First of all, thank you Maelfyn for such a lovely game and for putting so much hard work and time/effort into this project. You've created something really brilliant, unique and fun and I think we've all had a blast regardless of development cycle. Also, my laptop has a broken graphics card, so any time I try to play anything even remotely graphic intensive via application, my laptop shuts down. Now I finally have something I can play and I really enjoy it. Thank you Keep up the good work!

So I was thinking, I know there are a lot of suggestions scattered throughout the forums, but wanted a thread where we could make particular suggestions that contributed to the continuity of the Everquest theme. For example, the track ability basically doesn't do anything at all. It just pulls the next monster, same as everyone has. Maybe there's some line of code in there that makes it seem like internally it is doing something, but we all know that in practise it doesn't. In Everquest, track was mainly used to find named mobs to get loot. So why not have Track find a named mob every few minutes? Would it be that overpowered? I really don't think so, I think it would be a fun extra ability and could even have an own skill line to increase the chances of finding a named, but I think in most cases, it should find one, even if on a 5 minute cooldown.

Another thing I noticed is that with some classes, the effort to keep them closely similar to their real Everquest counterparts is far higher than with others. For example, in classic Everquest, the Ranger was useless with a bow and could not do half the things it does in this game. Which is fine, this isn't Everquest, it's a fun combo of EQ/Diablo/WoW. But then you have a kind of "unbalance" (or fun issues) with other classes. The Shadowknight tries too hard to stick with classic EQ Shadowknight and as a result, just really sucks and is quite boring to play. Why not add some abilities from, say, Planes of Power (i.e. bigger lifetaps, fast casting disease nukes, better pet, lifetap buff attacks that work, etc). The same goes for other classes that are maybe lacking in fun/strength, I think it's important to remember that since some classes aren't strict about staying similar to classic EQ, none of them should have to.

As long as the theme is the same, then great. But I've been playing this game a lot the last couple weeks (played time is almost 7 days) and I think it would greatly benefit some of the less popular classes/strong classes to just be more liberal about their abilities and to possibly have stuff from later on in the game's life. I know talents is a step, but based on the examples posted for Warrior, it doesn't seem like it will change this much, but instead make the popular/strong classes just even more so.

Well, I know you've got a lot on your plate Maelfyn, so anyways, thanks again and thanks for listening. I'd like for anyone else to post certain suggestions here as well, specific suggestions (perhaps we need an "underpowered item" thread, as there are a ton of items (e.g. Exceptional Gronk's Wedding Ring) that are just horribly bad despite their level, or just inconsistent with the game i.e. armor type.

Here's an example as far as items go (and is perhaps why my Ranger is level 73 and hasn't seen an upgrade in 35+ levels).

Nice post. It seems rangers are super popular and I think that is ok. I would rather bring every class up to their level than nerf a favored class. With games like this class balance is an issue that never dies. Even for the game design experts.

Track is definitely underpowered. I think its entire implimentation should be changed to some kind of passive buff. I have to be careful with a skill like track because it has potential to severely imbalance the treasure finding process. It actually does work, but it's like 5% of the time or so depending on your race/class.

I think I am mostly ok with how the uniques are designed. It may be worth mentioning particular items that you think are egregious because it might actually be a bug. Like if I mistyped allResists instead of allResist, no attribute would get assigned at all.

One thing I really disliked about WoW was how incredibly boring and formulaic the items were. You could basically look at the item level and what classes wore it and know what the stats were going to be. You could reliably predict the item's stats with level and a random number generator. It was really predictable and made the items super boring for me.

It wasn't that the designers at blizzard were boring or stupid. WoW was just a game that valued balance over item design flexibility. And it's easy to see why. They had unbelievably competitive arena systems and end-game content. But because of that the items became increasingly formulaic over time. I don't think it was like that in vanilla WoW.

So I am ok with a few great items like the dragon bone bracer. Everyone isn't going to find that, so consider yourself lucky. I much prefer a more flexible item design system like those found in Diablo 2 and classic Everquest.

Well, I've made it to level 93, so I'm going to drop my feedback.

The completely random itemization with seemingly no item level/quality floor is my biggest pet peeve. It's fine in Normal, and the game is actually quite fun in Normal, but it is seriously messed up in Nightmare, and also is in Hell from what I can see. I finished Mistmoore on Hell last night and Xicotl dropped an item I saw in Blackburrow at level 10. That was a tricky fight and took me over 5 minutes, all for nothing. The RNG approach to loot is also really harsh for a purely physical class. The only 2 piercing upgrades I found since Unrest 3 in Normal have had almost 100% caster stats. I'm using them because they are still better damage/delay, but it really would be nice if I could find equivalents with life leech, attack speed, and %crit instead of mana leech and casting haste.

The random stats would be entirely reasonable though if not for the additional lack of an item floor, which merely compounds the problem. In Normal, I at least had the expectation of getting something level appropriate and finding upgrades regularly. Since entering Nightmare, and now Hell, however... I basically have to hope the few exceptional or higher uniques I get from clearing an entire dungeon (generally 25% of the total uniques I get) are magically rogue appropriate. Which they almost never are. Maybe you should take a page from Diablo II itemization and drop only exceptional loot in Nightmare and only elite loot in Hell, with some items from the next difficulty in the final 5 dungeons as they are now.

Part of what makes RPGs fun is the feeling of progression, and I'm seeing zero gear progression at high levels. I haven't found an upgrade for literally half my equipment since Normal, and that's just not fun.

The short version: great game at low levels, but at high levels feels a lot more like EverGrind than NeverGrind because the gear progression slows down so much.

Zen, thanks for the thoughtful feedback. You convinced me to make an adjustment to how items drops are generated. There is now a floor level. It a low floor, but I also completely changed a few other things that will make exceptionals and elites more common. Overall, expect a more rewarding drop system in version 0-6-6.

Hmmm have you put in the fix for drop rates already? The reason I ask is I have gotten WAY more elite weapons very recently, including the cleric epic (Water Sprinkler of Nem Ankh), Shatter Frost, as well a pair of Stone Crushers that I am currently wielding. This is the best luck I have had in drops in...well ever. I am in Lower Guk killing things in Hell mode and don't want to go to bed with all these drops lol.

I have a suggestion completely unrelated to the previous ones offered, but a suggestion nonetheless relating to graphical settings.

Currently, the only visual indication that a mob is casting is available through the high graphical setting. I play on medium, as self-casting animations slow the game down incredibly for me. The drawback to this is that, as stated, this also removes the mobs' casting animations. I recall when playing months ago that mobs would display casting animations, I believe before graphical settings were changeable and before self-casting animations were implemented. If I remember correctly, just mob casting did not slow down the game for me.

Could you possibly implement separate settings for self and mob casting animations? Or perhaps some other kind of visual cue at lower settings? Thank you.

Yes the new drop system is on. That's normal now. Go to bed

Hm I will try to think of an easy visual cue.

Honest question. Is the new drop rate too good?

Well, I kept playing for about another hour or two after I made that post and I think I only saw a couple of other Elite Epics? (is that what they are called?) so things sort of balanced out over the whole night I think. So all that to say, from my experience (which is just based on last night's play) it seems to be pretty close to what I think it should be. Last night was the first night in...a week of play maybe, where I actually replaced my gear with a couple better things. I was beginning to think that there was not much else even out there, gear wise, for a ranger.

I did 2 clears of Nightmare Phinny which is probably the only boss I can kill on my mage without 5+ deaths and the loot seems worse now. I know my sample size is pretty horrible so I can try to grind out some more but from the 2 kills I received a normal rare and normal lv22 unique on first kill and a Exceptional rare and lv18 unique on second kill. I would hope a nightmare boss would be set to at the least drop Exceptional Unique majority of the time.

I'm super excited about the talent trees and hoping they boost the other classes up to par with Rangers/Bards on killing ability. I'm at a standstill with my Mage at lv81 where I can either go back and grind light blues for exp or slow clear phinny nightmare for small loot chances in hopes of a decent INT item. Most of my giant/boss fights were 20 minute fights where I would use an ice pet to slow the DPS down enough that I pray one of my defensive spells was refreshed before the boss randomly decided to target me again. Innoruk took me around 20 attempts on Nightmare and I think it was the luck of some chain crits and lighting pet procs inbetween his ironmaiden casts that finally won it for me.

One of my big suggestions for the mage would be to make the 2 AoE spells a little less random. As it stands now the randomness of them sometimes only hitting twice for 100 dmg with cast time and long recast almost makes them not worth using at the high end. I'm not sure how aggro works but the targets always seem to swap from the pet to me randomly even when I don't cast and let the pet just attack. My normal fighting I use air pet and pop burnout and the pet overpower spell to make him proc lighting strikes (prob my best dps at the moment). I mainly cast the ice spell just for the 30% slow as the damage is negligible. After that its just spamming fireballs or lightingstorm as it sometimes does some good dps (just a little too random).

Just for reference I think my gear is somewhat decent. My primary/offhand are both 10/10 with 15% magic dmg bonus. I have also stacked INT and Crit chance. I think i'm sitting on somewhere north of 244 int and 30%+ crit chance. But with the added cast time of my nukes and mobs hitting me causing my casts to take longer my DPS just seems very weak. If i'm not using the air pets lighting strikes or get some good crit chains boss and giants take FOREVER to die.

Thanks for the input. Yes, expect the game to feel very different with talents in. Warriors will be done very soon, so everyone can get some idea once their tree is available.

As the second highest Mage I agree. They need some sort of buff, the AoE's are fun, but too random and too insufficient.

Thanks for increasing loot drops in Nightmare and Hell. Haven't had a chance to play yet, but hoping to finally get an upgrade again now I think the solution also requires some of the level 30-40 uniques to just simply be made better. I have 3 of the Dragon Claw Bracers I posted :O Plus a million other uniques around that level, but only a few uniques that are level 38+ and they are all bad. I think that might be due to an error as you said, but it's awesome that you're so receptive of feedback!

Maelfyn, to answer your question, no, the new Nightmare/Hell drop rates aren't too good. I mean I can definitely tell a little difference, which is good, but it's mostly just an increase to exceptional/elite drop rates, which on paper sounds huge, but when most of those drops are still rares you can't use or uniques that are already guaranteed exceptional + and aren't that good from the start, it doesn't really have much of an impact. I have finally gotten an upgrade on my Ranger though, which was nice, since it hasn't happened in 40 levels. However, it wasn't that good and I'm still seeing a lot of items that are just bad. The new drop rates mostly just make getting gold easier, since exceptionals/elites sell higher, but that's about all I can tell it has done thus far.

Here are most of the level 40+ items I've gotten since the new drop rates (playing about 4-6 hours total). I don't think any of them are particularly good, and only the legs were a slight upgrade to my level 1 Barbed Legplates. I think if you take a look at a lot of these level 40+ elites they are actually quite bad. I think most level 36+ uniques need big upgrades. Because I'm still level 82 and using all level 20-25 uniques except for my level 38 Ribcracker and the new legs. I've gotten like 5 pieces of level 36+ chain, but they aren't as good as the level 20ish stuff I have (e.g. Windstalker's Malice, Dragon Claw Bracer, Dwarven Work Boots.

None of the level 36+ stuff gear has any resists on it at all and that makes most of it worthless. The extra armor exceptional/elite provides isn't enough to make these items competitive. Most importantly, you have to ask yourself "is this item FUN?" Fun is the keyword. Lots of armor isn't fun, being able to kill shit and do lots of damage and not get nuked for half your life is the most fun More equipment needs "fun" stats imo.

As always, my feedback is said with the highest respect and appreciation.

So Beckon for example. It's fun in a way because it has that huge Conjuration which will allow an SK to get a pet with another 5 levels or so and even if they don't use the weapon while fighting, they can swap it out. But otherwise it's not that fun or great. The damage/delay is decent, but it has no crit and crit is the fun stat and also the best stat. It has no resists and no procs and is consequently not as good as a lot of other lower stuff or rare weapons you can get from merchants if lucky.

Obulas Mantle is my first elite unique and I think it is absolute garbage. The item just confuses me to be honest. Is it for fighting leather classes (e.g. monk?), if so, why the mana? is it a flexible item for leather classes and chain classes? Who would this item be best for? Which class? Because if I answer that question, whatever class I pick, the item doesn't work for and is missing some key stat. the magic damage isn't enough to compensate for 0 crit and it has too many melee stats anyways to be useful for a caster. As a hybrid item it's decent, the MR is nice you can swap it in for certain things, but overall I just think it's not a good item. Despite the high stats in some areas, it's just too all over the place and lacking. I think MOST level 50+ uniques need to have either crit or all resists to be used and good/useful/fun for this game.

Same deal with the chain legs, no resists and no crit, so not great. Gauntlets of Fiery Might has the same issue has Obulas, what is it? Who will use it? Again no crit and no all resists so it won't be used vs. many other lower level gloves with crit or all resists such as Celestial and overall the stats are just bad, the casting haste is okay, but does it even beat Magefist? Not really.

Fluxbladed Axe fits the "fun" category cos of the proc, but is just bad on many other levels.

Not a suggestion exactly (although it may lead to one) but I am just going to ask this here. How are resists calculated in Hell mode? Everytime I think I have it figured out...well I don't lol.

Do you mean your total resists? Pretty sure it's exactly like Diablo. In Normal your resists are -0 and in Nightmare they are -50 and in Hell they are -100.

Which is exactly why I say resists are so important. It's such an important stat in this game and games like this (e.g. Diablo). High level uniques simply aren't good unless most of them have decent resists.

In hell it's -120 to all resists.

It's possible to score some items with very high resists that make items without resists useful. Particularly when they have very nice attributes. Not every item is going to be a jackpot. But most elite items will be very useful. I'd say the Obulus Mantle is pretty good for Paladin, SK and ranger, but yeah I wouldn't call it a dream item for anyone. If every item was equally amazing then none of the items would have special appeal. They'd just be replaceable cogs that you acquire once you zone into hell.

I agree with you definitely. Not all items are going to have all the perfect stats and it's fun and good game deisgn to balance that out. Get lots of good resists in a few slots and then one slot with pure damage or whatever. But when an item is lacking resists and a good source of damage, it's just garbage. I do agree not all item is going to be a jackpot, for sure. But like I mentioned, when you're level 82 and only 2 of your items are > level 25, I think it says something about the item design at higher levels. I'm not asking for everything to be upgraded or for everything to be godly, that wouldn't be any fun at all! There's always going to be uniques that aren't that great or that are situational, that's how Diablo was. But right now in this game, I do think quite a few uniques don't make any sense and need upgrades. There are a great deal that are just never good and would never be used.

Sorry if I sound like I'm criticizing a lot. I just really love the game so want to help it be the absolute best it can. I do greatly appreciate all the hard work you've done and continue to do and you work at a really fast pace and it's so awesome to have transparency and have you be so responsive to feedback. I'm in love with this game, so no matter what the criticism/complaints/feedback, thank you!

It's just a huge anticlimax when you get a level 50 unique of your class armor type and think you've got an upgrade to your level 15-25 and then you look at it and it's no good That kind of level disparity in items should be a guaranteed upgrade imo. And there's too many uniques that simply aren't. Of course you're going to have lower level uniques that are better than higher ones, niche items, say a level 20 item better than level 35, but when it's such a larger gap I think it should be very noticeable.

I use Matsuwari's Solace (level 18 Chain) over the Obulas on my Ranger. Maybe it's better for Pal/SK for "tanking", but hey, my Ranger technically "tanks" as well and yet the level 18 normal unique is still better, so I'd assume the same goes for Pal/SK. I think the huge amounts of armor on some exceptionals/elites doesn't make up for not having any good offensive stats. Pretty sure every class out there will pick 2-3% crit over 1-2% armor absorb. Not that all items should have crit, but the way this game plays right now highly rewards crit more than anything else, to the point where an item just isn't competitive in most cases unless it has crit or high resists.

Sorry for mass posting, I suck at forums without an edit button... and nevermind, now I've just finally found it haha, it's so tiny.

I think there's an error in the way you are programming or coding the "Attack" stat on items. It seems to be coded as if it were a skill stat such as Conjuration or 1Handslashing. All the items I've seen with Attack on them have the stat value placed adjacent to skill stat bonuses and are of a similar number. Here is an item as an example. +6 Attack is awkward, don't you think? Attack stat is 1000+ for most people, whereas normal stat skills are 200. So I think items with Attack are incorrectly coded as if the stat was a skill stat, whereas it needs its own value.

Might have a point there. I had to be careful with attack simply because it's a pretty good stat for melee. I may have gimped that stat a bit 8)