EQ TLP ramblings

Mangler is still going strong. That may change but there will be 12-15 guilds that clear dodh.

Mangler is doing a little better than Coirnav was at that point but it also started with more guilds than Coirnav did. The big issue is if you look at the list of Mangler guilds they're almost all "cycler" guilds I've seen on tons of TLPs, when the 2021 TLPs hit I foresee the typical outcome happening. Keep in mind DoDH may seem like "deep into" EQ, but it's still 3 years out from live and not even >40% of expansions completed. Phinny was still pretty healthy in these eras as well, but you just don't bring new players onto TLPs at this point so every guild that folds is a portion of the player base that's gone forever. It really adds up by the time you're in the level 90-95 range (at which point you're still more than 1.5 years from hitting live.)

It’s really hard to wrap your head around just how much EQ is left to go. In 2021 DoDH/PoR are still basically early era EQ.

All that's true but Mangler is more similar to Phinigel than Coirnav is my only point. Zaide mentioned how Mangler was the most popular TLP according to a dev.

Mangler and Selo gutted an already struggling Coirnav. Mangler survived Aradune fine, probably because of the queue and lag issues Aradune had for a long time. Thriving through even one wave of new TLPs makes its future a lot better than it might have otherwise been.

SoF is really the turning point where EQ turned into a more modern MMO. Level 80!

When do focuses on gear become standardized? I feel like one of the few things that makes gear selection non brain dead is juggling focuses in the 70 era.

DickTrickle said:

When do focuses on gear become standardized? I feel like one of the few things that makes gear selection non brain dead is juggling focuses in the 70 era.

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SoF was when they standardized gear and just tiered everything.

Sterling said:

SoF was when they standardized gear and just tiered everything.

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Yeah the specific slots having specific foci are fairly standardized with the SoF armor and forward, although even that is tweaked slightly over a longer span of time.

DickTrickle said:

All that's true but Mangler is more similar to Phinigel than Coirnav is my only point. Zaide mentioned how Mangler was the most popular TLP according to a dev.

Mangler and Selo gutted an already struggling Coirnav. Mangler survived Aradune fine, probably because of the queue and lag issues Aradune had for a long time. Thriving through even one wave of new TLPs makes its future a lot better than it might have otherwise been.

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I would agree Mangler is more on the Phinny trajectory than Coirnav, but I'm more talking about the kind of universal TLP trend we've seen and how truebox really starts to eat away at your player base past a certain inflection point. So far we have seen this on every single server (including Phinny) that has had a truebox ruleset. It's possible Mangler bucks the trend but I've not seen any reason to assume it will. Much like Phinny as long as you're willing to merge into another guild or absorb other guilds, at least some people there will reach live. But if you're not a tank or melee DPS main (and I really just mean Monk and Berserker) you're going to hit eras where I think the game isn't very fun outside of raiding, and some people are okay with that but a lot of people aren't.

DoDH is probably a good spot to drop truebox for TLP. There's little open world stuff that matters all that much and it would help with the population bleed.

A lot of us have suggested DoDH for those reasons. There's a bit of open world shenanigans in PoR but it's really pretty minor. Even TSS and SoD would still help a ton versus their current stance of "TRUEBOX FOREVER LULZ", like in SoD you can get fucking mercenaries which are really shitty automated bot characters, so it seems crazy they won't even consider dropping it after that point.

Is phinny down to just OGC at this point? i feel a huge part of that server surviving is Dima keeping that guild going, fippy died pretty late in the game too once the core membership had really shifted focus to phinny. I think mangler will be fine depending on when they launch the next TLP, launch it in March when people are really burning out in demi plane and its still a month and a half to TSS and you will hurt the population more than if it launches after TSS reinvigorates peoples desire to play.

At the end of the day the poor pacing by DBG in the 65 and 70 era is a huge drag on TLPs. They really should enable some of the catch up mechanics earlier like mercs and defiant gear to keep people coming in. Agree, they should also turn truebox off starting in DODH since that is when truebox ended on live servers.

The biggest issue is they still have is there is no end game with these TLPs. I mean Selo still doesnt know whats going to happen with them. Are they just going to be the only live server with AOCs and Truebox still enabled? All the dead servers which will limp along for years just wasting space basically have no idea whats going to happen either.

Creslin said:

Is phinny down to just OGC at this point? i feel a huge part of that server surviving is Dima keeping that guild going, fippy died pretty late in the game too once the core membership had really shifted focus to phinny. I think mangler will be fine depending on when they launch the next TLP, launch it in March when people are really burning out in demi plane and its still a month and a half to TSS and you will hurt the population more than if it launches after TSS reinvigorates peoples desire to play.

At the end of the day the poor pacing by DBG in the 65 and 70 era is a huge drag on TLPs. They really should enable some of the catch up mechanics earlier like mercs and defiant gear to keep people coming in. Agree, they should also turn truebox off starting in DODH since that is when truebox ended on live servers.

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Phinny has Resolute and Rosengard III still going in addition to OGC. Resolute still has more than a full roster of mains, but is more casual. They recently (I believe) announced they would not pursue beating TBL in era due to the 4-clears (or technically 3.5) required for each tier to unlock the next and the difficulty of the encounters. Rosengard I know is still raiding but I think at a reduced level compared to OGC and Resolute. Phinny I think was still at 5-6 guilds in VoA and then by TDS it ended up just being the same 3 guilds that are there now. This is not at all surprising, while the level 70 stretch is the first "bad time" on a TLP, the CotF-->TDS back to back are pretty brutal, two of the worst expansions ever released and one of them being a level increase expansion means Phinny was in it for 12 weeks.

Elderan said:

The biggest issue is they still have is there is no end game with these TLPs. I mean Selo still doesnt know whats going to happen with them. Are they just going to be the only live server with AOCs and Truebox still enabled? All the dead servers which will limp along for years just wasting space basically have no idea whats going to happen either.

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Yeah so after a campaign of many months we've finally been told they have reached a decision about Selo, but we can't be told the decision until "sometime soon."

Alright, which one of you guys showed up at the Capitol last month?

They finally announced what's happening with Selo's and others close to live

Selo: Starting with the first patch after you reach Claws of Veeshan, which is March 10th, we will open free transfers off of Selo. You will be able to utilize these free transfers until your server is merged at a later date to be announced in the future at which time you will be merged into Povar.

Phinigel: TBA
Miragul: TBA

Lendarios said:

I gotta say the TLP experience of EQ so far has been great.

I'm not into doing the same thing over and over again, such as classic, over and over, so this incremental TLP is really nice. And with MQ2 and boxes, it is really fun to play with a full group.

Right now this Covorterum flagging on underfoot is not bad at all. Underfoot is a great expansion so far.

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X2 I can’t believe I fell for those negativity on the internet
I should have returned to eq years ago
All these years buying & switching games endlessly , only Norrath can fill that void …