EQDiva

I started playing EQ about 7-8 years ago or whenever Kunark came out.  I got into the game because my brother in law played with his brother and a RL friend.  Anyay, I became addicted and ended up playing in a high end raiding guild.  Played for about 4 years then decided it was time to dedicate more time to my wife and concentrate on more important things in my life.  Fast forward 4-5 years and I move my family to Texas and find out my brother in law (now divorced due to the game - but that is another story) is still playing the game.  I got back in for a hobby and have been playing for about 3-4 months now.  Power leveled a new char up to 80 and starting to learn the game.

He has all but quit the game recently and moved to WoW.  It looks like a really pretty game, but wanted to get some feedback from you EQ players that might have played it.  What is it like?  I enjoy EQ, but the main reason I played was for the social aspect.  Of course, I only play once a week (Saturday nights for game nights now), but again, have been contimplating trying out WoW, but have dedicated a lot to EQ now =)  

My two cents on WoW,

 I left EQ for WoW for about 2 years.

You can AFK at a moments notice in WoW when solo for the most part without fear ( unless perhaps on a PVP server )

Downtime is almost non existent, appropriate level food / drink will restore you to full hp / mana in 30 seconds.

Death is painless in WoW, corpse recovery is painless.

Any class can solo to 70 relatively easily.

PVP does allow for an alternative progression to raiding for gear, but it is a huge time sink.

Tradeskills are worth doing for the most part.

Quests are worth doing, both for rewards and for meaningfull experience gains.

The game is almost stupid easy with regard to information, Blizzard actually supports limited scripting and UI enhancements ( custom UI components that make repetitive tasks / targeting / casting much simpler than the base UI, and usually the good ideas players come up with regarding UI enhancements end up migrating into the official UI over time ) Mouseover items etc gives you solid in game information including damage per second info on weapons etc.

You can't screw up a quest in WoW, it won' t let you hand in the wrong items, or eat 2 of 3 from a turnin because you haven't got em all on you, they quest related mobs simply won't allow you to, quests are for the most part clearly spelled out including where to go what to look for etc, auto updates as you go all in game.

Modern web info for WoW is vastly superior than EQ - check alla's site as an example, any mob in any zone includes dropped items AND drop rates on all items that mob drops, any quest is outlined in very good detail.

You can literally log in an see character progress at any level from 1 - 70 within a small period of time ( even an hour ), either through exp, skills, quests etc.

Eventually you will hit a point where you either live in PVP battlefields, or you will need a larger group to take on raid encounters to progress with gear.

There really is little difference between Alliance and Horde other than flavour of home cities and zones, Horde cannot speak or deal directly with Alliance other than through neutral auction houses, and killing each other in PVP ( unlike EQ where dark elves can mix with high elves )

Though the first 60 levels are fun enough, most of those zones are nearly empty since the burning crusade, and sometimes doing some of the quests is a bit of a challenge for lack of bodies in the right level range - but none of the quests are really neccesary. Once you enter the expansion zones within a pretty short time expect your mana / hp  etc to double with new gear available in the BC zones, even from solo quests.

In short its a much more relaxed environment to play in, its stupid easy to progress from 1 - 70 even solo, right up to a full set of Epic / Purple gear ( tradeskilled gear / world drop items ) - but to go beyond you either need to put in a stupid amount of time PVP'ing, or get into end game raiding with a larger group.

I left WoW when much like EQ most of the folks i knew left the game and progress wasn't possible without company.

Retired level 70 Warlock and 70 Priest left rotting in Azeroth and I returned to Norrath and rolled up a bard.

 Pretty much what Ryson said, I managed to play for all of a year. The game is stupidly, painfuly easy.  I truthfuly would have left with in the first month if not for friends that were there, in the end even they werent enough to keep me in that game. There really isnt much substance to the game. I advise you to avoid public chat channels like the plague unless you're of the d00d sp3k uber 1337 Chuck Noris type (There were times I wanted to hunt down and strangle the idiots in general). With a handful of friends the game can be fairly enjoyable for a little while at least.

 Thanks for the feedback.  It is rather overwhelming the number of times I hear how easy/childish this game is.  Sounds like any game, when you break it down, will all funnel into the same end game type atmosphere and what really makes it enjoyable are the people you play with.  

 Thanks for the feedback.

Well I quit EQ almost 2 years ago, been playing WoW steadily ever since. I personally enjoy the game but I have been getting the itch to come back to EQ as of late. I already reactivated my rogue's account just have not logged her in yet, I am sure the bard won't be far behind.

I saw you running around vanguard for awhile, I was grouping regularly with some of your cod guildies there. I still really love that game, it's a different game every week it seems, which is both good and bad. It's a backburner game for me for sure, but I have a great time when I play. I was just thinking of some of your guildies, most of them kind of vanished a long time back. Good people though, fun to play with.