Good write up Sunbeam!
And I agree with most of it, specially with "people won't come, unless the people are already there", which is a big problem for creating group oriented server.
I think I want to note however - non camping progression works for Baldurs Gates, because BG is a full scale RPG with a big evolving story-line. Moderns MMOS like WoW don't really have that. Yes there usually some central story line which mostly caters to high end raiders, but that's it - most of WoW consists of small time quest chains that go like this : "Investigate Village X - Kill 5 mobs - Investigate Y - kill 10 mobs - Kill local boss - Reward". I can produce those quests chain 20 an hour.
When playing WoW I found myself desperately running around doing these, and getting XP too fast to actually enjoy exploring what is obviously a beautiful scenery. I actually WANT to stay in zone for a WHILE - I want to camp/roam around that beautiful waterfall to spawn that rare named Z and kill it for some sweet random loot. But NO - the quest chain keeps pushing me forward to next location when I barely taking a look at the current one, and a handful of quest steps down the road I am ALREADY leaving the zone for the next.
What I ideally want from EMU server is some sort of middle ground between Hard Core EQ and modern MMO.
EQ was too hardcore and too slow - WoW too casual and too fast.
Crafting in EQ was painful and mostly meaningless with only goal to skill up to do a quest combine.
Crafting in WoW is boringly easy and just based on mats grinds.
EQ2 had perfect crafting system (which they dumbified few years later) that was both REASONABLY challenging AND REWARDING.
What I want from EMu is a server where SOlO exists for ALL classes, but groups/raids also exists, and no bots/boxes are allowed.
This would allow server to be acceptable to casual solo players, and when their number builds up - they could potentially form up pick groups or even guilds to take on harder tasks. It is OK not to make ALL content solo-able - let there be hard encounters that REQUIRE a full group (or hek even 2 for super boss fights) - yes you can't do this solo, so persuade others to join in!
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