Suggested Changes (mostly lower tier content)

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[Subdued]

I think a lot of the focus of changes are on T10, while the vast majority of players are not in T10 and won't be for quite a while.  I think it's important to look at changes that can retain new players in lower content. 

Having gone through the lower tier content early last year and then again recently when I level'd up a 3rd group, here are some comments and thoughts on how I feel the content looks to a new player, starting from level 1:

Field of Bone:  It's a pretty crappy starting area as a new player, IMO.  I think starting in a bit of a more epic area would be nice.  There's another custom server that used Vex Thal and the did a great job with it.  With that said, a new starting area would require too many resources that Akka can better spend elsewhere so I don't think this is important at all.

The rest of the zones to 70:  Good stuff.

Plane of Fire:  Great for new 70s and great for PL'ing your new group levels/AAs.  Feels relatively useless as a way to grind out levels on your Ring of Ages.  Now that the Ring has required levels, I would love to see Plane of Fire have some use as a grinding zone.  Any player who can mass pull Qvic+ would rather do that for AAs if they were AA farming, as they would have the chance for GSoAs/essences/rainbows.

Time/LDON:  Great zones, no complaints.  I would like to see LDON instance cost be free, in order to allow players a bit more leeway in wiping on their way up the levels.  It would make King's Chests for the FG/CG too easy to farm by doing that, which leads to my next point:

FG/CG: I think the quests are great but I dislike that you have to get the King's Chests because it makes you go through Time/LDON with toons without skills maxxed out.  Another time-consuming equivalent would be great, in order to make people work at the quest and gain the benefit of the offense/defense skill gains when they really need it.  I've always hated having to AFK toons for hours or overnight in order to work melee skills and/or defense up.  It just serves 0 purpose.

Qvic:  I loved the zone as a new player.  It was a lot of fun breaking into it.  I wish more zones felt this way.

CT/T1/T2:  This is where my suggestions get a bit more challenging.  I think the order of these zones are all wrong, including the order of the essences and how they affect UWs.  I think T1/T2 should be before CT.  Increase the drop rate of crystals for T1 and give all of the minis a very small chance to drop dragon minors. 

Beef up CT slightly and make the bosses there meaningful.  Turn it into a good dungeon crawl the way Qvic feels for a fresh group of 70s.   After the playstyle of T1/T2, this would be a drastic change back to the LDON/Qvic playstyle and I feel like it would make the first few tiers more enjoyable.  T1/T2 is just so incredibly boring.  I don't think there's anyone out there that enjoys T1/T2 at all.

As a result of pushing CT after Qvic/T1/T2, I think you re-work the UWs and make UW4 the big jump in power rather than UW3.  This way a player has to go through 4 tiers of content to get that big power jump.   

T3/T4:  I'm ok with both of these.   People complain about gmajors, which is a fair complaint, but I don't think there's a reason to make them easier.  Bottlenecks are ok.

T5:  I think it's a great zone.  I think a coral bane quest would be great, something with about +60,000 coral damage would be optimal.  Killing corals with a group of 6/12 without at least a UW6 is a nightmare when you're in the last few stages of clearing this place.  It's made even worse when you have to gear up duplicate classes.  I had 4 zerkers last year when I went through this place.  I had nightmares about yellow corals for months. 

T6:  Great zone, no complaints.

I haven't had enough experience in T7+ to comment on changes to those zones.

GSOAs:  I think they should only drop in T3 and up.  I think the drop rate should be increased in T7 and up.  I also think you could level limit the earrings.  Level 10 earring requires level 72.  Level 20 earring requires level 74.  Level 30 earring and up requires level 76.   The problem with GSOAs is that they're killing the economy.  Nobody farms SLS as new players anymore.  You get one GSOA as a lucky drop in Qvic, sell it for 15m+ and you can outfit your crew to the gills with strike augs and you can get your tank their SotA.  I don't know that farming SLS as a new player is necessarily a good option either, as it's a zero-skill, mundane task, but as it stands there are no SLS out there for higher tier players to buy.  MPG doesn't bring enough in.  It helps, sure, but it's just a supplement to your farming. 

[Raygan]

I don't like the idea of changing anything that Hunter established....I think it discredits the work he did. If he were still with us and agreed to changes that would be another matter all together.

[Subdued]

So a zone currently in a poor state (T1/T2) should be left unchanged?  I can't imagine Hunter wouldn't have wanted his work to be improved on.  Nobody's asking to throw it away. 

Leaving 90% of it intact isn't discrediting his legacy, it's evolution.  Things can get better and still reflect the hard work a person put into it before their unfortunate passing.  Should the iPhone remain unchanged because Steve Jobs was one of the top innovators in American history and it would discredit his incredible vision and hard work?  Of course not. 

[Loyal]

I enjoyed my struggles through T1/T2...perhaps it wasnt boring to me because half the bosses would wipe my raid if i wasnt johnny on the spot with heals.....uber buffs turn fun challenging content into boring grinds.

[Peign]

I enjoyed my struggles through T1/T2...perhaps it wasnt boring to me because half the bosses would wipe my raid if i wasnt johnny on the spot with heals.....uber buffs turn fun challenging content into boring grinds.

The heroic resist augs also took away much of the challenge from these tiers.   The AOE poison from the dragons used to be very challenging.    Now, as you said with everyone buffing, everyone getting leet XP from the XP mask MGB, and the ability to get elite resists there is no challenge here any longer.

I guess the grind is still a challenge, hmmm may be a pattern there.

[Loyal]

Field of Bone:  It's a pretty crappy starting area as a new player, IMO.  I think starting in a bit of a more epic area would be nice.  There's another custom server that used Vex Thal and the did a great job with it.  With that said, a new starting area would require too many resources that Akka can better spend elsewhere so I don't think this is important at all.

I agree - this change isnt worth anyone's time. You dont spend much time in this zone and there is never a need to come back.

FG/CG: I think the quests are great but I dislike that you have to get the King's Chests because it makes you go through Time/LDON with toons without skills maxxed out.  Another time-consuming equivalent would be great, in order to make people work at the quest and gain the benefit of the offense/defense skill gains when they really need it.  I've always hated having to AFK toons for hours or overnight in order to work melee skills and/or defense up.  It just serves 0 purpose.

Skills being maxed out in the guilds seems to me to be more of a convenience for players who are bringing up boxes and already well past that content. Otherwise, you should be maxing your skills as you progress through the content. To me, this sounds like an issue of advancing to fast through the earliest content. I dont feel like i ever had to stop to get my toons skills up because by the time i farmed all my epics from PoTime everybody got high enough to hang.

CT/T1/T2:  This is where my suggestions get a bit more challenging.  I think the order of these zones are all wrong, including the order of the essences and how they affect UWs.  I think T1/T2 should be before CT.  Increase the drop rate of crystals for T1 and give all of the minis a very small chance to drop dragon minors. 

I dont feel like the zone order needs to be messed with. I do agree with increased crystal drop rates and dragon minor drop chance on minis. Farming UW - T1 & T2 blows. If it blows for someone who can pull the entire zone, its worse for players who are actually grinding through the zone. Rot Bot & Dragon Class are great to alleviate the lower level pains, but neither are very helpful when RNG hits and the 20 crystals you spent forever farming turn up the same damn bosses over and over and none are the ones you need.

Beef up CT slightly and make the bosses there meaningful.  Turn it into a good dungeon crawl the way Qvic feels for a fresh group of 70s.   After the playstyle of T1/T2, this would be a drastic change back to the LDON/Qvic playstyle and I feel like it would make the first few tiers more enjoyable.  T1/T2 is just so incredibly boring.  I don't think there's anyone out there that enjoys T1/T2 at all.

As a result of pushing CT after Qvic/T1/T2, I think you re-work the UWs and make UW4 the big jump in power rather than UW3.  This way a player has to go through 4 tiers of content to get that big power jump.   

I enjoyed T1/T2   I would like to know more about what bores you with T1/T2...its the first zone where you arent just doing a dungeon crawl (which i think is great) and it should be challenging (absent uber buffs). I dont like messing with lower ranks of UW. To me UW shouldnt be something you farm until you are well past these tiers.

T3/T4:  I'm ok with both of these.   People complain about gmajors, which is a fair complaint, but I don't think there's a reason to make them easier.  Bottlenecks are ok.

To piggy back off my earlier question - What makes T3/T4 better than T1/T2. To me they are very similar zones with T3/T4 having a little more complexity to it.

T5:  I think it's a great zone.  I think a coral bane quest would be great, something with about +60,000 coral damage would be optimal.  Killing corals with a group of 6/12 without at least a UW6 is a nightmare when you're in the last few stages of clearing this place.  It's made even worse when you have to gear up duplicate classes.  I had 4 zerkers last year when I went through this place.  I had nightmares about yellow corals for months. 

Corals suck, but not absurdly so. I like the idea of coral bane quest but its honestly unnecessary. I like zones that punish class stacking. Don't get me wrong, i class stack just like everyone else, but i think its a fair price when you have to spend some extra time in each tier because you stacked up on what you believe to be the best class available for the task.

I haven't had enough experience in T7+ to comment on changes to those zones.

I can help you here - The zone is freaking huge and you spend more time running around clearing bosses than clearing the trash! But it is what it is and its not worth spending a ton of time to fix it. I think this zone is well balanced for having large pay offs for spending a large amount of time clearing the zone.

[Loyal]

I enjoyed my struggles through T1/T2...perhaps it wasnt boring to me because half the bosses would wipe my raid if i wasnt johnny on the spot with heals.....uber buffs turn fun challenging content into boring grinds.

The heroic resist augs also took away much of the challenge from these tiers.   The AOE poison from the dragons used to be very challenging.    Now, as you said with everyone buffing, everyone getting leet XP from the XP mask MGB, and the ability to get elite resists there is no challenge here any longer.

I guess the grind is still a challenge, hmmm may be a pattern there.

Fair Point - perhaps we should change T1/T2.......i suggest making spells in T1/T2 unresistable!

[Raygan]

I say make it so you can't use heroic resists until t7 and level limit buffs for lower classes (as this seems a constant complaint) so that content remains challenging.

[Subdued]

Skills being maxed out in the guilds seems to me to be more of a convenience for players who are bringing up boxes and already well past that content. Otherwise, you should be maxing your skills as you progress through the content. To me, this sounds like an issue of advancing to fast through the earliest content. I dont feel like i ever had to stop to get my toons skills up because by the time i farmed all my epics from PoTime everybody got high enough to hang.

Skills don't max as you go through, the leveling process is too fast as it is on live and other servers.  You can find new players AFK in Surefall on a pretty consistent basis hitting training dummies.  There's enough on this serve to keep us busy without encouraging people to AFK to train skills.  It just doesn't serve a purpose.

I enjoyed T1/T2   I would like to know more about what bores you with T1/T2...its the first zone where you arent just doing a dungeon crawl (which i think is great) and it should be challenging (absent uber buffs). I dont like messing with lower ranks of UW. To me UW shouldnt be something you farm until you are well past these tiers.

When did you enjoy them?  Right now they're awful as a player going through them the first time through.  They never posed any challenge whatsoever.  Just a boring, slow, spread-out crystal farm-fest.  There's no epic feel, there's no risk of death.  I don't think making the AEs meaningful is going to help much.  I also did T1/T2 without buffs and it was never a risk of death.  In LDON as a fresh 70 without buffs, there was a definite risk of death.  In QVIC, without buffs, there was a risk of death for the first 2-3 clears.  In T3, you could only pull 1-2 sections, if that, and there was a risk of death climbing stairs with mobs on you.  In T5, I started by only being able to pull 10-12 mobs when riposte was up, and only pulled in packs of 6-7 when riposte was down.  There was a risk of death.  In T6, I started the same way as T5.  I'm still unable to pull more than about 1/6 of the zone at a time, currently. 

T1/T2, even without buffs, never felt that way.  It was always a boring walkover.  I think it would be difficult to re-work T1/T2, which is why I think it's easier to put CT behind T1/T2, beef it up slightly, make the named always up like Qvic and make them required, and make this another dungeon crawl.  I think UW4 should be the big jump at that point because it would require a bit of a more difficult grind going through 4 UWs as well as a slightly more difficult CT.  As a new player progresses, the first time they can realistically consider pulling the entirety of Qvic to begin farming UW is after they have their 3.5 from HOH and even then it's a challenge.   It doesn't get trivial to pull the whole zone at once until you hit level 73, have your maxxed SotA, and 4.0.  On the flipside, T1/T2 farming was NEVER difficult even remotely.  Just terribly time-consuming and utterly boring.  Farming T1 crystals is worse than farming HOH tokens x100.  Pulling the entirety of HOH in one pull never comes within 10% of the ease of pulling T1/T2 in one pull.  It's not in the same zip code.

That's why I'd make T1 farming a bit easier, and make CT farming a bit harder and make it the bottleneck for the big UW jump.  As it currently stands, a UW1 is a minor upgrade, a UW2 is a minor upgrade, and then BOOM, UW3 instant-legendary.  UW4/UW5 are like no upgrades at all, and then UW6 and UW7 are moderate increases.  I think gating UW4 behind a tougher CT would make the jump to legendary-UW feel a lot more rewarding.  When I finished farming dminors, my elation was extremely tempered because I felt like I'd been run over by a truck a few times.

Part of what I just said answers your question about what makes T3/T4 ok and T1/T2 not.  I never felt any challenge whatsoever in T1/T2 and the setup of the zone itself generates no excitement.  It's not just the difficulty of the dragons, it's that the zone has no feeling of epic to it at all.  T3 has some challenge for a long time as far as pulling it is concerned.  T3 can get very burdensome as well when you're farming for gminors/gmajors, or even T4 gear.  I understand that.  But when I got there, at least I enjoyed clearing it out the first 10 or 20 times.  T1/T2 I didn't even enjoy the first time and I can't be the only one.  It's a lifeless zone that's too early in the progression and I think people who enjoyed Time/LDON/Qvic get smashed in the face with disappointment.  Then, right after you finish it, you go back-to-back with another large zone token-farm (equivalent to the crystal farm).  I think it would smooth out progression to not have them back-to-back and to make CT feel more meaningful rather than a quick bump in the road.

Keep in mind, by the way, that CT as a dungeon crawl for a player moving up the lower tiers is a lot different than farming CT for essences as a higher tier player.  I know most of the higher tier players don't like farming CT essences for UWs and whatnot because it's too cramped in.  That's the thing, though:  when you're going up through progression, I think dungeon crawls are a lot more fun than open spaces.  I think when you're farming essences, that dynamic flips, and you'd rather have the open spaces.  I'm writing this post, however, from the perspective of a player moving up through the tiers, not a player who is in T8/T9/T10 and doing backfarming.   The health of this server will always depend on retaining the new players.  It benefits everyone in the end to keep them here.  If only new content and T10 content is being addressed, then that content does nothing for the new players here.

I agree with the problem with buffs, by the way.  When I was new here at the beginning of last year, I cleared LDON and Qvic without buffs.  When I got buffed for my 2nd or 3rd Qvic run, I couldn't believe how boring and trivial it became.  It was like playing a really hard console game, and feeling immense gratification when you beat it, and then finding out there's a cheat code.  You plug in the cheat code, and play it again, and the game is never the same for you.  You just never enjoy it again and you can't stop yourself from taking the easy way out and using that code.  I think you need to take away god mode from the players for their own good, and in the end it will be for their betterment.  I'm ok with EXP buffs to a certain extent, but new players getting buffs that increase their 20k health to 200k is just way too much. 

[Chunka]

In some of the lower, more boring zones maybe take a page from the Plane of Growth playbook....every X amount of mobs killed, spawn mobs like the Protectors of Growth, who are RIDICULOUSLY hard to kill for the tier.....completely resistant to procs, perhaps, with very beefy mitigation....maybe tie their level to the highest level character in the instance...dont know. Just an idea.

And big yes to making resist stones level limited. Maybe make it progressive....rank 1's only til you hit T3....or make them recommended level as they progress, so that the benefits are incredibly limited til you level. Also, hell yes on buff limits. Start to 70 has pretty much always been trivial here, but now later tiers are trivial as well as long as you hang out in Nexus for a while. And before you all start arguing about making it harder for new players now that we all have ours, keep in mind that many of us "got ours" before most of these buffs even existed.

And sorry, been working myself up to playing again.

[Subdued]

I like that idea, Chunka.  I think to reward the lower tier players, maybe put charm prisms and weapon drops as rewards on those bosses to benefit the newer players for beating a difficult mob.  That way they're rewarded but you aren't rewarding the back-farmers who would find those things trivial anyway.  I think you could apply something similar to T3 as well.  As it stands, it's basically just a pull-as-much-as-you-can zone without any mid-point rewards for the new player.  It feels rewarding to have something in the middle of all the trash packs to keep it fresh.  I think Shadow's warping mechanic should also be removed and he should be made way harder.  The warping mechanic is just extremely irritating, particularly when he flies to the opposite end of the zone in an area you already cleared.  Make him really difficult, instead.  The 3.5 reward is massive as it is, for a warrior.

[Raygan]

I do agree though that CT sucks....a change that would be very cool....and still keep with Hunter's original concept.....move that tier back to oh crap the name of the zone from Qvic.....I am forgetting...the way it was originally....wow I am brain dead this morning.

[Peign]

I do agree though that CT sucks....a change that would be very cool....and still keep with Hunter's original concept.....move that tier back to oh crap the name of the zone from Qvic.....I am forgetting...the way it was originally....wow I am brain dead this morning.

Tacvi

[Rent Due]

Maybe instead of changing the original zones we can take a page out of SOE's playbook.

We could take each zone, copy it and beef it up to a higher tier rating and let it serve as a "Legendary" tier.

example: take T5, copy the zone and scale the mobs to tier 9 with greater rewards, more drops, etc.

it's no secret that there is a large population of the server that hates, and has always hated CT as a tier, however going back to Tacvi is just not a good idea imo. A new zone could be selected to replace CT would be the best option.

These ideas take time and careful consideration to implement though

[warrior5]

Love the legendary tier idea.

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