Progression server - what can you make?

[Astroshak]

IF Celestial Essences can be made on the progression server before Luclin (?) then in theory the BD cultural ought to be craftable from day 1 ...

Imagine a raid of level 50 toons, where the warriors are wearing RZ Red Heraldic ...

[Gaell Stormracer]

Well, while this sounds like a 'fun' project for the EQ Dev team, I see it as a significant distraction from sorting out the issues on the current Live servers.

Having played EQ from the week it was released in the UK (May 1999), I'm in no way nostalgic or enthusiastic about this.

[Maddoc-the-Wayfarer]

I'm going to guess (and I think it's a reasonable guess) that they will revert FP, oasis and the ro's to their pre-PoR status, but we can assume that all other changes will remain in place.

Freeport and the Desert(s) of Ro will remain in their current status on the progression server.

Veeshan's Peak, Paw, and a couple other zone revamps will be in their original datasets on the progression server.

Tradeskills will remain largely the same on the progression server, though we may find, during the beta process of the server, that some recipes will need to be disabled.

I'm in charge of the progression server and will be the one working on getting everything up and running over the next few weeks. There's a lot of things to think about, so feel free to keep discussing the server.

I'll definitely be keeping an eye on these threads.

[Apolline7th]

Blue diamond cultural also requires Velium, thus the requirement of Coldain Temper. Without Velious opened up there can be no Blue Diamond cultural.

[Xenephex]

Freeport and the Desert(s) of Ro will remain in their current status on the progression server.

Veeshan's Peak, Paw, and a couple other zone revamps will be in their original datasets on the progression server.

Tradeskills will remain largely the same on the progression server, though we may find, during the beta process of the server, that some recipes will need to be disabled.

I'm in charge of the progression server and will be the one working on getting everything up and running over the next few weeks. There's a lot of things to think about, so feel free to keep discussing the server.

I'll definitely be keeping an eye on these threads.

Maddoc - thanks for clarifying some of that. And thanks a bunch for implementing this server. I'm really looking forward to it. If you are concerned about possible 'overpowering' recipes, I would think that folks here would be willing to point out any they find; I'm pretty interested in looking into that aspect of it myself.

Will the Warrens, Stonebrunt and JaggedPine be there? The first two probably don't matter a bunch - JP would be a more significant addition.

Lastly, if you leave the Ro's and FP exactly like they are right now, I already know a really, really fast way to level from 10 to 30 or so, and I would think that some Sand Giants would probably become really popular also.

Edit to add: I know some people will not be happy with me for saying this, but you can disable a whole boatload of possibly problematic recipes by taking Celestial Solvent off the vendors in East Freeport.

[Verdandi]

Stickying to help get more discussion for Maddoc.

[Astroshak]

Blue diamond cultural also requires Velium, thus the requirement of Coldain Temper. Without Velious opened up there can be no Blue Diamond cultural.

Good point. Care to guess how quickly people will get the other expansions unlocked? :P

[mewkus]

With the lack of PoKnowledge portal stones, I can see the value of spiritstones and faithstones again. Also, alchemy portal potions will be in pretty good demand.

Anyone know if the bazaar will be included at start? Or will it be a return to GFay/EC Tunnel?

[KyrosKrane]

PoK was originally part of PoP, although it's now available free to all. Nevertheless, it will be restricted on the progression server until PoP is unlocked. That makes me think the Bazaar will be restricted until Luclin is unlocked.

[wayshaper]

to be honest, im hopeing ALL cultural is disabled until the "trigger" for the Kunark expansion when the first round of "old" cultural was introducted (ie the cultural befor blue diamond).

The Blue diamond cultural should be enabled after the "trigger" that activates the Luclin expansion, which is when that gear was enabled. Blue Diamonds originally were used for the enchant mithril / brellium / ect ect line of spells, and was later removed as a component.

I especially hope that all the DoN cultural is disabled cause certain races will have advantages over others in terms of acquisition of gear. In comparison, some of the expert armor is almost comparable to the orginal PoHate and PoFear armor and is way better then the Temple of Sol Ro class armor quests.

If they intend to do this, then it needs to be done right. Everyone gets their cultural or no one gets their cultural, can not do it half ass.

Lets look at smithing since that is what i am most familiar with....

Original Game = Banded armor
Late in Kunark era = Fine plate + old cultural
Early Luclin Era = Blue Diamond Cultural

For me at least, it is not about makeing a gazzilion plat (already did that) I want to watch and listen and see how folks react when they are introduced to the "old days" that so many of us veterans talk about. (too bad they can not remove the stacking limitations on sheets of fine steel and other items that are now stackable muhahahah)

To see that lv 50 warrior in a patchwork of Crafted Armor (ie the war armor from south Karanas quest) + Bronze Plate + ringmail ect ect with only couple k hp and that cleric who is barely breaking 200 wisdom trying to keep group alive. No KEI, NO virtue, NO temperance, NO Fo7th. this will be FUN.

wayshaper

[Delores Mulva]

My guild had tanks wearing Rallos Zek BD cultural pieces when we were clearing Vex Thal, and I recall wearing at least one BD cultural bracer well into PoP. Introducing that set of recipes any earlier than Luclin would be horribly broken. A guild could likely skip doing PoG/Thurg armour if BD cultural were available, and might even be able to skip Kael/Skyshrine armour. Do the comparison:

Champion's (Thurg) Greaves: AC 34 STR 9 STA 7 MR 4
Warlord's (Kael) Greaves: AC 45 STR 9 DEX 7 STA 5 FR 5 MR 5
Greaves of the Myrmidon (Skyshrine): AC 40 STR 9 DEX 9 AGI 9 MR 4 HP 40
Fierce Heraldic Greaves: AC 40 DEX 5 STA 5 HP 80

Demorgoth can say more as to what a real warrior would want most, but were I a warrior I'd want the Fierce Heraldic over the other three and that's before considering how long it would take to gear up a guild in PoG/Thurg and then Kael/Skyshrine. That gearing up on factional armour was one of the big timesinks in Velious. Without it, guilds will breeze through the expansion, slowing down only to outfit everyone with Sleeper's keys (assuming one of the progression mobs is in ST).

I have some questions:

(1) Will items have current foci on them?
(2) Will the current set of spells stay in game?

Those two are somewhat related. Foci and spell revamps were done, in part, to help casters compete with twinked out melees at lower levels. With no gear available to twink out melees, they'll be outclassed by casters until Kunark at the earliest. Hmm, now that I say it, that would be a lot like the original game!

(3) Will the expansions be unlocked in their original order?

The expansion I'm mainly thinking about here is LoY. LoY would make more sense after Velious and before Luclin, when the loot from the expansion would still be desired and the zones would actually be a challenge. I'm sure players would want access to the extra bank slots earlier, too! Some people have asked for LDoN to be opened up prior to PoP, but that doesn't make sense. Top LDoN vendor gear would allow players to skip a fair amount of elemental gearing, plus the best progression test in LDoN (the raids) just couldn't be done without level 65.

(4) Will zones stay in pre-revamp form, or will they somehow be available for those that unlock them?

The big one here is Cazic Thule, both the zone and the mob. The drops from the zone were a fairly significant part of gearing up for Luclin-era characters, even for raiders, and doing upgraded CT was a big source of gear for raiders during the same era. Will people who unlock Luclin gain access to these in some form?

[Kaaba]

I'm guessing with the recent revamp to alchemy, a lot of new recipes will not be able to be made with a lot of the parts being drop only from expansion zones.

[Xenephex]

I'm going to repeat what I said a while ago. Unless the info on the main EQTraders site is inaccurate, if you remove celestial solvent from the two vendors in EFP, a whole bunch of these problems are solved. No BD cultural until Luclin is released. That, and PoK, are the only other places to get it.

But you can make both old style cultural and Fine Plate with what is available in the old world right now. I don't think either of those are game breaking, but old cultural is a fairly significant upgrade over either FP or crafted for warriors at least, and I assume is the same for other classes compared to their original class quest armor.

I don't think you're going to see a lot of the classic BD resist gear until Kunark is released (which is when it appeared in the first place anyway - if I remember correctly), because there are just not many blue diamonds in the old world.

I think that tutorial items and newbie quest gear will end up having a much bigger impact on the first expansion than anything else, and my understanding is that both of those will be available in the progression server.

[Raisty]

Maddoc, I saw you posted here and I am hoping that you will take the time to read this. I do plan on playing an alt on this server and I remember (oh god do I remember) skilling up on fineplate by buying the components in rathe mountains. Is the froglok town going to be there or are you going to put RM back to how it originally was including the hill giant hill? oh please bring back the hill giant population lol.

Also, what do you plan on doing with the tutorial zone? I would really like to see us being forced to xp in the newbie zones although I would feel bad for any real true newbie players that came to the game if the tutorial zone was completly disabled. Would there be anyway to either not allow the xp gained in the tutorial to transfer to the character outside of the tutorial (I have a feeling this is far fetched..) or possible confine the tutorial example:

First is no xp for any quest done (now read the rest first lol). Allow players to go in and kill the kobold jailor and free the guy. (so we have basic combat experience with no xp gained) Then the main hub of the tutorial with all the npcs. Make sure that it is sealed off. No going to any area with mobs to kill and disable the quests that involve killing or gathering anything from down there. Then allow us to go through the npcs that are left and learn about the game and complete their quests (no xp gained again) and then allow us to exit dumping us at the newbie zone bind points for our races. This would allow new players to get experience in game mechanics but also force everyone to do progression outside of the tutorial (which I can only compare to PC in xp bonus gains) I really would like to see busy newbie zones again =(

Thank you for taking your time reading this.

edit: One more question. Will vet aa's be disabled along with other aa's? please please.. we don't need jesters running around.

[munwin]

I have to agree with Rais on that. The tutorial zone trivializes low levels, Especially with a Shared slot banker! But to truly get the old game feeling need to cut it out completely. Man trial and error made for some of the most frustrating and rewarding times.... Hell the Discs come with a manual READ IT. it explains how to do everything that the tutorial spoon feeds you.

Munwin