are another easy one, with wandering hill giants.  The Commonlands, and the danger of Griffon attack.  Oasis, Spectres, and Sand Giant trains.  In most other games I've played, there are very few of these types of situations where the low-level zone has occasional patrols of a high level monster, but in EQ they were pretty much the norm.  I can think of examples of this behavior all the way up to newer zones, like the giant that patrols the Broodlands, although they have gotten more rare - partly because most zones in recent expansions have been targeted at the highest level players.

[damijin]

that damn dragoon son of a bitch in the commons.

[MisterNoisy]

I thought Gadgetzan Bruiser was #1, though I can definitely see Mor'Ladim being on the 'top 5' list.

What aggros him? I know I've never fought that guy. Mor'Ladim, on the other hand -- anyone questing in Raven Hill has had to run away from that guy. I suspect most have died at least once to him.

If he was a level 28 gold elite, wouldn't be so bad...

Non-duel PvP aggros the Bruisers.  Hunters in particular would tap you and FD to drop aggro when you engage, leaving you to deal with 2-4 55 Elite bruisers.

[Venkman]

Anything feels more dangerous when it includes a 20 minute run for failure :)

Mor'ladim's easily got more kills than, say, Fippy. EQ had a lot of those. WoW adds them for flavor. I imagine Mor'ladim had a lot of kills, but as the collective knowledge of players increases, so does the avoidance of him. Odd though that WoW has been still on the top of the PC sales charts. String of multiboxers?

[Koyasha]

String of multiboxers?

High turnover, probably.  I haven't seen or heard anything on # of boxes sold (or really looked), but I bet it's twice or more their highest active subscription rate.

[jpark]

Anything feels more dangerous when it includes a 20 minute run for failure :)

TRAIN TO ZONE!

And so on.  There are no trains in WoW - so for most players there is no "reality" that the actions of players in their vicinity could set in motion events that effect everyone.  In other words, with WoW's current death penalty, the game would change if "training" were possible (right now it is rare and requires skill).

When you have no "social guardrails" as in EQ - you get community.  Without them, as in WoW, community does not quite develop.

[Phred]

Perhaps the danger in WoW is being ganked while in your safe little corner of the world? I'm not sure. I never really played WoW so I can't comment.

There isnt a ton of this in WoW, but they did add some higher level mobs to some areas. In Silverpine, the second Undead zone, there is a level 24 Elite mob called Son of Aurgal, a big ass werewolf. Since the zone is aroun 11-18, he would just fuck you up. Also, he wandered over a very large portion of the zone. It really gave the feeling of being hunted while you level there. When I was level 35 or so, I went back to the zone and spent several hours hunting him down and killing him as payback for all the times he killed me as a lowbie.

There's also air elementals in westfall that are about 5 levels above the average for the zone. 5 levels isn't much but untwinked they will still mess you up. Same with the elite loch ness monsters in Lakeshire (and the barrens oasis one) and who can forget Stitches in duskwood.

None of these are quite up to EQ's hill giants and griffons in the common lands or sand giants in oasis but they do provide some zone killers in various newbie zones. There's even a group of high 20 elite horde npc's wandering around Loch Modan that will mess up your day if they spot you.

[Morat20]

What aggros him? I know I've never fought that guy. Mor'Ladim, on the other hand -- anyone questing in Raven Hill has had to run away from that guy. I suspect most have died at least once to him.

If he was a level 28 gold elite, wouldn't be so bad...

Non-duel PvP aggros the Bruisers.  Hunters in particular would tap you and FD to drop aggro when you engage, leaving you to deal with 2-4 55 Elite bruisers.

Ah, that explains it. Me being a hunter in a PvE realm, and not an ass.

[edlavallee]

that damn dragoon son of a bitch in the commons.

that damn minotaur hero in steamfont.

[Jayce]

that damn dragoon son of a bitch in the commons.

that damn minotaur hero in steamfont.

I only played EQ for a short time, but weren't there some skeletons in the barbarian newbie zone (evil composers or something).

[edlavallee]

that damn dragoon son of a bitch in the commons.

that damn minotaur hero in steamfont.

that damn vengeful composer in everfrost.

There, I fixed your post to be in the proper form. Now on to the next one...


that damn Holly Windstalker in Qeynos Hills.

[Engels]

Freakin level 40 griffons in East Commons! That only lasted a year or so, because the blood baths were truely impressive.

[Morat20]

Freakin level 40 griffons in East Commons! That only lasted a year or so, because the blood baths were truely impressive.

Best blood bath I ever saw was when that nasty curse got out of a WoW raid dungeon and started infecting NPCs in Stormwind and IF. One tick was enough to kill anyone below 50 or so, and it had a nice wide range. The piles of bodies was quite impressive.

[Righ]

I've kited Dreamstalker to the Crossroads. That was quite a mess.

[tar]

I still remember the pile of bodies around the lifestone in Ayan Baqur after someone lured the white rabbit down there.

[Merusk]

Freakin level 40 griffons in East Commons! That only lasted a year or so, because the blood baths were truely impressive.

Do you mean the griffons being L40 only lasted a year, or that you think the Griffons were removed?  They're still there, and on a spawn cycle with some of the wandering mobs. They were L30-32 as far as I remembered, it's just that when the game was new there wasn't anyone capable of killing them.  Much like the Hill Giants in West Commons or East Karana (fuckers!)   

When I quit playing, though, the average lifespan of any of those mobs was only a minute or so.. leading a lot of folks to think they weren't there.

[Engels]

We're talking EQ1 here right? The griffons in east commons were gone for years. I think they removed them sometime after Kunark's release. There was much celebration at the time and it did happen all at once, after a patch. The tunnel was no longer used after Luclin, so I doubt very much that there were people hanging out in east commons with the explicit goal of eliminating the 3 or 4 spawns of griffons there used to be. They may have brought them back, in a limited capacity, but I haven't played EQ1 in two years.

[Rithrin]

We're talking EQ1 here right? The griffons in east commons were gone for years. I think they removed them sometime after Kunark's release. There was much celebration at the time and it did happen all at once, after a patch. The tunnel was no longer used after Luclin, so I doubt very much that there were people hanging out in east commons with the explicit goal of eliminating the 3 or 4 spawns of griffons there used to be. They may have brought them back, in a limited capacity, but I haven't played EQ1 in two years.

Hmm I don't remember them removing griffons and I started playing right around then, too. But of course I may have missed it being a newb at the time and all. I know that me and some of my friends recently re subbed to have some low level fun a few weeks ago and they certainly were still there.

The best mob had to be Sergeant Slate, though. He was one major badass if you were an 'evil' alignment and people would constantly train him right into the tunnel where everyone was trading. Always fun to watch.

[Yegolev]

They must have removed the griffins after Luclin, not that I spent a lot of time in EC after Luclin.  Or immediately prior, really.  I think I was cooking pandas on the other side of that kobold dungeon.  BUT I think I would have remembered the griff removal.

[Merusk]

I don't think they did.  Like I said, they shared a spawn with some wandering mobs (the same also being true of the Sand Giants in Oasis as well as the others  mentioned.)

 It was death in the first year or two as commons was where most noobs congregated, so the trigger mob got killed often enough.  However, after Paludial Caverns (aka XP-fest 2000) nobody kills stuff in commons so you're just not going to see it. 

There's one easy way to find out for certain, but I really don't want to reinstall/ patch/ pay for a month to break out the old druid. Anyone still playing and has an AOE class?