Gates of Discord AAs (Jan 29, 2004)

[Hrann]

Testing any change in a program as large as Everquest can be next to impossible.  I'm sure there are several layers of testing that these changes go through, with the some of the phases in house completely.  But to go from in house testing straight to production would be rediculous with a product this large.  And I'm sure SOE would be blasted if they attempted it.

Personally, I didn't sign any NDA, and there are no laws against me discussing SOE's beta stuff, so I'll do it until I'm blue in the face.  However if SONY loses revenue for some reason due to these discussions (e.g. people get fed up and leave the game before actually seeing the changes), and the loss is large enough that they feel it is worthwhile to pursue recouping them via a lawsuit, their lawyers could begin investigating who broke the Agreement.  They could subpeona me and ask me where I got my information - of course I would gladly tell them.  They would follow the chain until they came to someone who was bound by the NDA and then sue them, winning some nice damages if they could prove that the lost revenues were due to the breaking of the NDA.

Before you think that this sort of thing would be impossible to trace - it's not.  The SEC does it all the time for insider trading related prosecution.  They just follow the trail of he said/she saids and then prosecute anyone who was knowingly being bad.

[Tailchaser]

Honestly who cares if the info gets leaked?

 Hypothetical.  First day of beta a post appears listing all the AAs says they're all broken but 2 and the 2 that aren't broken SUCK and cost 300 aa points each (but we're getting GM buffed in beta so I got them free).

 The fear is people will read stuff like that and then simply not buy the product, even though that was the hypothetical first day of beta.  Even if they fix all those AA abilities before launch they could have lost customers simply based on that one leak and people losing interest based on it.

 If you don't think that happens go read the GoD post at the com board.  People where throwing tantrums about those slow spells that are no longer any thing REMOTLY like they where when the crying started.  If any of those people gave up on the expansion because of that information then a leak just cost sony a sale ...

[Goretzu]

I used to beta from Microsoft's IE programs

I don't think that's something you should admit to. :)

[Argach]

/further derailing on

This ED stuff made me wonder so...

They knew why they gave ED a lower proc rate (1.5 / min) than other weps (2.0 / min) from the start, maybe the AA will raise it to a rather normal level.

Uhm, parsed my last 2-3 weeks or so.

2012 time lapse procs from ED
2159 rujakian venom procs from ED

So, ED has more or less the same proc rate as normal LDoN augment procs, which proc 2/min with 255+ dex. Slightly lower yes, but I assume it is still within statistical variance?

/further derail off

[Tigarri]

Hey, Argach,

It was my understanding that the proc rate was based on the weapon only, and that augments proc at the rate of the weapon (instead of having a rate of their own.)

Is this wrong? Or does that explain the similarity in procs that you experienced? I noticed that you parsed 2-3 weeks of data. I didn't know if you actually manage to parse out a proc rate from that data, or just counted the number of procs within the total time.

[Satal]

As I said, Feel free to complain how you hate AA's you've never used.. and I know there are many screen shots going around, this is maybe the 5th directory of them i've seen for GoD?

More people here have used them than you think.

[Grymlok]

Grats Mr First Post on making a cryptic statement on a thread you've not yet bothered to contribute to!

The simple fact of the matter is: if you have vaild complaints about ANYTHING in the Beta (provided you are a member of the Beta, and if you aren't, you shouldn't have these issues in the first place) direct them to the GMs via /feedback and /bug.  Saying anything about them here just riles up people who for the most part have no clue wtf you are talking about.  Not to mention it is a breach of the NDA.

[Argach]

It was my understanding that the proc rate was based on the weapon only, and that augments proc at the rate of the weapon (instead of having a rate of their own.)

If that'd be true, clerics could augment Furious Hammer of Zek or Coral-Headed Mace and effectively double their dps (or get a sick amount of healing from a lifetap proc) - also all warrior threads I've read have stated that augments have their own proc rate. Don't have the time to find the parses now but I remember a cleric augmenting his FHoZ and getting 2 procs per min from the augment.

And yes, I just counted the amount of times I saw both procs during that time, otherwise I'd given the fight time too. But I've used numerous different weapon combos during that time so I can't. For me the fact ED's time lapse and rujarkian venom procs are roughly the same frequency is proof enough that ED doesn't have a "nerfed" proc rate. Also found a thread on warrior boards that states that every weapon has the same proc rate barring a few special cases and since they parse a lot of stuff I tend to believe their stuff. If somebody shows a long parse of ED procing significantly worse than 2/min with 255 dex I might believe it - as it is, all the proof seems to point towards ED having the normal proc rate.

[Vorph]

All weapons have a proc rate assigned to them individually--there might be a default value during item creation, but it's trivial for them to change it.  Augs have their own proc rate assigned that's separate from the weapon you put it on.

And finally, ED procs a lot even before WA.  Certainly not merely 75% as much as other weapons.  Having said that, I will not be at all surprised if they nerf it shortly after GoD is released due to this AA (unless the AA itself is lame in release).

(As for the NDA, I didn't sign it since I'm not in the beta, so I don't have any qualms about repeating what I hear elsewhere)

[cougerofeq]

We go thru this each Beta.  The admins try to keep the NDA, people leak stuff and just reading the threads is frustrating.  Yet Sony keeps doing them so they must figure the advantages outweigh the dissadvantages.

I'm not in the Beta as the web site would never load - I was in beta 3 back when EQ was new and they had leaks even back then. It seems like the whole beta/NDA process alienates the most devoted customers - the ones who use this and other boards.  

If you didnt get in you feel left out...
If you got in you can't discuss your thoughts with the community...
Some boards get chastised by Sony for breaking the NDA...
People fight and argue over what is a violation...
Some things do change for the better and some stay the same regardless of community/tester outcry...
and worst of all... each expansion is usually more of a timesink than the last regardless of what gets feedbacked, making the game less fun and more tedious.

That said... my concerns are:

300 AAs is alot of time for 5ish skills
20 AAs is alot for group pet buffs
and a 30sec? warderform is a dissapointment since it may have shrink issues and isnt longterm.

And yes, im "bitching" about AAs I dont have and have never used. But I do hope they get changed and it will make me much more likely to spend the HUGE time investment needed if they are changed. So why not let Sony know in the only way a non-beta tester can - here.

[Bengali]

Some general observations:

1.  Get used to the high aa costs.  AA's are much faster to get nowadays (in the right places) and they don't want people to have every GoD aa 2 weeks into the expansion.  It's just the reality of it, no matter how much we complain.

2.  There was a choice between long term illusion (which means everyone runs around as animals all the time) or a short term one.  There are people in both camps and pros and cons of each.  I personally think it's dumb for everyone to run around as a tiger or bear or gator or scaled wolf all the time but I fully realize there are people who love the idea.  Either way, whichever one gets picked is going to make some people unhappy or disappointed.

And no, you can't just do both.  Part of the objection for people like me is that it just looks stupid to have people running round as bears or whatever all the time.  If they had a long term illusion in addition to a short term one, that ends up being a "victory" for the people who want a long-term illusion, since there's still the option to always run around like that.  So you either have to have a long term one OR a short term one.

[Tastian]

Bengali my problem is that the illusion is either the main thing or an annoyance.  If you had an AA that was like mage elemental form you'd have people buy it for the illusion, use it, get a minor boost and be very happy.  If you put it on a short term thing like frenzy of spirits you have people that won't buy it for illusion and now you have people that buy the AA for the stats and are annoyed with the buff wrecking their shrink.  Seriously this either needs to be 1) illusion buff or 2) burst AA.  

I have never really cared either way.  An illusion would be cool and a *LOT* want, but in it's current form with big refresh and messing things up I'd rather not have the illusion on the current BA because it just interfers and the AA would be better overall for me if it wasn't there at all.  Given a choice I'd opt for a long duration illusion with proc/mana regen/veng/whatever.  *shrugs*  

Divine avatar atm has built in 70% shrink I believe, but an illusion when it fades messes up shrink/grow.  I don't see anything wrong with bst running around as bears verse mages being fire elementals or bards being werewolves, rangers being wolves, etc.  It's part of the game and a natural progression really.  Not to mention it's simply fun for a lot of people.

[Satal]

Grats Mr First Post on making a cryptic statement on a thread you've not yet bothered to contribute to!

The simple fact of the matter is: if you have vaild complaints about ANYTHING in the Beta (provided you are a member of the Beta, and if you aren't, you shouldn't have these issues in the first place) direct them to the GMs via /feedback and /bug.  Saying anything about them here just riles up people who for the most part have no clue wtf you are talking about.  Not to mention it is a breach of the NDA.

I've been following the Bst community since the inception of the old board. I'll stick my feet in and where I feel like, and not be belittled by people who think thier post count actually means something. There is nothing cryptic about my statement. I've talked to several other beastlords while in beta and quite a few belong to this forum. How is that cryptic? There are more Bsts in beta that belong to these boards than DiosT thinks. By his original statement that people are whining about aa's they've never used, he is wrong. It was a blanket statement though...i know.

I agree with your second statement though.

[Bengali]

Bengali my problem is that the illusion is either the main thing or an annoyance.  If you had an AA that was like mage elemental form you'd have people buy it for the illusion, use it, get a minor boost and be very happy.  If you put it on a short term thing like frenzy of spirits you have people that won't buy it for illusion and now you have people that buy the AA for the stats and are annoyed with the buff wrecking their shrink.  Seriously this either needs to be 1) illusion buff or 2) burst AA.  

Since everyone complains about illusions and shrink, it seems the more palatable thing to do is make it so illusions don't wreck shrink rather than avoid putting illusions on things.

Don't get me wrong, I hate illusions, especially non-player illusions because my perspective gets all jerky and messed up when I attack (god I hated grouping with druids who would spam that stupid wolf form spell).  So I would rather it was a straight burst AA also. But there are still people out there who think it's cool to turn into a tiger or gator or bear and do a bunch of damage short term, and who won't really care about having to re-shrink every hour or whatever the reuse ends up being.  Especially since we can shrink ourselves very easily.

The damage more than makes up for the inconvenience of reshrinking, imo.

A long term illusion buff with any meaningful stats (AC, veng, FT, anything) would create incentives for people to be in that form as much as possible.  That's fine if you think illusions are fun and like spazzing out when you attack mobs.  If you don't like them, then you're basically stuck with having inferior stats to the illusion junkies.

[Kylaz]

[quote="Bengali]it seems the more palatable thing to do is make it so illusions don't wreck shrink.[/quote]

Good suggestion. I guess devs just have to store "shrink level" and apply it whenever an illusion starts/stops. Ihis would make Ndt more useful, and prevent the "short illusion spell" size issue.
I know for a fact that when raiding, if the illusion "dispells" shrink when it goes off, I'd very rarely use it...