What are you looking for in a server?

[NostalgiaEQ]

I've been working on a server lately, I'm not very far along but I wanted to hear your thoughts on what a server should be. Why are you here? (may be a bit personal but I think it is important). I'm here because I guess I have been haunted by (good) memories of everquest and could never really find another game that could fully satisfy the MMO need that EQ created in me. Are you here because you couldn't/didn't want to keep up with the pace of live? Do you not like how live is pay to win? Did you not agree with how live was run? Do you want a return to old school EQ before the new textures and hub zones and models? Do you think they watered down the difficulty of live too much? Do you want to 'cheat' (not a bad thing) and pick your own difficulty and program bots? Do you love or hate mudflation/twinking? Do you love/hate boxing? What are your thoughts on custom content?

Why are you here and what are you looking for in a server? If a new server came out today what would you go in and look for to decide if you wanted to play there? What would your perfect server be?

These are just questions to get you thinking; feel free to talk about whatever you want.

[Keyn1]

Old school EQ was amazing. It took me a month to get to lvl 12 because no one had any idea what was going on. The first time I was blinded, I thought the cat had stepped on the vga cable of my CRT and unplugged it. The WHOLE screen was literally black. Back then, the code shutoff/blocked the video signal to the monitor.

The online community was amazing. No information was handed to players by the devs. The only way any of us got ahead was by the ones that managed to figure things out. The game just relied on its players. Now there're windows for everything, everything gets handed to you. Now it's 'just a game.' In the 90's, it felt like more than just a game.

Maybe we're all trying to recapture the old feeling. Some say you can never go back, and maybe that's true. By now, MMORPGs are no big deal. But I'm damned well going to try to find that "thing" that made EQ great.

[gravystain]

I think a lot of us are looking for that feel we got with Everquest in the classic-velious\luclin expansions. Project1999 did an amazing job at giving us that feeling again but unfortunately what now needs fixed is what to do when a server is made with the intention on never progressing past a specific point. EQ never had to go through these same issues because new patches and content were releasing making older content less camped, people didnt MQ everything single item. By the time people started figuring a lot of the content out there was already a new expansion or patch that gave them more to do. For me, i'm looking for someone to make a classic server experience and then tries to address some of the issues that come with making a hard stop server.

[tdanger84]

Let people play through with a few bots. Most of us have some kind of life where we need to be able to casually play while being able to watch our kids or do other things. That is why so many of us push for a solo experience. That is why so many people box or go for bots/mercs. Grouping was fun back in the day but you also had to do it that way because there was such a huge population. None of these emu servers will ever see a population of that magnitude. Bots are better than boxing because boxing is tedious and a great deal of us(myself included) don't have the patience or the will to learn and use it. Anyone with half a brain can manage a few semi-autonomous bots. I also prefer having a few bots over just having everthing tuned for solo and giving everyone a ton of clickies. Let my cleric bot cure me, let my druid bot sow me, its cool as long as there is a decent ooc regen.

[kokey98]

I like servers that minimize the time sinks but not effort.

e.g. i don't want to kill "a blazing elemental" for 13 hours waiting for 1 of many item drops for a mage's epic quest. .: the difficulty should be killing the npc, not trying to stay awake.

e.g. i don't want to spend 15-30mins "running" somewhere when i have an hour or two to play. hitting autorun is not playing a video game, imo. if someone wants to take the long way, they can choose to do that if they enjoy it.

don't focus on "group think" b.s.

e.g. just because there's a consensus on these boards about any facet of the game, that is not a logical argument that it is right.

if people really preferred "classic" then you wouldn't see so many playing the live servers still.... and p99 has that market locked up. 1000+ people consistently. that contradicts what i said above slightly, but i don't believe it applies, because those that play p99 aren't looking for new servers to join, they are looking for a temporary break or window-shopping for the heck of it.

which is nothing negative about anyone or anything thing. However, if your making a server i don't think they are your target market nor a good focus group, for lack of a better way to explain.

I'm trying casual dreams. no custom spells and such. although the way that particular server is set up, it's almost a waste of time to play certain classes that i like... if you can get around that type of stuff, a solo-experience liek the previous post is similar to what i am looking for, too.

The biggest problem i see with the lower pop / short-run servers is a lack of consistency. they waffle or are unaware that their new idea or fix completely contradicts what they said they intended for the server - more power to them, but it's like taking the rug out from under someone from the user's standpoint. sure they can do whatever they want, and the user can go somewhere else when it happens - easy enough, but i don't think either party is gettign what they wanted so it can't be a good thing for either.

once you pick a path that makes sense well thought out, ignore the players, lol... generally speaking, i think that's the problem, btw, not the sysop acting on a whim -- suggestions from multiple and varied sources will create chaos compared to a well thought out plan/goal. Find a few "smarter" players/staff/whatever you can bounce ideas off or that you'll listen to about suggestions, but never take them from the peanut gallery, lol.

i tried to not say anything too specific for that reason about what kind of server you should make. hammer out some preferred concepts, map it out, then implement it after you've thought it through. maybe you want people to run 20minutes before they see an npc that's worthwhile to kill and its item only drops 1/100000 deaths :P

[ChaosSlayerZ]

This question came up before just back in January:

http://www.eqemulator.org/forums/showthread.php?t=40320


Anyway. I have BIG feeling of nostalgia for my newbie days of unknown and exploration, going places for the first time, discovering things for the first time, stumbling upon quest npcs in the middle of nowhere, doing Stein of Moggok for the first time, grouping, raiding etc.

At the same time, I am also instantly reminded of:
-hideous time sinks,
-insane recover times after combat (unless you are a necro)
-disbalanced classes (necro can solo to max level yellow cons, while half of other classes can't even solo blue cons),
-ultra reliance of holy trinity on raids (warrior tanks and cleric heals, these 2 other tanks and and 2 priests are for utility only),
-poorly itemized world (tons of good loot in Crushbone for teen levels, and item-baren BlackBurrow and Karana), poorly designed quest structure
-generally poor layout of newbie zone in relation to level progression areas (smooth level progression if you start on Faydwer vs going trough huge trouble past teen levels if you strt in Erudin/Qeynos)


So, in conclusion: I don't want actually original EQ, I don't want P99. I DO want feeling of unknown and excitement.

No, I actually don't want any of the modern easy mode things: I don't need instant travel, or instant recovery, but i do want reasonable recovery, better class balance, ability to solo well for ALL classes, with unique skills to contribute to a group/raid, without being "the only tank" or "just a buffer".

Take EQ world as a RESOURCE and turn it into something new.
New lore, new zone connection system, new class system. ETC.

I REALLY liked EQ2 when it came out, because it seemed to have solved most of EQ1 issues, without loosing EQ spirit (ok I didn't like piling up all players in only 2 cities, but national villages well done with a love in a heart). But EQ2 only lasted for about 2-3 years until they decided to go into NEW DIRECTION with Faydwer expansion which totally killed it for me (dumbing down crafting system which I freaken LOVED, was the final straw when I quit).


In short, I want:
- new world based of EQ spirit
- better class system (and I don't mean just lets add 2 new cool nukes to paladin and a cool demon pet to cleric)
- good balance between SOLO, GROUP and RAID, with all types of content available.
- ABSOLUTELY NO FREAKEN BOTS or BOXES!
- SOulbiners, but no lev 50 buffers for lev 1 players (thats just a cheap way to say here blast trough first 20 levels in 20 min)
- Paid Teleporters - the further you want to go, the more expensive it is.
- Cities and Factions - yes I know population is an issue, but please no more - we start everyone in a Nexus or any other single hub.


There are many more things I would like,so above is just a short list. I have some good ideas for a server done "my way", but I guess in next couple years I won't have a chance to start working on it.

[N0ctrnl]

This question came up before just back in January:

The same question pops up at regular intervals and gets about the same discussion. It's like deja vu every time :)

[sunbeam]

Yeah. But as nearly as I can tell the big thing is that no server will have the population necessary to have it just like the old days. (P1999 is what it is. Don't think a critical mass of people are left who are looking for that to have it work twice.)

So it is absolutely essential that whatever your angle on a server, you have to face the fact that people are pretty much going to have to play solo for most of their play experience.

You may think otherwise, but I take it for a fact of life. So the most important question is what is the individual server's approach to this? Boxing? Bots? Rule adjustments?

People will group up to raid (and raids have to somehow account for reduced population), or just to help someone out. But the way people's real lives are now, you aren't finding someone playing EMU 50 hours a week.

You are camping your own FBSS and whatnot. And that's just not possible for some of these classes when it is appropriate to want that piece of gear.

[NostalgiaEQ]

Thanks all and thanks for the link to past discussions on this topic. I am taking it all in, the more perspectives I can understand the better I can design this.

What do you all think about no corpse runs? I think out of everything this was the one thing that cut into RL the worst. Its like "crap I have to go to bed or whatever but I don't remember where my corpse is what if I never find it!" I think it added more stress than it was worth. With eqemu you can set it to keep your corpse but leave an empty corpse so you can res it for xp if you want. What do you guys think about doing it like that? What do the hardcore classic people think of that? Does anyone think that would break the immersion? I have been playing like that on my server for a while now and I feel much freer and much less likely to rage quit lol.

Also what about plat sinks? With the good items bieng no trade what do you think people would like to buy from a shop? Potions?

[Uleat]

EQEmu does have the option to not leave corpses or lose exp on death.

[gravystain]

Changing rates in EQ is such a fragile thing. I've played on servers with enhanced exp rates or no corpse/exp loss and found that people used it as a free gate spell to suicide around. I myself solo leveled a wizard very quickly just by binding in my leveling area and solo 2-3 mobs and suicide for a free full mana bar again and did that over and over. Even live progression servers had that problem with casters bind rushing raid targets casting pets over and over until they were out of mana and then dying to refill. I wanted to group on a wizard but the increased exp rate made everyone else want to solo for better exp and i couldnt keep up without finding a work around to the system. Even something as simple as increasing spawn time rates can cause solo classes and smaller groups that don't have the best group makeup unable to level in certain camps because they cant keep up with the spawn time. I think the only way to put custom features into a "classic like" server is to put them in 1 at a time and observe. Things dont snowball this way from the get go.

[sunbeam]

I'd like to add one more thing to this.

Trade skills were never really integrated with EQ like they have been in other games.

But think of the player base and what they have to go through. It's just about guaranteed that you won't have a large player base with a stocked bazaar let alone an EC tunnel.

So any tradeskills, and they are required for a number of quests, have to be done with people manually farming, and in many cases leveling other tradeskills up so they can support the actual one of interest.

Please don't go all classic and get rid of the recipe list that was integrated with the containers. Or god forbid mandate carpal tunnel for all the freaking combines you will have to do because you need to quest the Arx Key, or the Earring of the Solstice. Well the Arx key isn't too bad, but that earring thing requires high levels in a number of skills if you don't have other crafters. And the Coldain Prayer Shawl is pretty tough too.

[N0ctrnl]

I actually push out a UI file on my server that disables the experiment button (buggy anyway) and made all recipes searchable.

[gravystain]

I agree. Things like that aren't what makes the classic feel. Its not like people are figuring out what they need for materials on their own. They would have a 2nd monitor with the guide up on one screen anyways. Why make it more tedious than it needs to be.

[jabedoben]

I'd give my left testicle to have Last World back.

[kokey98]

could make zones with raid bosses a non-binding area? i haven't booted my pocket eq in over a year, lol, but seems like a likely option. couldn't tell you anything about the specific settings like that.

[DanCanDo]

What are you looking for in a server?Just ask yourself that same question .......Then do it !
You'll be a lot happier with the results in the end :)

[NostalgiaEQ]

Lol I didn't want this to turn into a hype fest about my planned server but rather just a discussion with what we all think about eq but I will answer some things here

Even something as simple as increasing spawn time rates can cause solo classes and smaller groups that don't have the best group makeup unable to level in certain camps because they cant keep up with the spawn time. I think the only way to put custom features into a "classic like" server is to put them in 1 at a time and observe. Things dont snowball this way from the get go.

Hmm good point. I multiplied all spawn times by 0.6 so typical mobs were 10 mins and are now 6. I also implemented rested regen that kicks in in 6 mins so that should help make sure that camps can be held down also I added some temporary plat items that boost regen and introduce a plat sink since there won't be a big item economy. That regen should also help people keep up with the spawns. I can always tweak things but I think there was a bit extra wait time in eq to "preserve content" by slowing players down, so I feel like we can speed things up a bit and not have many issues.

I'd like to add one more thing to this.

Trade skills were never really integrated with EQ like they have been in other games.

But think of the player base and what they have to go through. It's just about guaranteed that you won't have a large player base with a stocked bazaar let alone an EC tunnel.

So any tradeskills, and they are required for a number of quests, have to be done with people manually farming, and in many cases leveling other tradeskills up so they can support the actual one of interest.

Please don't go all classic and get rid of the recipe list that was integrated with the containers. Or god forbid mandate carpal tunnel for all the freaking combines you will have to do because you need to quest the Arx Key, or the Earring of the Solstice. Well the Arx key isn't too bad, but that earring thing requires high levels in a number of skills if you don't have other crafters. And the Coldain Prayer Shawl is pretty tough too.

Don't worry even if I wanted to make tradeskills "classic" I don't have the know how to do someting like that. Plus I don't notice anything wrong with how tradeskills currently work and haven't noticed a difference. I plan on improving the usefulness of some tradeskills especially summoning and foraging and also possibly fishing. Ie adding immediately useful items that would add to the economy.

could make zones with raid bosses a non-binding area? i haven't booted my pocket eq in over a year, lol, but seems like a likely option. couldn't tell you anything about the specific settings like that.

Ya most zones are non binding areas standard so mabye the servers you have been playing in allow bind anywhere which I won't do.

Just ask yourself that same question .......Then do it !
You'll be a lot happier with the results in the end :)

Yes but I can't think of everything! This is why I open source ;).

[DanCanDo]

Yes but I can't think of everything! This is why I open source ;).

What I was kind of getting at, is when you are sitting around thinking to
yourself, "what kind of server would I really like to play on?".
Then go to work on it. I guess it all depends on your goals for your own
server, if you have any. More or less creating your "own vision".

I personally love this kind of project being around, since many of us agree they
didn't like the direction that sony went with EQ. So now with all the options
here for customization, the possiblities are endless for either rewinding the
game, or fast forwarding it, taking that "other fork in the road".
When trying to come up with an idea, it can be difficult because of the
already existing variety of active servers. Classic, fully custom, raid, pvp,
it's all out there. Myself, I didn't bother putting an effort in to feedback
before I got the server running. I just took my own idea, my own desires,
and ran with it. The feedback definately comes in game and from there
making decisions. But one thing I will never do, is worry about any kind of
competitive "player count", that's not a priority for me.
The server being fun for both me and whatever little players are on it, is
paramount. Hence - I am in my happy place. If I wasn't, the server would
not exist :)
But just an observation :
Lol I didn't want this to turn into a hype fest about my planned server but rather just a discussion with what we all think about eq.

You posted this in a "Server discussion" thread, so maybe a few of thought it was about your server. But just EQ topic ? No.

[ChaosSlayerZ]

What do you all think about no corpse runs?

Also what about plat sinks? With the good items bieng no trade what do you think people would like to buy from a shop? Potions?


Corpse runs were painful. They create a situation where if died in a dungeon while fully geared, there is no freaken way you can get there naked, without outside help.
If it was a trivial death outdoor - its also no challenge of getting it back.

I liked early EQ2 system where your gear took durability loss of death and gave you XP debt. Since we can't have those, I would settle for:

-you keep items on death
-you still take XP loss to prevent "no penalty exploring"



Plat sinks - are good when they are smart plat sinks. EQ1 crafting was a tremendous plat sink for very little reward - title of grand smith after putting literally millions of plat into it, because outside of a very limited time scope of early game there was nothing worth crafting that could compete with sold loot.

My idea: Healing potions and Weight Reduction bags cannot be crafted or looted - they vendor sold only.

[Maze_EQ]

What am I looking for in a server?

One that's not ran by me.

Zing.

[DanCanDo]

Corpse runs were painful.

I know that people hated that grind, but did I consider it painful ? No. It was
all part of the fun in a game that was intended that way. Hating dying and
having to run for a corpse, is the same as getting in to a demolition derby
and not wanting any dents in your car (chuckle)
Personally, I always thought of EQ as a grouping game. Maybe the classes
and the balance were out of wack, but generally it was setup so it would
not be painful when toons died, unless one was determined to solo.
Class to summon your corpse and class to rez your corpse.
That was one of the biggest problems in that game. If they would of set
the whole game up so you couldn't solo, then it would of been a matter of
whether there was enough players to find a group.
The only big problem that EQ live had, was the fact that we all paid a monthly
subscription and in that case, nobody wanted to sit around LFG all night
or spend an hour getting their corpse, loot and rez. Time was money.

[ChaosSlayerZ]

Class to summon your corpse and class to rez your corpse.
That was one of the biggest problems in that game. If they would of set
the whole game up so you couldn't solo, then it would of been a matter of
whether there was enough players to find a group.
The only big problem that EQ live had, was the fact that we all paid a monthly
subscription and in that case, nobody wanted to sit around LFG all night
or spend an hour getting their corpse, loot and rez. Time was money.


I agree. EQ frame was borrowed heavily from DnD, but in DnD your group is ALWAYS with you at the play table. So: there was no soloing, and your friends were always tried their best to get you rezzed ASAP.

Any MMO that allows any solo roaming has to make accommodations for it. Of course the fact that some of the classes were ultra powerful soloers while others could not touch a low blue con without a group was stupid or 15 min downtime.
Either have all classes more of less on equal footing in regards to solo or have no solo at all.

[NostalgiaEQ]

I agree. EQ frame was borrowed heavily from DnD, but in DnD your group is ALWAYS with you at the play table. So: there was no soloing, and your friends were always tried their best to get you rezzed ASAP.



Dancando, this is the reason I want to discuss things. I didn't play DnD so this insight is particularly valuable. This isn't about me wanting to use the eq engine to make my own game or to worship the released game as god and unchangeable, this is about picking eq back up after launch with the mindset of 1. no expansions 2. tweaking and smoothing out the experience to increase fun and immersion levels as well as cooperation but also making solo possible and a focus on the journey rather than the destination 3. attracting a new generation of players. 4. Non-profit open source mentality. I have never surpassed lvl 27 in eq and I started playing in 1999 as a 13 yo so I have had these memories of classic eq experience brewing in my mind for over half of my life and I feel like I can take up the mantle that was lost to the hands of corporate execs at Sony. It will take me a while to ramp up and acquire the skills I need but I'm hopeful I will be able to produce something exciting.

[ChaosSlayerZ]

Well if you need DnD insights, let me know ;)

I played DnD on and off for about 2 years (I know its nothing compared to people who played it for 20 years), I also designed my own combat/spell system (because I didn't like DnDs) and led a campaign for about a year.

I played EQ1 from 99 to 2004. Early years were probably not the most unproductive, as I knew little, kept changing servers and tried many classes, and during the first year of playing my top char was maybe level 20. But eventually I got into my skull that I had to group to progress, and things started to go better. I was very behind during Classical era - when people were doing Velious raids, I was just getting to lev 45 on my first char, but by 2004 I was in a guild that was doing Vex Thall and trying to take down Ralos Zek (yeah we were behind the top guys who already did Elementals and were doing GoD, but still were in top 10 guilds on the server)

[DanCanDo]

focus on the journey rather than the destination 3. attracting a new generation of players.

I never played DnD either, as matter of fact, I never became interested in any
type of game like that until I was introduced to EQ in 2003. I was all FPS before
that.
After I started playing, while many players were focusing on that "destination",
I was having a blast enjoying the journey. But the only problem was the fact
that I jumped on board at a time in EQ when the "solo boxing" player was
becoming more popular. The solid raiding guilds would not even let you in unless
you were x-level with x-aa's
Progessing was difficult, so while you were busy trying to improve your toon
enough, the rest got too far ahead. So when you're ready to do PoTime, the
raid guilds have no interest. By the time I got my war to 65, there was 2
more expansions brought out.
But right now, something that is even more common on these servers, is that
solo boxer focusing on the destination.
I have a few players that are actually taking their time but nobody grouping
yet. opportunities were there, but no interest. Everyone doing their own
thing.

[NostalgiaEQ]

Hmm good observations. That "state of the game" 2003 eq with always playing catch up sounds like hell. I'm glad I was saved from experiencing that. Well I kind of did in a mobile MMO. That is exactly the opposite of what I want to achieve, the size of my release game will never change. Mabye new parallel content zones will be added if population exceeds like 3000 lol. But ya as far as the solo mentality, it is really hard to avoid that. Unless you only want to log in with your friends and never on your own, everyone is going to end up different levels. This is how the mmo differs from DnD. The way the mmo gets around this is large amounts of players so there are always other people your level even if they aren't your original friends. This is obvious but I think it is valuable to think of it like that.

If there is one thing to learn from P99 it is the key to success is advertising, advertising, advertising. The amount of youtube videos and articles with "Project 1999" in the title are astounding.

Another way around this is to scrap levels entirely or make them much less consequential so everyone can play with everyone. Solo friendly leveling and focusing on endgame is another way to achieve this so everyone plays together once they reach endgame. The original game that inspired mmo's was ultima underworld, the "endgame" was when you finally left the dungeon but then the game was over.

So anyway I don't really know the right way forward but for now I think what EQ did best was the journey so my server will be all about that journey but when I make actual games in the future (from scratch using a commercial engine) I may do things a little differently and make it so a "max level" character is twice as strong as a lvl 1 so they can play together from the beginning and focus more on parallel content rather than vertical progression.

To make a popping EQ server focused on the journey requires a large playerbase and thus requires lots of advertising.

[ChaosSlayerZ]

Journey is the most important part of the game.
I have seen servers that have grind for 50 levels of empty boring content and only have the raids fleshed out. I also seen the servers and let you level up very very fast so you, again, see their awesome raids at 50+.
But to me those levels - are the lost journey.

I don't want to grind or fly trough 50levels of XP because the good game starts at lev 50. I want to start my game, my journey, at level 1. I want to be impressed and immersed from level 1.
If ALL levels are filled with good content, then players will be so involved in exploring it, they wouldn't be in a hurry to level up.

Solo-ability wise, I think there should be solo content for everyone, grouping content near by, and raiding for those who wants it.

[DanCanDo]

Solo-ability wise, I think there should be solo content for everyone, grouping content near by, and raiding for those who wants it.

Exactly Chaos, couldn't agree with you more. I find that feasible for the player
base that's "starting" to become a little more popular, (the solo player) but at
the same time, I believe if any player wants to get to that "end game" boss,
then they have to sacrifice their solo desires and find people to help them go
after the raid mobs, etc.
Features like mercs and bots cater to that solo player. Nobody is forced in to
using them, but those who look for servers with them, probably don't have any
desires to group with other players.

[Darkscis]

Exactly Chaos, couldn't agree with you more. I find that feasible for the player
base that's "starting" to become a little more popular, (the solo player) but at
the same time, I believe if any player wants to get to that "end game" boss,
then they have to sacrifice their solo desires and find people to help them go
after the raid mobs, etc.
Features like mercs and bots cater to that solo player. Nobody is forced in to
using them, but those who look for servers with them, probably don't have any
desires to group with other players.

The reason I feel the solo player is starting to become more popular is purely down to the age of Everquest. A lot of us here on EQEMU are here for the nostalgia... it's the game we played as we were growing up/studying. Naturally, with that being 15+ years ago now, we are all starting to reach the low to mid 30's. That means the bulk of us have jobs, houses, families etc that eat into your time. I can almost guarantee that new, young, EQ players will be few and far between - trying to get someone interested in the antique graphics in this day and age would be near impossible.

When you do finally make some time to game, you need to get on and start doing something immediately. You don't have the luxury of sitting around for an hour lfg before putting in a 12 hour stint because you finally got into a good lguk camp. Naturally, that means the requirements we have as players evolve a little more away from what original Everquest was. Those that ARE willing to chance their free time on finding a group need to play on p99 because that's where the rest of the like minded population are. The other servers need to have solo/small group content or people will eventually leave for p99 or other games when they realise they just don't have the time to achieve anything meaningful.

How can you reasonably expect a brand new server to have 30+ player content when you don't have the population that something like p99 has. Even if your player base was an average of 100 people - a full third of those would need to be the correct level, correctly geared, willing to group up and available for X hours. That means you need to start with small group content, something like 4-10 people, but then you get into the realm of what people expect. When your population grows and you try to release large scale raid content, everyone who flocked to your server because "solo/small group" gets annoyed and leaves and your population takes a dive again.

That leaves new servers with the option of either going solo/small group, or allowing boxing - both of which have their flaws and both of which attract vastly different players.

[NostalgiaEQ]

Those that ARE willing to chance their free time on finding a group need to play on p99 because that's where the rest of the like minded population are.

Need is a strong word. Thats like saying if you want a desktop computer you NEED to get a windows based PC. Monopolies are never good anyway, people need options.

The key here that everyone except p99 is missing is ADVERTISING. Everyone here are technical people so we tend not to want to think about that but that is the only reason why P99 is beating everyone else combined. They found a marketing hook and push it in 100 ways to a million+ person audience.

[ChaosSlayerZ]

How can you reasonably expect a brand new server to have 30+ player content when you don't have the population that something like p99 has. Even if your player base was an average of 100 people - a full third of those would need to be the correct level, correctly geared, willing to group up and available for X hours. That means you need to start with small group content, something like 4-10 people, but then you get into the realm of what people expect. When your population grows and you try to release large scale raid content, everyone who flocked to your server because "solo/small group" gets annoyed and leaves and your population takes a dive again.

I agree. Most of content should be solo, with 1 group encounters littered around corners of the zones (similar to WoW dungeons perhaps?), and raids being 2 groups - IMHO that should be good enough setting.

[ChaosSlayerZ]

Need is a strong word. Thats like saying if you want a desktop computer you NEED to get a windows based PC. Monopolies are never good anyway, people need options.

The key here that everyone except p99 is missing is ADVERTISING. Everyone here are technical people so we tend not to want to think about that but that is the only reason why P99 is beating everyone else combined. They found a marketing hook and push it in 100 ways to a million+ person audience.

There are few things that set P99 apart from the rest of EMU:

- people there want that EXACT classic content, without any fancy shmancy "bad" things added post Velios era (ok some extend that to pre-GoD, because thats when EQ1 Golden Age effectively has ended, with massive population loss in 2004, due to EQ2 and WoW). A lot of them take any custom content as an offense.

-P99 is run by very capable and highly dedicated team. I seen a lot of good custom servers rise and die due to: loss of interest, lack of time, or simply mood swings of their admins. It takes someone with strong DETERMINATION to keep doing it.

-and finally, yes advertisement is good. If no one knows what you are - no one will come ;)

[DanCanDo]

Don't get me wrong when I say this, but sometimes I think people who are thinking of
starting up a server, their main focus is the infamous "player count". Sure, it's nice if
you get a decent player base, but myself, that is last on the list of priorities for doing
something I enjoy. Even it sits for a few years with an average of 5-10 casual players,
at least I am enjoying it. That was whole reason I created it. Any editing, creating or
customization I do on the server, is not being done to attract players. Its being done
to make the server more fun and interesting. Even though I have a desire to share it
and welcome other players, if I created a server that I didn't enjoy myself, the server
would not exist, no matter how many players were on it.
As for the player base on p99, advertsing can yank them in, but they all love that era
and that kind of grind. I love some of it but not all of it. Last time I was on p99, I sat
for 2-3 hours /ooc'ing "donating for buffs", didn't happen. Not my kind of game. But
thats just me. The rest are there because they love it (I assume anyway).

[gravystain]

I think Shards of Dalaya did an awesome job making its own variation of Everquest. I played on that server for a long time. I've played on some of these other projects that clearly label what their server is and have had brief moments of fun also but always get tired of easily moving through content boxing or soloing. I assume a lot of other people feel the same way or these servers would have much higher populations. The last server I played on I had really high hopes for. It was just a classic server with all the modern bells and whistles, new trading skill windows, targeting rings etc. Their population went to 0 after tweaking HP regen values to try and make warriors and hybrids solo better. This change alone only made the solo classes more powerful and while yes the melee classes could solo a little better they still didn't because it was too slow. Meanwhile level 12 mage pets were soloing the entire unrest castle. My point is that i dont believe there is a happy medium in making a semi classic server. A lot of people in this thread have expressed the opinion that they think all classes should be able to solo. The amount of changes it would take to make a rogue be able to solo are huge. When they finally get to a good soloing tweak for them the casters, hybrids and monks have then turned into Greek gods. I think if someone wants to make a server like this it could be really fun but it needs to be marketed as something new and fresh, not a walk down memory lane of the Everquest we all knew and loved. My advice to some of you server devs is to not lose your identity as a server. The identity crisis bug hit my last server and it didn't go well.

[ChaosSlayerZ]

I think Shards of Dalaya did an awesome job making its own variation of Everquest.


+1 for SOD ;)

Their population went to 0 after tweaking HP regen values to try and make warriors and hybrids solo better. This change alone only made the solo classes more powerful and while yes the melee classes could solo a little better they still didn't because it was too slow. Meanwhile level 12 mage pets were soloing the entire unrest castle. My point is that i dont believe there is a happy medium in making a semi classic server. A lot of people in this thread have expressed the opinion that they think all classes should be able to solo. The amount of changes it would take to make a rogue be able to solo are huge. When they finally get to a good soloing tweak for them the casters, hybrids and monks have then turned into Greek gods. I think if someone wants to make a server like this it could be really fun but it needs to be marketed as something new and fresh, not a walk down memory lane of the Everquest we all knew and loved.


I agree. You can't just take base EQ DB tweak a few settings I have a new generation MMO. EQ was designed with group-hard core mindset (albeit with few OP classes like necro) which can't just tweak on the fly.
You have to sit down with a spreadsheet, put in values, evaluate class ideas and methods - essentially do this from the SCRATCH (yes, thats exactly my plans for my own server). You may still use similar spell names for the sake of lore consistency, but you have re-balance ENTIRE class system for it to work right.

If you reduce base mobs hp by half - you powering up wizards and underpowering DoT clases. If you give players ultra-high regeneration and planar weapon at level 1 - you powering up melees, while casters fall down. Etc.



My advice to some of you server devs is to not lose your identity as a server. The identity crisis bug hit my last server and it didn't go well.

THIS. You know what killed EQ2 for me? Their envy for WoW population and attempt to attract more players from WoW by emulating WoW. At the end they failed - why would WoW players play WoW-clone when they can play WoW? And at the same time they alienated EQ2 players who actually liked it the way it was.

Formulate your vision, your system and your methods - and stick to it. Yes there is always room for adjustment and improvement, but don't turn the ship 180 degree around because 1 guy doesn't like it.

[gravystain]

Well said. I'm a sucker for classic EQ but have been following the RebuildEQ server for a month now and it looks super cool. Couldn't be further away from my 'normal' preference but the way they market their product i feel i know what i'm getting into before its even in alpha and look forward to trying it. Find your niche and embrace it. Whether its a era based classic server, pvp, custom, solo, or fun server. Know what you are and just keep polishing your product. There's always going to be people that say they want this or that feature or xyz is why the population isnt growing fast enough but ive found for every person you gain from yeilding to a few suggestions you lose someone who came to the server for its initial concept.

[DanCanDo]

don't turn the ship 180 degree around because 1 guy doesn't like it.

THAT ^^^^ is paramount to any server OP's goals/visions/happiness :)

[Darkscis]

Formulate your vision, your system and your methods - and stick to it. Yes there is always room for adjustment and improvement, but don't turn the ship 180 degree around because 1 guy doesn't like it.

100% this. This is what killed off Elysium. We were trying to accomodate/change/re-code to satisfy every single complaining voice on the forums instead of staying true to exactly how we envisioned the server going. This left us with half finished/unpolished content, things all over the place and a general lack of focus going forward. We also ended up working on content that we ourselves had no interest in doing, which means as Dev's we lost motivation because it wasn't fun for *US*.

Now I digress because this has ventured off topic a bit, sorry about that!

What I personally look for in a server: Basically what I originally said. As an aging player with commitments and time constraints I look for a server that allows me to progress at my own pace. I don't like to group up not because I am anti-social but because I don't like the feeling I get when I have to let a group down by suddenly having to log off. This means I really only even look at servers that are flagged as "solo". I don't think that players should be "punished" because of this play style though - so my ideal server would be one that you can progress and achieve everything 100% solo if that is your desire. Make it take 10x as long if you don't group, or have alternate methods for group/solo or whatever - just as long as I can achieve everything someone who groups can **EVENTUALLY** I am happy. I don't expect handouts, I don't expect it to be easy to solo but I don't like it when I am forced to group (for example, via script mechanics, min raid requirements - that kind of thing).

So an example of this is what we tried to achieve on Elysium. We had 2 factions in our custom content; Vampire Hunters and Vampires. If you worked for the Vampire Hunters you could "raid" (group content) Dreadspire Keep and loot your drops as normal after defeating the encounters. For those that didn't want to group, you could work for the Vampires instead. This was our "solo" version of content. You essentially did a quest for each of those same bosses in Dreadspire Keep and earnt their drops through that, rather than killing them. All players ended up with the same gear, but the solo players had to work a little longer at it by first doing faction work to become Ally and then by actually completing the quest. The raiders were able to go in, learn the encounters and get their loot the normal way.

[DanCanDo]

Here's another thread from this year to add to this topic:
http://www.eqemulator.org/forums/showthread.php?t=40320

Called "What are you looking for"

[NostalgiaEQ]

I'm thinking that a classic minimal raid server would allow for soloing. From what I've heard soloing really only becomes impossible after lvl 50 so if the max level is 50 then? I'm going to start playing a rogue so I can understand the issues better. Never played a pure melee before but I can't comprehend how it could be impossible, just kill blues/light blues and bind wounds right?

[DanCanDo]

Back on Live in 2003, I solo'ed a war most of the way to lvl 55. Wasn't from lack of LFG.
I could of very slowly kept going, but had to start grouping. But it was difficult to find
groups, everyone was boxing, so I figured, well, if you can't beat'em, join'em. So thats
what I did, started boxing.

[NostalgiaEQ]

All good things must end, so perhaps everquest mechanics just don't work correctly past a lvl 50 softcap. Brad McQuaid himself said that when making panthepn he was best at balancing around lvl 50 so mabye the game was designed for lvl 50 and doesn't work well when you stretch it above that.

[DanCanDo]

Well, it was fine for a group or a guild raiding, but there was just too many people
wanting to solo and/or box toons to have their own group (with mercs).
I see more of it now, even on some of these servers. No interest in grouping. And
a lot of times, it really isn't a problem with people not having time, they just don't
want to play with others. A lot want to box/solo their their way up to the bosses.
I've even seen some of these servers starting out with a 2-3 box limit, then raising
it after to 6 or something because it's high demand.

[ChaosSlayerZ]

I'm thinking that a classic minimal raid server would allow for soloing. From what I've heard soloing really only becomes impossible after lvl 50 so if the max level is 50 then? I'm going to start playing a rogue so I can understand the issues better. Never played a pure melee before but I can't comprehend how it could be impossible, just kill blues/light blues and bind wounds right?

There are 2 inherited problems with this in original EQ:

1) When Kunark was released, to stop high level players from progressing new content too quickly, the hit points and dps of all 50+ mobs was made MUCH HIGHER than what natural progression should have been. Basically, if we assume that every level from 40 to 50, mobs power increased by say 2% per level, then from 50 to 60, it started rising by like 5% per level. This trend was continued with each next expansion, and specially noticeable in Luclin, PoP and GoD.

So, To make any sort of SMOOTH progression from 1 to whatever your max level is, you need to formulate a new formula for mobs hp and dps.


2) Another inherited problem with base EQ is - "pure melee" classes. These classes suffer from the fact that they have NO REAL ABILITIES, from just activating auto-attack and hitting KICK once in a while. (Warriors are the worst, and Monks slightly better in this regard) The entire core structure from pure melees needs to be re-made from scratch, so player gets some other buttons to push, other than a kick and taunt.

For example in my server plans is to scrap Warrior template completely, and use Paladin/SK as a template base for a new "warrior".
Or, for example, see how EQ2 made their rogues/brigands.


These of course only my own views on the issue ;)

[Maze_EQ]

Why would you scrap warrior when endurance can be used the same as mana?

Make the abilities discs.

You can make a disc cast a buff that doesn't get used by a timer.

There's absolutely no reason to remove any melee classes because "mana" is a problem.

[ChaosSlayerZ]

Why would you scrap warrior when endurance can be used the same as mana?

Make the abilities discs.

You can make a disc cast a buff that doesn't get used by a timer.

There's absolutely no reason to remove any melee classes because "mana" is a problem.

Yes, I know - you can use endurance instead of mana as source of energy.
I agree.
There are however some limitation related to Discs - unlike spells, they are more limited number of "empty slots" for discs (I believe its like 100?), and you can't delete them. Which means you can't give them an increasing progression as with spells (firebolt 1,2,3,4 etc), which leads to - you most likely will have to design them in such way that there are few of them and they improve with level by themselves.

You could probably make an npc or a custom command to reset/delete Discs but this could be another hassle for players.
On other hand, perhaps a warrior/monk/rogue/zerker doesn't really need as many abilities as say - Enchanter. So yeah this could be worked around.

I guess my most significant grief with pure melees is over a Monk - an amazing class in every way, that suffers from WASTED abilities. You get these cool monk skills every 5 levels (round kick, eagle strike, etc), but once you get a new one, previous one gets obsolete, people auto-switch and never go back. I believe they tried to give earlier abilities more value with AAs, but they didn't really worked out.

What would be better if each of these fancy strikes would not just do damage but have a unique perk to it (stun, interrupt, debuff etc) so you wouldn't just press the one that does more damage.

[NostalgiaEQ]

Good insight guys. Thats interesting to know they screwed with the xp system past 50 which was probably the single thing that killed EQ the most, that and constantly adding more zones as the game population was falling. I can see how this made them have to add overpowered mercs to make it possible to progress and whatnot.

I love the idea of stamina bieng melee mana bar. Do abilities like kick and stuff use stamina already? If so it should be easy enough to just add in a few extra abilities and call it a day. I don't see the need to totally revamp it, they just need a basic boost.

[sunbeam]

Good insight guys. Thats interesting to know they screwed with the xp system past 50 which was probably the single thing that killed EQ the most, that and constantly adding more zones as the game population was falling. I can see how this made them have to add overpowered mercs to make it possible to progress and whatnot.

I love the idea of stamina bieng melee mana bar. Do abilities like kick and stuff use stamina already? If so it should be easy enough to just add in a few extra abilities and call it a day. I don't see the need to totally revamp it, they just need a basic boost.

There are already some disciplines in addition to the usual stuff like Mighty Strike that are in the EMU codebase. Verant/Sony tried doing some of this a long time ago (stuff like a "Headbutt" for warriors, and monks got some different toys like lulls).

It is operational on some servers, and not on others. No idea what happened on live with it. They did use the stamina bar though, and I think they were on the same timers as other disciplines.

[ChaosSlayerZ]

To add to this discussion, here is a very interesting article "The Kunark Problem" written years back, by member of Afterlife - one of the top EQ guilds of all time.
It underlines some of the core problem in initial EQ design:

http://www.afterlifeguild.org/Thott/kunark.php

[Darkscis]

To add to this discussion, here is a very interesting article "The Kunark Problem" written years back, by member of Afterlife - one of the top EQ guilds of all time.
It underlines some of the core problem in initial EQ design:

http://www.afterlifeguild.org/Thott/kunark.php

It's an interesting read. Everquest is certainly known for introducing rather suspect mechanics to simulate "content".

The problem I see is that there are multiple different mind sets of players, and you need to know which one you want your server to cater too.

There are some who's attitude is "the game begins at max level". These people don't care what you have done to make the leveling fun and interesting. They don't care about low/mid level custom content. All they care about is your XP modifier and how quickly they can max level and start gearing.

Then there are those who enjoy the journey. They don't care if it takes days to level, provided there is new and engaging content they can explore while doing it. This ties in well with what Thott wrote in the article linked above. If there is content to consume, they don't mind that it takes days to level.

I have seen a lot of servers and devs in particular who only want to focus on end game content. They want to make raids, they want to make "uber" gear, they want to modify max level skills/spells/AA's. There is nothing wrong with this approach at all, but you need to make sure your XP modifier reflects it.

The classic leveling path has been done to death, creating a "live-like" leveling experience without custom content forces people into spending "an eternity" in these old zones which can contribute to the burnout described in the article. While there are plenty of people who enjoy this old content (and there is definitely a lot of it in Classic, let's not forget that!) eventually it gets stale. Doing it over and over on server after server just encourages the "end game starts at max level" mentality.

Personally, I am one of those "enjoy the journey" people. I love working my way through it, but it has definitely become stale to me. I have now done that 1-60 leveling path so many times in Classic->Velious/PoP the only way to make it fresh is to self impose certain challenges. For instance I have to tell myself "no more than 2 levels in each zone" or "in era gear only" or things along those lines to force myself to enjoy it.

This is no fault of the dev's, but is something that many should consider when thinking of designing and releasing their own server. Do you want a complete package where leveling and exploring is part of the fun, or do you want to focus on end game content? You need to adjust and match your XP modifier and the early game to match your vision.

[sunbeam]

Just as an idle thing, I'm not so sure "hell levels" were actually planned for the game from the beginning. The whole concept is kind of weird for anyone to put in if you think about it, as a base design concept.

I started playing before Kunark was out. Not one of the beta players, or very early ones, but pretty early. The Whirl Till You Hurl nerf had already happened (the first level 50's were a couple of Rogues that used that, as you could backstab mobs that had that cast on them originally. Rogues couldn't be invis to undead then, etc. You get the picture.

Anyway I remember doing a lot of reading about the game early on. I believe I read about the game developers being utterly shocked at how quickly people were leveling (they had originally estimated it would take most players a year to make level 50). And guys like Brutal (Brutuul? The FOH guy anyway, had like 2000 hours /played by year two, though I believe he just stayed logged on even when not playing).

My theory is that very early on (like the first few weeks), there was some kind of meeting with graphs and charts about the player base's levels after just a short time. And with the Kunark expansion being down the road a ways (took a year?).

Then the kludge of the hell levels came about.

If any of you guys go back to the very beginning, can you answer that? That is if you somehow made level 50 in the first month or two, you didn't have to go through hell levels?

Could be wrong, but that was always my theory. And the player base coming up with their own ways of doing things like pulling, camping, and kiting was never planned on as well.

[ChaosSlayerZ]

The classic leveling path has been done to death, creating a "live-like" leveling experience without custom content forces people into spending "an eternity" in these old zones which can contribute to the burnout described in the article.


This is exactly whats in my vision for a perfect server - spirit of a long journey, but in all new content from level 1. ;)

[NostalgiaEQ]

To add to this discussion, here is a very interesting article "The Kunark Problem" written years back, by member of Afterlife - one of the top EQ guilds of all time.
It underlines some of the core problem in initial EQ design:

http://www.afterlifeguild.org/Thott/kunark.php

I love stuff like this and agree with many points. Don't quite agree with this though: "The key is avoiding content burnout, by never forcing, or even allowing, a player to continuously play in the same area."

Not everyone is an explorer and some like things they are familiar with and to be the big dog. I think that is great. Having parallel content for the explorers to play in one dungeon one day and another dungeon the next then come back the 3rd day is awesome as well. I think having parallel content is important but allowing people to play in the same place for a long time is also good. I am actually encouraging this by bumping up light blue xp slightly which will also help soloers.

[microlo]

I absolutely loved the kimura server. I wish the old server not the remake could come back. I spent hours and hours on that server playing and never actually beat it. It had mechanics of where you could farm trash for gear, but zone boss to progress to next tier had clever abilities that required 2+ actual people. I no lie would of paid what little money i have to play that again.

[NostalgiaEQ]

I played from the beginning and I didn't get to the hell levels myself but my best friend was in the 40's that summer and we talked alot and he never mentioned anything about harder levels. No one ever mentioned that once my whole time playing. Needless to say I was shocked when I heard about this in p99. It does just seem like something arbitrarily added later and fits perfectly with the project 2001 feel (err I think they still call themselves p1999 erroneously but I digress). I still haven't made up my mind about what I want to do be because looking at the modifiers they aren't horrible, 75% xp for each hell level untill you get well past 50. I am all for things that add excitement and break the monotony but I'mnot sure about this one.

Just as an idle thing, I'm not so sure "hell levels" were actually planned for the game from the beginning. The whole concept is kind of weird for anyone to put in if you think about it, as a base design concept.

I started playing before Kunark was out. Not one of the beta players, or very early ones, but pretty early. The Whirl Till You Hurl nerf had already happened (the first level 50's were a couple of Rogues that used that, as you could backstab mobs that had that cast on them originally. Rogues couldn't be invis to undead then, etc. You get the picture.

Anyway I remember doing a lot of reading about the game early on. I believe I read about the game developers being utterly shocked at how quickly people were leveling (they had originally estimated it would take most players a year to make level 50). And guys like Brutal (Brutuul? The FOH guy anyway, had like 2000 hours /played by year two, though I believe he just stayed logged on even when not playing).

My theory is that very early on (like the first few weeks), there was some kind of meeting with graphs and charts about the player base's levels after just a short time. And with the Kunark expansion being down the road a ways (took a year?).

Then the kludge of the hell levels came about.

If any of you guys go back to the very beginning, can you answer that? That is if you somehow made level 50 in the first month or two, you didn't have to go through hell levels?

Could be wrong, but that was always my theory. And the player base coming up with their own ways of doing things like pulling, camping, and kiting was never planned on as well.

[NostalgiaEQ]

It had mechanics of where you could farm trash for gear

I do like this. One just needs to be careful that they don't encourage high levels to steal low levels mobs but rather incentivize high levels to work with low levels to get what they want by paying low levels for the items for example. Maybe that exterminator quest could be useful...

[gravystain]

I think exp rates are totally up to the type of server. If you make a kunark, velious, or POP server and want to make the exp rates faster for a potentially large group of your player base that likes to get into end game content than it would make sense. If your server doesn't go past the initial release content i cant imagine any reason why you would want to make exp rates faster in any way. Clearly on a server like that your player base is more interested in the journey and if it were me i would hate for it to be over too quickly only to be stuck at a extremely stagnant experience at level 50.

[tdanger84]

hell levels were a way to slow peoples progression down to give Eq more time to release content and space out the player base that was doing high end content. you have mobs with insane spawn times and triggers and whatnot so you don't want the whole server to be at that level simultaneously. in EMU it's more of an annoyance than anything else. A bunch of servers like their exp rates low to make people "focus on the journey" like you guys talked about, but most of us don't want to just play one toon forever. each class is a different experience so I personally like higher experience rates that will allow me to level as many alts as I want. if it takes way too long to level 1 toon then get bored and wont bother to make an alt on that server. once i get bored with the 1 toon I will likely look to another server. it has happened on too many servers that during leveling you hit an exp "wall" at higher level and it takes so long that is more of a chore to play your toon then fun. i can only clear a zone so many times before i stop and ask myself what the point of the grind is. if content is challenging then the rewards should be great.

[ChaosSlayerZ]

I love stuff like this and agree with many points. Don't quite agree with this though: "The key is avoiding content burnout, by never forcing, or even allowing, a player to continuously play in the same area."

Not everyone is an explorer and some like things they are familiar with and to be the big dog. I think that is great. Having parallel content for the explorers to play in one dungeon one day and another dungeon the next then come back the 3rd day is awesome as well. I think having parallel content is important but allowing people to play in the same place for a long time is also good. I am actually encouraging this by bumping up light blue xp slightly which will also help soloers.

There are more article there btw, where he speaks about ideas for hate, taunt,heals, new spells etc.

Also, while I myself do like to stick to certain area for awhile, to camp specific spots/mobsfor xp or loot, its one thing to stick around for a few days, and another to camp the same area for WEEKS.

IMHO, original EQ had problem with content gaps at certain levels. For example there was notorious content gap between level 7 and 13 if you were in Freeport area - the only thing you could do in that range in do Orc Camps for DAYS. Past 15 you could finally move on to Befalen.
If you were in Qeynos side, 5-15 were great in BlackBurrow, but past 15 there literally nothing to do there in entire western antonika. (not counting solo hunting roaming animals)

Another long term camp was in HK basement where people literally lived for weeks for 10 levels or more.
And yes Karnor was notorious for its massive overcrowding, while many other places were half empty.

Overall, I think, world should be balanced. There shouldn't be zone that only good for XP or only good for loot, while lacking the other things. All zones should be good and balanced with progression.
If you have multiple starting zones, then progression path should be developed from each of this points and be at least somewhat unique.
What happened in reality, that no matter where you started, past your teen levels there was mostly a single preferred path that absolute majority of players leaned too, creating overcrowding, and wait lines to get groups, while the rest of world barely had any players in it.

[NostalgiaEQ]

That's true and what I want is for all players to come together and start that path in EC once they make the journey from their starting city then branch out from there. I want to get new players around the "knowlegebase" so they can learn more about the game and hear about the other good places to level from more experenced players. I don't want my new players to be alone in their starting city for very long because I feel I will loose them. I'm talking about real noobs here which I want to attract.

But ya I definitly plan to use hot zone advantage to spread people out when there is overcrowding and make the most desolate zones very relevant.