Modified Classic Progression Server

Uzi_sl said:

This one only goes to PoP,

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Omg, that bit didn't sink in when I read it!

That's really promising to me because I loved the sound of this besides the "progression" part. Three boxing is the greatest thing ever... It's few enough that you can still focus on each one rather than the macro spamming a 6 box becomes, but it's enough that you do more or less any content besides raids. And it also means that people still tend to interact because it's not just a server full of 6 boxers.

I think I'll give this a shot. I still have EQ Emu installed. Thanks for the heads up!

I'm having fun with the server at the moment. I'm still lower level, but it seems like the higher levels in my guild are frequently grouping to tackle tough content.

burntsushi_sl said:

I think the newer versions of Live handle this fairly well. Out of combat you get increased regeneration rates, but you have to wait 30 seconds after combat ends before it kicks in. It really helps with solo downtime and limits the regen if you are grouped up and/or chain pulling. My guess is that most people are in favor of the resource management mini-game you are talking about, but not really in favor of extended out of combat medding time. I understand that some people consider sitting and waiting for the mana/health bar to slowly refill to be gameplay, but it does get a bit old after a while.....I can only watch so many cat videos on youtube =P The 30 second thing is a pretty good compromise as it eliminates extended ooc medding while has no effect if a group is chain pulling like it should be.

Also, things like mounts and flowing thought detract from this same resource management game, but are ingame and considered legit.

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That's just it: long solo downtime was the primary driver to get people to form groups. You won't be reading books or watching youtube in competent groups. All classes become much, much more efficient in groups. This is why EQ is a "required grouping" game-- not because soloing is 100% impossible, (well maybe for rogues) but that it is terribly inefficient to solo. To remove downtime is to remove the required grouping-- at least to exp anyway. There were however some solo friendly classes and tactics, i.e. Necros and quadding, so solo players had options.

On a server with super fast out of combat regen, wizards must rule supreme; why the hell would anybody make a rogue there? Just blow up mobs in seconds and regen all the mana near instantly. DoTs become less mana efficient than DDs. The primary value of melee damage-- that it is manaless and free-- becomes worthless. The only way to balance that is of course make melee do nearly as much damage as chain casting wizards which is ridicul... I mean WoW.

Resource management isn't a mini-game, it is a core component of the game for casters. Other than keeping people alive, what made a good cleric? Not making them wait for your mana needlessly. You can succeed at the former by spamming remedy while failing badly at the latter.

Horses just save you the trouble of standing and sitting. The extra mana from med ticks while casting are negligible. The key difference between flowing thought and OOC regen is that FT is constant regeneration in or out of combat. (aside from FT being much less regen) Having two regeneration rates will strongly pressure the player into minimizing the amount of time spent in the slower rate and reduce the number of strategies the player has to choose from, as any strategy that involves staying in combat for extended periods becomes infeasible. Examples: root rotting, med kiting. The mechanic harshly punishes low DPS groups in general. Even tactics like CH rotations get disrupted because you can have some clerics out of combat regenerating while others are casting. (in that sense it might be considered easily exploitable) In classic EverQuest, if your group was good, you could achieve a nearly 100% uptime; building your group around OOC regen could actually end up increasing your downtime.

Isn't it only +5% regen out of combat? Or does it mean that you regen 5% per tick or something? Either way they were talking about downtime still being a couple of minutes, just not 5 minutes or something. Sounds ok to me, you will still need to be mana efficient and play well but it will just reduce the long downtimes after big fights when you get all spent.

Will have to see how it works, I just made my characters but can't play now until tomorrow. I came up with my dream 3 box. I also love the idea of 3 boxing because you will still want to group like that, and groups should be easy to set up as well because if most people have a box or two, they can put a group together easily. Much better than 6 boxing where people just play alone. Can't wait to play tomorrow now, hope it's ok.

Hmm little disappointed. I gave it a shot but not sure it's something I could stick with.

First thing that struck me is that there's only about 30 people online. It could build up, but for now, that's way too low to have any sort of chance of grouping while you level up. And at max level there's already at least 4 guilds... so stupid having such a fractured community. I also got trolled by some guy every time I said something so really, not a good start.

Also, most of the players are level 50+, even though the server has only been live for a month. The fast XP rate seems to have quite an affect, but not only that, the regen is a bit nuts. I only got a few levels so not sure how it pans out later, but I think Torrid is right that it would change the way people play the game. The whole point of EQ was that it was really dangerous, especially in dungeons. But if you regen quickly then you can just play gung-ho, unload all your biggest stuff on every mob, smack everything down asap, and then rest a moment and you're ready to go again.

And not only that..... but they have adjusted the strength of none group content so that it's easier to solo. The affect is that my level 1 druid hit a bat twice and the bat died. It seems the bat had a grand total of 5HP, and I did one hit for 1hp, and a second hit which was a critical for 4hp and the mob died. I'm all for easing up on some of the tedium but that just aint EQ.

Not that it's worthless. But if you give everyone a very fast (and easy) level up process of one month, instant free teleports etc.. then basically the game is just going to be entirely about raiding. Before you know it, everyone will be max level with a million AA's and raid gear, so that makes all the standard group content obsolete. Probably good if you want a raid focused progression through old world, kunark, velious, luclin, pop and then custom stuff. But as someone who mostly liked group content and occasional soloing, it's not really for me :/