It's E3...and still no info on the Shadow Odyssey?

[Wilin]

<p>By this time last year and the previous year, we knew quite a bit about the upcoming expansions. Right now, we don't have anything official on the next expansion aside from a name and that only came from a URL registration.</p><p>Are we getting an expansion this year? If yes, could you give us more details please?</p>

[ke'la]

a) E3 is not overb) they are doing a slow build to this expansionc) we do have some official stuff as all the Lore posted on this website since February ties in with TSOd) they are running live events in game that are building up to the expansione) SoE has 3 NEW games they are working on that they want to show off at E3, and new games have priority over expansions(even in reporting)f) Fan Fair is just around the corner I am willing to bet by then we will have lots of info about itand lastly we do have the official statement that it is a Lore Based expansion.

[Wilin]

/sigh Ya, I know all of that...which is to say, nothing. I'm looking for a press release with quantitative details.

[Josgar]

Wow, I forgot all about E3...If nothing comes up at E3, then it will prolly come with fan faire.(which i get to miss this year <,&lt<img src="/smilies/8a80c6485cd926be453217d59a84a888.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />

[Aurumn]

According to the living legacy site we will be downloading expansion 5 data in August and Beta invite info is coming in September.

[dawy]

<cite>Josgar@Unrest wrote:</cite><blockquote>Wow, I forgot all about E3...If nothing comes up at E3, then it will prolly come with fan faire.(which i get to miss this year <,<<img src="/eq2/images/smilies/8a80c6485cd926be453217d59a84a888.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></blockquote> Josgar dont even mention there wont be an announcement at E3,my nails are down to thier nubs as it is <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />

[Wilin]

<cite>Mezzmyrelda@Unrest wrote:</cite><blockquote>According to the living legacy site we will be downloading expansion 5 data in August and Beta invite info is coming in September. </blockquote> Thanks, I did miss that much.

[Woody67]

Isn't the SOE block party at the end of July? I would guess that would be the next chance for some update if nothing is shown by the end of E3.

[Soluss2]

I think they said they were saving details for fan faire.  In my mind I think 1 of 2 things.  This is going to be a really awesome expansion and they are keeping the suspence on the details...Or they are out of ideas and dont want to release how the suck its going to be.  Either way I am having a blast playing still...cant wait to hear about the expansion though.

[Saroc_Luclin]

Over on EQLive, Zatozia has stated that people at the Block Party will get a sneak peak at the EQlive expansion. It's probably safe to bet the EQII expansion may be peakable then too. Otherwise, given the diminishment of E3 in recent years and the rise of events like Fan Faire and Block Party for SOE, Expansion information will probably be coming from Block Party and Fan Faires instead of the "industry" events.

[Wilin]

I just checked out the Fan Faire agenda and there is a slot on there now for EQ2 Next Expansion Details. Wonder if we'll see anything before that though.

[ZThoth]

<p>So SOE isn't going to take advantage of a huge event like E3 to show the world details on the next expansion?  Instead they're going to release info at a Faire that only current SOE customers care about...</p><p>Who's in charge of these wonderful marketing decisions???</p>

[dawy]

<cite>Azag@Crushbone wrote:</cite><blockquote><p>So SOE isn't going to take advantage of a huge event like E3 to show the world details on the next expansion?  Instead they're going to release info at a Faire that only current SOE customers care about...</p><p>Who's in charge of these wonderful marketing decisions???</p></blockquote>If this is the case,and i say if,it really does make the mind boggle E3 while very much smaller than years past is still the place where the big guns roll out thier wares you only have to look at this weeks announcements for proof of this

[Saroc_Luclin]

Well hard to say what all SOE will be doing. I was just guessing ofr the most part. On the other hand, the EQ Dev had this in his blog: <a href="http://eqdev.wordpress.com/2008/07/08/e3-and-eq-living-legacy-will-be-shown-in-full-force/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow">http://eqdev.wordpress.com/2008/07/...-in-full-force/</a> So they seem to be focusing on the Living Legacy, but they may also be slipping Beta info out too.

[DragonMaster2385]

First of all, E3 isn't as big as it used to be. It's no longer a giant fair for anyone to get in. It used to be that if you worked at a gamestop store, you could get tickets. Now, it is a much more exclusive event. The big thing is the press conference and they are going to use that time for new games coming out, like The Agency and their first forray into the PS3 world. The expansion information is being reserved for the fan faire because that is when they are going to get the biggest audience that cares about the expansion. You are not looking at the big picture. SOE is a company, so all that matters is the bottom line. They will make more money talking about The Agency than TSO. That point is beyond dispute and the one thing Sony knows how to do best is make money.

[dawy]

Well given ROK was shown to the world at last years E3 (which if  recall was smaller than this years event) i think most of us were expecting some news on TSO but it does seeem now that its not going to be announced until the FF (though granted E3 aint over yet) it does seem very narrow minded move by the dev and marketing team to do this

[krrr]

<cite>Diknak@Butcherblock wrote:</cite><blockquote>The expansion information is being reserved for the fan faire because that is when they are going to get the biggest audience that cares about the expansion.</blockquote><p>And fan-faire is happenning when? Right autumn. In other words realy close to expansion release.</p><p>What this "tactic" shows to me is: /conspiracy_tinfoil_hat on they are scared that people will go away after reading announcement. Because it's obvious for me that there are some MAJOR changes on the horizon (and i mean <b><u>MAJOR)</u></b>. And they learned lessons of LU13 and NGE (in some way. in other words "keep it secret, untill its too late&quot<img src="/smilies/8a80c6485cd926be453217d59a84a888.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />. /conspiracy_tinfoil_hat off</p><p>Announcing expansion pack creates hype around it, people read it and think "wow thats nice". Keeping all information secret also creates hype, but imho it only works for completely new products. </p>

[sah]

Fan Faire starts on August 14 (less than 30 days) and the website says that there will be "<b>exclusive first looks</b> at the upcoming <i>EverQuest</i> and <i>EverQuest II</i> expansions "

[DragonMaster2385]

What happened when RoK was announced? We were given all of this information months and months in advance and then we were staring at the new expansion's website without anything being added or learning anything else about it. It's like sending a party invite too early; when you do, you risk people forgetting about it and start focusing on other things. It happens all the time when games are announced 4 years before it comes out. Everyone gets all excited about it and then the excitement dies down. You say that they are doing radical changes. I say that they are trying to cause a boom of excitement right before it releases to get that spike of interest to give them their credit card information. And they announced RoK before E3 last year. Did they have anything else to talk about besides expansions? I know The Agency was talked about, but it wasn't in a stage to really show it off.

[Goemoe]

Who cares about all the other SOE games? I am here for EQ2 news and I am growing more and more dissappointed not to hear what I want to hear. I don't even care about all the lore either, as long as I don't know what content will come. Level cap or not, new city, race, class, features comparable to AA? There will be lore, there will be quests and zones (and most probably no new classes) but what else?All those live events and lore keeps you happy for 30 minutes after patching, or longer, if you grind some items, but it can't replace a good expansion or the anticipation for it.Really dissapointing... anyone heard something about EQ3?

[dawy]

For my money not saying anything when we have quite a few returning players back via the promo is madness its the carrot that could make the difference between them staying after august1st or leaving,of course put the meat on the bones for the FF attendees but given that the majority of players dont go (or in my case would love to but its the other side of the world) and not find time somewhere during E3 just beggers belief<img src="/eq2/images/smilies/385970365b8ed7503b4294502a458efa.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" width="15" height="15" />

[Noaani]

<cite>Goemoe wrote:</cite><blockquote>Who cares about all the other SOE games? I am here for EQ2 news and I am growing more and more dissappointed not to hear what I want to hear. I don't even care about all the lore either, as long as I don't know what content will come. Level cap or not, new city, race, class, features comparable to AA? There will be lore, there will be quests and zones (and most probably no new classes) but what else?All those live events and lore keeps you happy for 30 minutes after patching, or longer, if you grind some items, but it can't replace a good expansion or the anticipation for it.Really dissapointing... anyone heard something about EQ3?</blockquote><p>I am sorry to be the one to inform you, but E3 is not your private news bulletin. If it were, I am quite sure SoE would have had some information about the new expansion for you, personalised and detaling only the aspects of the expansion that apply to you.</p><p>Instead, E3 is now little more than an over hyped, over budget press conferance. It makes business sence for SoE to showcase in the limited time they have, the products that will attract the most new customers, and makes equal sence to showcase products aimed at existing customers at an event aimed at existing customers.</p><p>Reguardless of when announcements are made, one ting SoE has proven that should put you at rest, the expansion already has a release date, and nothing will alter that, including dates of announcements and whether it is actualy ready for release or not.</p>

[Woody67]

Was there any EQ2 information at all found from E3? I have been looking at several game sites and no mention of any news about EQ2 or living legacy was reported.

[DragonMaster2385]

well said. To be honest, I hated knowing all of the information about RoK so far in advance. It was awesome to look at the site and such, but there wasn't enough to keep me entertained and excited for the next 9 months. Now, we will have a fraction of that time to stay excited, which sounds like it will be much better. For now, I don't mid seeing the new files pushed to our computers and speculating about what they are. There are now SIX zones that will be in TSO that we already know about. Look at page 42 of the thread called The Shadow Odyssey.

[ATLDawgy]

<cite>Diknak@Butcherblock wrote:</cite><blockquote>What happened when RoK was announced? We were given all of this information months and months in advance and then we were staring at the new expansion's website without anything being added or learning anything else about it. It's like sending a party invite too early; when you do, you risk people forgetting about it and start focusing on other things. It happens all the time when games are announced 4 years before it comes out. Everyone gets all excited about it and then the excitement dies down. You say that they are doing radical changes. I say that they are trying to cause a boom of excitement right before it releases to get that spike of interest to give them their credit card information.And they announced RoK before E3 last year. Did they have anything else to talk about besides expansions? I know The Agency was talked about, but it wasn't in a stage to really show it off.</blockquote><p>It's not 4 years until TSO comes out.  I halfway believe some of the stuff the conspiracy theory poster mentioned.  SOE has decided to keep details to a minimum for a reason.  That reason is unknown but I hope it works out for them.  Marketing a product gets it on people's minds.  Don't forget that the vast majority of EQ2 subscribers do not read forums and most gain knowledge within the game.  Marketing the game in advance allows people to plan for the purchase of the new expansion.  Usually like $40 a copy.  For the single person with a single account it's not such a big deal but what about people with multiple accounts for themselves or family members?  Knowing the estimated release date helps people plan the purchase.  Beyond the economic side, knowledge of what to expect gets people interested and keeps them around.  The longer "on the fence" subscribers go unmotivated, the easier it is for them to let go of EQ2 and possibly find an alternative form of entertainment and the risk for SOE is losing them for a substantial amount of time which is the total opposite of what they are trying to do right now.</p><p>The funny thing is, many current longer term subscribers have voiced displeasure in the new and returning subscriber rewards, incentives, and attention received since nothing is being done for existing subscribers except for those who bring on new subscribers.  SOE's response is that it's all about marketing the game to build the base so these promotions are not applicable to established subscribers.  Well, that's true, but at the same time the established subscribers need a carrot too or else that status can change with the click of a mouse.  The established subscriber has done the existing content and is no longer excited about it.  It's easier to keep doing it when you have something concrete to look forward to and plan for...What's the point in building upon a foundation that has been declining.  Stop the bleeding before adding new bandages.</p><p>At the end of the day it really doesn't matter to me personally.  I would love to know general details about the expansion but either I'll be playing it this Fall or I won't.  Most video game details are atleast announced well before they are released so I'm just curious why SOE is playing this so close to the vest.</p>

[DragonMaster2385]

I don't think there are going to be any negative big game changes with TSO. Whenever they have done something game altering, it has been announced well in advance to allow the players embrace the change. I wasn't saying that TSO is coming out in 4 years and the point I was making still stands. Regardless of the actual time frame, you see a huge spike of interest after a game/expansion is announced. I don't understand why you even brought up the whole thing about the legacy promotion and the fact that people are upset about it? Were you trying to steer this topic off course? Personally, I think people need to take off their tin foil hats and calm down. Yes, they have waited longer than normal to announce TSO than other expansions, but I could certainly see it as a tactic to build suspense/hype. I just wish that someone from the community relations team would tell us WHY they are waiting to announce it.

[krrr]

<cite>Diknak@Butcherblock wrote:</cite><blockquote>I don't think there are going to be any negative big game changes with TSO. Whenever they have done something game altering, it has been announced well in advance to allow the players embrace the change. </blockquote><p>I sugest you to look more carefull at state of game. There are problems with current itemization, combat mechanics and so on. One of major problems is that people are already caping every viable stat. Normal stats were caped in EoF (or raised to point where diminishing returns ate any advantage of raising that stat), now people are capping crits (melee/spell/heal), double-attacks, +spelldmg, +healmods, some clasess dont even need high-end gear to do so.  And no raising lvl-cap will never solve it. So we are either waiting for major revamp of current mechanics (read: total nerf to everything), or we are waiting for some new mechanics to be implemented (read: everybody gets 100% crit on first week, and then works to gain some new kind of stat, for example "ubah-crit" chance to deal additional damage on crit).</p>

[ATLDawgy]

<cite>Diknak@Butcherblock wrote:</cite><blockquote>I don't think there are going to be any negative big game changes with TSO. Whenever they have done something game altering, it has been announced well in advance to allow the players embrace the change. I wasn't saying that TSO is coming out in 4 years and the point I was making still stands. Regardless of the actual time frame, you see a huge spike of interest after a game/expansion is announced.I don't understand why you even brought up the whole thing about the legacy promotion and the fact that people are upset about it? Were you trying to steer this topic off course?Personally, I think people need to take off their tin foil hats and calm down. Yes, they have waited longer than normal to announce TSO than other expansions, but I could certainly see it as a tactic to build suspense/hype. I just wish that someone from the community relations team would tell us WHY they are waiting to announce it.</blockquote><p>You asked me why I brought up the Legacy promotion.  Well, it is the ONLY official reference to the expansion.  Lore is lore but the lore never said "The Shadow Odyssey will be released on blah blah blah".  The only official mention of the expansion from SOE has come with the $5 off discount for the "upcoming expansion to be released this Fall" going to new and returning subscribers who convert from the promotion trial to paid subscriptions.  They didn't even refer to it by name but still, this is the only widely broadcasted official acknowledgement of the expansion.  Any other references have been in forum posts responding to a question from the community and even then it's been vague.  So, the Legacy promotion is the only relevant topic related to the expansion because the timeline of the Legacy promotion is what told us what a lot of the pushed content to our clients was for including LU 46, LU 47, and the murder mystery to come all of which lead up to the expansion.  The whole point of the Legacy promotion is to build the subscriber base during the summer and sustain it with the expansion this fall and beyond.  Also, new and returning players have a lot to be excited about with the Legacy promotion while the established players are just wondering what's next.  Yes, the LUs are pretty nice but we're used to LUs.  It's obvious people are ready to put ROK behind us (most controversial EQ2 expansion yet) and see what SOE has in store for us next.  </p><p>I'm not sure why you insist on being insulting about those of us curious about what's next then you end your post stating that you want someone from the community relations team to tell you why they are waiting to announce it.  Didn't I say in my post that I too am curious about why they are waiting?  If you don't care to know the details, why do you need someone to tell you why they are not being announced?</p>

[ATLDawgy]

<cite>Darlock@Runnyeye wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Diknak@Butcherblock wrote:</cite><blockquote>I don't think there are going to be any negative big game changes with TSO. Whenever they have done something game altering, it has been announced well in advance to allow the players embrace the change. </blockquote><p>I sugest you to look more carefull at state of game. There are problems with current itemization, combat mechanics and so on. One of major problems is that people are already caping every viable stat. Normal stats were caped in EoF (or raised to point where diminishing returns ate any advantage of raising that stat), now people are capping crits (melee/spell/heal), double-attacks, +spelldmg, +healmods, some clasess dont even need high-end gear to do so.  And no raising lvl-cap will never solve it. So we are either waiting for major revamp of current mechanics (read: total nerf to everything), or we are waiting for some new mechanics to be implemented (read: everybody gets 100% crit on first week, and then works to gain some new kind of stat, for example "ubah-crit" chance to deal additional damage on crit).</p></blockquote><p>Completely agree with you.  However, I do want to see one more level cap increase and here is why.  One day, SOE will need to "fix" the mechanics of the game.  They have 2 choices on how to do it.  The 2nd option you mentioned is just a continuation of the current broken system of implementing new mechanics/features on top of the current problems.  The 1st option you mentioned is viable but then you'll have a subscriber base complaining about the gamewide nerfage and it's hard to predict what percentage of the population will get over it and continue on with the game.  The option I'd like to see is SOE "fix" the game but deploy the fix with a level cap increase.  It would feel much better to progress your character into the new mechanics while obtaining new gear/spells/AAs of a higher level than to see a flat out nerf of your existing hard earned gear/spells/AA.  Yes, the "fixes" would have to be retroactive to 1-80 content but with or without a level cap increase, that fact still stands.  The benefit of the level cap increase would be that players will be looking beyond the current cap of 80 whereas no level cap increase means they'd feel stuck in the nerf.</p><p>That said, if SOE doesn't have a correction for the game mechanics ready to go with TSO, they should not increase the level cap.  But you're right, they need to do a much better job at the design stage on scaling new features when someone presents a new concept to the team.  The diminishing returns system along with the relative ease of capping stats and mods is not good for progression.</p>

[dawy]

<cite>Diknak@Butcherblock wrote:</cite><blockquote> I just wish that someone from the community relations team would tell us WHY they are waiting to announce it.</blockquote>I think that goes for most us tbh

[DragonMaster2385]

What I said was never meant to insult anyone, so sorry if it did. Itemization sucks in RoK and I agree with that, but if they do a gamewide nerf, they will lose a lot of players. The average player that doesn't visit the forums doesn't even know that there is an itemization problem in the game. While we would all be happy because we know that the problem is there, the average ignorant player wouldn't see it coming and would think it was unwarranted. I honestly don't think they will do a game wide nerf. Look at this next live update; they are actually giving a boost to the old world items! If they were going to solve this apparent problem with a game wide nerf, it would be pointless to spend time adjusting the stats on the old world items right to knock them back down. There may be a solution to the diminishing returns problem that we are not seeing as a viable option. If that is the case, then I solute SOE on their efforts and hope that the game doesn't break during the fix.

[OutcastBlade]

There's a strong likelihood that the level cap is not going to increase. So I have a question pertaining to a similar expansion... Since I was away when EoF came out, what is the difference between KoS legendary loot, and EoF legendary loot? Since the level cap didnt increase I would imagine there aint much difference at all.Did they add any new procs/effects/stats?

[ATLDawgy]

<cite>Kanolth@Antonia Bayle wrote:</cite><blockquote>There's a strong likelihood that the level cap is not going to increase. So I have a question pertaining to a similar expansion... Since I was away when EoF came out, what is the difference between KoS legendary loot, and EoF legendary loot? Since the level cap didnt increase I would imagine there aint much difference at all.Did they add any new procs/effects/stats?</blockquote>EOF introduced gear set bonuses and I thought diminishing returns.  Also the crit and +effect system but someone else will have to confirm.  But EOF basically ushered in the type of content we are most familiar with today compared to "old world".

[Nolrog]

<cite>Diknak@Butcherblock wrote:</cite><blockquote>I just wish that someone from the community relations team would tell us WHY they are waiting to announce it.</blockquote>Marketing is not ready to announce it yet.   Maybe they felt that having it out so early last year caused the hype to die down too early, or maybe not have the excitement of the announcement at FF.  It's out of the Community Relation team's hands I think, so they probably cannot say anything at all.

[ke'la]

One thing you got to remember about E3, it is a multi-company press conferance that lasts a grand total of 3 days. There is NO WAY that the people covering E3 will be able to cover even most of the games on display there. Now being that the only way for people not at E3 to find out any details about anything shown at E3 is to have the press write about the game, and being that the most EQ2 EVER gets press coverage wise is MAYBE 1 page IF it's an exclusive. Why would SoE waste thier money show casing a game that no one at the event cares one bit about. At E3 if you want to be covered you must be showing a NEW GAME not an expaintion to a game that is almost universally ignored by the gaming press... besides exsactly in only a few days(at the block party) they are going to have a group of people that accually CARE about the exsisting games showing up at their offfice. Which would be the better place to show off stuff for the next expaintion. An industery wide press conferance with people that will not cover the expaintion, except maybe in a 2 or 3 sentence bit at the end of an artical about "What is SoE up to", or would it be better to show some stuff to people that will wright pages of stuff on the littlest bit of minusha that gets shown to them, because of how into the game they are.

[Daysy]

<cite>sahet wrote:</cite><blockquote>Fan Faire starts on August 14 (less than 30 days) and the website says that there will be "<b>exclusive first looks</b> at the upcoming <i>EverQuest</i> and <i>EverQuest II</i> expansions "</blockquote>Don't let the facts get in the way of a good gripe

[dawy]

<cite>Nolrog wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Diknak@Butcherblock wrote:</cite><blockquote>I just wish that someone from the community relations team would tell us WHY they are waiting to announce it.</blockquote>Marketing is not ready to announce it yet.   Maybe they felt that having it out so early last year caused the hype to die down too early, or maybe not have the excitement of the announcement at FF.  It's out of the Community Relation team's hands I think, so they probably cannot say anything at all.</blockquote>Thats a bit odd as ROK was EQ2's biggest ever selling expansion so theres nothing to do with hype dying down but im sure the minority of EQ2's playerbase will have agreat time finding out about TSO before the rest of us but for me the minds still boggling to be honest

[Ranger13]

<p>Ahhhh...People whining about not knowing anything yet to whine about.</p><p> Typical.</p>

[ke'la]

<cite>dawy wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Nolrog wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Diknak@Butcherblock wrote:</cite><blockquote>I just wish that someone from the community relations team would tell us WHY they are waiting to announce it.</blockquote>Marketing is not ready to announce it yet. Maybe they felt that having it out so early last year caused the hype to die down too early, or maybe not have the excitement of the announcement at FF. It's out of the Community Relation team's hands I think, so they probably cannot say anything at all.</blockquote>Thats a bit odd as ROK was EQ2's biggest ever selling expansion so theres nothing to do with hype dying down but im sure the minority of EQ2's playerbase will have agreat time finding out about TSO before the rest of us but for me the minds still boggling to be honest</blockquote>I can more or less <a href="http://forums.station.sony.com/eq2/posts/list.m?start=0&topic_id=375433�" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">guarantee</a>, that by 4am on the morning after TSOs forum non-attendees will be seeing what attendees have seen. Most likly befor that, depending on WiFi availablity in the Convention area.

[Paddyo]

<p>All of these posts are purely speculation of course, but toss me in the doom and gloom category.  The fact that they havent given us even a shred of what is coming really bugs me. The name actually was changed around the period of time that we were getting hard facts about the expansion last year.</p><p>On the other hand, the living legacy promo (which seems to include about everything through beta invites in September) does seem designed to push this and the EQ live expansion. And as far as I know, info on the EQlive expansion hasn't been released, either, so that would mean that all the speculation of a major overhaul ala LU13 or NGE based on the lack of information is unlikely, considering the sister game isn't getting anymore information than we are and what is the likelihood of both games getting major mechanics overhauls? A dual conspiracy? </p><p>No, I think the lack of info is tied to them using living legacy as the promotion tool.  I still have this feeling we are looking at a lackluster expansion, though, because if it's me and I am sitting on some great new content with thousands of returning players taking advantage of free playtime, I am going to promote whats coming like crazy before their free time runs out.</p>

[ke'la]

<cite>Paddyo wrote:</cite><blockquote><p>All of these posts are purely speculation of course, but toss me in the doom and gloom category. The fact that they havent given us even a shred of what is coming really bugs me. The name actually was changed around the period of time that we were getting hard facts about the expansion last year.</p><p>On the other hand, the living legacy promo (which seems to include about everything through beta invites in September) does seem designed to push this and the EQ live expansion. And as far as I know, info on the EQlive expansion hasn't been released, either, so that would mean that all the speculation of a major overhaul ala LU13 or NGE based on the lack of information is unlikely, considering the sister game isn't getting anymore information than we are and what is the likelihood of both games getting major mechanics overhauls? A dual conspiracy? </p><p>No, I think the lack of info is tied to them using living legacy as the promotion tool. I still have this feeling we are looking at a lackluster expansion, though, because if it's me and I am sitting on some great new content with thousands of returning players taking advantage of free playtime, I am going to promote whats coming like crazy before their free time runs out.</p></blockquote>One thing you got to remember though is Lorewise, No one knows what is comming, so in a way it makes sence if your doing a major Story driven expaintion that again other then clues dropped here and there the people behind the charactors on screen don't know what is comming either.Remember there is more then one way to market something. First, is the Add Blitz where you where your run around reveling alot of what is going on and throwing around names that will get the fans exsited, like Kunark, and Sarnak. Then there is the slow build, where you purposly hold back most if not all information, then let just enough out to peak interest and get people debating what is really going on, and you continue to prime this pump until just befor release then you set off the adds, this works best when you don't have big names you can tout but instead have alot of stuff people have not seen, and stuff that people need to investigate to understand how cool it is.

[grymmstone]

No info at Block Party! But Vecsar is looking real cool. As far as Expansion... The dev team stated that FanFaire will be main release, and no matter how hard you pressed for a snippet all I got was people biting their tongues to keep quiet. They are REAL excited about expansion, but have a strict gag policy on info.

[Zabjade]

<span style="color: #00cc00;">It's a conspiracy!!!! <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/908627bbe5e9f6a080977db8c365caff.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" width="15" height="15" /></span>

[Galithdor]

<cite>grymmstone wrote:</cite><blockquote>No info at Block Party! But Vecsar is looking real cool. As far as Expansion... The dev team stated that FanFaire will be main release, and no matter how hard you pressed for a snippet all I got was people biting their tongues to keep quiet. They are REAL excited about expansion, but have a strict gag policy on info.</blockquote>they get gagged if they tell! wow thats harsh...part of the grimwell conspiracy perhaps...<img src="/smilies/69934afc394145350659cd7add244ca9.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />

[ke'la]

<cite>Galithdor wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>grymmstone wrote:</cite><blockquote>No info at Block Party! But Vecsar is looking real cool. As far as Expansion... The dev team stated that FanFaire will be main release, and no matter how hard you pressed for a snippet all I got was people biting their tongues to keep quiet. They are REAL excited about expansion, but have a strict gag policy on info.</blockquote>they get gagged if they tell! wow thats harsh...part of the grimwell conspiracy perhaps...<img src="/eq2/images/smilies/69934afc394145350659cd7add244ca9.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></blockquote>Accually it's an electronic chip that shuts down all Volintary mussle movement if they start to talk about it... It's similar to the chips that get implanted at all the "Behind Closed Doors" events that SoE holds.

[Galithdor]

<cite>kela wrote:</cite><blockquote>{0}</blockquote><p>if only quoting you worked...</p><p>But wow! So thats it huh...i would think that it would be classified...and only SoE employees would know about it! haha</p>

[DragonMaster2385]

I didn't even think to look into the EQ1 expansion coming out to see if they had announced anything yet.  If they are keeping quiet about it as well, then I am more comfortable believing that it is a marketing strategy instead of some big secret nerf.  The fan faire is in just a couple of weeks, so I'm sure we will hear something then.

[Saroc_Luclin]

From what I can tell, mum was the word on the EQLive expansion as well, since no information came from that angle. So I guess Fan Faire will be the big event. Just 3 weeks away.

[ke'la]

<cite>Galithdor wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>kela wrote:</cite><blockquote>{0}</blockquote><p>if only quoting you worked...</p><p>But wow! So thats it huh...i would think that it would be classified...and only SoE employees would know about it! haha</p></blockquote><p>You can't quote me... oddd.</p><p>But, yeah it amazed me last year when the people came down from thier chip update(er....contibuters forum) and where able to freely talk about thier chip, but suddenly got all stiff(like The Tin Man without oil) when I asked about RoK and other things they had plained for the weekend at last fan fair.</p>

[Qandor]

<cite>Kanolth@Antonia Bayle wrote:</cite><blockquote>There's a strong likelihood that the level cap is not going to increase. </blockquote><p>Really? What's the strong likelyhood? We have had 4 expansions to date. Three have had cap increases. It takes a very strong and diversified expansion to survive having no cap increase. EoF manged it by incorporating a 1-70 expansion with the intoduction of deity quests, 2 new trade skills, the introduction of blue shinies and first and foremost, a new wildly popular and unique playable race. </p><p>If anything, there is a strong indication that the level cap will increase. Why have all these bonus experience weekends if we are stuck with a level 80 cap for another 16 months?</p>

[ke'la]

They are doing the XP weekends to get people to the cap because there will be little or no below cap content.The reasons people are thinking that there will be no cap increase are:<ul><li>From the files people have decoded there seems to be no new overland zones. At this point with RoK there where overland zones found in the decoded files.</li><li>The devs have called this expaintion a very "Story Based" expaintion and if people are rushing to cap they tend to ignore the story until they get to the cap.</li><li>They have already started the story with the live events, and people would get kinda upset if they now have to grind to 90 to finish the story.</li><li>As the first 2 expaintions where on a differant expaintion cycle, people disreguard those and so they are seeing No cap increase, then a cap increase, so that would make this one a no cap increase.</li></ul>

[GrunEQ]

<span style="font-size: small;font-family: comic sans ms,sand;">I'm pretty sure a while back, it was posted that there would be no level increase in coming expansion.  I would not count on it.</span>

[DerFunkBlaster]

Im not sure if any of you caught this.. but they actually had some Expansion details listed for July and they were ninja changed sometime between when they started living legacy and now.. Of course I dont have a screenshot of this but Im pretty confident that there was something listed for July. Maybe they changed their mind and decided to wait on releasing information (probably because it wasnt as finished as they wanted it before E3)

[Jovie]

Expansion.

[DragonMaster2385]

Yeah, we are supposed to get our first taste of the expansion in August and then preorder/beta details in September. As someone else said, the bonus xp is (in my opinion) to get people closer to the current level cap, as I think that the void story will start in the upper levels. Since we know that this is very story driven and the zones will probably be in some sort of sequential order, they can't have the beginning of the story start below level 67 or people currently at 80 would have to complete gray zones. The one problem: the expansion would have nothing to offer lower players. Loathe and behold my solution: All of the instances would scale to level to a certain extent, depending on which zone they are attached to. For instance, we know that there are TSO zones in Lavastorm and Everfrost, so those zones should scale 50-80 and so on and so forth. This would offer content to a much larger playerbase. Lets just hope that SOE takes this approach.

[PsiaMeese]

I will be curious to see which gaming press were invited or already plan to attend Fan Faire.  I would think G4 gaming television would have someone there for the unveiling.

[Igu]

<p>They should start giving us somekind of clue. I don't mean giving the storyline or anything, but any character additions.</p><p>No way they will kick the levels up again, and we have two AA systems, deities and mythic weapons. What new mechanics will we get to improve our characters even further? Maybe subclasses?</p><p>They should start giving people a reason to get excited.</p>

[Aneova]

<cite>Igu wrote:</cite><blockquote><p>They should start giving us somekind of clue. I don't mean giving the storyline or anything, but any character additions.</p><p>No way they will kick the levels up again, and we have two AA systems, deities and mythic weapons. What new mechanics will we get to improve our characters even further? <b><u>Maybe subclasses</u></b>?</p><p>They should start giving people a reason to get excited.</p></blockquote>We already have subclasses, Example: Priest, Druid, cleric, shaman, Fury, warden, mystic, inquisitor, defiler, templar

[Galithdor]

<cite>Orpheus666 wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Igu wrote:</cite><blockquote><p>They should start giving us somekind of clue. I don't mean giving the storyline or anything, but any character additions.</p><p>No way they will kick the levels up again, and we have two AA systems, deities and mythic weapons. What new mechanics will we get to improve our characters even further? <b><u>Maybe subclasses</u></b>?</p><p>They should start giving people a reason to get excited.</p></blockquote>We already have subclasses, Example: <b>Priest, Druid, cleric, shaman, Fury, warden, mystic, inquisitor, defiler, templar</b></blockquote>Priest=Archtype <img src="/smilies/69934afc394145350659cd7add244ca9.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> Druid,Cleric,Shaman=class heh and the rest ARE subclasses haha

[madha]

<cite>DerFunkBlaster wrote:</cite><blockquote>Im not sure if any of you caught this.. but they actually had some Expansion details listed for July and they were ninja changed sometime between when they started living legacy and now.. Of course I dont have a screenshot of this but Im pretty confident that there was something listed for July. Maybe they changed their mind and decided to wait on releasing information (probably because it wasnt as finished as they wanted it before E3)</blockquote>I remember the Living legacy calander having a video preview for te expantion slated for July. Tis the 31 gues we will wait till fan fair to see a video of shadows disappearing and people duel wielding bows and daggers.

[ke'la]

<cite>dawy wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Azag@Crushbone wrote:</cite><blockquote><p>So SOE isn't going to take advantage of a huge event like E3 to show the world details on the next expansion? Instead they're going to release info at a Faire that only current SOE customers care about...</p><p>Who's in charge of these wonderful marketing decisions???</p></blockquote>If this is the case,and i say if,it really does make the mind boggle E3 while very much smaller than years past is still the place where the big guns roll out thier wares you only have to look at this weeks announcements for proof of this</blockquote>This is the point, EVERYONE is making their big anouncments durring E3, and as ONLY the gaming press is able to attend now, all anouncments are filtered through said press, and unless your Blizzard the gaming press NEVER covers expaintions anywhere close to how they cover New titles, it does make sence that they would wait to anounce the details until the people that will accually report the details are in attendance. Besides SoE had 3 other titles to promote as well adding to that list with 2 expaintions just ups the signal to noise raito even more. Also last I checked even Blizzard did not release the first bit of info on thier latest expaintion at E3 but waited until Blizcon.

[Zorastiz]

<p>It's July 31st who cares when it is announced or what it is based on even, what they need to do is a quality job of whatever is coming down the pipe. </p><p>Don't we all want a great exp?</p>

[ATLDawgy]

<cite>kela wrote:</cite><blockquote>{0}</blockquote><p>Yeah, Blizzard announced their latest expansion at Blizcon '07.  </p><p><a href="http://www.gamespot.com/news/6176147.html?tag=result;title;8" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">http://www.gamespot.com/news/617614...=result;title;8</a></p><p>There's nothing difficult or painful about announcing a game.  It's done all the time by all the publishers including SOE with every game released to date.  With the Internet, no one has to depend on the media anymore to announce a game.  All they have to do is post it to the forums and the EQ2 website and the media will come to them while subscribers will discuss in world chat in-game.  That is why so many people are wondering what's up with TSO.  This is just not typical behavior.  </p><p>Perhaps SOE decided to try viral marketing knowing that subscribers monitor the public information that is trademark registrations.  "The Dark Knight" went through a viral marketing period with the "Why So Serious" gimmick well before the first video trailers of the movie came out.  Definately an interesting approach.  </p><p>Or, the negative viewpoint is that with the loss of so many subscribers SOE didn't want to spend the money to traditionally market this expansion.  LOL.  At the end of the day, marketing can be more of a financial drain on a product since it's so expensive to do relative to the return of investment from customers gained directly from the marketing campaign.  A fiscally responsible company pushes a new product hard but an existing product more passively.  Think of Coca Cola.  They put print ads/billboards/vending machines/store displays all over the place instead of constantly blasting expensive TV and radio ads that viewes/listeners may never see or hear.  Coke usually reserves TV/radio ads for special promotions centered around a major event or holiday.  Then you have companies who always advertise and struggle to stay positive.</p><p>Whatever SOE is doing, I hope it works out for the best.  Instead of telling people how awesome TSO is going to be, they'll just release it to the loyal paying subscribers who will buy it no matter what it is and hope that they are happy and will spread the word for them.  In the real world, if you set expectations people will typically try to point out failures before they'll praise successes.  So, if SOE never tells us what to expect, we can't be too let down can we?  LOL.</p>

[Raolan]

Releasing the information at either E3 or Fan Faire is reasonable. Since it wasn't announced at E3, expect it at Fan Faire. If it's not announced at Fan Faire, then somethings up.Also, about the level cap. Didn't they state that the level would be raised each expansion when they switched to one a year? Or was that just EQ?

[dawy]

<cite>Raolan wrote:</cite><blockquote>Releasing the information at either E3 or Fan Faire is reasonable. Since it wasn't announced at E3, expect it at Fan Faire. If it's not announced at Fan Faire, then somethings up.Also, about the level cap. Didn't they state that the level would be raised each expansion when they switched to one a year? Or was that just EQ?</blockquote>It was raised 3 times out of the 4 expansions..EOF didnt have a raise and was much the better for it to imo,IIRC there was never any statement that eveery expansion would include a level cap raise

[Novusod]

It would be interesting if they didn't say much at Fan Faire either. Keep everything super secret until beta and then only those in beta will know what is going on until non-disclosure is lifted.

[Graditz]

<p>Not sure if I remember right. </p><p>But last year at Fan Fair John Smedley said during his talk. That they was going to be using Fan Fair now for the first look at all Sony games first. So the fans that play them get the first look at them. If that is the way I remember it then that makes since on why nothing has been heard on the expantion or the EQ1 expantion yet. They are waiting for Fan Fair to release that info.</p>

[Swifthand]

<cite>Akaros@Unrest wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>kela wrote:</cite><blockquote>{0}</blockquote><p>Or, the negative viewpoint is that with the loss of so many subscribers SOE didn't want to spend the money to traditionally market this expansion.  LOL. </p></blockquote><p>           Which doesn't make sense because every other expansion that came out, SOE marketed it to death.. Last year around this time, I remember seeing ROK ad's and posters everywhere.. But seeing that the faire is right around the corner, I would think SOE will finally release the much awaited anticipated info on TSO..</p><p>I just hope and pray it's not another KoS type expansion that just focus's on the end game raid content. Don't get me wrong, I definitely want to see this in the expansion, but I'd also like to see content for most tiers to enjoy, at least tier 3 and up..  </p>

[ATLDawgy]

<cite>Vizzuussh@Antonia Bayle wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Akaros@Unrest wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>kela wrote:</cite><blockquote>{0}</blockquote><p>Or, the negative viewpoint is that with the loss of so many subscribers SOE didn't want to spend the money to traditionally market this expansion.  LOL. </p></blockquote><p>           Which doesn't make sense because every other expansion that came out, SOE marketed it to death.. Last year around this time, I remember seeing ROK ad's and posters everywhere.. But seeing that the faire is right around the corner, I would think SOE will finally release the much awaited anticipated info on TSO..</p><p>I just hope and pray it's not another KoS type expansion that just focus's on the end game raid content. Don't get me wrong, I definitely want to see this in the expansion, but I'd also like to see content for most tiers to enjoy, at least tier 3 and up..  </p></blockquote>I'm saying that there seemed to be the largest rate of decline in subscriptions after RoK compared to the other expansions so maybe they can't justify the excessive marketing.

[ke'la]

<cite>Raolan wrote:</cite><blockquote>Releasing the information at either E3 or Fan Faire is reasonable. Since it wasn't announced at E3, expect it at Fan Faire. If it's not announced at Fan Faire, then somethings up.Also, about the level cap. Didn't they state that the level would be raised each expansion when they switched to one a year? Or was that just EQ?</blockquote>Well consitering the very first expantion that was on the 1 per year plan did not include a level cap raise then no, they didn't.In fact the only offical comment from SoE on when Level caps will be raise is, "We will raise the cap only if the lore for the faction supports it". Now you could call BS on this answer because SoE creates the lore, however as the ideas for what the expaintioin will be about is created via brainstorming with a group of people and not just one indivisual, the lore is more organicaly created and as such can be differant then what the orginal intent was.::EDIT::Also being that they are going to be spending a whole forum on the expainsion I am shure plenty of info about it will be available, after fan faire.

[ke'la]

<cite>Akaros@Unrest wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Vizzuussh@Antonia Bayle wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Akaros@Unrest wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>kela wrote:</cite><blockquote>{0}</blockquote><p>Or, the negative viewpoint is that with the loss of so many subscribers SOE didn't want to spend the money to traditionally market this expansion. LOL. </p></blockquote><p> Which doesn't make sense because every other expansion that came out, SOE marketed it to death.. Last year around this time, I remember seeing ROK ad's and posters everywhere.. But seeing that the faire is right around the corner, I would think SOE will finally release the much awaited anticipated info on TSO..</p><p>I just hope and pray it's not another KoS type expansion that just focus's on the end game raid content. Don't get me wrong, I definitely want to see this in the expansion, but I'd also like to see content for most tiers to enjoy, at least tier 3 and up.. </p></blockquote>I'm saying that there seemed to be the largest rate of decline in subscriptions after RoK compared to the other expansions so maybe they can't justify the excessive marketing.</blockquote>You must not have been around for DoF then, the servers where far less populated just befor KoS then they are now. In fact if I remember right they had to Merge servers just prior to KoS's release.

[ATLDawgy]

<cite>kela wrote:</cite><blockquote>{0}</blockquote>Yes, I was there for DoF and there were also many more servers.  Guess you weren't around for the consolidation and free transfers.

[ke'la]

<cite>Akaros@Unrest wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>kela wrote:</cite><blockquote>{0}</blockquote>Yes, I was there for DoF and there were also many more servers. Guess you weren't around for the consolidation and free transfers.</blockquote>Accualy I was around sence about a month after launch. The SERVER MERGERS was my whole point. They had almost twice as many servers all with very healthy populations PRIOR to DoF, they had to MERGE servers AFTER DoF(just prior to KoS), and there was only 6 months between those two expaintions. I would say that was a FAR GREATER "Rate of Decline" then the the nearly a year it's taken to get our current numbers. Now if you want to say we are at our lowest numbers ever after RoK(which can't really be argued ether way as only SoE know those numbers) thats another story. But as far as "Rate of Decline" goes, the Decline after DoF was FAR worst.

[ATLDawgy]

<cite>kela wrote:</cite><blockquote>{0}</blockquote>How much can you attribute that to DoF and how much can you attribute it to other EQ2 changes that had nothing to do with DoF?  Some people just left because EQ2 the game wasn't for them after playing it a year or so.  That'll happen with any game.  It was all uphill for the most part after DoF.  RoK decline is a step in the opposite direction seen after KoS then EoF and leading up to the launch of RoK.

[dawy]

<cite>Akaros@Unrest wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>kela wrote:</cite><blockquote>{0}</blockquote>Yes, I was there for DoF and there were also many more servers.  Guess you weren't around for the consolidation and free transfers.</blockquote>Aye i was here had just started the game iirc wasnt it just before DOF though the merges?

[ke'la]

<cite>Akaros@Unrest wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>kela wrote:</cite><blockquote>{0}</blockquote>How much can you attribute that to DoF and how much can you attribute it to other EQ2 changes that had nothing to do with DoF? Some people just left because EQ2 the game wasn't for them after playing it a year or so. That'll happen with any game. It was all uphill for the most part after DoF. RoK decline is a step in the opposite direction seen after KoS then EoF and leading up to the launch of RoK.</blockquote>I don't know to my the world seems just as empty at this point in the year last year as it did this year. I think the truth of the matter is that it is all a matter of perspective as to the drop off. If one does not like aspects of the expainsion, or ones guild members then they leave or notice what is wrong/missing more and as such it feels more empty. On the other hand if they or the guild members like what is happening then they overlook what is missing/wrong and don't notice the missing people.

[ATLDawgy]

<cite>kela wrote:</cite><blockquote>{0}</blockquote>I agree with you there.  Didn't SOE say that RoK is their best selling expansion yet?  I would have never guessed based on population that I see.

[dawy]

Have to agree with populations to be honest it was busy for the first month of the promo but has slacked off rather alarmingly in the last couple of weeks.

[Swifthand]

<cite>dawy wrote:</cite><blockquote>Have to agree with populations to be honest it was busy for the first month of the promo but has slacked off rather alarmingly in the last couple of weeks.</blockquote><p>            Antonia Bayle has a great server population. I'll tell you one thing. There are definitely tons more people playing now then there was when I first came back to EQ2, which was in september of 05. Back then the game was dying. EoF brought alot more people in and many of the maxed leveled characters rolled Alts to experience all the great content of EoF. Then came ROK and we literally seen populations we haven't seen since the game's initial release, lol. But that lasted about a month and a half before people started dying out again. Now, with this promotion we've seen the population rise in hopes people would continue to subscribe once their promo ran out. So far, I personally haven't noticed much of Antonia Bayle's numbers decreasing, which has to be a positive thing. Now, we have the 5th expansion due out in November which I'm hoping will intrigue and excite many old vets and newer players to help keep increase the population. I can't wait until SOE reveals it to the public. I just hope it's not an expansion just for the end game. If this is the case, then SOE won't help their cause of enticing new people to play. The expansion must have content  and land to explore in there for all levels to enjoy. A new class wouldn't hurt either.  Just my 2cp</p>

[dawy]

<p>I do feel AB is the exception numbers wise sadly,my server RE as i said was very busy at the start of the promo but as its worn on it doesnt seem as busy as it was back at the start,that being said it seemed busy again last night but given the almost ghost town like state of the previous week it made a nice change.</p><p>ROK without doubt was a success but then people saw how linear it was and didnt bother to stay to see the other improvements thats come along this year,i dont doubt SOEs claims that it was its biggest selling expansion for EQ2 but as AOC has proved its keeping people thats the hard part becuase i'm sure if they had there would not have been the LL promo this summer becuase the game would have been in profit and had a good base to launch the next expansion.</p><p>I've been heer since march 2005 without a break and seen the good (lots of game imprvements),the very good (EoF) and the bad (ROK) and i cant see me leaving the game anytime soon becuase i still feel that norrath is a living breathing world,that i can lose myself in for a couple of hours a night something no other MMO offers to me.</p><p>For my money i still say SOE have dropped the ball with this wall of no information over the next expansion,they had an people back and playing for free and they should have been plugging it good style to get them slavering at the mouth and keep em playing and paying untill it hits the shops,its a truth that whatever happens in regards to the next expansion content wise theres another MMOs expansion coming along that will impact on this and most other MMOs and while Blizzard have been clever in the way they feed info about it they take much longer to get them to the shops,SOE have stated that there will be one expansion per year so they need to use that time wisely to start to generate buzz about the forthcoming content,something that in this case they havent done IMO.</p>

[Vonotar]

AB is getting a lot of truely new players at the moment.At least three times in the last week I have seen somebody ask in channels what "ROV" was when somebody was advertising a group there.

[Swifthand]

<cite>Evaine@Antonia Bayle wrote:</cite><blockquote>AB is getting a lot of truely new players at the moment.At least three times in the last week I have seen somebody ask in channels what "ROV" was when somebody was advertising a group there.</blockquote>Yea, I noticed this as well.. I've also grouped with level 30's who asked me, "what exactly are heritage quests" LOL...

[Galithdor]

<cite>Vizzuussh@Antonia Bayle wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Evaine@Antonia Bayle wrote:</cite><blockquote>AB is getting a lot of truely new players at the moment.At least three times in the last week I have seen somebody ask in channels what "ROV" was when somebody was advertising a group there.</blockquote>Yea, I noticed this as well.. I've also grouped with level 30's who asked me, "what exactly are heritage quests" LOL... </blockquote>Ahh yes, the greatness of the newbies heh i have noticed this too and ive gotta say that it is a good thing...though i dunno how other servers are doing heh.

[Articulas]

Don't know if its been said, but at this point E3 is pretty pointless. I think SOE Fan Faire is going to be way more popular than the crapfest E3 has become.

[Scrappe]

<cite>Akaros@Unrest wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>kela wrote:</cite><blockquote>{0}</blockquote>I agree with you there.  Didn't SOE say that RoK is their best selling expansion yet?  I would have never guessed based on population that I see.</blockquote> I've been around since Feb '05. Until May '08, I played nonstop. I started playing again halfway through July. Here's my take on this, and I have no numbers to back it up. This is just my opinion. Before Kunark, there seemed to be a general agreement that DoF was the worst xpac, most likely because of missing masters and lousy fabled drops in raid. But, it was frequently excused because it was EQ2's first xpac. I've generally heard that KoS was not the best expansion, but it was the prettiest. I feel it was the prettiest and best with the exception of the relic armor drop situation. Very frustrating. Before Kunark, there seemed to be general agreement that EoF was the best xpac. I think it was very good. It had its flaws, but it was definitely worthwhile. (I say "before kunark" in this case because there are lots of folks I see proclaiming that Kunark is best, though I have no idea why. Perhaps they're all Guards and Assassins <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> But there are enough of them to dispute what is currently the best xpac.) For what seemed like the longest time, the anticipation of a Kunark xpac drew a ton of player and industry buzz because Kunark was some game defining EQ1 xpac. Lots of marketing was dropped on it and a lot industry attention turned towards EQ2. For $40, you could buy all xpacs in one box, something they didn't previously do, and that attracted new accounts that had to play "catch up". This artificially inflated the subscriber base like no other xpac had done before and you ended up with these wonderful sales figures that SOE bragged and bragged about. For my own part, I think Kunark is THE WORST xpac of all 4. Low master drop rates. Missing masters (in low tier 8 ). Whole raid keying requirements (something new to eq2, stolen from eq1). Forced solo'ing. Missing group instances (in low tier 8 ). Kunark is pretty. I'll give it that, but I never felt so jipped on an xpac. In fact, it changed the play dynamic enough to make me feel I was paying for some other game that I never signed up for. Was it just me? Across the spectrum I was hearing Kunark hatred, more than I'd ever heard about an xpac, even from folks that usually look on the bright side. Not all of them of course, but ones that I never heard speak ill of the game without some level of constructive retort. To me, this translated into a higher than expected subscriber cancellation, the likes of which rivalled the subscriber activation of Kunark. Now of course, I have no numbers, but I have read time and again (in the forums) players saying that subscriber attrition is currently the largest in the game's history. They probably have no numbers either, but seeing so many people agreeing (like I hadn't before) gives it more credence (to me). If SOE hadn't hyped up Kunark so much, then the attrition rate wouldn't have been so steep. Players who wouldnt have normally subscribed in the first place wouldnt have been there to get disappointed and subsequently quit, now with a permanent opinion about the game. In fact, SOE's overhaul of EQ2 for Kunark has probably done a good deal of dmg to it's reputation as WoW folks (amongst others) temporarily subscribed, only get their negative views confirmed, and then cancelled, now assured in their richteousness.

[DragonMaster2385]

You make a lot of good points, but I have to point out that instances have always been reserved for the upper end of the tiers. There are usually contested dungeons for low and mid (SoS, PoA, etc) but those kind of zones were missing. Try taking a group of fresh off the boat (literally) level 70's and put them into KC. KC was a nightmare at launch. If you didn't have a tank at least level 74 and two healers, you were going to get squashed like a bug. When KoS came out, a group of all 60's could easily go through a huge portion of SoS without any problems. There were no "easy" zones for the beginning of the tier, which ruined group play. I agree, forcing people to solo is not the way to go. Don't get me wrong, I loved (most of) the quests my first time through, but it severely unbalanced gameplay. I could get more exp, better loot, and more coin from soloing for 2 hours than I could for grouping (which is harder). SOE destroyed the risk vs reward in this aspect, which is why it "forced" people to solo. And taking another character through all of it was excruciating. They could have increased replay value by making us CHOOSE factions to work for. How come I could work for Bathezid's Watch AND Rillis? I mean come one. . . that is just stupid that I could work for both factions and they were just peachy with it. I would have loved to do intro quests to both of them so I could get a feel for what the factions were all about and then I had to choose one or the other. Even giving them the same faction gear and such to ensure that people didn't regret the decision would have been fine. Different quest lines and different stories would be the only thing different. Honestly, I don't think TSO will have any content for lower levels. If it is story driven, I don't see how they would include content for lower levels since that would require level 80 players to do gray zones/quests. The only way around this would be instances that scale with level . . . which would rock. We can only hope.

[dawy]

<cite>ScrapperX wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Akaros@Unrest wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>kela wrote:</cite><blockquote>{0}</blockquote>I agree with you there.  Didn't SOE say that RoK is their best selling expansion yet?  I would have never guessed based on population that I see.</blockquote> I've been around since Feb '05. Until May '08, I played nonstop. I started playing again halfway through July. Here's my take on this, and I have no numbers to back it up. This is just my opinion. Before Kunark, there seemed to be a general agreement that DoF was the worst xpac, most likely because of missing masters and lousy fabled drops in raid. But, it was frequently excused because it was EQ2's first xpac. I've generally heard that KoS was not the best expansion, but it was the prettiest. I feel it was the prettiest and best with the exception of the relic armor drop situation. Very frustrating. Before Kunark, there seemed to be general agreement that EoF was the best xpac. I think it was very good. It had its flaws, but it was definitely worthwhile. (I say "before kunark" in this case because there are lots of folks I see proclaiming that Kunark is best, though I have no idea why. Perhaps they're all Guards and Assassins <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> But there are enough of them to dispute what is currently the best xpac.) For what seemed like the longest time, the anticipation of a Kunark xpac drew a ton of player and industry buzz because Kunark was some game defining EQ1 xpac. Lots of marketing was dropped on it and a lot industry attention turned towards EQ2. For $40, you could buy all xpacs in one box, something they didn't previously do, and that attracted new accounts that had to play "catch up". This artificially inflated the subscriber base like no other xpac had done before and you ended up with these wonderful sales figures that SOE bragged and bragged about. For my own part, I think Kunark is THE WORST xpac of all 4. Low master drop rates. Missing masters (in low tier 8 ). Whole raid keying requirements (something new to eq2, stolen from eq1). Forced solo'ing. Missing group instances (in low tier 8 ). Kunark is pretty. I'll give it that, but I never felt so jipped on an xpac. In fact, it changed the play dynamic enough to make me feel I was paying for some other game that I never signed up for. Was it just me? Across the spectrum I was hearing Kunark hatred, more than I'd ever heard about an xpac, even from folks that usually look on the bright side. Not all of them of course, but ones that I never heard speak ill of the game without some level of constructive retort. To me, this translated into a higher than expected subscriber cancellation, the likes of which rivalled the subscriber activation of Kunark. Now of course, I have no numbers, but I have read time and again (in the forums) players saying that subscriber attrition is currently the largest in the game's history. They probably have no numbers either, but seeing so many people agreeing (like I hadn't before) gives it more credence (to me). If SOE hadn't hyped up Kunark so much, then the attrition rate wouldn't have been so steep. Players who wouldnt have normally subscribed in the first place wouldnt have been there to get disappointed and subsequently quit, now with a permanent opinion about the game. In fact, SOE's overhaul of EQ2 for Kunark has probably done a good deal of dmg to it's reputation as WoW folks (amongst others) temporarily subscribed, only get their negative views confirmed, and then cancelled, now assured in their richteousness. </blockquote>I've played more or less the same timeframe as you and i agree with you on pretty much all of your points..ROK was a great value xpac sadly backed up by being the worst one of the lot IMO.I logged into the beta of ROK last septemeber my first thoughts were frankly WOW after seeing KP for the first time but as it went on i couldnt see where the diversity was in the expac was,it was solo all the way and frighteningly thats what happened,as we all know theres no grind places in ROK (very bad move) quests that were linear and frankly for the most part dull,TD overpowered armour just added to the problems inflicted on the game by the expac.

[regalus]

yeah RoK was great value but sucked at the same time due to forced soloing and so on, but the real question is has SoE learned it leason ? the answer IMHO is yes. we've seen KC made easier to allow lower leveled groups to go there. RE: the gathering which is designed for 70-80 level range. and veskar on the way <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />. now going by this trend and the little hints that have been glimmed from the test server files. We have a fairly good guess that the next expansion is gonna be a more group focus, high-end expansion compared to RoK. so yeah server pop's my be down and things looking glum but it could be worse besides the only way is up from here. and i got a feeling TSO is gonna pull us right back up there.

[dawy]

<cite>Diknak@Butcherblock wrote:</cite><blockquote>You make a lot of good points, but I have to point out that instances have always been reserved for the upper end of the tiers. There are usually contested dungeons for low and mid (SoS, PoA, etc) but those kind of zones were missing. Try taking a group of fresh off the boat (literally) level 70's and put them into KC. KC was a nightmare at launch. If you didn't have a tank at least level 74 and two healers, you were going to get squashed like a bug. When KoS came out, a group of all 60's could easily go through a huge portion of SoS without any problems. There were no "easy" zones for the beginning of the tier, which ruined group play.I agree, forcing people to solo is not the way to go. Don't get me wrong, I loved (most of) the quests my first time through, but it severely unbalanced gameplay. I could get more exp, better loot, and more coin from soloing for 2 hours than I could for grouping (which is harder). SOE destroyed the risk vs reward in this aspect, which is why it "forced" people to solo.And taking another character through all of it was excruciating. They could have increased replay value by making us CHOOSE factions to work for. How come I could work for Bathezid's Watch AND Rillis? I mean come one. . . that is just stupid that I could work for both factions and they were just peachy with it. I would have loved to do intro quests to both of them so I could get a feel for what the factions were all about and then I had to choose one or the other. Even giving them the same faction gear and such to ensure that people didn't regret the decision would have been fine. Different quest lines and different stories would be the only thing different.Honestly, I don't think TSO will have any content for lower levels. If it is story driven, I don't see how they would include content for lower levels since that would require level 80 players to do gray zones/quests. The only way around this would be instances that scale with level . . . which would rock. We can only hope.</blockquote>My wife has just started to get her teeth into the ROK zones and she asked the faction question herself last night now you mention it it did seem very odd that you could do opposite factions quests while killing at times the same mobs it didnt make sense to me back in onvemeber when i was doing them and it didnt make sense to her last night

[DragonMaster2385]

Of course it doesn't make sense. There is one quest in KJ that you kill the boss's guards right in front of him (the Sarnak near the zone ent). Right after, you start a dialog with him and there is such animosity and disgust. Then, you complete the quest and if you haven't completed the quest line that he offers, he is all happy-go-lucky with you like nothing happened 30 seconds ago. Now I understand that it is a limit of the game and wouldn't expect quest dialog to change dynamically like that, but if we had to CHOOSE one or the other, this would never happen. This is one of the biggest immersion breaker I have seen in the game (outside of pure mechanics). MMOs should all be about choices. The choice of faction, the choice of AA, etc. Now that we have so many AAs that we can have almost all of them (good ones at least), it limits our choices. Most of our choices are made at the character creation screen (minus diety selection), but after that, character progression is very linear. I want to be upset with my choices every once in a while. I know it sounds weird, but if you are upset with a character progression choice you made, then it shows that the game has non linear gameplay.

[dawy]

<cite>Diknak@Butcherblock wrote:</cite><blockquote>Of course it doesn't make sense. There is one quest in KJ that you kill the boss's guards right in front of him (the Sarnak near the zone ent). Right after, you start a dialog with him and there is such animosity and disgust. Then, you complete the quest and if you haven't completed the quest line that he offers, he is all happy-go-lucky with you like nothing happened 30 seconds ago. Now I understand that it is a limit of the game and wouldn't expect quest dialog to change dynamically like that, but if we had to CHOOSE one or the other, this would never happen. This is one of the biggest immersion breaker I have seen in the game (outside of pure mechanics). MMOs should all be about choices. The choice of faction, the choice of AA, etc. Now that we have so many AAs that we can have almost all of them (good ones at least), it limits our choices. Most of our choices are made at the character creation screen (minus diety selection), but after that, character progression is very linear. I want to be upset with my choices every once in a while. I know it sounds weird, but if you are upset with a character progression choice you made, then it shows that the game has non linear gameplay. </blockquote>Thats the quest you mention in KJ that she questioned hehe

[Swifthand]

<cite>Diknak@Butcherblock wrote:</cite><blockquote> Try taking a group of fresh off the boat (literally) level 70's and put them into KC. KC was a nightmare at launch. If you didn't have a tank at least level 74 and two healers, you were going to get squashed like a bug. When KoS came out, a group of all 60's could easily go through a huge portion of SoS without any problems. There were no "easy" zones for the beginning of the tier, which ruined group play.I agree, forcing people to solo is not the way to go. Don't get me wrong, I loved (most of) the quests my first time through, but it severely unbalanced gameplay. I could get more exp, better loot, and more coin from soloing for 2 hours than I could for grouping (which is harder). SOE destroyed the risk vs reward in this aspect, which is why it "forced" people to solo.</blockquote><p>I understand your logic, and your right. If you take a fresh group of level 70 characters and head to KC, your asking to get owned rathe quickly.. BUT, lets reverse the hands of time real quick here back when eq2 first went live. Now, I was one of the first level 30 characters on the server. At 30, my guild did the EL Access quest. Upon arriving there, we discovered old misty thicket, the legendary rivervale, and everyones favorite low tier dungeon in eq 1, Runnyeye. Now, I remember when I was level 30, my guild and I scoped the place out. We were excited and pumped up to experience RE once again in EQ2. Ok, the first part of RE was cake, I admit, but as soon as we delved a little deeper the mobs started getting harder and we wiped in one of the rooms. Then we realized that we cant do the dungeon because were to low of a level. So, waht did we have to do? QUESTS around EL until we leveled up a bit so we could try RE again.</p><p>Now, every tier has a couple dungeons that are generally geared for players who ar about to out level the tier. By the time you hit level 70, you should already know this.  I've read where SOOOOOOO many people complained about how HARD KC is, was in beta and launch. Well, thats because ya'll didn't belong in there until the mid 70's,,not level 70.. If a dungeon says its designed for players 70-80, it doesnt' mean level 70's should be able to run the daaamn thing. Im' sure you understand this, but many people who complained about how hard these dungeons were honestly sounded like people who just bought their spiffy new level 70 off ebay and first thing they did upon recieving the account was running over to KC to LFG then got owned 3 seconds later at the trash mobs, lol.. </p><p>I understand SoE's design plan regarding most of Kunark's expansion. They wanted the content to literally last well past the time people hit their 80's. They wanted people to solo quest and keep up on the lore until it brought them to the group content. SoE didn't want you guys to run right to the dungeons and kill the content as soon as the exp pack went live at level 70 LOL.. But for some weird and particular reason, MANY OF YOU actually thought this was going to happen.. I mean,, I just don't understand the logic behind that stupid way of thinking.</p><p>Every tier I visit int he lower tiers whether it be Zek and EL at the low 30's, Steamfont and Lava in the mid 40's etc, I understand that the dungeons in those tiers aren't really meant for you to do as soon as you move into that particular tier. You have to quest, level up, and gear yourself appropriately before delving into that tier's dungeons.. It's simple and easy to understand.. I just don't get how so many people can be so,,,,,,,,i hate to say the word,,, Noobish...</p>

[dawy]

<cite>Vizzuussh@Antonia Bayle wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Diknak@Butcherblock wrote:</cite><blockquote> Try taking a group of fresh off the boat (literally) level 70's and put them into KC. KC was a nightmare at launch. If you didn't have a tank at least level 74 and two healers, you were going to get squashed like a bug. When KoS came out, a group of all 60's could easily go through a huge portion of SoS without any problems. There were no "easy" zones for the beginning of the tier, which ruined group play.I agree, forcing people to solo is not the way to go. Don't get me wrong, I loved (most of) the quests my first time through, but it severely unbalanced gameplay. I could get more exp, better loot, and more coin from soloing for 2 hours than I could for grouping (which is harder). SOE destroyed the risk vs reward in this aspect, which is why it "forced" people to solo.</blockquote><p>I understand your logic, and your right. If you take a fresh group of level 70 characters and head to KC, your asking to get owned rathe quickly.. BUT, lets reverse the hands of time real quick here back when eq2 first went live. Now, I was one of the first level 30 characters on the server. At 30, my guild did the EL Access quest. Upon arriving there, we discovered old misty thicket, the legendary rivervale, and everyones favorite low tier dungeon in eq 1, Runnyeye. Now, I remember when I was level 30, my guild and I scoped the place out. We were excited and pumped up to experience RE once again in EQ2. Ok, the first part of RE was cake, I admit, but as soon as we delved a little deeper the mobs started getting harder and we wiped in one of the rooms. Then we realized that we cant do the dungeon because were to low of a level. So, waht did we have to do? QUESTS around EL until we leveled up a bit so we could try RE again.</p><p>Now, every tier has a couple dungeons that are generally geared for players who ar about to out level the tier. By the time you hit level 70, you should already know this.  I've read where SOOOOOOO many people complained about how HARD KC is, was in beta and launch. Well, thats because ya'll didn't belong in there until the mid 70's,,not level 70.. If a dungeon says its designed for players 70-80, it doesnt' mean level 70's should be able to run the daaamn thing. Im' sure you understand this, but many people who complained about how hard these dungeons were honestly sounded like people who just bought their spiffy new level 70 off ebay and first thing they did upon recieving the account was running over to KC to LFG then got owned 3 seconds later at the trash mobs, lol.. </p><p>I understand SoE's design plan regarding most of Kunark's expansion. They wanted the content to literally last well past the time people hit their 80's. They wanted people to solo quest and keep up on the lore until it brought them to the group content. SoE didn't want you guys to run right to the dungeons and kill the content as soon as the exp pack went live at level 70 LOL.. But for some weird and particular reason, MANY OF YOU actually thought this was going to happen.. I mean,, I just don't understand the logic behind that stupid way of thinking.</p><p>Every tier I visit int he lower tiers whether it be Zek and EL at the low 30's, Steamfont and Lava in the mid 40's etc, I understand that the dungeons in those tiers aren't really meant for you to do as soon as you move into that particular tier. You have to quest, level up, and gear yourself appropriately before delving into that tier's dungeons.. It's simple and easy to understand.. I just don't get how so many people can be so,,,,,,,,i hate to say the word,,, Noobish...</p></blockquote>I'm glad you understood that design plan in ROK becuase i and i suspect many others didnt get it..didnt get it at all

[Thunderthyze]

<cite>Vizzuussh@Antonia Bayle wrote:</cite><blockquote><p>I understand SoE's design plan regarding most of Kunark's expansion. They wanted the content to literally last well past the time people hit their 80's. They wanted people to solo quest and keep up on the lore until it brought them to the group content. SoE didn't want you guys to run right to the dungeons and kill the content as soon as the exp pack went live at level 70 LOL.. But for some weird and particular reason, MANY OF YOU actually thought this was going to happen.. I mean,, I just don't understand the logic behind that stupid way of thinking.</p></blockquote><p>The reason is that people are no longer prepared to work for what they attain. They want it handed out to them and if it isn't they stamp their little feet and say the game is crap.</p><p>I agree with you. However there seems to be a certain type of player that believes they have been disenfranchised. While the game in no way precludes players from soloing, grouping or raiding there are these things called the "level cap" and the "end game". People see these events as being the "I win" point. RoK skewed the game dynamics 180 degrees in that they made soloing the fastest way to achieve these things. So the people who were used to being first to cap or first to clear a raid zone had to change their style of play.</p><p>The stupid thing is that the "soloers" who did get to cap quickly never had any intention of raiding and so getting the server discos. Basically, the people who DID get those achievements were driven raiders who just sucked it up and got on with it so that they could continue with their preferred style of play. The ones who complained (and are still complaining) are those that refused to adapt and expected the game to be changed back to what they wanted.</p><p>I have to be honest and say I regret the release of RoK because it meant my losing a LOT of friends from the game however I still play and I enjoy it when I do. I'm still looking for a guild on Runnyeye that perfectly suits my style but in the meantime I play alts alot as once you get to 80/80 there really isn't much to do unless you are prepared to devote your spare time to raiding. I got to cap with my main before Christmas and got my fabled epic (it's still fabled) within a week of release. There is no equivalent of the The Claymore series or the Prismatic that you can work on, rather it is a raid progression that I really don't have the time to devote to. The expansion was, in my opinion, poorly thought out and in no way compares with KoS which was, in retrospect, the best expansion so far. At the moment you have a lot of bored soloers who are leaving the game and a lot of the groupers/raiders who left ages ago when they couldn't deal with SOE's "volte-face".</p><p>Hopefully the next one will have a different ethos that may draw some of my old friends back again.</p>

[Gromph]

<cite>Holymoly@Runnyeye wrote:</cite><blockquote><p>... At the moment you have a lot of bored soloers who are leaving the game ...</p></blockquote><p>One thing that SOE could do to make at least some of the soloers eager to play (and I would guess quite a number of players over all) is to provide an instance that resembles the game mechanism we have for raiding, but here only for solo play.</p><p>I.e., you have rather hard mobs to deal with and they are harder the longer you progress. You have a high probability to be killed, and a low probability to win and get a better piece of armor/weapeon. This should probably be designed as an (interesting) quest line, and take maybe a couple of months of play to complete.</p>

[DragonMaster2385]

<cite>Vizzuussh@Antonia Bayle wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Diknak@Butcherblock wrote:</cite><blockquote> Try taking a group of fresh off the boat (literally) level 70's and put them into KC. KC was a nightmare at launch. If you didn't have a tank at least level 74 and two healers, you were going to get squashed like a bug. When KoS came out, a group of all 60's could easily go through a huge portion of SoS without any problems. There were no "easy" zones for the beginning of the tier, which ruined group play.I agree, forcing people to solo is not the way to go. Don't get me wrong, I loved (most of) the quests my first time through, but it severely unbalanced gameplay. I could get more exp, better loot, and more coin from soloing for 2 hours than I could for grouping (which is harder). SOE destroyed the risk vs reward in this aspect, which is why it "forced" people to solo.</blockquote><p>I understand your logic, and your right. If you take a fresh group of level 70 characters and head to KC, your asking to get owned rathe quickly.. BUT, lets reverse the hands of time real quick here back when eq2 first went live. Now, I was one of the first level 30 characters on the server. At 30, my guild did the EL Access quest. Upon arriving there, we discovered old misty thicket, the legendary rivervale, and everyones favorite low tier dungeon in eq 1, Runnyeye. Now, I remember when I was level 30, my guild and I scoped the place out. We were excited and pumped up to experience RE once again in EQ2. Ok, the first part of RE was cake, I admit, but as soon as we delved a little deeper the mobs started getting harder and we wiped in one of the rooms. Then we realized that we cant do the dungeon because were to low of a level. So, waht did we have to do? QUESTS around EL until we leveled up a bit so we could try RE again.</p><p>Now, every tier has a couple dungeons that are generally geared for players who ar about to out level the tier. By the time you hit level 70, you should already know this. I've read where SOOOOOOO many people complained about how HARD KC is, was in beta and launch. Well, thats because ya'll didn't belong in there until the mid 70's,,not level 70.. If a dungeon says its designed for players 70-80, it doesnt' mean level 70's should be able to run the daaamn thing. Im' sure you understand this, but many people who complained about how hard these dungeons were honestly sounded like people who just bought their spiffy new level 70 off ebay and first thing they did upon recieving the account was running over to KC to LFG then got owned 3 seconds later at the trash mobs, lol.. </p><p>I understand SoE's design plan regarding most of Kunark's expansion. They wanted the content to literally last well past the time people hit their 80's. They wanted people to solo quest and keep up on the lore until it brought them to the group content. SoE didn't want you guys to run right to the dungeons and kill the content as soon as the exp pack went live at level 70 LOL.. But for some weird and particular reason, MANY OF YOU actually thought this was going to happen.. I mean,, I just don't understand the logic behind that stupid way of thinking.</p><p>Every tier I visit int he lower tiers whether it be Zek and EL at the low 30's, Steamfont and Lava in the mid 40's etc, I understand that the dungeons in those tiers aren't really meant for you to do as soon as you move into that particular tier. You have to quest, level up, and gear yourself appropriately before delving into that tier's dungeons.. It's simple and easy to understand.. I just don't get how so many people can be so,,,,,,,,i hate to say the word,,, Noobish...</p><p> </p></blockquote> Aside from offending me by calling me a noob, I think you missed the point of my post. I am well aware that the difficulty of KC was intentional of SOE. I am not saying they screwed up following through with a design choice. . . I am saying their design choice sucked. Try to stay with me here . . . in KoS, as soon as you bought the expansion, you had a choice: 1) start soloing the solo quests in TT. 2) go to SoS and do the tons of quests in there as a group. In RoK, you don't have that choice, which is my point. You are FORCED to solo until the end of the tier. You say that this happened in all tiers, but it doesn't. In DoF, you had living tombs and Clefts. While they got harder the deeper you went, they had a lot to offer lower levels in the tier. In KoS, you have SOS as I mentioned above. Then in EoF, they released Acad, which was another low end T7 instance. RoK did not follow that same design, which is why so many people were frustrated. So to follow in your lead, "I just don't get how you can be so,,,,,,,,i hate to say the word,,, Noobish..."

[Dreyco]

The "I was forced to solo" argument doesn't stick for me.I wasn't "Forced" to solo.  I did the quests in small groups, and then went to dungeons in larger groups.  It was fine.  Yes, they probably could have toned up the experience in dungeons a bit more, but from what i've seen, a lot of the people who didn't have a lot of nice things to say about the expansions progression were people who were in a hurry to hit 80.  Now.But heaven forbid they actually have to quest their way up there.  Oh no, heh.

[dawy]

<cite>Dreyco wrote:</cite><blockquote>The "I was forced to solo" argument doesn't stick for me.I wasn't "Forced" to solo.  I did the quests in small groups, and then went to dungeons in larger groups.  It was fine.  Yes, they probably could have toned up the experience in dungeons a bit more, but from what i've seen, a lot of the people who didn't have a lot of nice things to say about the expansions progression were people who were in a hurry to hit 80.  Now.But heaven forbid they actually have to quest their way up there.  Oh no, heh.</blockquote>Im really glad you found groups to do the quests i couldnt for the life of me get a group for the solo part ones at all it took me a month to the day from when the expansion went live to hit level 80 and becuase of the dull nature of the quests it took me till last week to get my conj up to the cap and he too was level 70 when it hit live.Was i in a hurry to get to the cap? nope i just did the quests and made my way there easy enough,now dont get me wrong i love to do the quests but the ones in ROK,for ME at least were dull

[ke'la]

<cite>Diknak@Butcherblock wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Vizzuussh@Antonia Bayle wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Diknak@Butcherblock wrote:</cite><blockquote> Try taking a group of fresh off the boat (literally) level 70's and put them into KC. KC was a nightmare at launch. If you didn't have a tank at least level 74 and two healers, you were going to get squashed like a bug. When KoS came out, a group of all 60's could easily go through a huge portion of SoS without any problems. There were no "easy" zones for the beginning of the tier, which ruined group play.I agree, forcing people to solo is not the way to go. Don't get me wrong, I loved (most of) the quests my first time through, but it severely unbalanced gameplay. I could get more exp, better loot, and more coin from soloing for 2 hours than I could for grouping (which is harder). SOE destroyed the risk vs reward in this aspect, which is why it "forced" people to solo.</blockquote><p>I understand your logic, and your right. If you take a fresh group of level 70 characters and head to KC, your asking to get owned rathe quickly.. BUT, lets reverse the hands of time real quick here back when eq2 first went live. Now, I was one of the first level 30 characters on the server. At 30, my guild did the EL Access quest. Upon arriving there, we discovered old misty thicket, the legendary rivervale, and everyones favorite low tier dungeon in eq 1, Runnyeye. Now, I remember when I was level 30, my guild and I scoped the place out. We were excited and pumped up to experience RE once again in EQ2. Ok, the first part of RE was cake, I admit, but as soon as we delved a little deeper the mobs started getting harder and we wiped in one of the rooms. Then we realized that we cant do the dungeon because were to low of a level. So, waht did we have to do? QUESTS around EL until we leveled up a bit so we could try RE again.</p><p>Now, every tier has a couple dungeons that are generally geared for players who ar about to out level the tier. By the time you hit level 70, you should already know this. I've read where SOOOOOOO many people complained about how HARD KC is, was in beta and launch. Well, thats because ya'll didn't belong in there until the mid 70's,,not level 70.. If a dungeon says its designed for players 70-80, it doesnt' mean level 70's should be able to run the daaamn thing. Im' sure you understand this, but many people who complained about how hard these dungeons were honestly sounded like people who just bought their spiffy new level 70 off ebay and first thing they did upon recieving the account was running over to KC to LFG then got owned 3 seconds later at the trash mobs, lol.. </p><p>I understand SoE's design plan regarding most of Kunark's expansion. They wanted the content to literally last well past the time people hit their 80's. They wanted people to solo quest and keep up on the lore until it brought them to the group content. SoE didn't want you guys to run right to the dungeons and kill the content as soon as the exp pack went live at level 70 LOL.. But for some weird and particular reason, MANY OF YOU actually thought this was going to happen.. I mean,, I just don't understand the logic behind that stupid way of thinking.</p><p>Every tier I visit int he lower tiers whether it be Zek and EL at the low 30's, Steamfont and Lava in the mid 40's etc, I understand that the dungeons in those tiers aren't really meant for you to do as soon as you move into that particular tier. You have to quest, level up, and gear yourself appropriately before delving into that tier's dungeons.. It's simple and easy to understand.. I just don't get how so many people can be so,,,,,,,,i hate to say the word,,, Noobish...</p></blockquote> Aside from offending me by calling me a noob, I think you missed the point of my post. I am well aware that the difficulty of KC was intentional of SOE. I am not saying they screwed up following through with a design choice. . . I am saying their design choice sucked. Try to stay with me here . . . in KoS, as soon as you bought the expansion, you had a choice: 1) start soloing the solo quests in TT. 2) go to SoS and do the tons of quests in there as a group. In RoK, you don't have that choice, which is my point. You are FORCED to solo until the end of the tier. You say that this happened in all tiers, but it doesn't. In DoF, you had living tombs and Clefts. While they got harder the deeper you went, they had a lot to offer lower levels in the tier. In KoS, you have SOS as I mentioned above. Then in EoF, they released Acad, which was another low end T7 instance. RoK did not follow that same design, which is why so many people were frustrated. So to follow in your lead, "I just don't get how you can be so,,,,,,,,i hate to say the word,,, Noobish..."</blockquote>The Equivilant to SoS(minus the properly tiered loot) was(until they revamped KC) CMM and MMC they both start at 70 and goto 75 and if you have T8 gear they are just as easy as SoS was in T7 gear. The issue thier is the stuff from those places was T7, and people have been running them for a year already.