The first lunge in the battle has been made by Sony...

Animalor · Post by **Animalor** » March 1, 2005, 3:13 pm

http://eq2vault.ign.com/pagetools/paget ... ws&id=5774

Refer to the part in bold below...

"EverQuest II - 325,000 Players Strong, No Waiting

EverQuest II continues to grow at an amazing rate, not just in the number of players that have fallen in love with the game's rich, entertaining content, but also in the physical size of the world. We've got over 325,000 people logging in to our servers every week, with no delays or wait times and the game they are playing is only getting better.

Below are a few reasons why we believe that if you aren’t currently playing EverQuest II, you should be. We are committed to our player base and are very passionate about making EverQuest II the best MMO game.

Open Communication
Sony Online has an amazing community relations team that listens to players’ feedback, and let them know what is going on with EverQuest II. Our development team and even our president, John Smedley, often respond personally to players, so players can rest assured that SOE is listening (and reading) and we do care what our subscribers think. Many of the changes that have already been made to EverQuest II (i.e. more solo content, new interfaces, and even quest content) have been a direct result of community feedback.

325,000 Players, No Waiting -- SOE Subscribers Can Play the Game They’re Paying to Play, When They Want To
We believe strongly in ensuring that the players can get into EverQuest II whenever they want. Understandably, all MMO games have downtime for maintenance and patching, but we don’t believe in making our players wait in line to play our games. They’re paying a monthly subscription to play a game and our job is to work hard to let you play it as much as, and when, they choose.

Tons of Content Added Since Launch
Since launch, an enormous amount of free content has been added to EverQuest II. In addition to changes that made the game more fun for soloists and group players alike, more than 1100 quests have been added to the game since launch on November 8th. We've added more than 1200 new items to the game, including more craftable items for tradeskillers, and more loot around the world. Almost 400 new spells have been added and we've worked diligently to make sure our spell effects are as eye-catching as they are powerful. Recently, we added 8 new areas to the world, so there are now well over 100 zones in the world of EverQuest II to explore.

That's not all. We have a very long list of new features, additions, and gameplay enhancements that make EverQuest II even more fun to play, including:

- Greatly increased solo and small group experience rewards
- Mentoring allows higher-level players to “group down” with lower-level players
- Lots of new armor looks
- Two new dungeons available for level 25 to 30 groups
- A dozen new level 50 epic raid zones have been added, including the Draconic quests
- Eight new instanced dungeons for both soloers and groups
- More encounters added for soloers and small groups, including advanced solo encounters
- Tons of new quests, many for solo players
- Sabotage quests that allow you to strike at your rival city
- Training spells added as yet another way to personalize your character
- New examine information added to explain the benefits of spells, arts, food, drink, poisons, and potions
- Brawlers get built-in shields
- Guild followers can now spend the status they earn at city merchants
- Easier to equip rings, wrist items, and weapons
- Maps now show your current heading
- Lots of UI tweaks and enhancements
- Revamped Heroic Opportunities, making them more fun and visually dynamic
- Vitality indicator added to your XP bar
- Tabbed chat windows have been added to organize your conversations
- See what your target is attacking with the new Implied Target window
- More precise, informative AC values
- New heritage quests, including Golden Efreeti Boots and the Crown of King Tranix
- A new con system that allows you to see important information on enemies before you attack
- Longer durations for short-term group buffs and single-target buffs
- Less fizzles on spells meaning more damage more often
- Shorter timers and fewer restrictions on instanced zones
- House pet naming
- All tradeskill classes can now refine their own materials and components
- Wizards and Warlocks go nuke happy with more damage
- Tanks now tank better with increased mitigation
- Easier search abilities so you can find potions, poisons, activated items, and food
- Even more voiceover available for optional download

All of this new content has given players a reason to come back to our world again and again, and we're continuing to make gameplay improvements every month.

Today, Sony Online Entertainment would like to invite players from any game that may be experiencing lines to log in to their servers, a lack of customer service attention, or a lack of new, free game content, to play the EverQuest II Trial of the Isle demo -- We think you'll agree that EverQuest II is a fun, engaging experience that you have to see to believe.

We hope to see you in the world of EverQuest II soon."

Mr Bacon · Post by **Mr Bacon** » March 1, 2005, 4:07 pm

The battle began when both companies released their games a good month+ earlier than they should have.

Sargeras · Post by **Sargeras** » March 1, 2005, 4:15 pm

I like how they show fixes as new content.

miir · Post by **miir** » March 1, 2005, 4:19 pm

Sargeras wrote:I like how they show fixes as new content.

We have a very long list of new features, additions, and gameplay enhancements that make EverQuest II even more fun to play, including:

Fash · Post by **Fash** » March 1, 2005, 4:19 pm

the first lunge? lol... both of them have spent 4 years in development.

Aabidano · Post by **Aabidano** » March 1, 2005, 4:30 pm

Sony Online Entertainment

Those 3 words and past experience are why I don't play EQ2.

miir · Post by **miir** » March 1, 2005, 4:32 pm

Aabidano wrote:
Sony Online Entertainment
Those 3 words and past experience are why I don't play EQ2.

Well then it's your loss...
Seems like a lot of people who don't like EQ2 are people who will never play EQ2.

Bubba Grizz · Post by **Bubba Grizz** » March 1, 2005, 4:35 pm

Most likely true Miir. I for one can only afford to play one game. I already have enough money coming out of check to pay bills. I'm just happy the wife hasn't caught on yet that I am paying to play WoW.

Animalor · Post by **Animalor** » March 1, 2005, 4:41 pm

Fash wrote:the first lunge? lol... both of them have spent 4 years in development.

This is, to my knowledge, the first time that one of the majors players clearly exploited a weakness of the other product in order to make their own offering look like a better choice.

Sargeras · Post by **Sargeras** » March 1, 2005, 4:42 pm

miir wrote:
Sargeras wrote:I like how they show fixes as new content.

We have a very long list of new features, additions, and gameplay enhancements that make EverQuest II even more fun to play, including:

Maybe I should have been more specific. Yes, they're adding new things, but it also seems like they glamorizing fixes to make them look like features.

- Wizards and Warlocks go nuke happy with more damage
- Tanks now tank better with increased mitigation

Class balance perhaps?

- Maps now show your current heading
- Less fizzles on spells meaning more damage more often

Fixes? yay?

- Greatly increased solo and small group experience rewards
- Eight new instanced dungeons for both soloers and groups
- More encounters added for soloers and small groups, including advanced solo encounters
- Tons of new quests, many for solo players

Ummm, isn't that repetitive?

Aabidano · Post by **Aabidano** » March 1, 2005, 4:49 pm

miir wrote:Seems like a lot of people who don't like EQ2 are people who will never play EQ2.

I don't dislike EQ2, I dislike SOE. The initial reports of EQ2 turned me off from it a bit, but the main reason I'm not playing it is past experience with the company selling it.

miir · Post by **miir** » March 1, 2005, 4:54 pm

Maybe I should have been more specific. Yes, they're adding new things, but it also seems like they glamorizing fixes to make them look like features.

Why are some people are so rabid to criticise SOE about anything that they dont mind making themselves look like a complete fucking moron in the process?

Sargeras · Post by **Sargeras** » March 1, 2005, 4:59 pm

miir wrote:they dont mind making themselves look like a complete fucking moron in the process?

In this case, the only person that sees me as a complete fucking moron is you.

Criticize SOE about anything? What the fuck have we been doing here for years?

Ebumar · Post by **Ebumar** » March 1, 2005, 5:05 pm

I've played both. I liked both. I like WoW more.

masteen · Post by **masteen** » March 1, 2005, 5:10 pm

Ebumar wrote:I've played both. I liked both. I like WoW more.

You're still getting deguilded

Voronwë · Post by **Voronwë** » March 1, 2005, 5:11 pm

yeah Sony doesnt believe in its users having to wait for servers to be up.

Hello every fucking EQ expansion.

shit hello EQ launch. Hello January 2000. hello a million other times.

anybody who jerks off to that press release is such a fucking newb it is silly

Fash · Post by **Fash** » March 1, 2005, 5:29 pm

hahahahaa.. vorpwnwe

Ebumar · Post by **Ebumar** » March 1, 2005, 5:43 pm

My bowels move for voronwe.

miir · Post by **miir** » March 1, 2005, 6:14 pm

Voronwë wrote:yeah Sony doesnt believe in its users having to wait for servers to be up.

Hello every fucking EQ expansion.

shit hello EQ launch. Hello January 2000. hello a million other times.

anybody who jerks off to that press release is such a fucking newb it is silly

A company that has actually learned from it's past mistakes must be pretty shitty.

Nilaman · Post by **Nilaman** » March 1, 2005, 6:18 pm

Learn shmern.

Wait till SoE fucks up EQ2.

miir · Post by **miir** » March 1, 2005, 6:33 pm

OK, let's apply your logic to the real world.

Dodge/Chrysler K-Cars (back in the 80s) were the biggest pieces of shit on the road. They broke down, were cheaply made but people bought them up by the millions!

In the years following the demise of the K-Car, Chrysler produced some pretty fucking shitty cars.. but their sales kept increasing.

(Much like how people bitched about EQ and SWG being shitty games with shitty support and how SOE was evil.... but people kept playing!)

Fast forawrd a buch of years and Chrysler is one of the most progressive and successful aunto companies in the world.... putting out award winning cars like the 300, Crossfire and Viper.

People would call you a fucking idiot if you said how shitty Chryslers are now because of the shitty K-Cars they had made in the past.

noel · Post by **noel** » March 1, 2005, 6:35 pm

miir wrote:OK, let's apply your logic to the real world.

Dodge/Chrysler K-Cars (back in the 80s) were the biggest pieces of shit on the road. They broke down, were cheaply made but people bought them up by the millions!

In the years following the demise of the K-Car, Chrysler produced some pretty fucking shitty cars.. but their sales kept increasing.

(Much like how people bitched about EQ and SWG being shitty games with shitty support and how SOE was evil.... but people kept playing!)

Fast forawrd a buch of years and Chrysler is one of the most progressive and successful aunto companies in the world.... putting out award winning cars like the 300, Crossfire and Viper.

People would call you a fucking idiot if you said how shitty Chryslers are now because of the shitty K-Cars they had made in the past.

You're joking right?

The American Auto industry is STILL working to recover from the perception that foreign cars > domestic cars.

Wulfran · Post by **Wulfran** » March 1, 2005, 6:37 pm

miir wrote:
Voronwë wrote:yeah Sony doesnt believe in its users having to wait for servers to be up.

Hello every fucking EQ expansion.

shit hello EQ launch. Hello January 2000. hello a million other times.

anybody who jerks off to that press release is such a fucking newb it is silly
A company that has actually learned from it's past mistakes must be pretty shitty.

Well, for a lot of us, we didn't see any evidence of that in EQ, even if we played and bought Omens of War in September. As Voro said EVERY SINGLE EXPANSION and a good many patches had associated fuck ups, periods of server and zone instability and emergency follow up patches. Thats really learning from their mistakes. Now you can claim the launch of EQ2 has been smooth, tell us what happens when the next major content patch or expansion comes out, and some of us may start to believe it.

masteen · Post by **masteen** » March 1, 2005, 6:40 pm

Prolly because foreign cars are still better than American cars?

Voronwë · Post by **Voronwë** » March 1, 2005, 6:40 pm

i'm just going to speak from the perspective of somebody who occassional listens to people discuss the rationale for marketing messaging.

If you criticize your competition for something you have proven yourself to be vulnerable to, you are taking a risk.

in my view, not having ever launched either game, or really paid any substantial amount of attention to it, this "press release" looks moderately desperate.

WoW is eating EQ2s lunch in terms of raw subscription numbers. EQ owned the marketplace, and could not leverage that into increasing subscription to its next generation product. This may simply be a dynamic of this developing niche, that populations after a period of time will not be terribly brand loyal. But there is no way to spin that positively to the finance guys or the accounting guys.

no growth = bad

Bubba Grizz · Post by **Bubba Grizz** » March 1, 2005, 6:47 pm

masteen wrote:Prolly because foreign cars are still better than American cars?

Foreign Cars are made in America while American Cars are made overseas and Canada.

miir · Post by **miir** » March 1, 2005, 6:50 pm

As Voro said EVERY SINGLE EXPANSION and a good many patches had associated fuck ups, periods of server and zone instability and emergency follow up patches. Thats really learning from their mistakes. Now you can claim the launch of EQ2 has been smooth, tell us what happens when the next major content patch or expansion comes out, and some of us may start to believe it.

Alright.
So can I criticise WOW for exploits, horrific server security/stability and taking 12 months to patch a buggy exploitable product?

Just wait a few months for players to find holes in WOW server security and start exploiting and hacking their servers. It happened to Diablo 2, so that means it's going to happen to WoW. Right?

Is that realy so different than trying to criticise EQ2 by criticising EQ1?

noel · Post by **noel** » March 1, 2005, 6:54 pm

Hey I played EQ1, PS and SWG. Excluding EQ1, I voted with my pocketbook each time SOE shat all over their product in one form or another.

I played EQ2's demo extensively. The reason I won't play it long-term has everything to do with the fact that I really enjoy the way hunters have been implemented as a playable class in WoW.

Wulfran · Post by **Wulfran** » March 1, 2005, 8:16 pm

miir wrote:
As Voro said EVERY SINGLE EXPANSION and a good many patches had associated fuck ups, periods of server and zone instability and emergency follow up patches. Thats really learning from their mistakes. Now you can claim the launch of EQ2 has been smooth, tell us what happens when the next major content patch or expansion comes out, and some of us may start to believe it.
Alright.
So can I criticise WOW for exploits, horrific server security/stability and taking 12 months to patch a buggy exploitable product?

Just wait a few months for players to find holes in WOW server security and start exploiting and hacking their servers. It happened to Diablo 2, so that means it's going to happen to WoW. Right?

Is that realy so different than trying to criticise EQ2 by criticising EQ1?

If it was within the same time frame I could see it. OoW and the associated launch problems (and in comparason to some expansions they definately weren't as bad as some of us expected) came out 2 months before EQ2 went live, thus carrying on SOE's pattern of shoddy and rushed releases. If you have criticisms/oberservations of a Blizzard product that was released within that same time span, yes, I would say you have a valid point to make. Believe me, I am not in love with Blizzard either, but as again Voro said, SOE is throwing stones from what appears to be a glass house. There's no queues but...

VariaVespasa · Post by **VariaVespasa** » March 1, 2005, 9:59 pm

Perhaps I've just blocked it out or something, but I thought the OoW launch was very smooth in fact, and was hailed as one of the smoothest for a long time? So where's this OoW launch sucked stuff coming from? GoD had some issues, yes, but as I remember it OoW was smooth.

In any event, the "play when they want to" comment was a mainly potshot at the login queues on some WoW servers, not at server stability and patches. Pay attention, asshats.

Varia

eOmniz · Post by **eOmniz** » March 1, 2005, 11:25 pm

Voronwë wrote: shit hello EQ launch. Hello January 2000.

^^ This has a lot to do with Sony.

I don't understand why you argue with them Miir. WoW appeals more to casual players, and they happen to be the majority. I haven't tried EQ2 out yet, but after quitting WoW I'm sure if I had more free time I'd be playing EQ2, it sounds more like my type of hardcore 8 hour a day addiction.

WoW delivers a user friendly, well thought out, easy, beautiful yet not hard on the computer, possibly single player MMORPG. If that's all you're looking for in an MMO, yay you've found your match. As someone who played EQ hardcore for 4 years and really really gave a fuck about character development and about cried when I was 60 with 11 days played time in WoW (then spent 5 more days of played time fighting for raid slots with the army of other paladins to join zerging low skilled assholes for a few pieces of gear that improved my character by maybe .05% before quitting), the game is not what I'm looking for. EQ2 might not be either as I haven't played it and really don't want to get caught up yet again, but the argument of using the active accounts to prove which is a better game seems silly to me. They are different games, they appeal to different people, whoopdy do.

archeiron · Post by **archeiron** » March 2, 2005, 3:24 am

miir wrote:
As Voro said EVERY SINGLE EXPANSION and a good many patches had associated fuck ups, periods of server and zone instability and emergency follow up patches. Thats really learning from their mistakes. Now you can claim the launch of EQ2 has been smooth, tell us what happens when the next major content patch or expansion comes out, and some of us may start to believe it.
Alright.
So can I criticise WOW for exploits, horrific server security/stability and taking 12 months to patch a buggy exploitable product?

Just wait a few months for players to find holes in WOW server security and start exploiting and hacking their servers. It happened to Diablo 2, so that means it's going to happen to WoW. Right?

Is that realy so different than trying to criticise EQ2 by criticising EQ1?

WoW and EQ2 have a completely different set of challenges. Rather than focusing on content and fixes like EQ2 has been doing, it appears that every able bodied technical saavy person working anywhere near Blizzard or their data centers is working on setting up and stabilizing more servers, and by more servers I mean more than EQ1 + EQ2 + CoH + SW:G use.

http://www.mmogchart.com/Chart1_files/S ... age001.gif

One can criticize their marketing team all you want, but it still amazing that they drew > 1.25 MILLION people into their game (and growing!) when EQ2 didn't even top EQ1.

I am willing to give Blizzard some leeway to sort their shit out, and I am going to figure on six months of teething trouble once the server issues are locked down, but I will predict that at the end of that time WoW will be one hell of a great game to play for years to come.

Needless to say, WoW is going to enter the promised land of the legendary MMO playerbase sizes like Lineage 1 & 2 have. While I can't comment on the quality of EQ2, I don't expect to see it attract a 1M+ playerbase any time soon.

If some of this board's members want to play EQ2, then I wish them well, but I can't imagine what you have to be smoking to judge EQ2 to be a more successfull game or figure that WoW is doomed to failure based upon 3 months of 80-95% service availability while exponentially expanding capacity (servers).

miir · Post by **miir** » March 2, 2005, 3:28 am

Interesting.

I've heard that from a few people... that they have no attachment to their WoW characters. I mean in EQ people had a tremendous attachment to their characters... if it was just to get that next level, that next piece of loot or those AAs. Maybe that was the real appeal of EQ... you put so much time and effort into a character that it became a part of you.

With everything being so easy in WoW, and to a lesser extent EQ2, are people going to have the same long term commitment to either game?

miir · Post by **miir** » March 2, 2005, 3:30 am

I am willing to give Blizzard some leeway to sort their shit out, and I am going to figure on six months of teething trouble once the server issues are locked down, but I will predict that at the end of that time WoW will be one hell of a great game to play for years to come.

Needless to say, WoW is going to enter the promised land of the legendary MMO playerbase sizes like Lineage 1 & 2 have. While I can't comment on the quality of EQ2, I don't expect to see it attract a 1M+ playerbase any time soon.

I'm seriously starting to doubt the staying power of WoW.

What's the real measure of success in a MMOG? The initial sales or account retention?

Madwands · Post by **Madwands** » March 2, 2005, 3:51 am

We should all quit playing these silly games.. Band together, and find our own way to make big money..

who's In ?

archeiron · Post by **archeiron** » March 2, 2005, 10:36 am

miir wrote:
I am willing to give Blizzard some leeway to sort their shit out, and I am going to figure on six months of teething trouble once the server issues are locked down, but I will predict that at the end of that time WoW will be one hell of a great game to play for years to come.

Needless to say, WoW is going to enter the promised land of the legendary MMO playerbase sizes like Lineage 1 & 2 have. While I can't comment on the quality of EQ2, I don't expect to see it attract a 1M+ playerbase any time soon.
I'm seriously starting to doubt the staying power of WoW.

What's the real measure of success in a MMOG? The initial sales or account retention?

The measure of success by those number crunching economists would be the return on investment (crazy, I know!). There a a lot of crazy numbers floating around about what the cost of development was for WoW; regardless of which one is accurate, they will be into the realm of profit for WoW very soon, if they haven't entered it already.

The attachment to a character will come in WoW for those people who farm a set of Molten Core gear and invest in the game through the end of the free content to come and into the expansions. Yes, getting to 60 is easier, but that doesn't make the character in WoW complete nor did it in EQ; I recall becoming substantially more attached to Archeiron once he had a most of the Vermiculated Armor set, the attachment grew with Kunark armor, Vellious sets, Luclin, and PoP armor sets. The time needed to farm up a set of Transendence on a priest is at least comparable in duration and would yield the comparable levels of attachment for me that the original Vermiculated did.

Do you doubt the staying power of WoW because you don't play the game and have no clue what it is like from your armchair vantage point? Do you doubt WoW because its population goes up every month? Or do you doubt WoW because you don't see a patch every week like you have with SOE games and that makes you feel like the game is stagnant?

Akaran_D · Post by **Akaran_D** » March 2, 2005, 10:41 am

Arch, he played WoW post beta.

I'm the armchair guy.
//just a point of clarification. Not getting into this fight.

noel · Post by **noel** » March 2, 2005, 10:48 am

miir wrote:I've heard that from a few people...

miir wrote:I'm seriously starting to doubt...

Miir is a marketing organization of one.

Aabidano · Post by **Aabidano** » March 2, 2005, 11:47 am

I don't understand why you argue with them Miir. WoW appeals more to casual players, and they happen to be the majority.

Can them BNet rejects or whatever, they're paying Blizzard money every month. That's the people this game is aimed at. From the polls Sony ran, and what I saw in general in EQ1, "casual" players were the bread and butter, pay the bills customers. Fanatical raiders were a (very) vocal minority. SoE really screwed the pooch when they catered to the loud minority, at the expense of the majority. Now they're paying for it to some extent.

I don't know how WoW will turn out for raiding type people, casual folks are good for a long time to come I'd think even if no content is added. I don't think they'll get bored, people still play Diablo in fairly large numbers.

A number of people I saw in Barrens when I was level 20 are still there noobing away

miir · Post by **miir** » March 2, 2005, 11:48 am

The attachment to a character will come in WoW for those people who farm a set of Molten Core gear and invest in the game through the end of the free content to come and into the expansions. Yes, getting to 60 is easier, but that doesn't make the character in WoW complete nor did it in EQ; I recall becoming substantially more attached to Archeiron once he had a most of the Vermiculated Armor set, the attachment grew with Kunark armor, Vellious sets, Luclin, and PoP armor sets. The time needed to farm up a set of Transendence on a priest is at least comparable in duration and would yield the comparable levels of attachment for me that the original Vermiculated did.

So you have to level to 60 and raid for months before you can feel any attachement to your character?

In the first 3-4 months of EQ1 I felt a tremendous attachment to my characters. When I got my Ykesha, my first few pieces of rubicite...
Also, people get attached to their character by what they have done with other people. The environment of WoW is so geared towards soloing that there is very little social interaction needed to get from 1-60.
I have loads of fond memories from EQ1 (and to a lesser extent EQ2) from grouping with other people, XPing, raiding or just doing stupid shit.

Having played WoW for a month, I just didn't see the social interaction that made EQ1 such a compelling game. I don't deny that it's a great game and a whole lot of fun, I just think the emphasis is too much on solo play from 1-60.

Groups are where you meet people and forge friendships in MMOGs.
It puzzles me that both WoW and EQ2 seem to be bending over backwards to cater to the solo player.

noel · Post by **noel** » March 2, 2005, 11:57 am

miir wrote:When I got my Ykesha, my first few pieces of rubicite...

1999 called. They want their post back.

Kilmoll the Sexy · Post by **Kilmoll the Sexy** » March 2, 2005, 12:03 pm

Voronwë wrote:yeah Sony doesnt believe in its users having to wait for servers to be up.

Hello every fucking EQ expansion.

shit hello EQ launch. Hello January 2000. hello a million other times.

anybody who jerks off to that press release is such a fucking newb it is silly

I thought of every poster on here that you would at least be the one least blinded Voro. Sony had nothing at all to do with the EQ launch or anything to do with the game at all until they bought the company in 2000.

Xyun · Post by **Xyun** » March 2, 2005, 12:15 pm

In the first 3-4 months of EQ1 I felt a tremendous attachment to my characters.

And you still haven't let go apparently.

WoW does have its flaws. Namely there is too much content 1-59 and not enough at lvl 60. However, this is the nature of the beast and content that gets added, is added for end-game. With that said, WoW social interaction is much like EQ1 in my eyes. The difference obviously being having played EQ1 we had a foundation to build from. Having a core group of players gave us a social advantage, as well as allowing us to finally see our online friends chat in bright green again. This, however, does not mean that WoW is a less sociable game, nor that what we did in EQ cannot be repeated. I have already played 37 full days on this game and I will tell you from experience that grouping and soloing are not that much different than EQ, what is different is the pace at which one levels.

Everquest introduced a concept that I think will live for a long time in the mmorpg genre, the raid. The successful raid is the epitome of triumph in these games. It can then be argued that leveling is a tedium to the essence of the game, and games who allow for faster leveling are in fact better, as is the case.

On our server, we have competition both on Horde and Alliance sides. Social activity flourishes as the top 5 or 6 guilds struggle for the top spot, and it is still wide open and we are in the hunt. We have all of the social interaction that EQ1 did except for the steamrolling, but instead we get pvp, a better way to interact with your enemy.

But hey, what level are you in EQ2?

archeiron · Post by **archeiron** » March 2, 2005, 12:24 pm

miir wrote:
The attachment to a character will come in WoW for those people who farm a set of Molten Core gear and invest in the game through the end of the free content to come and into the expansions. Yes, getting to 60 is easier, but that doesn't make the character in WoW complete nor did it in EQ; I recall becoming substantially more attached to Archeiron once he had a most of the Vermiculated Armor set, the attachment grew with Kunark armor, Vellious sets, Luclin, and PoP armor sets. The time needed to farm up a set of Transendence on a priest is at least comparable in duration and would yield the comparable levels of attachment for me that the original Vermiculated did.
So you have to level to 60 and raid for months before you can feel any attachement to your character?

In the first 3-4 months of EQ1 I felt a tremendous attachment to my characters. When I got my Ykesha, my first few pieces of rubicite...
Also, people get attached to their character by what they have done with other people. The environment of WoW is so geared towards soloing that there is very little social interaction needed to get from 1-60.
I have loads of fond memories from EQ1 (and to a lesser extent EQ2) from grouping with other people, XPing, raiding or just doing stupid shit.

Having played WoW for a month, I just didn't see the social interaction that made EQ1 such a compelling game. I don't deny that it's a great game and a whole lot of fun, I just think the emphasis is too much on solo play from 1-60.

Groups are where you meet people and forge friendships in MMOGs.
It puzzles me that both WoW and EQ2 seem to be bending over backwards to cater to the solo player.

You missed the point of my response. The attachment wasn't the level in EQ, and it isn't the level of your character in WoW: the lasting attachment comes from spending time to invest in getting something special for your character. This is still possible in WoW; it just happens almost exclusively at level 60 rather than along the way. This is acceptable in their model because of the short time it takes to get to 60.

In order to make WoW more accessible to the masses, they have removed the tradition of a long grind to the maximum level that was common to previous MMGs. Psychologically speaking, this was a fantastic choice. This same methodology was used to introduce martial arts in the West: by adding a large number of interim milestones (coloured belts) into the system, the masses feel that they are making progress with every modicum of time that they invest in the hobby.

As to your issue of grouping, I noticed the absense of interaction while I was leveling. When I reached level 60 and started raiding with a guild and doing pickup raids on off nights, I found the "long lost" social aspect of WoW.

It just seems that Blizzard really does believe that life begins at 60!

Aabidano · Post by **Aabidano** » March 2, 2005, 12:32 pm

miir wrote:So you have to level to 60 and raid for months before you can feel any attachement to your character?

I don't think it's the same situation for anyone who posts on this board. I don't have the attachment to my WoW shaman as I did to my RoK era enchanter way back when. I didn't have that attachment to my beastlord, cleric or bard either for that matter, all of which came along much later.

miir · Post by **miir** » March 2, 2005, 12:40 pm

I fail to see relavence in the levels of my EQ2 characters.

I don't have a max level character yet and I am in no rush to get to max level. My highest is 41 and I have had combat XP turned off for weeks.

Everquest introduced a concept that I think will live for a long time in the mmorpg genre, the raid. The successful raid is the epitome of triumph in these games. It can then be argued that leveling is a tedium to the essence of the game, and games who allow for faster leveling are in fact better, as is the case.

All MMOGs have raid content. EQ2 has boatlads of content ranging from small raid instances, static world spawns, guild raids... at all level ranges. The first guild hallmark raid is geared towards level 15s. The difference between EQ2 and WoW in this respect is that in EQ2 people are actually utilizing the lower level raid content. In WoW it's far too easy to outlevel most of the sub 60 content.

I will argue that faster leveling infact hurts MMOGs.
What exactly is tedious about doing content at level 30?
How is that any more tedious than doing the same raid content over and over and over and over again? Is onyxia really that much more fun than the entire 59 levels leading up to it?
In chosing not to level up, I have access to more content than the people who obsessed about getting to max level as fast as possible because they are of the same mindset as yourself.
I can't quite understand how faster leveling means more fun, in the long run.... unless skipping content is fun.

On our server, we have competition both on Horde and Alliance sides. Social activity flourishes as the top 5 or 6 guilds struggle for the top spot, and it is still wide open and we are in the hunt. We have all of the social interaction that EQ1 did except for the steamrolling, but instead we get pvp, a better way to interact with your enemy.

There is a hell of a lot more to social interaction than just competition.

miir · Post by **miir** » March 2, 2005, 12:42 pm

Arch, can you shitcan that oversized graph in your post?
please?

Fash · Post by **Fash** » March 2, 2005, 1:03 pm

I bet you'd have no problem with the graph if eq2 wasn't bringing up the rear.

miir · Post by **miir** » March 2, 2005, 1:18 pm

No asshole, my laptop screen runs @ 1024X768 and its a pain in the ass to have to scoll back and forth to read posts because of the fucking margin displacement.

As usual, I'm not surprised you have nothing of value to add to this discussion.

miir · Post by **miir** » March 2, 2005, 1:20 pm

Fash wrote:I bet you'd have no problem with the graph if eq2 wasn't bringing up the rear.

Maybe this will help illustrate my point: