The Divine Reapers (custom/LEGIT) 99% uptime / 5 server network

[John Adams]

Good show. It is the server itself that draws players, not where it sits in the list of other <locked> servers with 0 players. Provide great content, fair admins and GMs, fun events, and endless encounters that make players feel they are accomplishing something, and your server could be called "Zzzzzz!" and players will still play on it.

Good luck, again.

[techguy84]

Its amazing to see people take this much intrest in thier servers. Most people just slap up something stock using a guide like mine and say "Cool Server Now Open" and its gone in a day cause that person ran it from thier home computer and they shut it down at night to save power. There is no comunication between players and Server OP's, as thier are no websites, and even if thier is a site, its just phpbb2 with 40 boards and 0 threads.

Now this one on the other hand is taking a stong business approach, which is a must if you want a great server. Look at PEQ for example. Great site, great crew, great player base. The only thing that cause this type of server to go down is lack of funding for dedicated boxes and lack of people to help run and maintain the game. So long as your team can afford to keep it going on your own for awhile, you should be fine. Dont go for donations just yet cause it will be more of a pain in the ass then anything else, plus you got to have players trust you and be grateful for what you have put together for them before they will donate.

Looks like a great set up though, but like everyone else says. Its not the <--====Name Here===--> that helps bring in people, its the quality of what is behind the name. Keep your name Normal but advertise and entice people to come to your server. Build a population and you could have "Crap Server" and people will still play on it.

[Breea]

We are hoping to actually bring something to the community not just sit day by day waiting for a fix or leach code =P We are here to help the best way we can, all of our GM's and Developers.

[drakelord]

Interesting server you have here. Couple of small questions though.

A. What's the XP rate set at?
B. What build of the Emu are you running?

[Lalolyen]

We are running the latest build atm. Every time there is a new build we will compile it test it, and if it is working and not many people on, we will stop the server and start the updated/new one.

The exp rate is as close to live as we can get it. We do have level appropriate hot zones also set at the same exp rate as live.

[boogerific]

I wonder how many people here actually know the reason for the slower-than-molasses exp rate on Live? Evidently not too many. For some odd reason, "Live exp" seems to be some sort of standard that should be matched, otherwise gameplay would suffer? Nope. The *only* reason that Live sets their exp rate so low is to make money. You know, the Corporate Mentality thing. Keep the exp grind as slow as tolerable, call it a "gaming experience" and players are willingly duped into thinking that the exp grind is good, making them spend their money by the millions (collectively speaking) just to keep on top of it.

People can have just as rewarding of a gaming experience without having to spend ridiculous amounts of time leveling at Live exp rates.

Ever wonder why Live set AA exp at level 51 equivalency? It's what the market would bear. If they set it their normal rate people would be a lot more reluctant to bother with AA. Less time played, possibility of less people playing, dollars go down.

Tradeskills? Call the goal Accomplishment and a company can make something go as painfully slow as they want. Those people who played on Live before SOE decided to throw the players a bone in the form of the handy-dandy window that calls up recipes and does inventory know how that goes. Picking up each component, putting it in the container and hitting Combine took forever. I can just hear the meeting where they decided to change that. "What? Some players quit tradeskilling over that? Make it easier so we don't lose anymore revenue!!"

And so it goes... lol.

[Lalolyen]

Originally Posted by boogerific

I wonder how many people here actually know the reason for the slower-than-molasses exp rate on Live? Evidently not too many. For some odd reason, "Live exp" seems to be some sort of standard that should be matched, otherwise gameplay would suffer? Nope. The *only* reason that Live sets their exp rate so low is to make money. You know, the Corporate Mentality thing. Keep the exp grind as slow as tolerable, call it a "gaming experience" and players are willingly duped into thinking that the exp grind is good, making them spend their money by the millions (collectively speaking) just to keep on top of it.

The same could be said for just giving people all the available GM commands too .

Actually there is a reason for Live exp, and though its in the ball park you explained, its no where close to your meaning.

Live experience levels is to keep the game progressing at a steady pace while developers are able to keep the end of the treadmill (the end game) developing without heavy demand.

If you wish to question that you can feel free to view my real life resume working in LA as a security annalist of Sony Online Entertainment in the EverQuest development division.

So what does Live EXP really mean? It means unlike you said, you get a little bit of pleasure over a longer period vs one big burst all at once, then get bored off your fourth point of contact when you are "end game", max aa's, max exp and the developers cannot keep up.

So honestly it is my opinion that to keep a server interesting, to keep the population there, equalize the experience rates with the the game's development speed. Again strictly opinion, but in empires such as Verant, SoE, EA Games, etc, they have proven this 5 billion times over with each dollar they have profited as that "time" weight.

But besides all of that, our server is trying to preserve the look, feel, and atmosphere of Live EverQuest without the $'s hanging over their heads and with a little more opportunities available to them.