Question for those in Raiding guilds

[Gnomers]

With the new expansion coming out and SOE is designing it for single group encounters what is your opinion on this. DO you feel you guys will be left out and not have a real challenge with this expansion? Just curious on what your opinions are about this that is all. I think SOE will keep in mind the raiding guilds and have some more content for you guys to tackle but not alot to get you busy.

[Shikarii]

i think the raiding guilds have enough to chew on at the moment ( the non-top_server_guilds); and the new expansion ( whatever it does ) will provide enough non-raiding content to allow everyone to have fun.
i used to be in a primary raiding guild; yet we didn't raid 24/7. stuff like this makes for good downtime fun.

[proteg]

I totally miss the point of this question. Please let Verant add something positive to the game without someone stirring up animosity about some group net getting something for themselves.

Verant can't fix everything at once. :)

[Gnomers]

no it wasn't a gripe in the interveiw they addressed this issue I just wanted your opinions that is all. I like this idea I am not in a big guild and this will open up some great contnet for me

[gulug]

heh our guild is just about to enter NToV. We still have a ways to go yet before elemental planes, so we have more than enough raiding options to last a couple more years, so im happy that the next expansion is for single grouping.

[Hussar]

I like this idea. Even in a raiding guild, you don't always raid. Things like this are good for when you're just having fun with friends during a time with no raids =)

[Adzar]

I would think that this is a positive for everyone. Even the top guilds on each server have not chewed through all of the content that is available and this will give them time to catch up without the game getting too far ahead of them. I think non raid guilds would like this because they can go out and have a good time with a single group and get some loot. I see this as a win win. Besides if the content is interesting enough people of any type of guild will take the time to get around to it.

[Grimmlokk]

Ykesha 2.0 anyone?

I'd guess the vast majority of 63+ people have either never beem to Ykesha, or only for a day or 3 getting a charm(which is now worthless) or exploring. Sounds to me like another expansion that will get very little use. I guess maybe they don't want the old mass exodus thing like they got with PoP though.

[Gallerus]

What they need to do is split it up - 50% raiding & 50% xp.

[Khazzuz]

I really like this idea for the new expansion personally. I am in a smaller guild, and most evenings we are limited to doing things in single groups across the different level ranges, unless we plan far enough ahead to guarantee attendance at a raid. I am looking forward to having something that may be a challenge for us, easy enough to get started, and not overcamped.

/cheer SOE

Khazzuz
54 Warrior on Povar

[Binnamar]

They said the difficulty of the dungeon would vary with the levels/classes of your group, so I think this will have stuff for everyone. Unlike yekesha which is only good for farming plat at 65, or unlike pop which is limited to only 46+ (counting poj and such)

[Kendolekk]

My (soon-to-be) guild is still doing NToV, so I welcome this expansion warmly. Zone instancing = teh win.

[Timmok]

I have a feeling this expansion will be totally worthless to anyone in the elemental planes.

I certainly have no illussion about there dropping better-than-raex equipment from a 6 man encounter. So that leaves but a very few slots where I dont already have nice equipment.

So unless the EXP in those dungeons are godly, or they drop some new stuff with unique effects(hint to SOE: most people love clickies!), then I will have absolutely zero incentive to go there, and neither will my guildies.

But for anyone not in elemental planes it will probably be a fun expansion. In concept I like the idea, but it is still the loot that is the driving force/incentive to go explore and there will be nothing for me there.

[Brutul]

This expansion sounds really cool to me.

That said, by the time this comes out, there will be quite a few guilds that are done with Time and bored. A year with no new raid content is a long time, even though PoP was a massive amout of raid content. Personally I'm not worried about it because my (soon to be) guild won't be anywhere near finishing PoP by that time, but I"m sure some of my uber friends will be tired of Time and looking for new stuff to kill, and even more 2nd tier guilds that wish the ubers would get the hell out of time so they can get in.

[Baadan]

Just guess, but there probably, MAYBE, 100 guilds with PoTime access. Multiply 100 guilds times 200 people with flags (again, being generous) and that's still just 20000 people out of the 400,000 some odd accounts out there. Quite a few of these are mutli-boxed, so perhaps the number of individual players of EQ is 300,000.

With those _GENEROUS_ numbers, the "uber guilds" of EQ are only 15% of the population. They've been thrown enough bones in the last couple of expansions, it's time to let the other 85% have some fun.

[GSW]

I don't see how they could add more raiding content really. I mean, nothing could be more powerful than the gods, right? And with all the gods defeated, there's nothing else they could raid that would be a bigger challenge.

[Eoden]

Well from what I have read they have given very little away with whats going to be in this new expansion. I am fairly sure that 'focusing on single group encounters' does not mean that there will be no multigroup raid content introduced.

Read somewhere that theres going to be 40 zones?

Every expansion so far they have managed not to cater exclusively to only casual players or only raiding players (lets not count the downloadable 5 zones + frogs) so I think its safe to assume that there will be a a decent number of XP group quest / dungeon crawl zones, as well as a number of zones with content for guilds to go smash stuff up.

Sure we probably arent going to see the amount of raid level content that PoP brought us, but maybe instead of PoPs 2 travel through zones, 5 XP zones and 20odd raid zones we will see 2 quest zones, 20+ XP zones with dynamic content and 5-10 raid zones.

Its early days still, so Im happy to wait and see what they come up with. :)

[Gnomers]

Just wondering one more thing about this new type of EQ experience called "instances". When a group enters the dungeon they basically will have it to of themselves correct. So will this prevent any other groups attempting to try out the zone at the same time. OK it sounds confusing even while I was typing that let me put it another way. Since they are desiging the expansion basically over this "instance" concept allowing only one group to take on the dungeon, not have to worry about the spawn rate, having the named basically to themselves with no adds. WIll this only allow one group at one time allow to take on the quest at the same time or will SOE make it that multiples groups can do the quest at the same time running multiple instances of that dungeon. I hope so due to the fact that alot of big guilds will have it perma camp and it will screw the little guilds over. Nothing against big guilds (uber) just coming from past experiences that this does happen.

[slyse]

the zone instances are separate for each group, so you can have multiple groups each in their own instance of the same zone. I haven't done much reading about this, but I also hear that there are no respawns in these dungeons, so you'll have to do an honest to god dungeon crawl, which is badass.

[Gnomers]

ok cool thank you

[Vamcoy]

The thought of crawling is so sweet. Yeah i know that sounds funny but you know what i mean

[Throag]

Well from what I have read they have given very little away with whats going to be in this new expansion. I am fairly sure that 'focusing on single group encounters' does not mean that there will be no multigroup raid content introduced.

So, what you say is that high end players might have some raiding content? What a joke. Let me give you some examples, in expansions that were mostly designed for raidings guilds content have been consumed damn fast. Luclin : everything destroyed in a few months minus VT because the key was NOT implemented (i wont even talk about inner acrylia...). PoP, well the expansion would have been beaten a few months ago already if SoE had not artificially made Rathe council unbeatable.
The only things that makes expansions last longer for raiding guilds are artificial cockblocks. So basicaly what we have with LDoN is an expansion designed for the non raiders with maybe a few raiding zones......I won't expect them to last more than a couple of weeks... yay !
This expansion is a fucking slap in the face of guilds SoE FORCED to become larger and larger over time. And no one can say that it's not a problem....SoE made the game to require guilds of 70+ people, they HAVE to give them content to play with.

[gulug]

i really don think the new expansion is going to be raid oriented.

the way uber guilds are set up right now, anything done half ass, or a couple of token "raid zones" will be torn through in a blink of an eye.

reading the interview, i think the primary focus of this expansion is for single group encounters in dungeons. what the person pointed out to me had a ring of truth - i know on my server theres maybe what - 4-5 guilds in the elemental planes, 1-2 in time, if that. looking at the server guild list alone theres over 100 guilds on my server, so from whatever way you look at it, sony cant keep pandering to the high end guilds with every expansion because its alienating its other player base - hence the opening up of the pop zones.

Loy was a stab at catering to this, but it clearly fell short of the mark, what with inaccessibility, no real content for post 60 etc, so thats why i think they are going to have a second shot at this.










and i really dont think its gonna cater to those in elementals/time.

[Breogan]

Honestly I think it's going to suck big time for raiding guilds. I have bought LoY and have yet to set a foot there because it offers nothing to me (I didn't even bother camping a charm).
I love raiding (and I guess most of the people in high end guilds too)... I play for raiding new and badass mobs and this expansion won't offer that to me from the looks of it.

What are you going to do when all your guild (who has advanced together for years through different expansions) has nothing new to do and is forced to kill old content? Do you think people in the high end guilds will stay?
Imagine that PoP was a single-group oriented expansion... do you think the high end guilds would have stayed if all the content they had for killing was Vex Thal for months? I think they'd rather pull needles under their fingernails :)

[Valeris]

Don't forget Lost Dungeons comes out about the time EQ2 does, with any true competitor for the MMorpg market still being in development (WoW). So they might be fairly blase about the uber guild folks looking for something new, and it's true that not just the raid guilds could use something new and fun. most expansions have been primarily about raiders, this time around i guess the balance has shifted.

Hmm, one factor in the thinking may be that casual players burn through content less fast and therefore they are less quickly going to get tired of the game, therefore they're the long term audience for the game as second gen MMorg's start coming out....

[Tima]

Read somewhere that theres going to be 40 zones?

Ive read an interview with one of the devs and he said:

You can explore five new dynamic environments as they lead you through over 40 diverse dungeons.

I take that as 5 different types of dungeons, and there will be 8 different layouts for each dungeon, randomly chosen when the group is given the "quest" to enter. The full interview can be found here (http://www.gamespy.com/interviews/june03/eqldonpc/)

From the perspective as an adventuresome player, Im kinda looking forward to the expansion, it sounds really fun and will be getting back to the roots of eq and the fun i used to have years ago fighting through the early dungeons when they really had a sense of danger. From the perspective of a tank in a raiding guild, the expansion is going to leave us spinning our wheels. We're not in Time yet, but 2 months down the road, who knows. We will be nearly at the end of the available content not too many months from now and im not too sure what we're gonna be wanting to do then, only time will tell.

[Frodlin7th]

Those who make the claim that "The raiders got PoP and plenty of content while casual players didn't" are not thinking through this.

The *only* players who didn't get new content since Luclin are those who are level 20-30. Seeing that that takes about 3 days to pass, it's silly to cater to them anyhow.

Now, onto those who say "High End raiders got PoP"...

This is true, although... so did Casual Players.. Yes, every casual player not only got Justice, Nightmare, Disease, and Innovation, as well as the PoK portals, but recently they also got Valor, Halls of Honor, Crypt of Decay, Bastion of Thunder, Plane of Storms, and if you spend a couple hours focused on a goal, you'd have tactics too. You got new levels, now AA skills, and so on and so forth. Yes, you got a LOT of new content with PoP... and so did raiders.

LoY comes out and the 30-60 crowd gets new content.. and after the recent changes, even more additional exp content for single groups via LoY, whereas there's -0- raid level content. Guess who didnt' complain then? If you guess raiders... you get a cookie! Raiders were quite happy for those in the 30-60 range who got new content.

A SECOND expansion is announced, and it's specifically announced for single-group content. This is bad, not bad that single group content is the primary focus for the expansion or that dungeon instancing is bad, hell, we all like these ideas... what's bad is this: It's focusing on one area of the game to the exclusion of others. If there was one thing that they should've learned in PoP it was that exclusionary content breaks up guilds. For someone on the verge of Luclin, there's all sorts of raiding content available in this game, but for those in the Elemental Planes/Time, there isn't... it's about to be consumed.

Thos who claim that "well, you've beaten the gods... there isn't anything left you can do".. I respond.. nonsense.

I beat Cazic and Innorruuk, and there was plenty still left they expanded on. Tormax, Dain, and Yelniak were harder than any gods at the time.

[kragrock]

Somehow, somewhere along the way, people have forgotten whateverquest is about. I see people posting here that although they bought LoY they have never been there. Why? Because the loot aint UBER enough for them. Do you really play this game just for experience and loot. Is your sole reason for logging on just for the possibility of a couple of extra AC or whatever.

Take a timeout and just go exploring for exploring sake. Grab a couple of friends and go look around. Some of the LoY zones are fun, not because they drop UBER loot or anything, just because they are different. A change of scenery if you will.

People rely on maximising gametime. Those zones will still be there tomorrow. The experience will still come even if it is a little slower.

Personally I think this new expansion has the potential to be an EQ lifesaver. What does it offer to the UBER guild raider. Well actually if what I understand is right then it is ESSENTIAL. PoT will be made into a zone that will be instanced. In fact due to the way it is set up it HAS to be. To Completely get through PoT takes 10 hours plus and each time you have to start again from scratch. The current scenario means you go in and either clear the entire zone or do half of it and then camp out and do the second half the next night. This is fine until you have several guilds with access. Then you go in do your half then camp out. Along comes another guild finds the first half complete and skips right through to the second half.

No longer when you are out for experience will you have to sit in one spot chain pulling all day. You can head off to a dungeon and work your way through it. Experience without the boredom. That to me can only be a good thing. The fact that the dungeon will be custom made for your group makes it even better.


Krag

[Grimmlokk]

I see people posting here that although they bought LoY they have never been there. Why? Because the loot aint UBER enough for them. Do you really play this game just for experience and loot. Is your sole reason for logging on just for the possibility of a couple of extra AC or whatever.

Because I play for my guildmates/raidmates. And LoY has nothing for them. Fun isn't going to content you can manhandle with almost no effort at all. Fun is going forward, to us. You think everyone who raids is greedy and out for themselves apparently. That's a stupid assumption. Personally, I care about all my friends having fun. Not being left out. Not being bored out of their wits. It just so happens we're all 65 and happened to be able to think up ways to kill bigger mobs. And lo and behold it was fun too! But because this isn't *YOUR* personal eutopia you just lay down a blanket statement that everyone who disagree's has "forgotten whateverquest is about". (BTW, this isn't a Charlie Brown Christmas special k?). For you it might be about exploring those places, they might be a challenge for you and get your heart pumping. For us they might be a total snoozefest. I find raiding fun, thus I must declare you and all your ilk have truly lost the Everquest Spirit. You bunch of God damned Grinch-ass bastards.

[Brutul]

Originally posted by Baadan
Just guess, but there probably, MAYBE, 100 guilds with PoTime access. Multiply 100 guilds times 200 people with flags (again, being generous) and that's still just 20000 people out of the 400,000 some odd accounts out there. Quite a few of these are mutli-boxed, so perhaps the number of individual players of EQ is 300,000.

With those _GENEROUS_ numbers, the "uber guilds" of EQ are only 15% of the population. They've been thrown enough bones in the last couple of expansions, it's time to let the other 85% have some fun.

You're right, but the uberguilds are very important to SOE. There are tons of people that are casual players, but read uberguild websites every day. Hell half of the regular posters on www.fohguild.org, when they come out and say who their character is, are level 55 druids. They are nowhere near PoT and probably won't ever be, but they read Legacy of Steel and FoH's boards every day, and by god they're gonna quit EQ and play WoW because they are so damn pissed about the Rathe being broken for so long.

The only reason to keep playing EQ other than your friends is to progress (however slowly) toward the end game and keep improving your character. If these people read every day on the uber websites that the end game is a piece of crap and everybody there hates it, well, that's not much of a goal and they will have less motivation to keep playing and be more likely to quit. The uber guilds really do have a lot of influence with EQ players, so it's important to SoE to keep them happy Why do you think when Furor is really mad about something, it almost always gets fixed by SoE? Because he is the most famous, and therefore influential player in the game, and it's in Sony's best interests to keep him happy.

And even semi-casual players will get to this stuff in a year or two, and it's nice that it's there and working when you get there.

[Shikarii]

who took the jam out of your donut grimmlokk :D

[Grimmlokk]

Krag. Filthy jamthief. There's a thriving black market for stolen jam in Mexico I hear.

[Aveen]

I'm looking forward to the new expansion. So long as it has some actually upgrades and fun things for pure melee, and little in that way for casters. Casters have dominated the last three expansions. Time for melee to have an expansion thats mostly for them.

[Valeris]

I won't hold my breath :)