With the change to XP, please look at AA leveling [Archive]

Alvane

01-22-2010, 02:34 PM

<cite>CoLD MeTaL wrote:</cite><blockquote>Especially for those of us at level cap BEFORE AA was introduced, the AA grind is an incredible pain. My one character at the AA cap (200) is the last character I rolled because he got credit for all that stuff leveling up.Mentoring is NOT really an answer as mentored stuff is wroth so little.Having over 1000 quests that you didn't get AA for is an 'astonishing' hit to AA.Now let the trollage of the min/maxers begin.</blockquote>Not all quests receive AA. I have a character who was at level cap before AA. I really didn't find it that much of a problem. I used quests that gave AA, ran instances, HQs, L&Ls and collections as well as Disco! Wikia has an AA list. I was at level cap when AA increased to 150. I was at level cap when AA increased to 200. And I am now at level cap (been there since last spring) and SF will increase AA to 250.Each time, I just made sure I did the AA quests, killed AA named MOBs and so on. I don't expect any real difficulty in hitting 90 with 250AA. And while I do mentor to help a friend or two on occasion, it isn't my mainstay. I do not use the Chrono mage neither, nor have done any of those Chrono instances. I even reached 80/200 before the slider was put into operation. But I'll prolly use that for SF 90/250. <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/908627bbe5e9f6a080977db8c365caff.gif" border="0" />Call me a troll, Idc.... you just need to look at a different game plan than what you have been doing ever since AA was introduced. <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/8f7fb9dd46fb8ef86f81154a4feaada9.gif" border="0" />And BTW, AA is set for particular MOBS, HQs, L&Ls, Collections (even lvl 30 collection will give you some AA), and those relics do add up, so don't over look them. If you mentor down to lvl 55 and do all those HQs that are green, blue, white, yellow to you... you have a few AAs from those - because if you move your slider to 100% AAs, you'll get not only the quest AA but also XP turned into AA which gives you an added bonus, that is, if you want to gain AAs at cap level or even while leveling up to 90/250.You can, however, do those same things at grey level and still get the base AA, but you won't get any bonus AA from killing any AA Mobs. The idea is to get your MAX AA from each quest. Try using your slider instead of just thinking "mentor". Use a few other suggestions if you haven't already done so, or increase the numbers.Have you taken a good look at that achievement list SoE provided for your entertainment? They are all based on gaining AAs! So, you can get braggin' rights, a few plushies, and some armor and titles just following that achiement list.I also have a 43 lvl inquis who now has about 70AA; a 60 bruiser with 122AAs, a 63 illy with 86AA, and a 61 warlock with 85AAs. So, once again, think about your game plan, think outside the box, be a bit flexible, then change up a few things and u'll be on your way to collecting the AAs while leveling to 90. <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" />

Banditman

01-22-2010, 03:13 PM

Gray quests reward AA. What's more important to note however is that AA is rewarded in relation to your AA level versus the quest level, not your Adventure level.So, for instance, if you were to (somehow) manage to get to Adventure level 80 with zero AA, and you then completed a Level 80 quest, you'd probably get 2 or 3 AA off just that one quest. Basically, going from AA 1 to AA 2 requires less AA XP than going from AA 189 to AA 190.There are basically two ways to go about getting your AA's maxed if you don't do it on your way to the Adventure level cap:1. Gray quests. I've found that the quests introduced in the EoF or later eras tend to reward more experience. Do everything you can of that particular time period.2. Mentoring. You still do quests, but, by mentoring, you also turn the mobs from gray to colored, thus allowing you to reap additional AA from killing any named mobs you run into along the way, or who may be required by the quest you are doing. Additionally, when mentoring, keep in mind that doing a "natural" mentor of a player gives an additional bonus to AA rewards that you do NOT receive when using the Chronomage.My Shadowknight made it to Level 80 / 200 AA in about 16 days /played. He completed about 1200 quests and killed 800 names. None of the names were TSO era. He was maxed out before he touched any TSO dungeons.All in all, it's really quite fair.

feldon30

01-22-2010, 04:51 PM

CoLD MeTaL

01-22-2010, 04:57 PM

<cite>feldon30 wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>...</cite></blockquote>And if I have done all that and am still below 160AA due to being max level at introduction of AA?

Kendricke

01-22-2010, 05:22 PM

<cite>CoLD MeTaL wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>feldon30 wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>...</cite></blockquote>And if I have done all that and am still below 160AA due to being max level at introduction of AA? </blockquote>As Henry Ford said, "Whether you think you can or think you can't, you're probably right."At some point, we have to take a certain amount of responsibility for own own playstyles. I average about 55-60 hours a week through half of my year and it ramps up to 80+ hours a week for a few months. I barely played any games at all from May through October last year and yet even I've managed to near the 200 barrier on my primary and level up a third level 80 (well, he's almost there). You say you've "done all that". With respect, I'm going to disagree with you. If you truly had "done all that", you'd have more than 160AA. You're looking for excuses. You're looking for an excuse based on the fact that you were level 60 already in February 2006...some FOUR YEARS ago. Why February of 2006? Because that's when AA came about with the release of Kingdom of Sky. There have been THOUSANDS of quests and named targets released since February 2006. There have been HUNDREDS of discovery points. There are HUNDREDS of collections that have been added in. There have been DOZENS of holiday events and limited quests. For over two years, you've been able to gain a bonus in AA for mentoring. For the last several months, you've had access to an AA slider. When you say you've "done all that", I start wondering what you actually mean. Because to truly have "done all that", you'd be at 200AA. As I said, at some point we have to take responsibility for ourselves. If AA are important to you, you'll find a way. If not, don't look for excuses...because the problem isn't in the system.

Jardon

01-22-2010, 05:46 PM

When TSO came out my guardian (created before AA) was at 80 with 140AA and had completed well over 3000 collections and quests.I had no problem getting to 200 by completeing the new TSO quests and collections, running shard instanaces, running the groob and tupta daily quests, doing the chronomancers quests, and the crafting quests. I also used the chronmancer to mentor down and went back and killed as many named as I could find that still had the white star by their name (indicating I had never killed them when I could get AA).I have been at 200 for a while now, and I still run across many named mobs that have the star by their name, because I have not killed them and recieved the AA because I was at cap last time I killed them.I am currently number 2 in quests completed on AB and in the top 100 on all servers, and I don't really anticipate a problem getting to the next level and AA cap.

urgthock

01-22-2010, 05:49 PM

<cite>feldon30 wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>CoLD MeTaL wrote:</cite><blockquote>Especially for those of us at level cap BEFORE AA was introduced, the AA grind is an incredible pain. My one character at the AA cap (200) is the last character I rolled because he got credit for all that stuff leveling up.Mentoring is NOT really an answer as mentored stuff is wroth so little.Having over 1000 quests that you didn't get AA for is an 'astonishing' hit to AA.Now let the trollage of the min/maxers begin.</blockquote>I would have agreed with your post last July. However a ton of changes have been made since then which really render your argument moot. Once again, your posts lack credibility and rarely reflect reality.We have gained the AA slider which lets you earn mountains of AA by running old dungeons.We have gained the Chronomages, which encourage players to mentor down and kill names for house trophies. Chronomages also allow you to mentor down without the aid of a group to any level you want, so that you can solo heroic content and earn mountains of AA solo.Last summer, Rothgar adjusted nearly every non-instanced Named Encounter throughout the game, removing placeholders, adjusting spawn timers, adjusting loot, and downtiering mobs.And in the last year and a half, we have gained a significant amount of new quests including the Order of Rime quests, the Shard of Love quests, all of the Live Event quests like Frostfell, Nights of the Dead, Tinkerfest.This is not to mention the revamped Everfrost which has enough quests to earn 3-4 AAs (I run every toon through there, even if I have to mentor).People often forget just how much AA can be earned by mentoring down and running the noob quests in Darklight Wood and Timorous Deep from 10-20. I earned about 10 AAs from those alone.I would suggest doing Shard Runs as they reward 12-18% AA, but I don't know how many groups you get.</blockquote>Most of what you have suggested here does not reward much AA experience post 165(ish) AA. I am speaking from experience, having run multiple toons (mentored) back through HQ's I had missed, numerous zone quests I had missed and named killing sprees in various zones I had missed, all post 165 AA. I think the most I got on one toon total was in the neighborhood of 8 or 9 AA points from doing things like you described above. Clearly far from the "mountains" of AA you are claiming. What I found most disheartening of all was the 15 hours or so over 4 or 5 nights I spent taking my monk through all of the old HQ's (20 or so) I had not yet completed and in the end being rewarded with a big fat whopping total of 1.5 AA points. My 15 hours would have been much better spent running grey shard zones for AA instead. Also, I fail to see how the AA slider has any bearing on this discussion at all. If you are level 80 (as all my toons are as well as the poster who you responded to), we have had the "benefit" of the slider all along. The mechanic only make a difference on characters under max level and again, far from "mountains" of AA. Find a toon who already has 165+ AA and go slaughter mobs using the slider you seem to have so much faith in and see how much AA you gain per hour from wholesale slaughter while mentored to a low enough level where you can actually engage in wholesale slaughter. Sorry, but I wholeheartedly support adjusting the AA exp curve to enable one to reach 200 AA faster. Please note, I am not advocating that they increase the speed with which one reaches the current AA cap. I am advocating they increase the speed with which one reaches the previous expansions AA cap. Since in 3 and a half short weeks, TSO will be the "previous expansion", that is why I stated 200 AA. This would be particularly helpful for new toons or alts or even those toons yet to be made by new players yet to start playing. Essentially I am asking for the devs to do the same thing they did to regular exp for AA exp and for the exact same reasons. To get new players or alts closer to the end game caps faster.

Kendricke

01-22-2010, 06:05 PM

<cite>urgthock wrote:</cite><blockquote>Most of what you have suggested here does not reward much AA experience post 165(ish) AA. I am speaking from experience...</blockquote>I gained 5 AA in a single afternoon a couple of months back (from 186-191) as part of a guild mentoring group which had formed up to help mentor a guildmate. We spent most of our time flat out speed grinding through Runnyeye, Cazic Thule, and Permafrost.

avow

01-22-2010, 06:15 PM

I did about 1,000 low level, non repeatable, quest BEFORE A.A. was introduced on my level 80 conj. i am just a handful of quests away from completing 2,000 non repeatible quests. I have run out of quests that i con do myself other than the repeatable ones that also give faction, which i am doing. At 191 a.a. it is taking 50 plus hours to get one a.a. just doing mind numbing repeatables. I wish there was some way to ger retroactive a.a. for all those quests I did. heh heh. Meanwhile i am hoping soe will soon allow us to buy level up potions, a.a. up potions, or augments or super ex/a.a. potions that help us get 10 times normal exp. Here's hoping.

Yimway

01-22-2010, 06:17 PM

<cite>Kendricke wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>urgthock wrote:</cite><blockquote>Most of what you have suggested here does not reward much AA experience post 165(ish) AA. I am speaking from experience...</blockquote>I gained 5 AA in a single afternoon a couple of months back (from 186-191) as part of a guild mentoring group which had formed up to help mentor a guildmate. We spent most of our time flat out speed grinding through Runnyeye, Cazic Thule, and Permafrost.</blockquote>I've seen similar results many times over.I've gone from multiple toons at 80/140 when tso came out to 80/200 now.On one it was 99% doing misions.On 3, it was nothing but doing all the soloquest content added.On one it was doing nothing but killing named npcs via mentoring.There are many ways to do it now, and I just can't empathize with the OP, or see rationally how what he claims can be true.Not when I've done it many times over with toons that were max level before AA was introduced.

CoLD MeTaL

01-22-2010, 06:25 PM

<cite>Kendricke wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>urgthock wrote:</cite><blockquote>Most of what you have suggested here does not reward much AA experience post 165(ish) AA. I am speaking from experience...</blockquote>I gained 5 AA in a single afternoon a couple of months back (from 186-191) as part of a guild mentoring group which had formed up to help mentor a guildmate. We spent most of our time flat out speed grinding through Runnyeye, Cazic Thule, and Permafrost.</blockquote>And I recently ran those three zones mentored killing every named in all three places and got less than 2. I have never seen an answer, to whether you get more AA from a mob yellow or green, but I bet you ran it with the mobs yellow, and I ran it with the mobs 'very' green. Maybe that does matter. I can't find groups on my server so I tend to find things I can do on my own which menas green. To my knowledge a red name has never said one way or the other.

urgthock

01-22-2010, 06:28 PM

<cite>Kendricke wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>urgthock wrote:</cite><blockquote>Most of what you have suggested here does not reward much AA experience post 165(ish) AA. I am speaking from experience...</blockquote>I gained 5 AA in a single afternoon a couple of months back (from 186-191) as part of a guild mentoring group which had formed up to help mentor a guildmate. We spent most of our time flat out speed grinding through Runnyeye, Cazic Thule, and Permafrost.</blockquote>I can admit that it may (since you claim it to be so) be possible to do in a raid geared super guild group. Far less return on time invested while solo though. And it is hard for me to get people willing to do just that (even in guild) on my server, so solo is about all that is available for things of that nature. I play on Oasis and (regardless of claims by Davionx) it is a very very low populated server.

Kendricke

01-22-2010, 06:36 PM

<cite>urgthock wrote:</cite><blockquote>I can admit that it may (since you claim it to be so) be possible to do in a raid geared super guild group.</blockquote>Why does it automatically have to be a "raid geared super guild group"? Honestly, those are Tier 5 zones ...with AA points already (which didn't exist in Tier 5)...and we were mentored (which automatically makes one overpowered)...in relatively easy zones. We weren't running Spirts of the Lost. We were running regular, vanilla Cazic Thule. We weren't going out of our way to look for quests. We were grabbing any that we could, but generally we were just plowing through in a good old fashioned grind group (like every other group in old Everquest was). You don't need to be some amazing superhero to mentor through old content. You dont' need Tier 4 set bonuses to handle Tier 5, 6, or even 7 zones. You don't need incredible powers of persuasion to put together groups of 3-6 people to help out a guildmate. Find a reason. Find a way. Get it done. <cite>urgthock wrote:</cite><blockquote>I play on Oasis and (regardless of claims by Davionx) it is a very very low populated server.</blockquote>I play on Guk. Any other excuses? I don't mean to sound condescending. I'm not trying to be. However, I'm a goal oriented individual. I have to be or else I'd never get anything done with the limited time I have available to me most weeks. This doesn't make me hardcore or uber in any way (and most of the players who know me would laugh to hear either phrase applied to me). What I mean is that I set goals for myself when I log in and do what I can to accomplish one of those goals.There's nothing stopping you from doing the same...except yourself. I don't mean to say that everything is super easy peasy al the time. I have to work to find groups. I have to get a bit aggressive when forming up groups in my guild on some nights. If there aren't any tanks around, I start hitting channels and friends lists. However, I don't make excuses. I find solutions. Every problem I've seen here related to AA gain aren't related to the system (though I'm sure no one would really complain if they adjusted the curve overall), but are rather player generated excuses. I can understand that, actually. No one wants to be told "learn to play" and anytime a player like me comes in talking about how we can gain 5 AA in an afternoon, it might sound like what we're really saying is "I'm better than you" or "you need to learn to play". It feels like an attack and it can put you on edge, so now you're finding reasons (read: excuses) to rationalize how you actually do know how to play but that the odds are stacked against you. Either it's your guild, your class, your server, no one's on when you're on, you don't have raid gear, you don't have your mythical, you can't find the right classes to form a group, or whatever...Those aren't reasons. Those are excuses. Recognize this and find a way around them. Find a way through them. Adapt and overcome. Find a way. Get it done.

Geothe

01-22-2010, 06:36 PM

<cite>avow wrote:</cite><blockquote>I did about 1,000 low level, non repeatable, quest BEFORE A.A. was introduced on my level 80 conj.</blockquote>Wow. you must have put in an aweful lot of effort to pull that off being as AA was introduced with KoS when the level cap went from 60 to 70. Heh.

Yimway

01-22-2010, 06:40 PM

<cite>CoLD MeTaL wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Kendricke wrote:</cite><blockquote>I gained 5 AA in a single afternoon a couple of months back (from 186-191) as part of a guild mentoring group which had formed up to help mentor a guildmate. We spent most of our time flat out speed grinding through Runnyeye, Cazic Thule, and Permafrost.</blockquote>And I recently ran those three zones mentored killing every named in all three places and got less than 2. I have never seen an answer, to whether you get more AA from a mob yellow or green, but I bet you ran it with the mobs yellow, and I ran it with the mobs 'very' green. Maybe that does matter. I can't find groups on my server so I tend to find things I can do on my own which menas green. To my knowledge a red name has never said one way or the other.</blockquote>Did you do it in a group killing fast and also getting the conversion xp?Or did you really just get named aa only?There are however enough nameds in the game to get 200aa with completing almost no quests. Hunting them all down just isn't trivial.Looking at my current main, I've only completed 1002 quests total, and quite a few of them were before AA entered the game, yet I'm sitting at 200 AA.

CoLD MeTaL

01-22-2010, 07:03 PM

<cite>Atan@Unrest wrote:</cite><blockquote>Did you do it in a group killing fast and also getting the conversion xp?Or did you really just get named aa only?There are however enough nameds in the game to get 200aa with completing almost no quests. Hunting them all down just isn't trivial.Looking at my current main, I've only completed 1002 quests total, and quite a few of them were before AA entered the game, yet I'm sitting at 200 AA.</blockquote>Mainly though the difference is probably that you killed 'raid' mobs which give a very disproportiante amount of AA sometimes 1 mob being worth half a level.And I have almost 1200 quests done and less than 160 AA.Yes, I know. min/maxers have no problem getting AA.

Yimway

01-22-2010, 07:11 PM

<cite>CoLD MeTaL wrote:</cite><blockquote>Mainly though the difference is probably that you killed 'raid' mobs which give a very disproportiante amount of AA sometimes 1 mob being worth half a level.And I have almost 1400 quests done and less than 160 AA.Yes, I know. min/maxers have no problem getting AA.</blockquote>The only raidmobs I've seen give higher aa amounts are the expansion bosses. And of those I've only killed 3. Between the 3 of them, yes that was around one whole AA, but they were deaded before TSO came out and part of the 80/140.The vast majority of the AA earned from 140-200 has been from the roughly 400 Soloquests I've done since TSO came out, and doing missions. I doubt the raid mobs I've killed since they equated to more than 2-3 of the 60 AA.Before the changes to mission AA, I was also well behind the curve.

urgthock

01-22-2010, 07:27 PM

<cite>Kendricke wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>urgthock wrote:</cite><blockquote>I can admit that it may (since you claim it to be so) be possible to do in a raid geared super guild group.</blockquote>Why does it automatically have to be a "raid geared super guild group"? Honestly, those are Tier 5 zones ...with AA points already (which didn't exist in Tier 5)...and we were mentored (which automatically makes one overpowered)...in relatively easy zones. We weren't running Spirts of the Lost. We were running regular, vanilla Cazic Thule. We weren't going out of our way to look for quests. We were grabbing any that we could, but generally we were just plowing through in a good old fashioned grind group (like every other group in old Everquest was). You don't need to be some amazing superhero to mentor through old content. You dont' need Tier 4 set bonuses to handle Tier 5, 6, or even 7 zones. You don't need incredible powers of persuasion to put together groups of 3-6 people to help out a guildmate. </blockquote>Yes... I know. But doing it solo as opposed to in a group is much much much faster. I never stated that being in a raid geared super guild group was inherently necessary or automatic, although let's both be honest... you were. If it walks like a duck, talks like a duck and... yea; it's a duck.In a group there is no downtime waiting on power, no downtime waiting on anything, massive DPS etc. etc. etc (raid geared super guild group or not). Furthermore, as you stated you weren't killing raid mobs and gaining AA from named kills or running through quests; this was a pure slaughterfest. In the particular situation that you yourself described with the people that were in your group, it was and will always be significantly faster than the average run of the mill level 80 mentored down to the same level while solo. Surely a player of your caliber recognizes this and no further explanation is needed.<cite>Kendricke wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>urgthock wrote:</cite><blockquote>I play on Oasis and (regardless of claims by Davionx) it is a very very low populated server.</blockquote>I play on Guk. Any other excuses? I don't mean to sound condescending. I'm not trying to be.</blockquote>You and I both know you are. It's ok... I don't expect you to suddenly gush out "Shucks... you got me. I was being condescending wasn't I?" Like you said no one responds well to hearing bad things about themselves and I don't expect this situation to be any different.Kendricke wrote:<blockquote>What I mean is that I set goals for myself when I log in and do what I can to accomplish one of those goals.There's nothing stopping you from doing the same...except yourself. I don't mean to say that everything is super easy peasy al the time. I have to work to find groups. I have to get a bit aggressive when forming up groups in my guild on some nights. If there aren't any tanks around, I start hitting channels and friends lists. However, I don't make excuses. I find solutions.Every problem I've seen here related to AA gain aren't related to the system (though I'm sure no one would really complain if they adjusted the curve overall), but are rather player generated excuses. I can understand that, actually. No one wants to be told "learn to play" and anytime a player like me comes in talking about how we can gain 5 AA in an afternoon, it might sound like what we're really saying is "I'm better than you" or "you need to learn to play". It feels like an attack and it can put you on edge, so now you're finding reasons (read: excuses) to rationalize how you actually do know how to play but that the odds are stacked against you. Either it's your guild, your class, your server, no one's on when you're on, you don't have raid gear, you don't have your mythical, you can't find the right classes to form a group, or whatever...Those aren't reasons. Those are excuses. Recognize this and find a way around them. Find a way through them. Adapt and overcome. Find a way. Get it done. </blockquote>You have your way and I have mine (nah, you aren't being condescending much huh?) If I can't cajole friends or guildmembers to do something, I hit the LFG channels and/or try to form up my own group with any of my 7 level 80's. If I spend more than 30 minutes without being able to find and/or build a group, I either log off or go do something solo. And by the way, those are not excuses, they are root causes. Any reasonable person would understand the difference. Since I don't believe you to be a reasonable person able to understand other people's situations, I fully expect another "Tony Robbins you can do it if you're as good as me" speech to follow.

Ahlana

01-22-2010, 07:29 PM

<cite>CoLD MeTaL wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Atan@Unrest wrote:</cite><blockquote>Did you do it in a group killing fast and also getting the conversion xp?Or did you really just get named aa only?There are however enough nameds in the game to get 200aa with completing almost no quests. Hunting them all down just isn't trivial.Looking at my current main, I've only completed 1002 quests total, and quite a few of them were before AA entered the game, yet I'm sitting at 200 AA.</blockquote>Mainly though the difference is probably that you killed 'raid' mobs which give a very disproportiante amount of AA sometimes 1 mob being worth half a level.And I have almost 1400 quests done and less than 160 AA.Yes, I know. min/maxers have no problem getting AA.</blockquote>I am not a minmaxer and was around before AA was introduced.. I found myself in a similiar boat in RoK where at the end I was not near the 140 mark... come TSO and the last 15months or so both my chars now sit at 80/200AA.. with the chronomage and the TSO dungeons (that you can scale yourself now btw), and all the free content and quest added throughout the year... it was easy to catchup to everyone else.No offense Cold... but if I can do it... well you just are not trying because I hate quest.. I loathe them and I hate the part of my wife that loves them. So If I of all people can bite down and chew my way through to max when being behind at the beginning.. anyone can (and no I do not raid either, I like top end group content, that is my prefered playstyle).

Jesdyr

01-22-2010, 07:43 PM

One easy fix to the AA leveling speed at cap is to allow vitality to still be consumed at level 80 for the purpose of XP conversion to AA (this would mean (alomst)2x the AA for kills at lvl 80). by far the fastest way to get AA is using RAF and mentoring down to mass pull low level zones heroic zones (Zerk or SK works best). If you do this before 80 with your AA slider set to 100% it will take no time to get to 200 AA.

Qandor

01-22-2010, 09:43 PM

Have a conjuror created in 2009 who has never grouped, so obviously never raided or done any TSO instances and even he has 195 AA currently. It is incredibly easy to gain AA now. I really do not see what the problem is.

graciaso

01-23-2010, 04:00 PM

<cite>urgthock wrote:</cite><blockquote>Yes... I know. But doing it solo as opposed to in a group is much much much faster. I never stated that being in a raid geared super guild group was inherently necessary or automatic, although let's both be honest... you were. If it walks like a duck, talks like a duck and... yea; it's a duck.In a group there is no downtime waiting on power, no downtime waiting on anything, massive DPS etc. etc. etc (raid geared super guild group or not). Furthermore, as you stated you weren't killing raid mobs and gaining AA from named kills or running through quests; this was a pure slaughterfest. In the particular situation that you yourself described with the people that were in your group, it was and will always be significantly faster than the average run of the mill level 80 mentored down to the same level while solo. Surely a player of your caliber recognizes this and no further explanation is needed.You and I both know you are. It's ok... I don't expect you to suddenly gush out "Shucks... you got me. I was being condescending wasn't I?" Like you said no one responds well to hearing bad things about themselves and I don't expect this situation to be any different.You have your way and I have mine (nah, you aren't being condescending much huh?) If I can't cajole friends or guildmembers to do something, I hit the LFG channels and/or try to form up my own group with any of my 7 level 80's. If I spend more than 30 minutes without being able to find and/or build a group, I either log off or go do something solo. And by the way, those are not excuses, they are root causes. Any reasonable person would understand the difference. Since I don't believe you to be a reasonable person able to understand other people's situations, I fully expect another "Tony Robbins you can do it if you're as good as me" speech to follow.</blockquote>Very well said, you sir/mam would be a lively debate.It must also be mentioned that the leveling curve is even more daunting for a new or returning player. EQ2 is an immense game and must be respected as such. I'm sure after years of consistently playing the game Norrath may seem a bit smaller, but imagine entering the game in its current state. New players have few friends (if any) and even less experience. Surely, you vets can empathize with inexperiened players.

Alvane

01-23-2010, 06:17 PM

<cite>CoLD MeTaL wrote:</cite><blockquote>And if I have done all that and am still below 160AA due to being max level at introduction of AA? </blockquote>ROFL... there are well over 1,919 plus quests that give AA --- In all probablity, a lot of the quests you have done, did not give AA.There are over 1800 Discovery points that give AA But not all Disco gives AA....There are 40 L&L that give AAThere are 38 HQs and subs that give AAThere are 13 signature quests that involve 153 subquests - all giving AAThat doesn't exclude farming for MOBs that give AA including over 2,400 NamesThen there are mission AAs, live event AAs, diety AAsNow, if you did all that and are still below 160AA, I would suggest you need to really look at what you are doing; that perhaps you are doing quests and killing MOBs that do not give AA.Or perhaps, you may need to move your slider to 100% AAs instead of 0%

Kendricke

01-23-2010, 06:27 PM

<cite>urgthock wrote:</cite><blockquote>I never stated that being in a raid geared super guild group was inherently necessary or automatic, although let's both be honest... you were.</blockquote>I've gained AA duoing with a side account to help out a guildmate (and myself) at the same time by clearing out the dark elf camps in Lesser Faydark over and over. I've gained AA by just hitting up the broker and dropping 20-40pp or so on collections. I've gained AA by using the new veteran reward to bring low level characters into high level zones for discovery. I've used guild strategist flags for the same purpose. Sure, I've been in groups that had raid geared characters and I've also been in groups which were filled with alts of alts. Assume for a moment that you're absolutely right about me with every opinion you've stated (I could spend time pointing out how your assumptions are wrong, but that would be irrelevant to the overall point anyway). For the sake of argument, let's just assume you're right. Assume for a moment that I'm the absolute pinnacle of Everquest II skill and that my massive guild of superstar raiders are just sitting around waiting for an executive order so they can muster forth and start powerlevelling low level characters. During that time, I managed to pick up 5 AA just from mentoring. You concentrated on that and bypassed the real point:If a "raid geared supergroup" is able to pick up 5 AA from an afternoon of mentoring (and frankly, a true supergroup should be pulling in nearly twice that), then even the most lackadaisical, casual minded group of 3-4 players should still be able to pick up at least couple of AA in the same time frame. So what if you don't pull in 5 AA in an afternoon...isn't 1-3 AA in an hour or so an acceptable rate or return? Even soloing, I can pull an AA a day through questing/chronomagic daily missions/Shard of Love, etc.But even if I couldn't...why is that bad? Why SHOULD soloing pull in fast returns at high levels? Soloing is already the path of least resistance - you don't have to bother finding a group, you don't have to worry about bad groupmates, you don't have to worry about keeping up or throttling down to match the group's capabilities, you don't have to worry about when to take AFKs or whether or not groupmates are taking AFKs, you don't have to worry about sharing loot. Soloing is already the least hassling path to take, so why should it give significant rewards on par with group rewards?

Alvane

01-23-2010, 06:27 PM

<cite>urgthock wrote:</cite><blockquote>Most of what you have suggested here does not reward much AA experience post 165(ish) AA. I am speaking from experience, having run multiple toons (mentored) back through HQ's I had missed, numerous zone quests I had missed and named killing sprees in various zones I had missed, all post 165 AA. I think the most I got on one toon total was in the neighborhood of 8 or 9 AA points from doing things like you described above. Clearly far from the "mountains" of AA you are claiming. What I found most disheartening of all was the 15 hours or so over 4 or 5 nights I spent taking my monk through all of the old HQ's (20 or so) I had not yet completed and in the end being rewarded with a big fat whopping total of 1.5 AA points. My 15 hours would have been much better spent running grey shard zones for AA instead. Also, I fail to see how the AA slider has any bearing on this discussion at all. If you are level 80 (as all my toons are as well as the poster who you responded to), we have had the "benefit" of the slider all along. The mechanic only make a difference on characters under max level and again, far from "mountains" of AA. Find a toon who already has 165+ AA and go slaughter mobs using the slider you seem to have so much faith in and see how much AA you gain per hour from wholesale slaughter while mentored to a low enough level where you can actually engage in wholesale slaughter. Sorry, but I wholeheartedly support adjusting the AA exp curve to enable one to reach 200 AA faster. Please note, I am not advocating that they increase the speed with which one reaches the current AA cap. I am advocating they increase the speed with which one reaches the previous expansions AA cap. Since in 3 and a half short weeks, TSO will be the "previous expansion", that is why I stated 200 AA. This would be particularly helpful for new toons or alts or even those toons yet to be made by new players yet to start playing. Essentially I am asking for the devs to do the same thing they did to regular exp for AA exp and for the exact same reasons. To get new players or alts closer to the end game caps faster.</blockquote>If you did 20 HQs and only received 1.5AA points, you did them gray or you miscalculated because HQs give better AA than that.The AA slider dictates how much XP is converted into AA. If you are level 75 and set your slider to 0, then NONE of your XP will be converted to AA. If you are level 75 and you set your slider to 100%, then ALL of your XP will be converted to AA except any quest, collection, etc turn -ins. If you are lvl 80, then all your XP adventure will be converted to AA. If you are level 80 and 200 AA, nothing gets converted because you are capped.

Kizee

01-24-2010, 01:34 PM

Wullail

01-24-2010, 02:57 PM

Go to the older (Tier 2) zones and do EVERY grey quest , each gives between 1-3% of an AP...at 80 you can grind out massive amounts of quests in 1 day , in some zones thats 1.5 AP easilly in a few hours.

Finora

01-24-2010, 03:59 PM

<cite>CoLD MeTaL wrote:</cite><blockquote>Especially for those of us at level cap BEFORE AA was introduced, the AA grind is an incredible pain. My one character at the AA cap (200) is the last character I rolled because he got credit for all that stuff leveling up.Mentoring is NOT really an answer as mentored stuff is wroth so little.Having over 1000 quests that you didn't get AA for is an 'astonishing' hit to AA.Now let the trollage of the min/maxers begin.</blockquote>I was at level cap before aa's were introduced. I managed to max the first set out with ease doing the new content introduced with KOS. I was at aa & level cap before EOF came out for quite some time. I managed to reach level and aa cap without any issues with that expansion as well. Same with ROK. With ROK it was remarkably easy due to the huge numbers of quests one did as progression through the zones. I hit max with quite a lot of quests still in my quest book. With TSO I've not been very actively playing and I've still managed to get to 190 aa without having to 'grind' it anywhere. If I'd actively adventured more I would have easily gotten that last 10 points long ago.I'm not a min maxer. I am not much of a raider. I rarely even group anymore due to time constraints. I do quests and mentor either friends to help them out or hit the chronomancer and run through old areas (like Stormhold) that I hadn't been too really since AA was introduced. I've barely scratched the surface of TSO quests because I didn't really care much for that expansion. I do the live events religiously because I adore fluff items. Just running through the moonlight mushroom ring quests can net a fair amount of aa even at 190ish. Doing all five of those doesn't take that long at all, even if you are running them on an unguilded low level character. Time spent doing those is pretty trivial for anyone with a guild hall available who's bothered to get the shrubs from the druid rings and knows how to use the wizard spires. Not to mention that can net you the aa xp from 5 more level 80 collection quests.There is no real reason you can't hit 200 aas with an old character without having to sit somewhere and grind mobs for the aa you get converted from combat xp.

Rokaab

01-24-2010, 07:25 PM

Alvane

01-25-2010, 12:52 PM

<cite>CoLD MeTaL wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Kendricke wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>urgthock wrote:</cite><blockquote>Most of what you have suggested here does not reward much AA experience post 165(ish) AA. I am speaking from experience...</blockquote>I gained 5 AA in a single afternoon a couple of months back (from 186-191) as part of a guild mentoring group which had formed up to help mentor a guildmate. We spent most of our time flat out speed grinding through Runnyeye, Cazic Thule, and Permafrost.</blockquote>And I recently ran those three zones mentored killing every named in all three places and got less than 2. I have never seen an answer, to whether you get more AA from a mob yellow or green, but I bet you ran it with the mobs yellow, and I ran it with the mobs 'very' green. Maybe that does matter. I can't find groups on my server so I tend to find things I can do on my own which menas green. To my knowledge a red name has never said one way or the other.</blockquote>I just got 2 AAs on 2 of my characters running the tradeskill epic (RoK). It kinda surprised me because I wasn't expecting that. The characters were levels 60 and 61. My lvl 43 now has 89 AAs, my lvl 60 has 123AAs and my lvl 61 has 87AAs. They still need to do KoS, LP, RoK, TSO and my lvl 43 hasn't started DoF yet - so I think there should be no problems in them getting to 200 and then some (with xpac SF release) well before they even get to SF.As to AA from yellow, green, blue or white or even red MOBs - they are all the same per level. The AAs are purdy much standard. You get X amount of AA from killing any MOB that is designated with AA. Same with a quest that is AA designated, only with a AA quest, you can do it grey such as an HQ. However, you do not earn any AA from killing a grey MOB designated AA such as a named.What changes is the XP. You get more XP from a red MOB than a green MOB. You get more XP from a yellow MOB than a blue. You get more XP from a white MOB than a blue, etc. You do not earn any XP from any grey MOB. The AA is not related to the XP.Now, add in your slider bar. If you have the slider bar set to say 100%AA, if you kill a white MOB, all your XP will be turned into AAs. If you have your slider bar set to 0%AA, then none of you XP will be converted to AA.AA acts separately from XP, but in identical format. If your adventure level is 80 and your AAs are 0, then the first AA designated quest you do will net you maybe 1-2AAs. However the higher amount of AA you have, you will need more AA quests and other designated AA MOBs you need to kill or complete. So if you have 140AAs, you will need a number of AA designated quests/MOBs to achieve 141AA.It is identical with XP. At adventure level 1, if you complete one quest, you will level up to 2. At adventure level 70 you'll need a lot more than 1 quest or other XP designated accomplishments to get to 71 - even if your AA is 0 or 200.IMHO, if you are killing green MOBs for AA, and wish more AA, simply move your slider bar to 100% AA. You will not get any XP, but you will get additional AA besides the standard AA you get for killing a designated MOB that is green or better. If you kill that same mob where it is white, you'll earn even more AA on the conversion if and only if you have your slider set to 100% AA. Once again, all your XP will be converted to AA under those circumstances.

CoLD MeTaL

01-25-2010, 01:13 PM

<cite>Eldra@Unrest wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>...</cite></blockquote>My characters were at max level "80" before the slider bar was introduced, at 80 it goes automatically to 100% AA.Edit: most of the rgulars have chimed in and don't like the idea. No big deal. I think AA is too slow, they probably won't do anything about it now. oh well.

GoldSpider

01-25-2010, 01:19 PM

<cite>feldon30 wrote:</cite><blockquote>We have gained the Chronomages, which encourage players to mentor down and kill names for house trophies. Chronomages also allow you to mentor down without the aid of a group to any level you want, so that you can solo heroic content and earn mountains of AA solo.</blockquote>That alone might be enough to get me to re-play my SK. How does that work, though, on PvP server? If I recall correctly, mentored players are defenseless in PvP.

Kendricke

01-25-2010, 04:39 PM

<cite>CoLD MeTaL wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Eldra@Unrest wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>...</cite></blockquote>My characters were at max level "80" before the slider bar was introduced, at 80 it goes automatically to 100% AA.</blockquote>Then mentor down and go kill yellow heroics.

CoLD MeTaL

01-25-2010, 04:53 PM

<cite>Kendricke wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>CoLD MeTaL wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Eldra@Unrest wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>...</cite></blockquote>My characters were at max level "80" before the slider bar was introduced, at 80 it goes automatically to 100% AA.</blockquote>Then mentor down and go kill yellow heroics.</blockquote>I have been, ad nauseum. Grey shards are actually the fastest way to AA, but you can only do that for so long. I do agree it is my choice to have several characters (1 is max AA) and a lack of willingness to do access quests for Poet's Palace for instance does restrict some AA.The bottom line is I feel cheated for not getting the AA for all the things (non repeatable) I did before they added the mechanic. Does that bother you or anyone else, of course not. Anyway I put it out there, if they don't feel like enough people are in the right spot in AA they will makes some alterations, otherwise it will stay. Later they will lower requiremetns as they did with this adv xp. I know why they did that, because people would have had so much to start with, and the way they did made people come and grind more. but after a while its' just 'meh' to me. that is a lame way to do things.

Kendricke

01-26-2010, 12:05 AM

<cite>CoLD MeTaL wrote:</cite><blockquote>The bottom line is I feel cheated for not getting the AA for all the things (non repeatable) I did before they added the mechanic. </blockquote>The level cap was raised to level 60 in September 2005 with the release of Desert of Flames. AA were introduced in February 2006 with the release of Kingdom of Sky (which also raised the level cap to 70 and introduced a hojillion new quests and named). Since then, there have been four major releases and dozens of live events. At some point, you have to ask yourself if the problems you're experiencing are the games or your own? In this case, I'd argue that it's the latter. You're not even upset about rewards you missed out on during your gameplay, but rather rewards you missed out on which were implemented after the fact that you didn't get.Congratulations. Now you know how every crafter felt who levelled to cap prior to Update 24. You understand how every raider who flagged for Veeshan's Peak felt before they removed the requirement to have both Overking AND Venril killed. You know the frustration that every player who had to level up to 255 Blacksmithing felt the day they lowered the trivial from 220 to 189 for banded armors (oh wait, that's old Everquest...). Seriously, griping about lost AA from 2005 is like griping about Update 13. It's history. It's old news. It's the dusty past. With due respect, it might be about time to let it go.

hellfire

01-26-2010, 12:27 AM

<cite>Kendricke wrote:</cite><blockquote> You know the frustration that every player who had to level up to 255 Blacksmithing felt the day they lowered the trivial from 220 to 189 for banded armors (oh wait, that's old Everquest...). </blockquote>i still feel cheated after all these years!!!!! <img src="/smilies/69934afc394145350659cd7add244ca9.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />

Alvane

01-26-2010, 12:23 PM

<cite>CoLD MeTaL wrote:</cite><blockquote>The bottom line is I feel cheated for not getting the AA for all the things (non repeatable) I did before they added the mechanic. Does that bother you or anyone else, of course not. Anyway I put it out there, if they don't feel like enough people are in the right spot in AA they will makes some alterations, otherwise it will stay. Later they will lower requiremetns as they did with this adv xp. I know why they did that, because people would have had so much to start with, and the way they did made people come and grind more. but after a while its' just 'meh' to me. that is a lame way to do things.</blockquote>I can feel for you cause that has happened to two of my characters who were capped and maxed AAs each expansion. However, I still managed to max not only my adventure level but also the AAs with TSO xpac and the updates. I rarely did instances and I sure didn't grind stuff (well, maybe a few writs here and there). Raiding didn't provide much in the way of AAs but some.What I did was follow every questline available in the expansion. I also with some guildies went around and we did name killing in places like DoF where there are a zillion names and NPCs to be killed including those at the caravan stops! We also ran through many places mentoring to get those MOBs in KoS and EoF when we were capped. We raided MMIS, FTH, EH again for AA after RoK was released. Went through HoF, DT, the Labs and the Den during RoK. Amazingly, my two lvl 80 characters got to maxed AAs well before TSO was released. Following the TSO questlines, I completed all that was offered, finished up the old journal grey quests left over from EoF/RoK and got 200AAs - about half way into the TSO xpac. And all that without doing much grinding nor many group instances. I also worked on collections, too. And with my crafting, AAs were given for the RoK epic, the TSO missions. AAs are all over the place... if you know where to look for them.And now, I feel cheated because of the new achievement system SoE put in. Since I've killed many Mobs when I was at max AA and capped adventure level, I never received credit for a lot of those. Oh, well. Then when SoE added stuff like "urgency" and "short-handed" to the list, I just laughed. Guess even SoE was worried everyone would finish up those achievement lists way too quickly. <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/97ada74b88049a6d50a6ed40898a03d7.gif" border="0" />It's always your choice to set a game plan; to open your mind to various ways of doing things - not just grinding. Or if you grind things like the Rime faction, split it up and do parts of it at a time, rather than from start to finish. But there was quite a few AAs with Rime faction, too.My main character has well over 2000 quests to her credit, yet she isn't even close to the number of quests in this game - somewhere around 5-6K.I suggest you seriously look at your game plan and adjust accordingly. There has been lots of suggestions made to help you get your AAs. If your main concern is how fast and easy you can get capped at both adventure and AA, perhaps you should play another game that has the mechanics to get you to the end game faster than a speeding bullet. <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/ed515dbff23a0ee3241dcc0a601c9ed6.gif" border="0" />

CoLD MeTaL

01-26-2010, 12:55 PM

<cite>Eldra@Unrest wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>...</cite>. If your main concern is how fast and easy you can get capped at both adventure and AA, perhaps you should play another game that has the mechanics to get you to the end game faster than a speeding bullet. <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/ed515dbff23a0ee3241dcc0a601c9ed6.gif" border="0" /></blockquote>"Faster than a speeding bullet", I've been playing for over 5 years.Whatever.

Valdaglerion

01-26-2010, 01:06 PM

Few things about AA:<ol><li>AA experience does not scale. You will be awarded the same amount of XP for a quest whether it is gray or not. Remember this is not a percentage. A quest may provide 5 AA points which translated may be 20% of a AA point if you are between AA 1 and 2 but .05% if you are at AA point 150.</li><li>Quests do not provide AA unless they are level 10+</li><li>Not all quests NOR do all discovery points NOR do all named encounters NOR do all collections actually provide AA</li><li>SLIDER is FTW</li></ol>Before the slider, before the level cap increase, etc it was easy to get AA and XP. With them it is easier than before. I have a 1 week old toon on a new server that is level 13 now and has 27 AA points. Use the slider and figure out good places to convert combat xp to aa, its really not too hard.This game IS NOT about leveling any longer, its about AA's. Its been shown that you can level a toon from 1-80 in 7 hours with the right setup as a veteran player and boxing. Without those tools but really pushing the race you can achieve 1-80 solo in under 3 weeks. The question becomes, "what will you have when you get there?"The end game in this game is not that great right now. The only thing to do at end game is chase gear upgrades, one after the other after the other. There is little to learn in terms of lore or exciting story lines as there are in the 1-70 range and most of it concludes with EoF. There is some in RoK but not much that is really engaging aside from some of the information contained in the Epic Weapons lines, TSO gave us /yawn, not much other than instance grinding for tokens.To that end, consider why you play, what you want to achieve with your toon and play accordingly. If its to get to end game quickly then power level your toon, use the slider and max the toon in 4-5 days, get your myth and start grinding out instances in hopes of gear drops. If you want to enjoy the ride, use the slider to reduce or stop your XP, get your AA's and enjoy the questing. Its a whole different style of play. Its the one where you stop and smell the roses along the way.