LFG

I've had a good time beta testing in the past, and it always gave me something to do for at least a month before the expansion went live. Plus, I have no natural sense of direction, it takes me a while to learn my way around. So betas have really helped me get off to a good start in expansions and not always be the last guy to arrive somewhere because I couldn't find my way.

So far this expansion, I've:

-leveled 2 toons from 60 to 70 adventuring
-leveled 1 toon from 1 to 58 adventuring, including betrayal and prismatic quests
-leveled 1 toon from 1 to 64 adventuring
-leveled 3 toons from 60 to 70 tradeskilling
-leveled 2 toons from 1 to 70 tradeskilling
-Done the Claymore quest, DT access quests, and literally every other quest in the expansion on two different toons

I'd planned to level my unfinished adventure toons to 70, but I guess I just got really burned out on grinding and leveling. Plus, I was spending 200 p a month on upgrades for all my alts. I started thinking, why? Even if I had 4 level 70 adventurers, I'd probably only ever play my shaman and sk anyway. My SK is ridiculously underpowered for raid purposes and was my original main, but it is a great toon (and may be the best fighter class in game for this, I'll admit) for two box farming. I can two box kill everything in PoA, and was two boxing the PoA dragons with just my defiler and sk until I got tired of that and realized I couldn't possibly use any more plat.

I think SoE actually did me a favor by not inviting me to beta, because now I'll be able to spend my FULL TIME upgrading, developing, and sharing my thoughts about EQ2 on this web site between now and the EoF release, which is my own way of helping improve EQ2.

I just know SoE will eventually appreciate my tireless efforts on their behalf. :smiley-wink:

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LFG

Hey man, I had a thought -

At 8:00 P.M. PST tonight, 11 P.M. EST, I'll log Ixnay on to the Nektulos server, and will start a new guild named "Bitter and Unloved Subscribers".

Anyone who'd like to join, just send me a tell at that time and I'll shoot you an invite. Level 1 to 70s are welcome, I do need enough people at the registrar to form the guild, however.

Thanks :smiley-happy:

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Otis

Will there be coffee & pastries?

RadarX

It's apples and oranges my friend. First of all, I doubt seriously he was a compensated writer. If I get banned and can't do my job? My kid doesn't eat. The same thing restrains me from saying everything I think on the forums because I do represent a fansite.

I'm not employed to make SOE look good and I'm damn sure not going to lie about something I see needing attention. But the better EQ2 looks, the more people play it and that makes everybody happy. If EQ2 tanks, you can damn sure bet Ten Ton Hammer will move our staff somewhere else.

So, honestly? No I probably wouldn't flame SOE because they don't listen to flames unless there are hundreds of them. I would definetly complain about it though.

RadarX

Chaos torqued off the CRM from my understanding which really isn't the same thing as the Dev's not caring.

I'm not sure how the selected beta process worked but I know a lot of it has to do with PR. They aren't blind to the truth, but you have to approach it correctly.

Fansite writers? Yeah sometimes you have to take what they say with a grain of salt. The flip side you don't see unless you do this long enough though, is you get jaded. Every writer does. I've seen enough dog and pony shows to know when I'm being fed bullshit. I may not call shens, but I'm very aware of it. I was sent to preview Dark and Light at E3 and they were very nice, very accomodating, and I think even considering advertising with us. I pointed out the positives, then concluded by calling it a flaming train wreck.

I think most of us who write for fansites can admit there are some serious flaws in the game. I personally was one of those who bitched about more DPS for Templars for months and months. I even cornered Lockeye on 2 occassions to discuss it. You are very right though, because of being fansite you have to be a little more careful what you say. It reflects on your site as well as SOE.

Korina

Wow. I've certainly been there. I hated Feerrott for a long time just for that reason.

LFG

I think it will go something like this:

Me: "Hi, my name is Ixnay, and I'm Bitter and Unloved."

Everyone else: "Hi Ixnay!"

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Kurizo

I can't help but disagree. You invite fansite authors to beta, exclusively..... that means only one thing - free supporting press. I'll just quote LFG here:

It's plain and simple.

And as far as the Elrohn guild creation joke I really don't find it funny. Yes LFG that was typical of your response but to cash out on someone's loyalty like that is only a slap in the face. Some people take it far more seriously than others how much they play a week, or what they have to offer to beta, or how much time and effort they would really put forth. I would have to agree with Elrohn that when it comes to certain aspects of beta testing, you have to really choose the right people.

It's is obvious that SOE has failed to choose the right people. Especially here.

Do you really think RadarX, Nurta, Calthine, Coyote, or any of the others are going to be knee deep in testing raid content? Well no, you and I both know that is not how the EQ2 DEVs beta test raids anyways. It's the biggest fucking joke known to the gaming community. So I'm not faulting them, entirely.

You need hardcore raiders to test raid content and you need carebears to test the well... carebear shit.

They have repeatedly fucked that up, and I'm confident that if they would just listen and pull their fucking heads out of their asses things could change at a minimum of 90 degrees.

But they won't. You know it as well as everyone else, they make the game appealing to the newbs and casual types, the #1 priority at SOE headquarters. They will continue to shit on the veterans and smile while they are doing it with little veteran rewards that suck ass.

Why do I say this? I'm not mad at the veteran rewards, I'm bothered at this evolution process: When veterans quit, guilds struggle to keep their heads above the water, so they recruit the noobs. For every 1 veteran that quits, there are 5 noobs to come take their spot. So who needs the vets?

It's like shooting a gun. Eventually SOE is going to run out of bullets.

The RadarX's the Nurta's, the Calthine's, the Coyote's will continue running around praising SOE not because they are physically mentally retarded but because of what they do for a living and how they fail to see the big picture. As much as a hardcore raider would sit back and call them stupid as hell, they are sitting back with their 850,000 books read library saying raiders are stupid as hell.

Sure I've seen them complain about things on the forums and it's the "I choose my way of doing things differently" way, but still - Every single person who is on the beta and is part of a fan site exclusively dangle off the developers jock, it's the nature of the beast. If I was still playing the game it would piss me off too.

I would hope that they were taking care of the high end stuff with high end players and not the people who think about PIE all fucking day. Of course hoping that is like pissing in the wind.

LFG

Let me tell you how bad this is with me.

In the original EverQuest, over 8 years ago, I made Ixnay, my first character ever. He was a Paladin.

I travelled from Freeport, where I made him, all the way to Kelethin at level 8. When I got to Kelethin, I went up in the tree city, and found someone to give me a bind outside the bank, so that I wouldn't revive all the way back to Freeport and have a massive corpse run if I died while adventuring on this new continent.

Well, then I spent the next three hours trying to find my way down from the tree city so I could hunt some Orcs. This was before maps. I never did find a way down, so I decided I'd just suicide and jump down. The problem was, I was bound at the bank, and kept reviving back there. So I was stuck in an endless loop.

Finally, I became so fucking frustrated that I just deleted the character. I started over as Ixnay the cleric, and I'm pretty sure I never went back to Kelethin until I was at least level 40. The rest was history.

I never understand why they feel the need to design every freaking zone as a maze. This obviously benefits one type of player - the type who is good with directions and always has a sense of where he is and how to get somewhere in RL. "Maze design" is a clear disadvantage to players who simply aren't good at directions and need a map in a complex, unfamiliar environment just to navigate and play. I don't see the "fun" or "benefit" in designing zones like mazes, at all.

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Illuminator

I need context.

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Bow down before the one you serve. You're going to get what you deserve.