EQ1 vs. EQ2 vs. WoW

>> should Death XP loss occur? In EQ they even punished you further
>> during certain levels by giving additional loss which i hated. It did
>> however make you more cautious a player. In WoW you get item damage
>> from death which can get costly to repair....is this a good tradeoff?

>This is, probably, my biggest gripe with WoW and EQ2. I just don't
>feel that death is penalised enough. With EQ I fealt a big thrill when
>I narrowly avoided death - I never got that feeling from EQ2 or WoW. I
>think that this is due to the fact that you don't lose experience in
>either of them (experience debt didn't have the same impact for me). I
>also think that the fact that you reappeared at your bind point with no
>gear and then had to overcome the difficulty of getting it back also
>added to the thrill of a near miss. In WoW, sometimes the easiest way
>to overcome a problem is to die and I have seen posts recommending it
>as a tactic. I just don't think that is a good thing. In EQ I would
>never have even contemplated doing something that resulted in certain
>death even if it did put me nearer my goal.

Not played the original EQ but losing your gear sounds like hell to me.
It bad enough losing soul shards in EQ2 and having to get them. I've
died many times trying to get and totally failed in one case and had to
rest the char for a week to get it back. Zero fun in my books and it
will turn people off the game fast.

In my opinion the best game for debt is one you didn't mention, Guild
Wars. If you die your char becomes 15% weaker up to a maximum of 60%.
At 60% the mission might become impossible to do and you have to quit
but once you do the debt goes away. So, there's no permanent effect
but losing hours of play is enough to stop people treating death easy.

As for SOE copying ideas, if you played EQ2 for longer you would know
they've been copying everything WoW and GW offers in an effort to get
subscribers. Some of the changes are good and necessary but I don't
think make EQ2 like it competitors will get many new subs just stop
people from leaving.

Faned wrote:
> <yng.TakeThisOut@zomg.com> wrote:
> > In WoW you can solo easily all the
> > way to 60 but it isnt nearly as good xp as instances and the grind is
> > boring and the loot isnt as good. You arent being punished but
> > encouraged.
>
> That's just blatantly wrong. Even with the most well-oiled instance
> crushing machine of a group, I could make faster experience solo in WoW. A
> big part of that is that the experience reward from quests was significant,
> so while grinding through a quest I was getting experience the whole time,
> comparable to the experience gained with a group in an instance (and better,
> depending) and then a big chunk at the end of my grind from finishing the
> quest.

It seemed like the OP was comparing solo grinding to group grinding in
instances. I'd imagine grinding in a group anywhere would be better
experience than grinding solo. I don't know for sure though as I
rarely grind solo and never grind in groups.

steve.kaye

<yng DeleteThis @zomg.com> wrote:
> I played EQ1 since '01 and tried EQ2 this spring. I didnt get really
> far but it looked cool. Then a friend of mine asked me to join their
> guild in WoW and been playing that for a couple months now and I
> wanted to get others take on the future of these games and whether
> Sony learned their lesson from people or not. IMO EQ was punishing for
> people. Death xp loss, quest reward vs. difficulty, no ability to solo
> past a young level for most classes (just telling people to play druid
> or necromancer limits the game somewhat). I have read that WoW is
> today has the largest volume of subscribers and a LOT of people I meet
> in the game are EQ players who love it.
>
> should grouping be REQUIRED to play a game like this? in EQ1 you
> couldnt do jack without a group. In WoW you can solo easily all the
> way to 60 but it isnt nearly as good xp as instances and the grind is
> boring and the loot isnt as good. You arent being punished but
> encouraged.

That's just blatantly wrong. Even with the most well-oiled instance
crushing machine of a group, I could make faster experience solo in WoW. A
big part of that is that the experience reward from quests was significant,
so while grinding through a quest I was getting experience the whole time,
comparable to the experience gained with a group in an instance (and better,
depending) and then a big chunk at the end of my grind from finishing the
quest.

> should Death XP loss occur? In EQ they even punished you further
> during certain levels by giving additional loss which i hated. It did
> however make you more cautious a player. In WoW you get item damage
> from death which can get costly to repair....is this a good tradeoff?

You never lost additional experience in certain levels. Experience loss on
death has always been a flat equation. It's the actual experience required
per level that had bumps (and in those "hell levels" death actually seemed
to hurt less due to this, with the death the following level seeming to hurt
more due to the contrast). That's long long long been changed. WoW's death
penalty is meaningless except for one thing, it punishes warriors (and, by
extension, groups/raids relying on those warriors).


> EQ has many more classes and races, more continents, planes etc....the
> content of EQ was rich.......the graphics and game environment of WoW
> however is rich. EQ2 is pretty good in that regard but i never got
> past 12th so I wouldnt have seen much content there.

WoW has incredible graphics, and *cohesive* content. Right up until you get
to max level, then they did the same thing EQ did and start throwing in
everything but the kitchen sink (next expansion, "Kitchen Sink Wars"). For
a casual player who wants an immersive game, I highly recommend WoW.

> So whats your take on things? Could Sony learn from other games to
> make EQ better and not lose the customer base or is it fine the way it
> is? Could Blizzard learn from EQ and toughen up WoW a bit??

Those are the most idiotic questions I've seen in a long time.
Congratulations. Everybody can learn from everybody, and does so
continually.

steve.kaye wrote:
> oom wrote:
> In WoW, sometimes the easiest way
> to overcome a problem is to die and I have seen posts recommending it
> as a tactic. I just don't think that is a good thing. In EQ I would
> never have even contemplated doing something that resulted in certain
> death even if it did put me nearer my goal.

You never raided?

<bealrabbitslayer.RemoveThis@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> steve.kaye wrote:
> > oom wrote:
> > In WoW, sometimes the easiest way
> > to overcome a problem is to die and I have seen posts recommending it
> > as a tactic. I just don't think that is a good thing. In EQ I would
> > never have even contemplated doing something that resulted in certain
> > death even if it did put me nearer my goal.
>
> You never raided?

Very few raids in EQ involve certain death (if you're winning that is).
Sony actually left the "deathtouch" concept behind, or rather, they made it
something you could strategize past unlike the original implementation of
it. Current "deathtouch" fights generally have a delayed and "fixable"
implementation so that people only get insta-killed if they don't do
whatever is necessary to stop it from happening.

Vidden wrote:
>
> I hope EQ1's next expansion (oh god.... another one?) will be something
> for all levels. When was the last expansion geared for all levels?
> Luclin??
>

That depends entirely on how you count. PoP had the books, which
everyone could use. LoY had more bank space, and I think the in-game
maps. GoD had the Abysmal Sea tradeskill mecca. DoN had the Guild
Hall and corpse summoners. I can't recall an expansion since PoP that
did NOT have some little game-enhancing goodie designed to draw in even
someone with a level 15 main. If nothing else, the latest expansion
will allow anyone to "play as a monster", won't it? Luclin was the
last expansion that had new monsters for a level 5 to kill, but
everything since then has offered *something* for even the lowbies.
You can form your own opinion whether this constitutes "geared for all
levels", but there is invariably *some* content for everyone. Can't
miss out on a potential customer just because s/he is low level...

In article <bvidi1t7hpn97t8089n7vil5g7p39gftf7.TakeThisOut@4ax.com>, yng.TakeThisOut@zomg.com
says...

> So whats your take on things? Could Sony learn from other games to
> make EQ better and not lose the customer base or is it fine the way it
> is? Could Blizzard learn from EQ and toughen up WoW a bit??

Why does one have to "learn" anything and be more like the other?

What's the point of making them the same. Let the people who want to
play WoW play WoW, and let the people who want to play EQ play EQ.

If the WoW formula is better than the EQ forumla in terms mass appeal,
so be it. Monopoly sells more copies than Risk; I don't want Risk to be
made more like Monopoly though.

faned.DeleteThis@wyld.qx.net (Faned) wrote in <slrndiee3m.766.faned.DeleteThis@wyld.qx.net>:

>Very few raids in EQ involve certain death (if you're winning that is).

What? Are you on drugs? Most raids on new content are certain death. Old
content is not raiding it's farming.

bealrabbitslayer DeleteThis @hotmail.com (Beal) wrote in <1126644868.075348.194420
@g49g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>:

>Yeah, I know it isn't "certain" however.

Raiding new content death is almost certain.

Old content is not raiding, it's farming.

EQ has lost a lot.

Mary Poppins wrote:
> bealrabbitslayer.RemoveThis@hotmail.com (Beal) wrote in
> <1126644868.075348.194420
> @g49g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>:
>
> >Yeah, I know it isn't "certain" however.
>
> Raiding new content death is almost certain.
>
> Old content is not raiding, it's farming.
>
> EQ has lost a lot.



I hope EQ1's next expansion (oh god.... another one?) will be something
for all levels. When was the last expansion geared for all levels?
Luclin??

__________________________________________________________
Submitted by: Vidden
This message was submitted through the Erollisi Marr Forum

"steve.kaye" <nospam.RemoveThis@giddy-kippers.co.uk> wrote in
news:1126618325.821488.301430@g44g2000cwa.googlegroups.com:

>
> This is, probably, my biggest gripe with WoW and EQ2. I just don't
> feel that death is penalised enough. With EQ I fealt a big thrill when
> I narrowly avoided death - I never got that feeling from EQ2 or WoW. I
> think that this is due to the fact that you don't lose experience in
> either of them (experience debt didn't have the same impact for me). I
> also think that the fact that you reappeared at your bind point with no
> gear and then had to overcome the difficulty of getting it back also
> added to the thrill of a near miss. In WoW, sometimes the easiest way
> to overcome a problem is to die and I have seen posts recommending it
> as a tactic. I just don't think that is a good thing. In EQ I would
> never have even contemplated doing something that resulted in certain
> death even if it did put me nearer my goal.
>
> steve.kaye
>

The problem is that it is a thin line: An overly harsh death penalty
is one of the reasons people invented the XP grind group - safe, steady
XP. Also, you won't get 60's in WoW with much epic gear saying that the
death penalty doesn't affect how they play the game. Repair costs get
pretty impressive at that level.
--
Arch Convoker Mairelon Snapbang
Feral Lord Bosra Snowclaw
Lanys T'vyl (Retired)

Mairelon, 47th Paladin
Silverhand

Faned <faned RemoveThis @wyld.qx.net> wrote in
news:slrndidmvm.766.faned@wyld.qx.net:

> WoW has incredible graphics, and *cohesive* content. Right up until
> you get to max level, then they did the same thing EQ did and start
> throwing in everything but the kitchen sink (next expansion, "Kitchen
> Sink Wars"). For a casual player who wants an immersive game, I
> highly recommend WoW.

And not just one time - there are a number of paths to level up that have
only minimal overlap in quest lines. I'd wager I can get my next
alliance character up to 60 and only overlap a few quest lines - I'm
aware of the existence of whole other zones of quests to do with them.

I'd also wager I can get a horde character up to 60 without much overlap
in zones/quests.

By then maybe something new will be out for it (Hero classes) or maybe
not - but that's a ways away for me (I don't get a lot of time to play
anymore).

>> So whats your take on things? Could Sony learn from other games to
>> make EQ better and not lose the customer base or is it fine the way
>> it is? Could Blizzard learn from EQ and toughen up WoW a bit??
>
> Those are the most idiotic questions I've seen in a long time.
> Congratulations. Everybody can learn from everybody, and does so
> continually.
>

EQ borrowed from other games - new games borrowed from EQ - EQ reborrowed
good ideas from them. And so it goes - cross pollination is the norm.
Of course, not all ideas borrowed translate as well.

--
Arch Convoker Mairelon Snapbang
Feral Lord Bosra Snowclaw
Lanys T'vyl (Retired)

Mairelon, 47th Paladin
Silverhand

"BombayMix" <bombaymix DeleteThis @altavista.co.uk> writes:
> Not played the original EQ but losing your gear sounds like hell to me.
> It bad enough losing soul shards in EQ2 and having to get them. I've
> died many times trying to get and totally failed in one case and had to
> rest the char for a week to get it back. Zero fun in my books and it
> will turn people off the game fast.

I think the current arrangement in EQ is a good balance in this regard
(though I know some people point to it as another "training wheels"
element in the game). If you die at a low level, there's no penalty
other than the time to get back to whatever you were doing (and maybe
get fresh buffs and re-memorize spells). After level 10, you do lose
experience (but not much until mid to high levels), but can get most of
it back via resurrection if you can find the corpse, and you have to get
to the corpse to regain your gear. It used to be the big screw was if
you couldn't find (or reach) your corpse, because then the experience
loss was permanent and your items were gone. Yes, it made players more
careful about dying, which is good, but stuff happens, and people did
occasionally lose all their gear.

A while back, they added Shadowrest. If you died and didn't retrieve
the corpse, the corpse would appear in Shadowrest a week later and you
could at least get your gear back. (It would be too late to rez.) But
being unable to play your character for a week sucks, as does losing xp
permanently.

With the introduction of the Guild Lobby in the previous expansion(*),
players have a reasonable choice. They can summon their corpse there
for a modest fee (based on level) and get it rezzed and get their gear.
But doing so means they're back in civilisation, and getting back to
whatever they were doing can take a while. So people often still prefer
to bind closer to where they're hunting, with the intent to run back in
and get their corpse "in situ" if they die. But if things go sour, you
have the Guild Lobby to fall back on so the penalty isn't as big as it
used to be.

-- Don.

(*) Do I win anything for being the first to refer to Dragons of Norrath
as the "previous expansion"?

---------------------------------------------------------------------
-- See the a.g.e/EQ1 FAQ at http://www.iCynic.com/~don/EQ/age.faq.htm
--
-- Sukrasisx, Monk 57 on E. Marr Note: If you reply by mail,
-- Terrwini, Druid 52 on E. Marr I'll get to it sooner if you
-- Wizbeau, Wizard 36 on E. Marr remove the "hyphen n s"
-- Teviron, Knight 25 on E. Marr