Agnarr sounds hilariously terrible, and I'm sure it sucks to group with those people, but isn't that what early EQ was like? It was for me. Everyone I grouped with played like shit. Wizzies would cast their biggest nukes on the pull, and end up tanking the entire fight. Druid would aggro it by healing the wizzy and then run in circles while everyone has to chase the mob around like Benny Hill. I liked that it was so chaotic because it gave everyone so much to learn. EQ got kinda boring once everyone nailed it and knew how to tank, dps, heal. Also most healers only had 1 heal back then, the HoT and stuff came a lot later in the game.
You don't get shit like trains on most of the servers I play because everyone knows how to play too well. I really like that noobs are still coming to EQ and having a chaotic experience. Although, I hate playing with shit people, I think modern gamers are generally shit. I play a lot of online games and people are generally really bad. Fun for PVP but frustrating as hell in a team game when team work is essential.
Its the main factor in the box armies.
I haven't seen how Krono affects the game really. On the server I play on people trade with it and everyone is so rich, it takes like 10 krono to buy an end game item which seems crazy to me, but I don't play end game so I never cared about all this stuff.
But I do think SOE did a bad job at making this game F2P because predictably they went for the P2W approach. There are lots of F2P games that survive on cosmetic stuff only, but EQ lets you buy far too much of an upper hand. You can just buy a level 85 character straight off, which out of 105 total levels is almost the whole way, and it comes with great gear. So if you want to start from scratch you can just buy one of those guys and power level the hell out of yourself. And there are loads of things you can buy to get an upper hand, on one of the servers I play, you can buy a Krono with real money, then sell it in game for about 2.5 MILLION plat. That is textbook paying to win. I always thought EVE did it the smart way but however it went wrong in EQ, is bad. The subscription thing isn't too bad, playing without it is otherwise doable, and buying it is still desirable because of the extra AA's and stuff.
Not letting people in the global chat channel is a bit baffling though, especially in a game that already seems completely dead to new players. The server might have 1000+ players on it but you will never see or hear any of them when you are starting out. I think good ruleset servers could bring in a lot more players, but I think their F2p model would be a stumbling block.
Anyway, that poll shows people want kind of the opposite of what is currently on offer. Mercs, Defiant, etc. is only wanted by a quarter of voters, and most people want progression servers. Seems clear Daybreak need to get busy bringing out more of those servers and try to get some better rulesets.
