2 questions. 1) strategy? 2) will archetype system work?

[Overman]

Dear Community,

Hopefully my questions are not naive. I am new to the EQ community. (a little historical info - I used to enjoy playing Dungeons and Dragons when younger and my friend and I created our own roleplaying game called "the game." The details of "the game" where more creative than the title, seriously. RPG's have always been my favorite type of video game) I'm looking forward to getting involved in EQII. I only played EQ for about the 3 past weeks.

Anyway, here are some questions,
1) Will EQII offer strategic and creative playing? or will it require alot of rote effort?

2) I am wondering what other gamers think about the following.
When characters of various classes get to higher levels will they all still be valuable and powerful players in a group? In other words, with respect to the high level characters, will some classes become more powerful and valuable while other classes become weak and insignificant?
If each class is still significant and valuable to a group, offering unique benefits (perhaps further conditioned by the users temperment and skill), that's awesome and I hope this is the case. Do you think in EQII high level characters in each class will each have unique worthwhile abilities?

I would like to hear any opinions, expectations or speculation on this. Also - experienced EQ players - I would love to hear your opinions on this and how is was in EQ 1.

-overman

[COFFEE]

Hmmmmmm,wish I could help with that one ,good question....
Best strategy is to roleplay and let the rest fill itself in ~snickering~ Yes yes I am one of those annoying RP people.
Anyway, it was a good question,hope someone can answer it.
(By the way ,D&D was how I got started ...20 years ago heheheheh.How Long has D&D been around anyway ?)

[Ecstasia]

As for that D&D question... the original was in 1974 if I'm not mistaken... by Gygax and Arneson... and of course, was published by TSR.

Fun bits about the original D&D book if you've never seen it... you are limited to three classes (fighter, magic-user, and priest), and yes, Hobbits are a playable race. ^0^

For the rest of the timeline...
Late 70's - AD&D
'89 - AD&D Second Edition
'00 - 3rd Edition
'03 - 3.5

Yes, I know... I'm a dork... but I did start playing the game (AD&D 2nd) when I was five, so... yeah. ^^;

[Cantino]

This might be a slightly long post and since I'm from an older version of EQ1 feel free to correct me if I'm wrong on something. I believe this should carry over pretty well into EQ2 though.

1) Will EQ offer strategic and creative playing?

You bet! First things first though, you spend a lot of time in groups leveling up. You always will, you always do. It's not always fun to sit there and level by killing things, but it's the only way to do it effectively. Second, there will also be plenty of times when you're sitting on the sidelines looking for a group or a place to solo. Happened to me ALL the time in EQ and I played an Enchanter (one of the most wanted classes in the game). So there will be plenty of boring repetative moments to get your hopes down... Now the good news: Speaking from EQ1, if you could get a good group, you could do anything. With my close groupmates we could travel into any zone and just crawl the entire thing. When Chardok was re-vamped and before that (long time ago, I know) we would dungeon crawl with one group and just kill everything. I remember being so low on mana I had to duel the bard mid-fight just to manatap him and keep up with the mezzes. I was always looking for more creative ways to keep mobs mezzed, my groupies buffed, and damage the enemies all while conserving mana. That NEVER got old! Then you get into the raiding aspect.. Wow. A good raid can be one of the best experiences in all of gaming. 50 of your guildmates get together plus some guests, you run into a zone, and you systematically kill everything in sight. Being from one of the more powerful guilds on my server, I've been in some very high level kick-ass raids and that is just awesome! It's a great feeling to know that 50 people can actually play cooperatively together and pull things off without a hitch. So yes, there is plenty of creative and strategic playing, but it may take a little while to find people who will have the skills to do that with you. Coming from a D&D background I"d say you're well prepared. The basic ideas are all the same, just have to learn a new rulebook.

2) When characters of various classes get to higher levels will they all still be valuable and powerful players in a group?

You'll find a lot of debate on this one, and when more people start posting I'm sure you'll find people who dont agree with me either. I'll start with lower levels. Here it's harder to find those smart groupies that will add to strategic gameplay, and I tended to solo alot (even being a pure group spellcaster, this was before the charm craze). At low levels groups tended to be comprised of someone who could heal, and a whole lot of people who could do damage. Groups didn't really appreciate the subtle ways an enchanter can bring about boatloads of experience. As for high level groups/characters? They all serve their purpose. Warriors with high defence and high hit points are a must in any group so they can take hits from the mobs, an enchanter is a must for groups because they mez mobs and allow you to kill them one at a time, a cleric-type is a must because they heal, then you have three (in EQ1 groupsize was 6, I THINK it's the same with EQ2) spots that are filled with others. Everyone has their own trait and EVERYONE is extremely useful. The scouts do lots of damage per second, the mages do the big nukes and can whup up on enemies to kill them faster, the semi-healers like druids are great for backup heals and other special effects. Kills go by faster when the cleric can sit down and med while the druid picks up heals for a few minutes. Really, every class has their place and in high levels people will appreciate this.

The most important thing in my opinion is to be well known. I've gone into zones in EQ1 where no one knew me, and I couldn't get one group, then I go to a zone I'd been in for a while and I'd have people shouting at me to come group with them as soon as they got rid of whatever chanter they had at the time. Make friends, play with them, be in guilds, show groups that you know what the hell you're doing, research the web, ask questions. If you have connections then you'll always have a group. Just a quick note, though Enchanter was one of the most wanted group classes, I had plenty of friends who were of all classes, and it was the same way, they always had a group because they knew lots of people and would just ask them.

Oh, the most most imporant thing... Have fun! Pick a class you will enjoy playing and play it with all your heart! That's how you really get the best out of EQ. In D&D I could never play a Paladin because being Lawful Good is too damn stupid, in that respect, I would just never enjoy playing, but to be a Sorcerer... Yea! Play something you love, and love what you play. That's my advice. =) Goodluck!!

~Sariig

[Cantino]

Oh, and wasn't the origional D&D started by a retired Army General who was inspired by Lord of the Rings?

[TAG]

Sorry Cantrino, but there are numerous posts from Beta players saying that EQ2 isn't like EQ1. There is less raid content and due to the fact that characters are balanced at the archetype level, there will be less need for specific classes to form a group, like a cleric instead of a druid.

[heXum]

They will add much, much raid content. I have no doubt in my mind at all. Look at EQ1.. the first game had 2 dragons. By now, there are so many raid encounters you can't even name them all. They'll get around to it, sooner than you think.

[guice]

1) In PoP they've shown they can get creative with raids which is a very good thing. I believe if they stick with the original raid developers from PoP, they can do this. However, I herd in GoD and OoW they went overboard and raids aren't nearly as good, but just what I heard so don't quote me on that. I enjoyed raids very much in PoP cause it required you to think and for strats unlike Luclin where NPCs were purely just brute force. I didn't appreciate the fact they only way to make raids harder was to make the boss NPCs hit harder.

2) Yes. But do know this, class balance is a myth! In the upper level game you're going to have 24 classes and only 6 persons per group. SOMEBODY IS GOING TO BE LEFT OUT. As long as the classes are "close", there wouldn't be a concern but your addicts that feel that extra that extra 0.0002 DPS is so important.

[Cantino]

From what I've been reading on the EQ2 boards and site, Tag may be more right with the Archtype thing. They're trying to make all the upper-level classes different, but at the same time be able to substitute for each other. I'm not convinced it'll work out as closely as they want, because in my humble opinion a full healing Priest will still be better than a Druid, but time will tell on that one... =)

~Sariig

[Esperant]

well I think I should add to this since I think some of you have gotten this whole archtype thing mistaken.

Let me give an example while I explain.

Lets say you have two different warrior classes. You have a Monk and then you have a Berserker. While both fill the ROLL of being the warrior (tank)... they are definitly better at certain things than the other.

Same goes for Mages. My main (though I have at least level 9 in all 4 primary classes) is my summoner. I've noticed that a Sorcerer is better at some things than I am and I'm definitly better at other things than him. A perfect example is how I summoned a underwater essence for a group so we could swim underwater and attack underwater sea creatures that could not have been reached otherwise. On the other hand, when it came to topping off long combos, he could do much more damage in a single strike. To add to this though, it did'nt mean he did more damage than me over all. If it was just us soloing, I could do more DPS than him but just barely. So he was better at doing long drawn out combos in a group. Hope that helps. Everyone truly is equal for the most part... it just really depends on what you're doing. I personally have come to love that about this game. I surprisingly havent seen as much "jealousy" in the game as I did in the original EQ1. But there will always be those jerks who wants everyone elses skills for themself.

Hope that helped.

[Averad]

With a starting base classes lower lvl characters can group with out much problem (only 4 classes to choose from). Once you reach higher content and skill lvls grouping will require more defined skills/characters. Moving slow into a class should teach the player how to play their class through the changes.

With this setup it should be easy for low lvl groups to find people to join them and higher lvl groups to get the type of character/skills they need.

Hope that makes some sense

[Fibonacci]

First, EQ2 is not EQlive. Get this straight now, it will save you some grief later on. They are completely different games.

1) Will EQII offer strategic and creative playing? or will it require alot of rote effort?
Yes and yes.
You can coast through on a few simple routines. Some classes are easier than others in that they require less player skill for the simple solo grinds. Group tactics are still being debated and developed. In EQ, when you think of tactics some of the first things you think of are splitting mobs and CHeal chains. There are many stratigies for pulling all of which rely on some way of minimizing adds. Pacify, Feign death, non-damageing aggro, all of these and more go right out the window. There is no splitting mob groups. Just like players will be solo and in a group, so are the mobs. You aggro one then all his buddies in group come as well no matter where they are.

C-heal chains? Try Sup-heal spam instead. Priest are just as much second line melee as the are healers. Add to this the incredible aggro from heal spells and your priests will be tanking some. Fighters do get several taunt skills that work very well but you can not be sure they will always have one ready for snap use.

Next is the idea of Heroic Opertunities. As a solo player you will quickly learn how to fire off a few of these. In a pickup group you will break many more chains then you finish. If you are with a group of friends you will learn to use these oppertunities frequently for devistating effect.


2) [snip] When characters of various classes get to higher levels will they all still be valuable and powerful players in a group?

From my experience (and this is just MHO) most of the classes and sub-classes are well balanced. The exceptions are:
1- Crusaders are just under warriors and brawlers. They do make the best secondary tank. It's rather odd and hard to explain but any tank is a better tank with a crusader in the group.
2 - In the mid levels (and upper levels I have heard but I do not know first hand) having a second healer is advisible when going for riskier targets. Risky being anything with a better than average loot table. Priests are easy to solo -- or at the very least, no worse than any other class -- and are more than the med-heal-med buffbots of EQlive so you will usually not have a hard time finding a priest (any will do) and often a second as needed. In fact, the some of the best group makeups are 2 priests, 2 tanks and 2 DPS. This leads to exception ...
2a - There are 4 archetypes and 3 group slot types. Mages and scouts vie for the same DPS position with scouts getting the short end of the bargin. Crowd control is nice if you have it but dead mobs are prefered of mezzed mobs.

=======

If you want to know what is the best class to play for groups, pick any one you like. Just pick a class and learn how to opperate in a group. If the pay version is anything like the beta version there are a scarce few who can actually play EQ2 well but there are many, many, MANY players who are from ubar_guild_08 and have been in Plane of Time since two days after PoP was released and have logged more raid hours per week than on the job hours who just can not get it through their uber thick skulls that THIS IS NOT EQ!!!!

Sorry for the rant :\