responding to Kolinahr

[Antai]

[An aside to the forum moderator who thought it necessary to close the thread "whine whine whine" started by Kolinahr. This is the rare case where someone started with an abuse but earned at least my respect by coming back later and by starting to give arguments. I can't see the reason why you closed the thread then.]>>>First off, let me address my use of Fanboi. In my experiences these are people that vehemently defend, against all attacks, a position without any critical thought. <<<I can see you point here, Kolinahr, but you do realize that you immunize yourself against any differing opinion yourself? If someone is not your opinion he becomes very fast a fanboi ... >>>No skill needed - I spoke of button mashers, and I believe this to be true. There is no skill needed any longer, everything is handed to the player. I am sure that for raid mobs there may still be some type of strategy required to take them on, however normal grouping lacks this draw. There is no longer a need for harmony, as now you know exactly how many mobs you will get for each pull. Unless you position your group in a place that is guaranteed to get adds, the whole grind experience becomes a dull rhythm that puts people to sleep. For those that played the first EQ I am sure you can empathize with this analogy. I remember many over pulls that resulted in a dead chanter, an OOM Cleric and a Wizard forced to engage in stun rooting, while the Tank and others performed emergency bind wound, in an effort to keep the tank up just a bit longer in hopes of salvaging the engagement. Or, when another group in a camp next to your gets more than they bargained for, and shouts for help. Your group would move to them and a mass melee would ensue. Regardless of the outcome of either of these scenarios, the experience of the fight was worth its weight in gold on the fun factor scale. Sadly enough EQ2 is lacking this. Hell, in contrast to the engagement platform of EQ2, Fear CRs almost seemed more fun.<<<I agree with you completely. SOE drastically reduced the amount of knowledge and intelligence you need to play compared to eq 1 (was a pal 65 there). EQ2 is mass entertainment, is becoming even more so from patch to patch and having WoW on the market will increase the speed of this development even more. I am not sure that this is a bad development in the long run. We will have different games catering to different audiences. Maybe there are enough players interested in a complex game to make it worthwhile for a company to offer the game. Actually if I look back at EQ1 the most intense memories I have are often related to corpse runs. The easier game is easier to play but neither are the memories so intense nor is the relation to the game so deep. >>>Grouping - Groups just don't stay together, people intent on completing their current quest join up, kill the 3 mobs they need and move on. I understand and conceded that giving and alternate form of level advancement in the form of quests is a unique idea, but it undermines the basis for groups. You stand around waiting to get a group together, head in, and within 10 to 15 mins someone already has to go. ( usually because they completed the part of the quest they needed) This was also prevalent in EQ1, but not as frequent as it is here. I understand that people have real lives and other obligations they must tend to, and under those circumstance I fault no one for the dissolution of a group, however when a feature of the game directly results in poor grouping practices then that is another story. This limits the cohesiveness of the the in Game community as time spent with individual characters is very limited. I still speak with, on a daily basis, people that I met in EQ1 within the first month of it going live. I have been in EQ2 since it's debut and have yet to be given enough time to get to know anyone that well.<<<My experience quite differs from yours. Because many quests require to kill group mobs there is another incentive to group in eq2. Also the group update for killing mobs is a good idea. In eq1 I did most of my quests alone, because I had to wait endless hours for some mob to spawn. I find group finding easier in eq2. But that may be related to my change of class. >>>Boreal [...] just a pet peeve of mine.<<</agree - it is useless. but this spell is not really important. I have more problems with some other problems with spells we really could and should use. like heat stroke with a casting time of 4secs and no elemental mitigation reduction. Shouldnt this be our update of incinerate? and so on. But the SOE is much more reactive nowadays and things get fixed. Many older paladins in eq1 used to say things like in Kunark and Velious we had our dark days then our class was fixed. Imagine a class having serious trouble for more than 1 year and the people stayed because there was no alternative.>>>Latest Patch – IMO the latest Patch removed any ability for adventure classes to make money. That is unless you want to be an Artisan. I personally don’t want to be an Artisan, I didn’t in EQ1, I didn’t in SWG, and I don’t want to be here. SO that leaves me with two options to make money. Selling non-attuned mob dropped items, but lets be honest, if you are in any kind of respectable group, when a Decent item drops, it more than likely will go NBG to a group member, unless you win it and I am sure if the item exceeds any of your current gear you would rather wear it than sell it. This means that you are relegated to selling substandard FFA gear. I would imagine that this would present little extra on hand cash. The second option is not much better. You can mine, forest, and collect in an effort to sell to Artisans. However, most artisans will either mine their own OR have an Adventure alt class that they can mine/forest/ect for them. Thus the end result is; if you wish to succeed you must be a tradeskiller. I cannot imagine why this would make current artisans happy since it will increase the over all availability of active artisans, thus reducing the over all selling prices for items crafted. I understand the idea behind the patch though. It is to create a money sink in order to prevent inflation and market saturation. I honestly don’t have a fix for this, hell, I doubt John Maynard Kanes would understand or have a fix for this game’s economy.<<<I disagree. You do earn money while you are in a group (spells, artisan books, armor, money drops) - even with NBG which isn't too trustworthy in pickup groups anyway. There is also a good market for harvested stuff - many artisans even compain that the harvesters are too greedy. I also hate to attune my stuff because it is like burning money. But I think in the long run it was the only way that trade skills are not only for the rich like in eq1. No, I think they did the right thing and I like how trade skills, harvesting and adventuring interact. If they would only find a way to make trade skills more interesting. At the moment they are so incredibly boring.Thanks for coming back and explaining your reasons.