Evercracked.. Everquest Documentary. - Page 12

Saban · 06-12-2009, 08:15 PM

I quite liked the idea behind VT/SSra/Lucid shards, but not so much the way they actually implemented them.

Ssra was alright, but between stupid lucid shard drop rates and the hilariously boring fights of VT i was not too impressed.

kcxiv · 06-12-2009, 09:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Saban

I quite liked the idea behind VT/SSra/Lucid shards, but not so much the way they actually implemented them.

Ssra was alright, but between stupid lucid shard drop rates and the hilariously boring fights of VT i was not too impressed.

lol, shards and VT sucked ass, but i loved that actual zone of SSRA. Multiple guilds in there clearing that shit. Someone up at emp, someone in the basement doing cursed, then others off doing rhag1 to arch lich and the dude with the fucking hate hammer. I forgot his name.

Zhaun's_Shade · 06-12-2009, 09:45 PM

I always said Luclin was the begining of the end for EQ. In fact I remember telling someone that the first day I loaded it up. But I still enjoyed it all the way until GoD. Maybe it was the guild I was in, but I think part of it is that the expansions between PoP and GoD opened up the game some more to those less than the super hardcore. Sure I didn't get to see Time until GoD released, but we still got to see it as like the #5 or so guild on the server.

I remember in Velious that only 2 guilds downed Vulak before Luclin launched on our server.

Anyway, I agree: EQ was awesome those first few years, and as much as I love WoW, I don't think anything will bring back that original "EQ Experience".

Maxx · 06-13-2009, 12:35 AM

The thing I loved about EQ was that the players had jsut as much influence on game development as the actual devs. No other game has come even close to this.

Players HAD to research the game and the mechanics of how things worked to figure out what was what.
What did AC do?
How did haste stacking work?
How did slow stacking work?
The AC vs. HP argument and the in depth parses and theories that even got the devs thinking about it.
All of our research was for the purpose of advancing the knowledge of the game and unlocking its secrets. Again, even the devs were in on these studies and were students jsut as much as teachers and the holders of the keys of knowledge. Hell, I guarantee you that the players like Thott, Furor, Tigole, and other EQ crusaders knew more about the game and how it worked then teh devs did.

We did not have in game parsers that told us what the dps was, we the players had to figure this stuff out and write programs and scripts to help us. We did not have a in game Map on our gui, we had to print out the maps from eqmaps, or alakhazams, or make our own maps.
Discoveries were kept secret and shared only with guildies. The feeling of community was HUGE and is what lacks in most games today.

It was truley the wild west in mmorpg.
I miss it.

Zoomi3 · 06-13-2009, 12:43 AM

You know something i've always wondered. Was the "ugly" factor ever real for fear duration for SKs, Necros and monks? There were so many early items that were necro, SK or monki specific, or people would purposely make those classes take the items..

I tested it with my monk and intimidation and on my SK with fears early game and it seemed like a real mechanic. But was I delusional?

Something I loved was actually have intimidation skill maxxed. It was a great CC and pulling tool when used right.

Araxen · 06-13-2009, 01:17 AM

-cha never helped fear at all and I still cant' believe people keep bringing it up. One of the great myths from EQ.

Shinrai · 06-13-2009, 04:53 AM

EQ was mostly great because of novelty (and everything not being data-mined one day after patching), a reasonably small and tight community and the players and developers being really into it. Some area's showed that the developer really cared and the players loved it.

It can't be recreated because everyone knows the formula now, and MMO's are a business where every developer must justify their time. Heck, not even EQ itself could keep it going... the game lost its soul as it progressed.

tomodachi · 06-13-2009, 12:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Maxx

The thing I loved about EQ was that the players had jsut as much influence on game development as the actual devs. No other game has come even close to this.

No fantasy MMO perhaps... but EvE does this quite nicely.
In fact, despite being an EQ fan-boy, I'd suggest EvE does it better.

Grizzlebeard · 06-13-2009, 02:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Araxen

-cha never helped fear at all and I still cant' believe people keep bringing it up. One of the great myths from EQ.

Only reason I put points in charisma when I originally rolled my paladin was because I'd played AD&D for so long and figured I'd need it as a pally in EQ.

Kuro · 06-13-2009, 03:04 PM

The people who put points into CHA are the winners in the long run, though!

Gogo infinitismally small % chance increase in the auto-rez spells going off since Charisma is the only stat that high end gear doesn't auto-cap, and its the stat that influences the proc chance.

Dabamf · 06-14-2009, 01:30 AM

Finding 5 other necros at level 20 to lifetap a sand giant to death while our pets tanked was my favorite unintended ability thanks to lifetap being unresistable.

Solo breaking guk lord as a necro was also pretty awesome. The hallway could be cleared really easily by charm-killing your way up. Then for the guk lord, you charmed one of his guards, let them assbeat him while you ran down to the end of the hallway, FD once pet dies, wait for reset, go back, charm other guard, this gets guk lord someone close to 50% before your pet dies again, FD, summon a real pet, give him daggers, and solo the rest of lord. Only did it once or twice because charm breaking, fd failing, etc, was a huuge risk and a death was unlikely to get resed due to the zone not being very populated yet.

The gangrape in fear is my favorite memory. Groups running clear up to the north wall which was then followed by a 2 hour CC before we even started pulling, and if the pullers weren't top of the line they got us killed multiple times, risking and sometimes leading to another break in from the portal followed by 2 hour CC. And even if you wiped, every kill was a victory and brought you that much closer to successfully breaking the zone.

Of course later we figured out the much easier strategy where I would zone in and immediately FD to scout the portal while the 1-2 groups would wait for the all clear. I'd tell them, they'd zone in, pray that during the loading time not too many mobs had come near, then run to the west wall. I'd /q just out of caution, come back and the 1-2 groups would be doing everything possible to kill just 1 or 2 mobs while the enchanter slowly got overwhelmed, then evacing out and returning to repeat the process. This took probably a bit over an hour until the portal was reasonably safe, then the rest of the guild was allowed in.

Pulling the beginning wyverns in NToV on my monk was my favorite in terms of personal challenges (and the feeling of reward after success). Velious eliminated the randomness of mobs returning home (that made vanilla/kunark easy to pull), and those wyverns were particularly tricky. It felt like an art form FDing and popping back up over and over as they chased you, walked back home, chased you, walked back home, 10-15 times sometimes before you got enough separation to have one tagged. It eventually became 2nd nature and pretty simple (though I was never able to teach anyone else to do it, was too instinctual) but the learning process was difficult and rewarding.

The lamest thing I ever did was not fuck with a rival, more powerful, guild when they assreamed us time and time again with very questionable tactics stealing mobs and training us. I could have easily trained them all I wanted in return but had some "I'm better than that" moral reason for not doing it. Was pretty retarded in retrospect.

Northerner · 06-14-2009, 01:54 AM

EQ had idiots like me parsing shit for hours or days (when we could find a good target) to 'prove' an advantage. WoW has those numbers essentially naked and yet a playerbase that just likes using ability 'X' even though it fucks their dps/hps/tps or whatever.

I'll be honest, I don't mind the fps-esque did-you-stand-in-a [voidzone, rocket. fire, whatever] and did you notice to stand in a [...]. What drives me crazy is the that in EQ at least you knew that Joe in gear_98132 was capable of threat_AAE and damage_ABW or whatever. In WoW it is all potential and so goddamned often a mouthbreather is complete shit. Again, in EQ that well-geared idiot can suffice for an exp grind if you can't find better but if you can get attentive/smart then you'll go there. Gear mattered and it mattered a ton but good players even or perhaps especially for grinds were king.

Plus of course I have no idea why removing pulling was done. Even as a Rogue it was always my favorite part of what was oddly my favorite activity, the exp/AA/flag/cash grind. I had more fun in CT2.0 than I ever did in Sunwell.

Your results will vary.

Caocao · 06-14-2009, 02:00 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Northerner

Your results will vary.

Nope, nail on the head.

Drave · 06-14-2009, 06:06 AM

Quote:

Pulling the beginning wyverns in NToV on my monk was my favorite in terms of personal challenges (and the feeling of reward after success). Velious eliminated the randomness of mobs returning home (that made vanilla/kunark easy to pull), and those wyverns were particularly tricky. It felt like an art form FDing and popping back up over and over as they chased you, walked back home, chased you, walked back home, 10-15 times sometimes before you got enough separation to have one tagged. It eventually became 2nd nature and pretty simple (though I was never able to teach anyone else to do it, was too instinctual) but the learning process was difficult and rewarding.

Truth. Being grouped with a mage CotH made it even more interesting

Kreugen · 06-14-2009, 06:25 AM

Northerner hit on what I wanted to say, which is that what I miss most from EQ is that you pretty much knew that player of class X is going to do Y and Z for your group. In any other modern game that is pretty much a fucking mystery. Is he a tank? Is he dps? Will he heal? Who the fuck knows. All you needed to know in EQ most of the time was their class and maybe some of their gear. The game was so basic and the classes so restricted that a player would do most of the right things by accident. Later they fucked that all up of course - now its "gosh I hope this tank actually spent some points on defense" and so on.

The funny thing about EQ though was its gameplay was so goddamn slow and simple that I had to do other things to entertain myself while playing it. I think I wore out a VCR or two while "playing" Everquest.

06-12-2009, 08:15 PM	#166 (permalink)
Saban Registered User Join Date: Dec 2003 Posts: 2,343 +5 Internets	I quite liked the idea behind VT/SSra/Lucid shards, but not so much the way they actually implemented them. Ssra was alright, but between stupid lucid shard drop rates and the hilariously boring fights of VT i was not too impressed. __________________ Saban - Paladin, Dark Iron I does things.

06-13-2009, 12:35 AM	#169 (permalink)
Maxx Registered User Join Date: Aug 2002 Posts: 76 -13 Internets	The thing I loved about EQ was that the players had jsut as much influence on game development as the actual devs. No other game has come even close to this. Players HAD to research the game and the mechanics of how things worked to figure out what was what. What did AC do? How did haste stacking work? How did slow stacking work? The AC vs. HP argument and the in depth parses and theories that even got the devs thinking about it. All of our research was for the purpose of advancing the knowledge of the game and unlocking its secrets. Again, even the devs were in on these studies and were students jsut as much as teachers and the holders of the keys of knowledge. Hell, I guarantee you that the players like Thott, Furor, Tigole, and other EQ crusaders knew more about the game and how it worked then teh devs did. We did not have in game parsers that told us what the dps was, we the players had to figure this stuff out and write programs and scripts to help us. We did not have a in game Map on our gui, we had to print out the maps from eqmaps, or alakhazams, or make our own maps. Discoveries were kept secret and shared only with guildies. The feeling of community was HUGE and is what lacks in most games today. It was truley the wild west in mmorpg. I miss it. __________________ Maximo Ceasar - Rogue - E'ci > Zeb > Xeg Sweatpant Stiffy - Druid - Icecrown Kaskyk - Pally - Cenarion Circle Maximo - Sword Master - Magnus Larrz Fackler - Free Realms Toon Blog Last edited by Maxx; 06-13-2009 at 12:38 AM..

06-13-2009, 01:17 AM	#171 (permalink)
Araxen A Bearded Gnome Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: Near Chicago, IL Posts: 4,913	-cha never helped fear at all and I still cant' believe people keep bringing it up. One of the great myths from EQ. __________________ PSN: Araxen http://www.last.fm/user/araxen The Best FAQ on the Internet: The Official God FAQ

06-13-2009, 03:04 PM	#175 (permalink)
Kuro Support Beam Join Date: Dec 2003 Posts: 1,977 +56 Internets	The people who put points into CHA are the winners in the long run, though! Gogo infinitismally small % chance increase in the auto-rez spells going off since Charisma is the only stat that high end gear doesn't auto-cap, and its the stat that influences the proc chance. __________________ Alt Army-Over 9,000 Games

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06-12-2009, 09:45 PM	#168 (permalink)
Zhaun's_Shade Death Panel Supporter Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Rhode Island Posts: 2,633 -7 Internets	I always said Luclin was the begining of the end for EQ. In fact I remember telling someone that the first day I loaded it up. But I still enjoyed it all the way until GoD. Maybe it was the guild I was in, but I think part of it is that the expansions between PoP and GoD opened up the game some more to those less than the super hardcore. Sure I didn't get to see Time until GoD released, but we still got to see it as like the #5 or so guild on the server. I remember in Velious that only 2 guilds downed Vulak before Luclin launched on our server. Anyway, I agree: EQ was awesome those first few years, and as much as I love WoW, I don't think anything will bring back that original "EQ Experience".

06-13-2009, 12:43 AM	#170 (permalink)
Zoomi3 It doesn't matter how fancy the spoon is, when people are feeding you shit. Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Chicago Posts: 108 -25 Internets	You know something i've always wondered. Was the "ugly" factor ever real for fear duration for SKs, Necros and monks? There were so many early items that were necro, SK or monki specific, or people would purposely make those classes take the items.. I tested it with my monk and intimidation and on my SK with fears early game and it seemed like a real mechanic. But was I delusional? Something I loved was actually have intimidation skill maxxed. It was a great CC and pulling tool when used right.

06-13-2009, 04:53 AM	#172 (permalink)
Shinrai Registered User Join Date: Aug 2002 Location: Melbourne Posts: 679 +1 Internets	EQ was mostly great because of novelty (and everything not being data-mined one day after patching), a reasonably small and tight community and the players and developers being really into it. Some area's showed that the developer really cared and the players loved it. It can't be recreated because everyone knows the formula now, and MMO's are a business where every developer must justify their time. Heck, not even EQ itself could keep it going... the game lost its soul as it progressed.

06-14-2009, 01:30 AM	#176 (permalink)
Dabamf Registered User Join Date: Apr 2004 Location: Seoul, Korea Posts: 2,335 +15 Internets	Finding 5 other necros at level 20 to lifetap a sand giant to death while our pets tanked was my favorite unintended ability thanks to lifetap being unresistable. Solo breaking guk lord as a necro was also pretty awesome. The hallway could be cleared really easily by charm-killing your way up. Then for the guk lord, you charmed one of his guards, let them assbeat him while you ran down to the end of the hallway, FD once pet dies, wait for reset, go back, charm other guard, this gets guk lord someone close to 50% before your pet dies again, FD, summon a real pet, give him daggers, and solo the rest of lord. Only did it once or twice because charm breaking, fd failing, etc, was a huuge risk and a death was unlikely to get resed due to the zone not being very populated yet. The gangrape in fear is my favorite memory. Groups running clear up to the north wall which was then followed by a 2 hour CC before we even started pulling, and if the pullers weren't top of the line they got us killed multiple times, risking and sometimes leading to another break in from the portal followed by 2 hour CC. And even if you wiped, every kill was a victory and brought you that much closer to successfully breaking the zone. Of course later we figured out the much easier strategy where I would zone in and immediately FD to scout the portal while the 1-2 groups would wait for the all clear. I'd tell them, they'd zone in, pray that during the loading time not too many mobs had come near, then run to the west wall. I'd /q just out of caution, come back and the 1-2 groups would be doing everything possible to kill just 1 or 2 mobs while the enchanter slowly got overwhelmed, then evacing out and returning to repeat the process. This took probably a bit over an hour until the portal was reasonably safe, then the rest of the guild was allowed in. Pulling the beginning wyverns in NToV on my monk was my favorite in terms of personal challenges (and the feeling of reward after success). Velious eliminated the randomness of mobs returning home (that made vanilla/kunark easy to pull), and those wyverns were particularly tricky. It felt like an art form FDing and popping back up over and over as they chased you, walked back home, chased you, walked back home, 10-15 times sometimes before you got enough separation to have one tagged. It eventually became 2nd nature and pretty simple (though I was never able to teach anyone else to do it, was too instinctual) but the learning process was difficult and rewarding. The lamest thing I ever did was not fuck with a rival, more powerful, guild when they assreamed us time and time again with very questionable tactics stealing mobs and training us. I could have easily trained them all I wanted in return but had some "I'm better than that" moral reason for not doing it. Was pretty retarded in retrospect.

06-14-2009, 01:54 AM	#177 (permalink)
Northerner Shiny Join Date: Sep 2002 Location: Calgary Posts: 1,761	EQ had idiots like me parsing shit for hours or days (when we could find a good target) to 'prove' an advantage. WoW has those numbers essentially naked and yet a playerbase that just likes using ability 'X' even though it fucks their dps/hps/tps or whatever. I'll be honest, I don't mind the fps-esque did-you-stand-in-a [voidzone, rocket. fire, whatever] and did you notice to stand in a [...]. What drives me crazy is the that in EQ at least you knew that Joe in gear_98132 was capable of threat_AAE and damage_ABW or whatever. In WoW it is all potential and so goddamned often a mouthbreather is complete shit. Again, in EQ that well-geared idiot can suffice for an exp grind if you can't find better but if you can get attentive/smart then you'll go there. Gear mattered and it mattered a ton but good players even or perhaps especially for grinds were king. Plus of course I have no idea why removing pulling was done. Even as a Rogue it was always my favorite part of what was oddly my favorite activity, the exp/AA/flag/cash grind. I had more fun in CT2.0 than I ever did in Sunwell. Your results will vary.

06-14-2009, 06:25 AM	#180 (permalink)
Kreugen Fires of Heaven Ancient Join Date: Jan 2002 Posts: 3,136 +71 Internets	Northerner hit on what I wanted to say, which is that what I miss most from EQ is that you pretty much knew that player of class X is going to do Y and Z for your group. In any other modern game that is pretty much a fucking mystery. Is he a tank? Is he dps? Will he heal? Who the fuck knows. All you needed to know in EQ most of the time was their class and maybe some of their gear. The game was so basic and the classes so restricted that a player would do most of the right things by accident. Later they fucked that all up of course - now its "gosh I hope this tank actually spent some points on defense" and so on. The funny thing about EQ though was its gameplay was so goddamn slow and simple that I had to do other things to entertain myself while playing it. I think I wore out a VCR or two while "playing" Everquest.