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Is it OUR fault?

Started by Lorathir, May 30, 2004, 11:49:42 PM

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gnomersy

Quote from: Kashmiir Battlekat
In terms of raw content levels levels 1-50 have 10 times the content/quests/mobs to kill then 55-65 zones/content/quests.

I think in this case your arguement has no grounds to stand on.
the problem is that you cant use any of that content due to the fact that there isnt a large enough influx of new player or alts to give people locations to group the basis around the game is now get to 65 start aa's and raid then have fun. at least thats all ive seen out of it hell most people who are lvl 65 and have 100's of aa's still havent seen a 1/4th of the content available because it isnt worth while to go to because it just sucks now

gnomersy

the problem with content is as oneir stated that with raid content it isnt a time=content/loot etc. deal you need to have like 4 hours just to do a raid someone spreading his time out in 1hour periods but playing say 5hours total a day still wont get the same benefits and the 4hour per day single session raider

Kashmiir Battlekat

Quote from: gnomersythe problem with content is as oneir stated that with raid content it isnt a time=content/loot etc. deal you need to have like 4 hours just to do a raid someone spreading his time out in 1hour periods but playing say 5hours total a day still wont get the same benefits and the 4hour per day single session raider

Thats is VERY true man.

If Sony implements the single person instanced LDoN Type adventuring zone this 'might' alliviate some of the stress our casual players are seeing.

Im of the opnion that if you are willing to spend the time Adventuring and save enough points then you should be able to obtain Elemental Quality loot if you are the right level and apply the right amount of time/effort in small blocks.

Im just big on effort versus reward... also known as "Risk versus Reward". If you apply the effort you should get paid for it. If you apply little to no effort then you should get little or nothing in return.

Coprolith

Sorry to say this Kash, but you couldnt be more wrong.

There's only one kind of people playing EQ; people that want to be entertained and have fun playing a game. In a game that has no end, no clear defined goal, getting some sense of accomplishment through advancing your characters power is part of the fun, but its not a means to an end by itself. The 'goal' of EQ, if you could call it that, is to be able to take on bigger challenges, explore new zones. And that's the same for casual and hardcore gamer alike.

If you play less, its only natural that your progression is slower as well. Contrary to what you believe, i think most casual player know this and accept this. I certainly do, i know a play a entirely different game then hardcore players and i don't mind that at all. But when character progression is so slow that you feel you've reached a ceiling, and are unable to do new stuff, that is a problem, because it takes part of the fun out of the game. To keep casuals entertained, you dont need to provide them with an easy way to get Time-level gear, you only need to provide them with new content and challenges.

And now we come to the heart of the 'uber'-mentality that has slipped into the game. As you said yourself:

QuoteHardcore gamers are what drive Everquest and the Development Staff to produce new and exciting encounters which produce loot only the most extreme will ever see

This is exactly the problem. Those hardcore gamers are like what, 5% of the player base? It should be the casual gamers that drive the Development Staff to produce new exciting encounters. But they don't. Instead, everyone just seems to assume that seeing what amazing loot drops in Time+ zones will be an incentive for casual players to follow exactly the same route as the hardcore gamers. But if you start a new char today, and join a casual guild, it'd take you another 5 years to reach PoT, and thats assuming no one in the guild quits before that time. In reality, a casual guild will never reach PoT because few people stick around that long. In the meantime, the 5% hardcore gamers are devouring the high-end content and pressuring SOE to release new content for them. SOE in turn does their their best trying to slow them down with timesinks. But what is a 3 month timesink for a hardcore guild is a year-long timesink for a casual guild. Gosh, what fun.
The result is that the content behind the timesinks is effectively blocked from 95% of the player base. That's fine, as long as there is enough fresh alternate content to prevent them getting stuck in the same old content, and slowly but steadily getting more and more bored until they quit. Note that i said alternate content, not alternate routes to the same content. There doesnt have to be time level gear in that new content, just a steady pace of upgrades to existing gear attainable for a casual gamer.
But there isn't, or at least not enough. How much new raiding content has been added for casual guilds in the past 3 years compared to high-end raiding content? Certainly not in a 95:5 ratio. Instead casual guilds are expected to follow the same route as hardcore or 'uber'-guilds, but at a much slower pace, or via alternate routes that require even more playing time. Even the non-raiding content is affected by it. Because the gap in gear-quality between casual and hardcore has become so huge, what is a challenge for one person has become totally trivial to another. LDoN partly solved this with 'hard' and normal missions, but in GoD all open content is 'hard'. The balance is lost.

You say that simply saying you 'pay' to play just like everyone else is not a valid arguement to have earned to right to obtain the same level of gear. You're absolutely right. But it does give the casual gamer the right to ask to be kept entertained with new content and new challenges at the same rate and level as the hardcore players. The rewards in terms of gear quality shouldnt be the same, but the entertainment value does.

SOE made the mistake of letting the hardcore gamers pressure them into this mentality. Now they are between the rock and the hard place, as Aneya put it, but they let themselves be taken there so i'm not feeling too sorry for them. And what I've read about the summit meeting so far isnt changing my mind about that either.

/hugs
Elder Coprolith III
Trollie ferrul lawd of 65 levels (retired)

gnomersy

just btw tho ldon point scaling sucks ass you cant afford jack until like 40s-50s and thats when doing hards

Lorathir

Maybe there should be more options post 50 for someone who doesn't like raiding other than a grind with little in the way of quests.

Maybe there should be an expansion that caters for the 60-65 crowd that doesn't like raiding and offers lots of quests that are worth a damn and fun to do.

Maybe many people reach lv50 on their toon and don't like to raid, but all there's left is a slow, tortuous, boring exp grind.

Maybe they are re-rolling another toon because to them, lvls 30-50 was the most fun they've had - and they want to have fun again.

Maybe that explains why the majority of people who play EQ are lvl30-50.

Maybe.

Rakarr

Quote from: Kashmiir Battlekat
BUT WHY!?!? WHY CANT WE THE CASUALS HAVE THIS TOO!!!

Because, quite simply, you didnt earn it. Simply saying you 'pay' to play just like everyone else is not a valid arguement. Its HOW you play that matters.

If the most you can do is 15 hours per week in game then you need to set your goals accordingly.

Honestly, I don't think that's what it's about at all. What I think needs to be addressed is the fun factor and content of the casual, low and midlevel game as well as the game in its entirety. I think it is a grave mistake to focus too heavily on keeping just the uber guilds happy at the expense of this. You can try to keep players or you can try to make sure you get new players as well. If you fail on the later.. you fail in the long run imo.

It's not about wanting to have what the uber players have. I'll never see time. I can't see myself getting uber gear. So what? I don't care. I'n not playing the game for that. But I'd like to be able to start an alt, or see a new player come in and have a more meaningful and more bugfree existance than currently exists. I do NOT think this is about casuals wanting to see all the stuff that hardcore players can see. I could not have put it better than Coprolith.

Stating the number of quests / mobs / zones etc for 1-50s vs 50+ has little bearing on this imo. I think they should focus more on game mechanics and bugfixing that attends to the global playerbase, not just the high ends. Making more zones does not address the problem, imo it makes it worse as you spread your playerbase out. More content, less zones is where it's at I believe, or yes! instanced zones that can be entered into by a wide range of levels and group sizes. just a few peoplem, a group, two groups etc.

I hate the way these things always turn into casual player reward vs uber player reward. Surely that shouldn't be what it's about at all, it should just be about what makes the game a good experience for all.

And as far as how the game is today, please don't go pinning it all on the new players. They've come into a horribly twinked insanely mudflated world populated by uber alts always wearing a temp at level 5 who are shooting back up to rejoin their higher level friends. As for beggars - most problems I've had with beggars were low levels whos knowledge indicated they were -plainly- not new players at all ;) yeah fine non-raiding, newer players out there exist, and yeah they are rare, but you know what? Non-raiding newer players are rare -period-.
http://www.magelo.com/eq_view_profile.html?num=973008" target="_blank" class="postlink">Rakarr
67 Beastlord
Drinal

Rakarr

One thing I forgot to mention, is that I feel I'm approaching this from a pretty middle of the road perspective. I'm not what I'd call a casual player but I'm not a hardcore player or focussed raider either. I'm in a small guild that does get involved with high end content and has some elemental or soon to be elemental members but which is essentially a family based guild and I do see the other end of the spectrum as well, the social or casual players.

I think it's very easy to see this from a skewed perspective. Those players who raid exclusively in the high end may not realise how much the low end game has changed, or what it's like for new players to enter such a game, populated by twinked buffed alts who just want to get the levels as it is, among other drastic changes. I say we should support the playerbase as a whole, that's all. Keep people coming back, but keep people joining up too!
http://www.magelo.com/eq_view_profile.html?num=973008" target="_blank" class="postlink">Rakarr
67 Beastlord
Drinal

Cyphen Wilder

Just to sidetrack this a little....what about a lvl 65 bstlord with a TON of AA's that has done it all without going elemental?  Like has stayed on first tier only?  Of course his gear would be substandard to time/ele, but there ia a pretty good chance he knows his class like the back of his his/her hand.....they have put the time in, just not going toward tiime/ele but toward levels and AA.  I say this since, more then likely, I will have a 65bst and 65warr that will not be time/ele and I have been screwing around with EQ for a hell of a long time.  What would make me uber then?  Flags?  Total amount of AA?  What would I be called?  Hardcore casual gamer?

a_moss_snake_001

Quotewhat about a lvl 65 bstlord with a TON of AA's that has done it all without going elemental?

That category would fit me pretty well. A boatload of AA's, have most of the good LDoN stuff, a lot of VT/Ssra gear. In terms of PoP I have very little interest in that torture device known as EP/Time. In the process of doing GoD trials now on a casual basis with friends (trial 5 atm).

Casual? so so.
Hardcore? hmmm, no idea..
High end? no interest
Powerful character? I do ok. GoD trials havent really challenged me much so far.

So how DO you describe players like me?

Lorathir

Think I'm in that category too.

Been around, seen a lot, done a lot but not ele. No real interest in PoP, nor anything that comes from GoD. 65, stack of aa's, bored as hell, nowhere to go. Lot's of potential though and dedicated. Sounds like a resume.

End game casual?

Kashmiir Battlekat

Corp makes many good points and none that I can argue against.

I bow to your Intellect once again Mighty One!

:)

I think SoE is in a positon of this:

If they make content which would be difficult for the casual players/guilds then it would be simply trivial for the EP/Time/GoD Hardcore players/guilds.

If they then take this content catered to the casual players/guilds and itemize it with 'worthy' loot then you KNOW the hardcore players will flock to this area, wipe it clean, remove all that can be removed for there gimps and then what is left?

Yup, SoE 'retuning' the zone so these hardcore players cant simply walk the zone and rape it for all it is worth... thus once again making it 'too' difficult for the casual players/guilds.

Casuals would be screaming yet again for content that 'they' can play in.

Rock and a Hard Place. I see it.

Whats Sony to do?

They cant lock out 'certain' play styles from content.

Screwed if ya do and screwed if ya dont.

Rakarr

Certainly I can see a problem there when considering one zone, but I don't think it needs to be a problem overall. I don't think many casual side players have much of an issue being locked out of some content as things stand. PoP can create a bit of a rift within a guild socially sure, as flagged members go off and do things and non-flagged members can't join in but I'm sure there are other answers.

With the advent of instanced zones like LDoN I see some good potential. It sounds like they are looking at adding some more points purchaseable high end gear to LDoN and I think that's a positive move too. This lets people who don't get into flagging spend the time commitment to upgrade their gear to a decent level perhaps. I like the idea of some instanced theme based zone outside of LDoN as well, something immersive which could be scaled for the level of those doing the adventure.

I agree with the situation you are imagining there for a zone. However, perhaps there are other ways around this such as instancing the zone.
http://www.magelo.com/eq_view_profile.html?num=973008" target="_blank" class="postlink">Rakarr
67 Beastlord
Drinal

Jataan

Mindlet wrote---
QuoteKeys in Kunark are a joke compared to the major pain that pop flagging is. Trakanon idol can be got in about 10 mins with 1 character. HS key takes a bit longer but still is as easy. VP key is a pain but still 90% of it is solo or duoable
.

You either were not around when Kunark came out or forget the gear we were in at the time...Those frogs hurt bad back then, my 49 ranger at the time could barely live thru pulling them and tanking em was nigh on impossible w/o a couple of clerics. There was no soloing these keys back then.
Jataan Sixclaw
65 Feral Lord
Drinal

xaoshaen

You could certaintly duo the OS key at the very least. I farmed the named cycles there hunting a meditative blanket for a long time with a druid and a monk. A good necro could have soloed the Hunter and Forager pretty easily.

HS key was soloable as a monk.

VP key was 90% soloable as a monk.
-Xao