Hi All!
The element of surprise is long gone from EQ... there is no way around it. People make Dark Elves nowadays because of the looks (as yesterday), but without dying 10 times because Invisibility dropped at the wrong time (the other 9 deaths being Corpse Recovery ones). I remeber hunting in Oasis because experience was good and I never went thirsty or hungry in the desert, oddly enough. I also remeber doing my first massive Crowd Control in Orc Highway with my chantie (main), which nowadays is forever long gone, you are lucky to find another player in zones with mobs level 30 and lower.
Most new characters are alts, only very few new characters are true noobs. And even so, with Bazaar prices and people spending 1K pp as it it were 1pp, it is easier (cheaper) for a true noob to get his/her hands on good equipment (which doesn't make Bazaar wrong, what was wrong was spending 400pp on a ring with +5 AGI at torch 1 in EC). Whether, they choose the farming avenue to get the items easier or the questing avenue is up to them. And with the quest system being pretty much worthless, their choice is easy, why bother with questing, just level yourself as fast as possible to be able to solo mobs that drop diamonds till you can afford that Bazaar item.
And what has SoE done? They have paved the way for the race-to-level-65 with new port systems that trivializes race faction and adventuring thru zones, LDoN with a point reward system that pushes everyone to get 65 so they get 51 points per win instead of 20, not fixing the quest system so there is an alternative to power-leveling camping the same mob over and over till you ding yourself out of the zone, etc.
I started my main (chantie) before Bazaar came out, raised my tailoring skill so I could craft raw silk items for myself for that extra +1 AC. Killed green orcs at hometown so I could afford most of my level 8/12 spells (didn't know about rat tails selling for 1pp each back then), raised my bind wound skill healing myself to 50% while waiting for my mana to go up in Oasis (South Karana) when soloing. Recruited help for a corpse recovery at level 12 cause I ventured into Kitchicor Forest at night on my way to HHK to get my pet spells, thinking I was safe with regular INV on. Worked on my Fishing and Sense Heading skill while waiting for the Boat to Freeport,etc. In all, all those little things made the game fun, and now are pretty much gone from the game.
On the other hand, my alts had it easy, money was available to buy spells and twinking as needed. My chantie INT was 160+ at level 49 while my Erudite Necro started with 200 INT at level 1. Yet, my necro or any of my alts have explored their potential with each new batch of spells and skills for either solo or group. But, it sure has been a more dull level-up time than with my chantie when everything was new sort-of-speak.
IMO SoE chose the dull road, they just made sure everyone gets to level 65. Hence, SoE has only offered the level 65 characters reasons not to quit playing EQ, instead of fixing the quest system (see LDoN, PoP, more AAs coming with Gates of Discord, etc...).
The day SoE revamps the quest system so it is fun to start an alt to go questing, so people start leveling thru questing instead of killing the same mob over and over, that would be the day this game will be EverQuest instead of NeverQuest. Quests that are one group doable and can be done in a reasonable amount of time or else continued with different groups (no matter where at is everyone on that particular quest), quests that offer decent items for the players level range, so that questing for them is desirable. SoE can also do this thru trigering as well (either by killing a Quillmane type mob in a particular zone trigering whatever else, or have some kind of NPCs vs. NPCs event - like dworfs vs Ice Gaints at Ry'Gorr Fort - where people can join whichever side by talking to whoever NPC before event starts and accomplish something if their side wins, etc).
Better yet, make "smart" mobs... mobs that go in packs of 3 to , with same toon and name but different classes (you don't know which mob is what class till fight started), so that when a group tackles a set of mobs and one mob happens to be a chantie or bard class, have the mezzer mob mez the cleric when the first big heal lands, or mez the chantie player when the 1st mez lands on mob, or mez the shammy player when the first slow lands, the same way agro changes when a player HPs gets under 25%. Have rogue mobs placing themselves behind of tank for Backstabbing so that offtanking or mez is needed, have zones with mobs roaming with INV on, or have caster mobs go INV after casting the nuke/debuff on player, etc... That would make fighting mobs fun, even in old zones... heck, I would make an alt just to encounter the mobs that wander INVed... LOL.
Otherwise, EQ =
> You have slained Mob_01!
> You have gained partial experience!
> Congratulations! You have gained another AA point you don't know what to do with!
> Your faction with Mob_01 cannot get any worst!
> /g Woot! AA Ding 300! Pull 50,000 more Mob_01, I want to ding 400 AAs before next expansion comes up!
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> A Microsoft scowls at you ready to attack! What would you like your error message to say?