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[Razoric]

Everquest 2 looks to be early November now:

Originally Posted by Smedley
I wanted to address a couple of concerns:

1) Login - these issues should be completely gone in the next few days. Sorry for the problems, but simply put there were problems that needed addressing.. and addressing them caused some bugs.. those will be gone quickly.

2) Lag - it's really 2 zones atm.. it's Antonica and Commonlands. The team has made great strides in this area..and they have some big stuff coming in within the next few days that we hope is really going to get things back to normal. It's gotten a lot better, but we see it too (we're all playing EQ 2 all the time). This will go away before we launch. Please also understand that we have very deliberately been running the servers at what we consider to be the maximum capacity. In the next day or so we'll add another server or two to the list that players can go to. This should help a lot since as we let in a lot of new people we won't be seeing them all go in to the existing ones. Our strategy here is a simple one - to keep the servers stressed out to make sure we address server performance issues. At launch we will have a significant number of servers, so in and of itself this should help a great deal.. but we're not relying on that. We're going to make sure the performance is good.

3) Launch - The offical announcement comes out tomorrow. While I understand that some of you may feel the game is coming out too early.. we feel very strongly that we can address the remaining issues and have a very smooth and successful launch. We have a lot of things that we're testing internally before we open them up to you all... and that does include a ton of bug fixes that are underway. The team is closing bugs out at a lightning fast rate. From the outside, when you see login issues it looks like we've taken a step backward.. and I can understand how it appears that way. But the people on this team are stone cold pros who have done this for a long time and are dedicated to making sure EQ2 is an enjoyable experience.

Thanks,

John Smedley
President, Sony Online Entertainment

Who's taking bets that Blizzard will counterattack with Open Beta on or about the day EQ2 is released?

This war should be interesting to say the least.

:O

 

[Razoric]

Link to EQ2 annoucement (Nov. 8th release):
http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=109&STORY=/www/story/10-25-2004/0002308367&EDATE

 

[Ramirez]

So is WoW really gonna make its 11/15 date?

 

[Razoric]

I'm hearing Nov. 22nd is what they are shooting for.

 

[MrAngryFace]

Ill be playing Dark Age of Camelot, especially with its new Catacombs expansion coming out which promises nicer visuals, usual new crap, and instancing which means casuals can play too. Not only blizzard can do stuff like that

and cool new classes for the exciting realm of hibernia (my fav)

The Vampiir class is a fighter who wields a one-handed piercing weapon in its right hand. While in melee combat, it is able to cast Vampiir magic with the left hand. The class does not have a normal power pool, however. It will gain power from a variety of attacks - primarily melee strikes. The class receives Safefall and Climb Walls, as well as a passive form of health regeneration. Vampiiric magic comes in three categories or spell lines: "Self Enhancement" spells such as parry, evade, run speed, magic and melee absorption bonuses; "Offensive Damage" spells such as Lifetaps, Flame Strikes, and a special ability to turn the left hand into a claw for further melee attacks; and "Utility" spells such as a single target mez, snare, Lull Enemies, and effectiveness debuffs.


The Bainshee class is a cloth wearing class whose magic comes in the form of sound, and may only be played by female avatars. The class has three specialization lines, each line with spells focused in one of three areas: Point Blank Area of Effect, Ranged Area of Effect, and Cone Area of Effect. The Bainshee will be a class that debuts many unique magical abilities never before seen in the lands of Camelot. These include: a Befriend PBAE spell that will temporarily turn monsters into realm guards who will then attack any pursuing enemies for a short time; a ranged AE wail which, when sustained, can be used to reduce the visibility of enemies in an area; a Buffering Breath spell (a damage absorption buff) that will absorb a certain amount of spell damage for group members; and finally, is a PBAE shriek that causes nearby monsters to try and (temporarily) flee from the Bainshee until she finally stops to breathe.

 

[AeroGod]

I like Nov 22. Leaves me plenty of time to finish up with H-L2, Halo 2, and GTA: SA before I sink myself into WoW.

 

[nubbe]

ah.. damit... I just unlocked my Jedi in SWG ><

 

[SyNapSe]

It seems like they are going to drop it because they obviously want to hit the Holiday season + EQ2. I hope they put out open beta for WoW before Halo 2 comes out. I may not have much time after that.

 

[Razoric]

Ill be playing Dark Age of Camelot, especially with its new Catacombs expansion coming out which promises nicer visuals, usual new crap, and instancing which means casuals can play too. Not only blizzard can do stuff like that

and cool new classes for the exciting realm of hibernia (my fav)

If this had come out 6 months ago I'd be all over it. With WoW so close I'll have to opt out of playing it for now. It's a shame though.

 

[MrAngryFace]

Id play WoW, its stylized enough, its just in its current Form the best time to start DAoC is now cause its so solid. MAN its solid.

 

[hobart]

WoW doesn't have a monthly fee listed yet either... huh?

 

[AeroGod]

Id play WoW, its stylized enough, its just in its current Form the best time to start DAoC is now cause its so solid. MAN its solid.

I have trouble getting back into it. I feel like I missed out on so much leaving it for nearly a year. I watch my brother play and it just scares me how much time it takes to put in. The artifacts for ToA take forever and you sit farming scrolls for 4 hours untill you get the last one you need which drops like .00001% of the time. And you NEED these artifacts to be good at PvP, because I see him play and the people who have these artifacts are 99% of the time better then those who dont. Meh, Id rather get a fresh start with a new MMO. Thats WoW. Plus Dark Age of Camelot has boring combat, somewhat. WoW is better in every respect. Casting system is better, fighitng is better, and there is no downtime hardly. Fight fight fight, unlike DAoC in most cases. The only thing DAoC has over WoW is the PvP system, but even then DAoC PvP was shitty when it first came out. Give WoW some time to fix up their PvP system

 

[MrAngryFace]

Im going to see how Catacombs private dungeons turn out, that should be cool. Plus I play windowed. That way im productive with everything else with the Downtime.

Id rather get an opinion from Fragamemnon, he's apparently a demigod on some servers haha.

 

[AeroGod]

You have to be like my bro and play like a sneaky bitch. He goes around from guild to guild joinging them, getting their trust, then stealing all the shit in the guild vault and selling it. HE has a shit load of platinum from doing it. Hahah, what a bitch. I love it. He sucks though because he doesnt know how to specc a decent Shadowblade and cant kill anything except noobs in Darkness Falls 40 levels lower then him.

 

[MrAngryFace]

I used to run around as a female character naked saying some bug or something befell me and I didnt have any equipment left. Or I used the story that I was tricked by someone who said they would dye my armor for me.

Id get donations obviously, then id sneak around the corner and put on all my stuff again and run to the next town haha.

 

[AeroGod]

Haha:lol I love scamming people in MMOs. 90% of the reason why I play them. Play female toons and get free stuff. Its great

 

[MrAngryFace]

IM A GIRL I HAVE NO CLOTHES BUY ME SOME I COULD GET CUT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Outdoor Miner]

One thing I will say DAoC has over WoW at this point is melee combat. It's just soo much fun using reactionary styles and chains in DAoC. Kept you on your toes a bit more. It wasn't just hit attack and go get a beer. Hopefully WoW will include some of that down the road.

 

[MrAngryFace]

yeah being a tank was actual work, as was keeping said tank alive. Being a Warden taught me a fuckload about both since their bubble is loved by millions and their warrior skills allow them to emulate a tank character to a degree

 

[hiryu]

One thing I will say DAoC has over WoW at this point is melee combat. It's just soo much fun using reactionary styles and chains in DAoC. Kept you on your toes a bit more. It wasn't just hit attack and go get a beer. Hopefully WoW will include some of that down the road.

WoW is nothing like hitting attack and going to get a beer. I would say they borrowed many points from DAoC when it comes to combat. For instance, many of the warriors abilities can only be used after either blocking or parrying a hit. Plus, WoW's combat is much more faster paced. You kill things so quick that you wouldn't even have time to grab a beer.

 

[MrAngryFace]

some of us LIKE down time

 

[Razoric]

WoW is nothing like hitting attack and going to get a beer. I would say they borrowed many points from DAoC when it comes to combat. For instance, many of the warriors abilities can only be used after either blocking or parrying a hit. Plus, WoW's combat is much more faster paced. You kill things so quick that you wouldn't even have time to grab a beer.

Exactly... from what I've played its more like Diablo 2 / City of Heroes combat than it is Everquest / UO style. Its very fast paced with minimal downtime. Gone are the days you spend 20 minutes killing a bunny outside of town.

ahh the good old days. lol

 

[Razoric]

some of us LIKE down time

:O why on earth would you like downtime.....

 

[MrAngryFace]

So I can run my game in a window while I do other things. Sometimes its more about the journey than where youre going. I like tinkering with MMORPGs. That way its never a BIG focus.

 

[Razoric]

So I can run my game in a window while I do other things

But it's a game... you aren't supposed to be so bored that you are checking your mail or the forum while "playing"...

 

[MrAngryFace]

who said I was bored, I just dont have much time off so I like to maximize my time off doing things I like.

 

[madara]

ROFL. The war of watered down hold my hand mmorpgs has begun. Thank god I am out this mess, only very casual will end up happy then again there some here still play FF11, lol, so perhaps more then just the bnets will have a month of fun or two at least. Back to Vanguard boards for real mans mmorpg.

 

[Razoric]

ROFL. The war of watered down hold my hand mmorpgs has begone. Thank god I am out this mess, only very casual will end up happy then again there some here still play FF11, lol, so perhaps more then just the bnets will have a month of fun or two at least. Back to Vanguard boards for real a mans mmorpg.

Wow now the MMORPG genre is splintered into casuals and hardcore?

Consider me casual then because I play games for fun.

 

[MrAngryFace]

MMORPGS have always been a case of casuals vs hardcore. Time vs Less Time

 

[Razoric]

MMORPGS have always been a case of casuals vs hardcore. Time vs Less Time

Im talking game wise... like now it's "uncool" according to the hardcore MMORPG nerds to play a "casual" game like World of Warcraft. Pathetic.

 

[MrAngryFace]

im sure WoW will have its hardcore aspects.

 

[ManaByte]

I have trouble getting back into it. I feel like I missed out on so much leaving it for nearly a year.

I left for about a year (started my Thane back when ToA came out) and am enjoying it more than ever. I played WoW for 9 months and right now all I'm playing is DAoC and I can't wait for Vampiirs and Bainshees.

I watch my brother play and it just scares me how much time it takes to put in. The artifacts for ToA take forever and you sit farming scrolls for 4 hours untill you get the last one you need which drops like .00001% of the time. And you NEED these artifacts to be good at PvP, because I see him play and the people who have these artifacts are 99% of the time better then those who dont.

That's why you get in a guild to easily get the pages. My guild's vault is full of extra pages.

Meh, Id rather get a fresh start with a new MMO. Thats WoW. Plus Dark Age of Camelot has boring combat, somewhat. WoW is better in every respect. Casting system is better, fighitng is better, and there is no downtime hardly. Fight fight fight, unlike DAoC in most cases. The only thing DAoC has over WoW is the PvP system, but even then DAoC PvP was shitty when it first came out. Give WoW some time to fix up their PvP system

WoW is nothing like hitting attack and going to get a beer. I would say they borrowed many points from DAoC when it comes to combat. For instance, many of the warriors abilities can only be used after either blocking or parrying a hit. Plus, WoW's combat is much more faster paced. You kill things so quick that you wouldn't even have time to grab a beer.

DAoC is not "hitting attack and going to get a beer." If you play like that, you DIE. Oh, and you can do it in WoW as well...

One thing I will say DAoC has over WoW at this point is melee combat. It's just soo much fun using reactionary styles and chains in DAoC. Kept you on your toes a bit more. It wasn't just hit attack and go get a beer. Hopefully WoW will include some of that down the road.

Exactly. And it's not just reactionary, there are the positional styles that require you to be next to a mob instead of in front of it, etc. My Thane uses a side-positional shield style in groups to open combat and solo I use 1 chain and 2 reactionary styles + instant cast spells to easily solo yellows and oranges.

 

[ManaByte]

Im talking game wise... like now it's "uncool" according to the hardcore MMORPG nerds to play a "casual" game like World of Warcraft. Pathetic.

It's not so much that, really. A lot of hardcore MMORPG players see WoW as Diablo II in the War3 universe using a persistant world. And in a way, that's what it is. There are so many Diablo elements in the game now that a lot of hardcore players want a little more depth in their MMORPG. Honestly I can see EQ2 doing pretty well in this regard as it does offer a lot more depth in character customization and development than WoW does.

 

[ManaByte]

Back to Vanguard boards for real mans mmorpg.

It's sad that people are ignoring Vanguard. That's the MMORPG I really, really, want to play. EQ2 is nothing more than a marketing tool to further the EverQuest brand name. Vanguard: Saga of Heroes is the true sequel to EverQuest.

 

[AeroGod]

Nothing wrong with Dark Age combat system. Its just the down time that sucks and its slow paced, especially when you solo. WoW is so much faster paced and I love it. I could give a shit about attack chains and positional styles, i hate melee classes anyways(except for rogue types), i do give a shit about fighting one or 2 monsters then sitting for 30 seconds or longer..repeat repeat. SNORE. If you have a big group in DAOC its better, but forget soloing. Takes forever unless you play a rigged class like Necro or Cabby.

 

[MrAngryFace]

people talk about the downtime and its like, im rarely sitting around not by choice

 

[MrCheez]

Just open up the god damn WoW beta. It's been 17 days since the "Open Beta Coming Soon" announcement and there has been NO info on a start date.

Please Blizz.

PLEASE.

Blizzard, I'll do anything... ANYTHING >_<

Gaaahaadkl;fajsflksjdfdfsh;ohjsdfsfdg

 

[MrCheez]

some of us LIKE down time

The thing is, it's kind of silly to say the downtime works because you can just alt+tab... in a game that has no downtime, you could always still take a break between fights and do your thing. Without downtime you can play at whatever pace you want, with it you're forced into one slow pace.

 

[AeroGod]

people talk about the downtime and its like, im rarely sitting around not by choice

Solo much? When I try and solo my Bonedancer I can maybe get 2 or 4 kills(yellow-orange con) in maybe...5 minute depending on resists and whatnot before my power runs out. Then you have to sit down for a minute for it to return. Rinse repeat for whatever amount of experience. If i was doing this in WoW I could probably get 5-6 kills of an even or slightly higher con with my mage and then im out of power. BAM! I swig a drink and im back to full power in 10 seconds fighting again. And thats IF I decide to hunt. I could grab a quest and work on that killing, then when im done i get a nice fat hunk of xp and maybe a nice item. The quest system in WoW is so much better because its a storyline. It beats the pants off of DAOC. Its like your actually part of a world, with other characters that have storys and this world is actually active with things happening. Even if it is just kill tasks, delivery missions, or collecting something its 100 times better then DAOC which is getting a group and heading to the area thats produces the most xp/time for your level...just like everyone else.

 

[MrAngryFace]

I solo constantly. I use hibernian classes which are better at soloing tho. The warden and druid are almost completely self sufficient.

bonedancer sux!

 

[AeroGod]

I solo constantly. I use hibernian classes which are better at soloing tho. The warden and druid are almost completely self sufficient.

bonedancer sux!

Bonedancers use to be good untill they got nerfed because noobs complain. When BDs first came out, my supp troll BD could solo entire groups of albions and hibernains without effort in Caledonia.

In Darkness Falls my groups would watch in awe as my BD solo'd two rocots purple con to me while they lay dead becasue hteir classes suck and/or they suck. That was great because immediatly following that they logged off and went to make suppression Bonedancers.

 

[MrAngryFace]

yeah, overpowered stuff eliminating competition is cool

 

[AeroGod]

yeah, overpowered stuff eliminating competition is cool

Its not overpowering its skill. If those morons dont know how to deal with me they cry to mythic and tell them to nerf to Bonedancer legion. THEY DO IT. Yet they let the hibernian caster with their bullshit and Sorcerers ability to stop entire armies dead in their tracks and their bullshit bolt mezzez go run wild.

 

[madara]

No worriest yet, it is 06 product afterall but here is one example out of like 10k(and hollow promises are nearly void with this solid team):


The quest system is very robust. The typical “Fed Ex” or “Kill mob A in location X” needed to be changed. This idea works, but the Sigil twist is how do they make it better and more fun? Quests will work in the traditional way, you walk up to a NPC and respond to the keywords and they tell you what needs done. We were actually shown an example of the way the quest system will work. You will be given an objective but there will be different ways to complete the goal. In the quest we had, you had to save some guys son from a group of bandits. His son is being held for ransom in a camp not far from town. You have the option to guy in the camp and kill everyone, you could go to the guys sister and help her collect some trinkets to repair her family heirloom and pay off the ransom for the son or choose the third option. We snuck in the camp, killed a scout and took his clothes. Once disguised as the scout we entered the camp and decided the best way to free the son. So we killed another scout, took his clothes and went back to camp and disguised the captive son in the bandit clothes. We snuck him out of the camp and back to safety. This is not an epic quest or a high-end quest, this is just an example of how the majority of quests will work. There will be different ways to complete quests with different rewards.

 

[MrAngryFace]

spilt milk, all over the place!

 

[Spiritreaver]

Oh crap, I'm still playing MUDs.

 

[Outdoor Miner]

No worriest yet, it is 06 product afterall but here is one example out of like 10k(and hollow promises are nearly void with this solid team):


The quest system is very robust. The typical “Fed Ex” or “Kill mob A in location X” needed to be changed. This idea works, but the Sigil twist is how do they make it better and more fun? Quests will work in the traditional way, you walk up to a NPC and respond to the keywords and they tell you what needs done. We were actually shown an example of the way the quest system will work. You will be given an objective but there will be different ways to complete the goal. In the quest we had, you had to save some guys son from a group of bandits. His son is being held for ransom in a camp not far from town. You have the option to guy in the camp and kill everyone, you could go to the guys sister and help her collect some trinkets to repair her family heirloom and pay off the ransom for the son or choose the third option. We snuck in the camp, killed a scout and took his clothes. Once disguised as the scout we entered the camp and decided the best way to free the son. So we killed another scout, took his clothes and went back to camp and disguised the captive son in the bandit clothes. We snuck him out of the camp and back to safety. This is not an epic quest or a high-end quest, this is just an example of how the majority of quests will work. There will be different ways to complete quests with different rewards.

That sounds great. I'll believe it when it's actually in a playable form.

I'll check out info on Vanguard in a year or so, when things like that are taken out before any Beta phase starts out. I absolutely do not follow MMO's so early in their lifetime. Way too many innovative ideas, promises, etc all taken out over the course of a year.

 

[ManaByte]

That sounds great. I'll believe it when it's actually in a playable form.

It is playable...

 

[Outdoor Miner]

Sorry, I meant in a Beta phase. Where it would be playable for a mass of people.

 

[ManaByte]

Sorry, I meant in a Beta phase. Where it would be playable for a mass of people.

I'm sorry. I don't see the difference. You said:

I'll check out info on Vanguard in a year or so, when things like that are taken out before any Beta phase starts out. I absolutely do not follow MMO's so early in their lifetime. Way too many innovative ideas, promises, etc all taken out over the course of a year.

What madara described is exactly how quests work in Vanguard and they are fully playable. Sigil had an event two weeks ago where they invited a ton of people to their offices in San Diego to see the game, and it is real and the quests are working exacly as he described. This isn't some design written down and a design doc, this is how the quests in the game work and they are fully playable.

Just because a game isn't playable to the general public it doesn't mean it doesn't exist. By that logic, the new Zelda doesn't exist because you can't play it.