Vanguard - I don't give a fuck if it's dead, It's still brown as fuck (Download link in 1st post)

Let's talk Vanguard. Since we are capable of changing things in the game, what would you like to see change? Things we can change are as follows: Class Abilities, Leveling Experience (1-55), Quests, Mobs (Encounters/Placement), Dungeons/Raids, Gear/Itemization. Things we cannot change: Graphics/Art, Anything to do with modifying the game files itself.

Me, personally, I would like to see some minor changes from 1-50. At sunset, there were some gear imbalances. You could get some amazing gear at the 35-40 range that was as good or better than level 50 gear. Also, would like to buff some gear from quest lines to bring it in line with one another to make them all viable. I would also like to adjust all the 51+ content down to level 50 and tiered. I feel that once the cap was increased, areas (NN, etc) and Raids (APW) were made obsolete and useless. Also, the gap in gear from the APW to the augmented gear is insane. It needs to be tweaked (nerfed really) to be more in-line for future content additions. Additionally, once this is done, I would like to see some additional areas completed such as Cave of Wonders and Stiirhad. AAs may also be a possibility since the UI is already there.

What are some other (serious) ideas people have that we could try and bring to the emulator?

Cyrcle_sl said:

Also, would like to buff some gear from quest lines to bring it in line with one another to make them all viable.

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Thumbs up for getting rid of levels 51+: worst thing SOE ever did for the game.

Thumbs down for this suggestion: I'd actually recommend the opposite nerf the items that were added later to put them in line with original itemization. Return to the original slower leveling - which made those lower level items worth getting.

Finally, I'd also add some charm back: things like bringing back the vampire curse, mothra and the weird changes SOE made to old content (e.g. turning the 10-15 level dungeon near Tanvu into a level 50 dungeon).

It's either bring 51+ down to 50 or make 51+ actually work by adding more content. All the 51+ gear needs to be re-balanced in my opinion because if you look at APW gear then look at stuff like the Pantheon gear with augments in - it's insane. There's no where to go after there regarding new content. The gear would just look insane. And if gear is tweaked, of course content needs to be tweaked. It only makes sense at that point to bring the content down to level 50 anyways.

I also just posted this on the emu forums:
I'm starting to see the reason why Vanguard was shut down. Once that SoD/51+ increase was released, shit was piled on top of shit on top of shit. Things became a pain to fix for future content to work. Which is probably why they went with some whack ass augment gear for CoW and that stupid new broken buff system in an attempt to fix it. Trying to undo several years worth of shit, they realized it was just too much and shut it down.

Fix the Warrior class. There was simply no reason to bring one when you had another tank available. Also DK didnt stack well so one was enough to bring as well.

Cyrcle_sl said:

Let's talk Vanguard. Since we are capable of changing things in the game, what would you like to see change? Things we can change are as follows: Class Abilities, Leveling Experience (1-55), Quests, Mobs (Encounters/Placement), Dungeons/Raids, Gear/Itemization. Things we cannot change: Graphics/Art, Anything to do with modifying the game files itself.

Me, personally, I would like to see some minor changes from 1-50. At sunset, there were some gear imbalances. You could get some amazing gear at the 35-40 range that was as good or better than level 50 gear. Also, would like to buff some gear from quest lines to bring it in line with one another to make them all viable. I would also like to adjust all the 51+ content down to level 50 and tiered. I feel that once the cap was increased, areas (NN, etc) and Raids (APW) were made obsolete and useless. Also, the gap in gear from the APW to the augmented gear is insane. It needs to be tweaked (nerfed really) to be more in-line for future content additions. Additionally, once this is done, I would like to see some additional areas completed such as Cave of Wonders and Stiirhad. AAs may also be a possibility since the UI is already there.

What are some other (serious) ideas people have that we could try and bring to the emulator?

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No one and I mean NO ONE wants to farm the Shores of Darkness chunks. It was by far the worst content in the game.

- set xp rates to what they were at launch, the game wasn't made to race to 50 with so much content at all levels
- remove the HR and other ez-mode gear questlines. It made most low to mid content obsolete and made the game a race to the end
- remove 51-55 levels and areas, it trivialized all the end game content while adding almost none besides gear and a few grinding areas
- re-itemize a lot of the low to mid level gear... especially in some of the less known dungeons
- The end game should be - Swamp Gear -> Nusibe Necropolis -> Rahz Inkur -> ToT -> Ancient Port Warehouse + few overland raid mobs ...when you guys finally launch. Other content can always be added later on.
- The only other post-APW content you should even conceive of adding for launch is the gigantic questline for the gryphon mount.

Everything else, including SoD, Pantheon, higher tier overland mobs, City of Brass and Cave of Wonders should only be added after the emulator has been around for a while and people are farming APW. Even then it should be added in a heavily modified form, the 51-55 update was a fucking disaster that turned VG from a dungeon crawling game into 'sit in the same fucking spot and grind shitty mobs' game.

Thanks for the input guys. I've been going back and forth with a few guys on why the 51+ content needs to be adjusted, but don't seem to be getting any where. We'll see where it goes. Throw more some more input at me.

Luxer_sl said:

No one and I mean NO ONE wants to farm the Shores of Darkness chunks. It was by far the worst content in the game.

- set xp rates to what they were at launch, the game wasn't made to race to 50 with so much content at all levels

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I implied same thing earlier but Luxer's post puts it into context: the game was originally designed for slow leveling so taking a week or two to get a Red Weapon from Original Pantheon or CIS was worth the effort. Same thing is true for Crafting and Dip XP. It was all supposed to take a long time.

- remove the HR and other ez-mode gear questlines. It made most low to mid content obsolete and made the game a race to the end

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Again, I sorta implied this but Luxer puts it into context: why bother with Lord Tsang's Tomb, which is a PITA grind for the various stones and (in the original version - required a run across Thestra for final upgrade of weapon), when you can walk through the Hunter's or WTF questline and get weapons that were much better.

I would also remove Isle of the Dawn and any crap associated with Kamelott.

- remove 51-55 levels and areas, it trivialized all the end game content while adding almost none besides gear and a few grinding areas
- re-itemize a lot of the low to mid level gear... especially in some of the less known dungeons
- The end game should be - Swamp Gear -> Nusibe Necropolis -> Rahz Inkur -> ToT -> Ancient Port Warehouse + few overland raid mobs ...when you guys finally launch.

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Should be multiple paths to APW. In addition to NN/RI/ToT there were several 45-50the level Dungeons that were never fully itemized such as Vault of Heroes

Pantheon, .

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Return Pantheon to the level 30ish dungeon it used to be with the Red item quest line.

Curious but if you have the skills to build an emu, can't you make a Mmo from scratch? I smell eq/Vg game!

Convo_sl said:

Curious but if you have the skills to build an emu, can't you make a Mmo from scratch? I smell eq/Vg game!

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Remember they get all (or most of) the art, quest text, and similar for "free."

Convo_sl said:

Curious but if you have the skills to build an emu, can't you make a Mmo from scratch? I smell eq/Vg game!

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EverGuard:Saga of the Fallen

or

VanQuest: Rise of Heroes

I'd investigate how much is possible with using the housing system to make a more 'living, dynamic' world like what was promised with Vanguard's initial launch. An 'on-rails' system of content honestly was what killed the game based on what was promised.

Honestly expected a game like ArcheAge or Wurm Online when I first played Vanguard.... it was hyped up as a spiritual successor to EverQuest and fell short and then some of it.

I never saw anything wrong with HR/URT questlines. They gave lower level palyers incentives to gear up and explore different parts of the continent. The questlines were challenging enough for the rewards made sense

I remember the early days with player posts talking about how you'd make your house in a dangerous area near a raid entrance and you'd be a diplomat so people who basically knock on your door and request your diplomatic services to open up the raid you live near that you've spent months negotiating with....

Fucking dumb ass dreamers too dumb to realize house would be segregated, nobody would be hanging around their house all day waiting for a knock on the door, and what it all meant is someone in your guild would be asked or forced to grind diplo to max for whatever minor benefits it would provide, but that it wouldn't be nearly as 'required' as anything thought/hoped.

There were and are a hundred things that should be fixed and focused on before housing is ever touched, especially trying to make housing more dynamic.

Convo_sl said:

Curious but if you have the skills to build an emu, can't you make a Mmo from scratch? I smell eq/Vg game!

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They don't have access to the source code or world building tools. All they can do is modify already existing assets and systems.

Vinyard_sl said:

I never saw anything wrong with HR/URT questlines.

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It made like 15 dungeons completely useless.

pharmakos_sl said:

i think secrets was suggesting that, while it would be incredibly difficult to add new content to the world by altering the game files, perhaps it would be possible to hack in new content by manipulating the housing system.

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This is what I was hinting at. EQ1 can be manipulated in a similar way with ground spawns - you can flag them as solid and unclickable with loaded models in the zone (example, HOUSE1_ACTORDEF) to transform barren wastelands into completely new areas, in clients as early as Titanium. I'm sure something similar would be possible in Vanguard.

I was actually thinking the other day, we could just increase bank space and drop housing all together, because that was all it was good for. Think of all the land mass we could use for future content. ^.^

I like the idea to scrap 51-55 and readjust leveling curve and mobs. It was fun to be like ~40 when you were fully done with CW armour and weapon after a long grind and dungeon crawling.