DEV Round Table - Community input

[Xero]

More Dragons!

More Dragons!

My only input is please don't make bosses like VT tier 1, almost everyone just skips them or does them once. We want a challenge but not "God I have to kill those". They're just to annoying to kill.

Mounts: The buffs they provide on live are cool. So, some can as you hinted, teleport you "somewhere", while others can add a buff of some kind.

And last but not least YAY more epics!

[Ryzen]

First of all, I enjoy the collaboration. I agree with most but here are some honorable mentions.

First off I want to Thank all the Devs for the fantastic work they have been doing I am really enjoying the server !. Especially the more stable server .

** Can you guys please revisit the idea of possibly raising raid experience so the people who do multibox can gain some AAs too?

First off - Devs FTW

For the love of The Hidden Forest, PLEASE, raid=grp experience. I cannot express this enough. Everyone wins here especially with open style raids that will soon be implemented.

I really like everything I've read and i even really like the appreciation for "invisible background work" - Even if it is invisible, it's nice to be appreciated. Nice work Peterigz!

I've noticed zones don't crash on a weekly basis anymore. Hopefully, I was a good test guinea pig. Again, Devs/Peterigz FTW!

More Dragons!

More Dragons!

My only input is please don't make bosses like VT tier 1, almost everyone just skips them or does them once. We want a challenge but not "God I have to kill those". They're just to annoying to kill.

Mounts: The buffs they provide on live are cool. So, some can as you hinted, teleport you "somewhere", while others can add a buff of some kind.

And last but not least YAY more epics!

This guy knows his stuff!

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Idea's that came up while reading mrhorn's post.

Since we are limited on bags and obviously quests are on the horizon, can we get "completion" style quests moving forward? Looting and turning in seems to be rather dated. A simple kill, loot then immediately destroy, or hail would be sufficient.

Second idea that came up while reading mrhorn's post.

Kind of piggy's the first but for augments. The idea is to evolve aug's rather than loot a bunch of items for a turn in.
Evolving my Halls of Honor aug's seems less daunting than obtaining a brand new set. However, removing them seems too big of a challenge at this time.

Kill style evolving progression comes to mind. Individuals with lvl0 item will be able to grp with someone who has a higher aug but both need the kills. This idea maybe flawed since it has been implemented to a degree with Nobles Causeway. Community consensus is its' rather monotonous. Don't shoot the messenger just providing feedback - turn the dial back a bit - allow piggy's into Deepscar's Den

Lastly, potential zones for T10 super robot dragon cave.
POP was fun and so was Anguish

p.s. Anguish was my last raid zone, n00b in training.

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TL;DR

Indeed, Vishimtar the Fallen was one of my favorite back in the days.

Yay dragons are coming to THF!

[Syong]

Mounts.

Yess! I was wondering if THF would ever see mounts. I love the thought of not only just having the run speed (would be nice for NC), but having some sort of awesome area, group, or personal buff, heal totem (quick heal, regen, complete or chance of death save), illusions, aura, or maybe even a bard song buff.

Solo/group content

I do know there are a select few that solo in THF. Would be nice to have some beefed up content for the solo heads. I personally love the Frostcyrpt holiday zone, the Ascent, alot of the Omens content was awesome - Anguish, MPG, Rift seekers sanctum. Something with decent items and augs that can be had from trash and sick items from named.

[Strumm]

As a player who has been here since Sleepers was guild raid zone, looking at you mofish, all of these have been great and as a player who boxes one group I really enjoy the custom events and some of the custom zone bosses; not a fan of the kill various boss mobs and keep within a certain % and oh btw some are immune to physical and others magic.

A few changes I would kill to see are:

Instance new custom zones from the original - I love going to older zones like eastern wastes, field of bone, etc... and would hate to see this changed into a custom zone; may be keep custom zones to newer zones (i.e- after POP). To piggy back off of this perhaps create zones for the custom zones we currently have? (i.e. - Icewell keep or even Kael). If this is something even remotely entertaining I would volunteer to populate zones/quest/waypoints/scripts/etc...

Weapon and Shield Ornaments - The only post I could find about this was by vaion in 2015. He mentioned a working script but had trouble implementing due to various client versions. Since we are all on ROF2 now perhaps this is a thing. I know this is not a simple sql to add weapon augment but I believe many items and zones would benefit from new blood should this happen. Who doesn't want a velium round shield graphic?

Tradeskills - Food and drink items. I really liked the alcohol tolerance debuff on the world bosses may be expand on this for other encounters? i.e - certain items drop if your tradeskill is high enough. New aa's based off tradeskills.

NPCs Vendors - May be make custom vendors that will purchase different well known items, quested and non-quested, for various amounts of plat. I feel this will incentivize players to farm or complete older quest thus opening the game further to more than just custom content. (Again, if this is remotely possible, I will be happy to fix scripts or create/fix npcs)

These are just ideas I have of and for the server and in no way would ever prevent me from playing here. I know everyone here that works on the server does a fantastic job and there are hundreds of hours behind the scenes, looking at you HOH and Solteris. Ideally wanted to expand on the quest that most players see when they first join THF as I myself am only in HOH/Nadox with no experience in VT or DSK3. So take these from someone who plays here very casually but for just over a decade.

Thank you all for the work you do and time you devote.

[Ydiss]

Thanks for all the feedback.

A couple of you mentioned the epic 3.0 quest format and this is something we've talked about internally a great deal. It's quite a challenge to create something that truly is epic (and I do stress that we do not want these quests to be "easy" or completable in an hour or two) yet as fun as they possibly can be and without creating too much of a time sink.

The revamp of the 3.0 format was intended to achieve that but I think there are some areas this can still be improved. Just to recap (and this includes some minor spoilers):

Initially, the 3.0 quests were released (cleric, shaman, warrior and wizard) and followed this format:

• 3 raid bosses (hard T8 difficulty) or a solo option where you have to farm multiple 5% drops from mobs that spawned every 7 minutes [wizard actually has only 2 raid bosses]
• You were not allowed to switch between solo or raid options, without raising a petition
• In addition to this, there were around 10 other targets around the world that had 5% drops and 7 minute respawn timers.

The 5% drop camps resulted in sitting still and camping for several hours, often as long as 10+ hours for one camp. Whilst the raids did, in theory, allow you to "skip" 3 of those camps, that didn't change the impression that the quests were very grindy.

Version 2, the revamp, worked this way:

• The "solo" option camps were removed entirely and replaced with solo instances. These are 100% unique and entirely brand new "mini quests" for the soloist to complete, involving a number of tasks and challenges that were aimed at a T5 ranked player to complete in around 4-10 hours depending on their performance. They take time but they're designed to be very fun to play.
• You are now allowed to freely switch between solo and raid options, until the task is complete.
• All "world" targets had their drop rates increased from 5% up to 25% or 33% and their respawn timers increased from 7 minutes to 3-4 hours.

This has so far been implemented for the cleric and shaman quests only. The warrior and wizard epics are still currently designed in the same way as they were initially. The intent was to revamp these next but we shifted priorities to getting all the other quests released first.

We're getting close to the end of development for the next epic 3.0 quest and it has, again, slightly changed its format. We've spoken about this quite a lot and, without going into any specific details or spoilers, these are some of our conclusions:

• The new solo instances are high quality content and something we're really proud of and we want this level of detail to continue in future. So far, we think they've been successful (and we do want to hear your feedback about the new ones in the next release).
• They do take a decently long length of time to complete.
• They take a very, very long time to design
• They do somewhat deserve to be enjoyed by everyone, not just the players who opt to not raid
• They're enough of a time sink that we do not think having even 33% chance drops for remaining targets is necessary (and these can still result in several hours of time sinks, relative time, due to the 4 hour repop)
• We also don't particularly think these 33% chance camps are more fun because they can take hours to finish (or no time at all if you're lucky) but we think they're a viable alternative to the raid bosses, if they're limited in number.
• The raids appear to remain popular with the community who are able to take them on, so we think the raids should stay, so long as the alternative solo option is viable and not a grind

This is the format we're leaning towards going forward:

• Fewer solo instances (we're thinking just the one, actually; they really are like mini-epic quests in and of themselves) that must be completed by the player, not to be skipped by raiding. We love creating these instances for you to enjoy but even just creating one of them takes longer than the entire remainder of the quest to develop. So, we think having just one is enough but we also really do want everyone to enjoy them, rather than just those who choose not to raid.
• A couple raid bosses of the same difficulty as all existing raid bosses.
• The solo alternative to this is the existing 33% chance, 4 hour repop targets.
• All remaining targets will drop 100%, meaning you just need to find them and kill them once to get your required item
• The rest follows the same format as already in place

Please note that the quest that's shortly to be released will not necessarily follow that format exactly because it's already been developed, mostly (and I won't say anything about that now due to spoilers). We will likely apply some of the changes retrospectively to the existing quests (the revamped ones only); for example, I think we will change the drop rates to 100% for all targets because they both have 3 solo instances to complete. We may even take some time to apply that format to the warrior and wizard epics before moving on to the next new quest, because the new format won't take quite as long to implement to these existing quests.

I hope the proposed format sounds a bit less of a time sink and a bit more fun.

[Niixnec]

Mounts: Not high on my list due to boxing and the available ports / issues in dungeons but others seems happy so Yay.

Expeditions: Like this idea but hate the expedition window, again goes back to quitting the expedition on all chars. If there is a way around this that would be great. The only concern is instead of working/getting the gear to beat that one mob, whatever, you can just team up and blast through content as there are always people looking to help.

A single evolving aug would be pretty cool, upgrades with achievements completed. System is sort of in place already. Multiple item combine from each tier (2-3 items from Crushbone, 2-3 from Unrest, etc.) combine into an item. Items from 1-30, 30-55, 55-70 combine into aug - Hidden Forest Sapling (eventually Tree of the Hidden Forest). More work would be to create this class(es) based (Oak Tree, Maple Tree, etc.)

Side note, been messing around with some alts and the 55-70 zones don't seem to have a decent amount of exp mobs. Lots of light blue.

Focus effects: would be nice to have augments with some of the focus effects. Some better gear has to sit in order to get certain focus effects (distance for instance). T9 armor items seem to have alot of dark fire...

3.0's sounds interesting. Looking forward to seeing it implemented.

New zone: please stay away from DSK 3 like progression. As a player who can sometimes only play a limited amount of time it is nice to be able to get into a zone, kill something that may actually drop an item needed then log. Having to kill multiple mobs to progress to the mob you actually might get something from kind of stinks.

Another way to get distillers, don't care what it is (quest only available once a week, .01% drop on mobs, whatever). It sucks to delete augs you don't think you need anymore only to find out they are now used in quests.

I think there are quite a few people that would be willing to test items and provide feedback if you would need that.

regards,
Niix

[Ydiss]

Side note, been messing around with some alts and the 55-70 zones don't seem to have a decent amount of exp mobs. Lots of light blue.

Agreed and this is a topic close to my heart. There has for some time been a plan to add a "bridge" zone between level 62-70 that'll introduce new players nicely to the 70 game - this will be the first zone we create before we do the new group pathway. And the idea is to add a few items to bridge the rather large gap between chaotic armour and kael armour.

New zone: please stay away from DSK 3 like progression. As a player who can sometimes only play a limited amount of time it is nice to be able to get into a zone, kill something that may actually drop an item needed then log. Having to kill multiple mobs to progress to the mob you actually might get something from kind of stinks.

Noted and I think there's definitely room for different styles of content. But this is definitely something that we're talking about.

T10 is likely to be a gigantic undertaking and so I am pretty sure we'll need the community to help us with it and so we'll have more detailed discussions and maybe even get some of you guys to help test example encounters and give some really in-depth feedback, if that's what some of you would like (just some ideas anyway).

[BongoDrongo]

Hi!

First off, a big thank you for all the excellent work and content you guys put into the server. I'm returning after a long break and having a fun time exploring new content.

One of the things that I'm struggling with required raid length. I'm enjoying the difficulty of some new content (in a cursing, handwringing way), which is good. But it's hard to cobble together more than an hour or two to play at a time which makes running some content tricky outside of the difficulty. As an example, I can clear Xi'Thuuli, Redfang, and Kortiz, but usually Xi'Thuuli and Redfang uses up all my play time. I hit a similar issue with clearing VP. I often wish the respawn time for bosses was a bit longer (2 or 3 days maybe?) so I could spread it around.

That said, one size doesn't fit all. I suspect a lot of people love being able to run the content daily and I grant that part of EQ is long raids. But, I suppose, my ask is that with the expedition format, would it be sensible or possible to have the bosses stay down until the expedition is restarted? I'd love to, say, start an instance of DSK and slowly work my way through it while time allows.

Thanks again for everything,

BongoDrongo/Bahana Mammock

[Nexor]

Ok first thing great job devs for adding over the years new exciting content and working with the community.

Mounts

While i am not the biggest fan sounds interesting, however if mounts will give benefits (buffs) would it be possible to add em maybe as Aura's, UI has still the Aura window element and i believe on live they added in EQ those Aura during Secrets of Fay.... ?
Also would be great if we could maybe handle em like buffs that give Illusion those that like keep the mounts visible,those that don't can block em somehow.

Expedition Vs Guild Instances

Expeditions honestly one of the best additions to the server over the years.
Main reason i would say we have so many guilds started and remain is content that is Guild instance exclusive.
Expeditions would maybe also allow more complex encounters see DSK III as an example that are a bit more difficult to handle by one person with there boxed team alone.
Only problem i could see with it would be if the same expedition with several Tiers (see current Solteris as an example) share the same Lockout timer.
Also the progression seems smoother from one tier to another in Solteris.

Stuff that mentioned before and some additional things

XP in Raid groups while i can see a full raid group shouldn't gain as fast xp as a group or even solo play.
Could it maybe just be half of that of a single group once the raid has more than one group regardless of how many Chars in raid at that point ?

Rooted bosses, would be nice if new bosses at least could be instead rooted have negative movement speed sure i could see some encounter specific exceptions.

While working on T10 please have a balanced variety of slot drops for all classes, looking at Tier 8/9 some classes have a easier time currently to obtain items for some slots than others.

Add maybe one or 2 more zones aimed more on XP farming ala Shadow Haven for lvl 70 for a bit more variety.

The Diablo style Dungeon sounds interesting not sure if it would be possible to have a different style of Zone layout possible, however i could see that could add somehow maybe different type of mobs and random linked zones with maybe increasing difficulty, once a zone/dungeon completed.

Augs well currently we have HoH augs currently as hotzone to gain Augs in a more or less easier way to catch up with the Rank requirements that some some newer Zones require.
Would be great if we could get more ways to do that and maybe also include some Weapon augs maybe, something entry tier that could be obtained the same way.

[shannix]

Hi,

Thf is a great server but the end game is limited and a lot of players are leaving due to a lack of end game content.
The other part is the programing part that allow players to play alone their army without the eq social part.

Ii think that a few things could help players to stay or make old gamers to come back on the server.


Expeditions vs. Guild instances
I think that every tier could be expeditions, it's a great improvement.


Starter/Hub Zones
the game starting after level 70 and it s a few days to reach that level and a few months to cross tiers, i don't see the point of revamping starter/hub zones.


Mounts..
travellig is super fast and easy on thf, again i don't see the point of having mounts for travelling but if mounts with pecial effects why not.

Treasure Goblin v2.0
+1 could be fun

Something different..
1) aas)
I don't know if it s possible but once u have arround 3k aas u have no point xping.
I wish new lines of aas at expensive cost.
As exemple: hero stats 100 rank 20 aas per rank
4 new lines of aas: offensive, defensive, spells, heals. 500 aas to open the line then
Hero atk, hero crippling blow, hero melee mitigation hero critical dot or nuke, hero healing amount... 10 rank 20 aa per rank.

New line of ability from other classes at super expensive cost like 500 aa per rank and 3 ranks
sos fading memories, war song, life burn, mana burn, offensive discs, mezz, charm, tracking

The goal of having a high cost is to allow players to custom their toons, to create something unique but no one could have everything( even kitty with her 20k aas saved...)

2) new ldon

Create new instances from old revamp zone with the idea of last xmas event.
Sebilis could be an instance zone with T3,T6,T9,T12, reward in points and super rare drop, with solo trio, group and raid.
The point reward could break the endless vt rading with 99% of rotting loots.

Some zone could be also timed and become a part of achivements, we could have a hall of fame for the fastest team.

3) Introduce non mq2 instance to offer players the opportunity to play together

I dream of old group with real challenge everyone focused on his own toon, discussing, having fun together


Tier 10

I don't think that t10 should be new items.
I like the solteris idea of improving pre existing item.
A global quest to allow players to add one slot on their t9/donor item
The quest could be a box that cost like 50 wins t9 new ldon per slot, a token at 100k plats, a rare drop for the slot(tradable), a class token at 250 aas.
New item will be godly item with 1 extra slot type 15 for exemple, and extra hero stats
New type 15 augment from quest or from super rare drop or from new ldon merchant.

Those new augments could have specific worn 2 effect, would be tradable with like 10% points lose


Solteris was fun i took me 3 weeks to get all quests done on my monk and his bot + most of my group have all compo needed to complete all quests.
After 3 weeks i have no point to go again in solteris except to help other players.

Hardest part on thf is to play everquest but at one point it's overquest, you just have nothing to do...

Have fun

Usinea