Ok, we're allowed ONE thread about 200 Sense Heading.

[Inyidd]

Originally posted by Auricula
Want to talk 'Not an exciting skill to practice' and 'tedious'?
Ever tried to learn languagues?
Ever tried to skill up swimming? fishing? (at least SH could be practiced anywhere)
Ever played a Monk who tried to skill up Feign Dead?
Ever played a character that needed to skill Safe Fall?

Or Foraging, for that matter. Not only is it mapped to a movement key on my characters, but because of the refresh rate, I have to do the stand-forage-sit routine while medding/waiting just to keep up. Even then, it's a race to max the skill before I level up.

[dahna]

Originally posted by kiztent
You didn't get the arrow at 200 skill. That is, it didn't change to an arrow when your skill hit 200. It already was an arrow. I guess you'll never be able to check this for yourself, but it's true.

I can say that before the patch, when you begin create a new char that had not some SH skill already trivialized (such as barbarian, not dwarf), the arrow was replaced by a cross.

Yes, for sure, for newbie it is difficult to find to the way back to town since you don't know how to create a mapline, you dont have any SH skill and you can easily get lost with your empty map. But will all this will be enough to lure new players in eq? For non-rpg gamers, the most important thing is sadly the graphics. Perhaps the "new improved engine that should use less ressources" mentioned earlier will be a better argument.

Though I admit that the easy gameplay and game handling argument is also important, as most of my friends would not be playing atm if I wasnt behind them to teach them how to play, how to find their corpse, how to look at website when they need infos...

[Sanna]

Just in case anyone is keeping tabs or is otherwise interested in data like this...

And because someone in one of these threads around here said that it wouldn't happen....


A guildie of mine quit EQ because of this.
Removed his registration, uninstalled, snapped his CDs.

He had been getting bored/frustrated with the way '[they] have been handling the issues that HAVE been addressed, and have NOT been addressing the issues that NEED to be addressed.' He said 200SH was the 'last straw' (that was part of the title of the thread he left on our board), and that he was leaving and getting his old life back, or to that effect.



No one knows if no one says anything, so there's the data.

-- Sanna

[Maevenniia]

He was a melee class, perhaps a warrior, wasn't he? I'd almost bet on it, because I'm sure that melee classes are extremely frustrated since they've been hearings "we are working oon it" since at least May of this year.

[KyrosKrane]

I've posted my thoughts, both good and bad, about the sense heading change previously. Short version: It was a needed change and a positive one, but the method of execution could have been more ... refined.

What if, instead, it was set up so that there was no level cap to SH, and you could skill it up automatically as you move around, without pressing buttons? (Same way you can skill up medidate any time you sit down and regen mana.) Imagine the glee a newbie would feel as they see one of their skills rise and rise and rise, getting maxed by level three or four!

Of course, that would have taken a lot more programming work -- time which, in all honesty, could be better devoted. Thus, their solution of maxing SH for all was a convenient compromise. Not the most elegant, by any means, but certainly a good one.

And yes, melees do need some balancing, but I'll save my thoughts and rants on that to boards for which it is better suited.

[Mileron]

My level 34/35 druid (she bounces around a lot) with a maxed sense heading (prior to change) of 180 had a cross/+ shaped indicator on the map.

My 47 ranger, who I had never gotten past 150 SH, I decided a few weeks ago to work on in Veksar with my paladin. His indicator on the map was a + until he got better at sense heading (200)... THEN it changed to an arrow.

Not that it matters anymore

[kiztent]

I saw the change at 195. My shopping bot had a cross, and a skill of 194, I found it annoying, tapped SH a couple of times, skilled up to 195, she had an arrow.

And Lilosh, I'm sorry, but if you use an OOC feature to up sense heading (key binding) then complain about this change, I find it hard to have any respect for your complaint. The people that actually bang SH until it reaches 200 and are complaining I think are nuts, but to complain about it when you've used an OOC feature... no. Rationalize all you want, won't change my opinion.

[Kahmon]

Would everyone who is upset be as upset if they simply didn't show Sense heading as a skill any more?

Everyone would still have 200 skill and compasses that work, but when you scroll down your skills list sense heading would not appear.

[Celdil]

The auto 200 SH skill doesn't particularly bother me. I've always kept Sense Head at max for my level on all my toons, and had a small sense of satisfaction when I would get them to 200 and not need to hit the key anymore. (and yes, I always did it manually, I never mapped it to a movement key)

But the reason SoE is stating for changing it is likely not the real reason. They have added features to the game (find NPCs, Mark on Compass to show LDoN dungeon location) that rely on a good sense heading skill. Further, it was impossible to max that skill until level 39 as it followed the normal skill up progression of (5 x lvl) +5. I think they altered it so people would be able to use these new functions to their fullest from the point they started a character.

[eniamn]

how do you creat a map line? just run around the edge of the zone using the line feature or is there a feature to automatically write your map while you explore if you leave your map up or something. i figured out how to mark payala fruit but that was about it. only had loy for a week or so now i think.

if you took 200 points away some ppl would be upset that their total had become 9750 instead of 9950 but otherwise i dont think anywone would have cared.

[Shinianad]

Originally posted by KyrosKrane
I've posted my thoughts, both good and bad, about the sense heading change previously. Short version: It was a needed change and a positive one, but the method of execution could have been more ... refined.

What if, instead, it was set up so that there was no level cap to SH, and you could skill it up automatically as you move around, without pressing buttons? (Same way you can skill up medidate any time you sit down and regen mana.) Imagine the glee a newbie would feel as they see one of their skills rise and rise and rise, getting maxed by level three or four!

Of course, that would have taken a lot more programming work -- time which, in all honesty, could be better devoted. Thus, their solution of maxing SH for all was a convenient compromise. Not the most elegant, by any means, but certainly a good one.

And yes, melees do need some balancing, but I'll save my thoughts and rants on that to boards for which it is better suited.

I agree with this.

To me, I"ll be glad to remove the movement key binding I had to do to ALL my alts to max sense heading.. thus rendering hotkey positions 9 and 0 useless when I didnt need it any more.

I wont miss the constant spam of (you dont know what direction you are facing) every time I move.

As for time spend developing this change.. This sort of thing happens to me all the time as a developer.

I may be working on some bugs that take days to analyze and fix.. then my boss drops in and gives me some little assignment that I can do in about 10 minutes. I do it, grateful for the break I get from working on the big stuff!

The idea to raise SH similar to swimming or channelling would have been nice.. but I agree. much more effort. Should have been done like that to begin with, but too late to add it now.

[Nhin Impious]

if you use an OOC feature to up sense heading ... I find it hard to have any respect for your complaint. The people that actually bang SH until it reaches 200 and are complaining I think are nuts

Kiztent, oh well respected one, then WHO exactly DOES have a right to complain and be taken seriously by you? For heaven's sakes, my father and I practiced my times tables on the way to school; because we did it at the same time he was driving, is it suddenly less valuable than simply sitting around doing nothing but that?

I don't want to be seen as a pointless complainer. I do think there are lots of pieces to this game that newbies don't get or never see-- there are lots of pieces to this game that some level 30 people have never seen. There are even plenty of places left that I've never seen. (Never been to Shar Vahl, for example. Or more than ten steps into Sanctus Seru. Hear they're pretty places, just never been there.)

Does it make the game richer and more worthwhile when our community of players is filled with explorers, with curiosity, perseverance, adventure? I think so. Does giving ability A, B, C to honest-to-Tunare newbies foster these abilities, or create a false sense of security that after 5-10 levels will make them quit the game in frustration that it's not so easy anymore? Guess what my answer is. Of course, what would be a better solution to what Sony perceives as the problem?

I don't know.

Nhinx not-a-newbie-anymore Aphsion

[kiztent]

Originally posted by Nhin Impious
Kiztent, oh well respected one, then WHO exactly DOES have a right to complain and be taken seriously by you? For heaven's sakes, my father and I practiced my times tables on the way to school; because we did it at the same time he was driving, is it suddenly less valuable than simply sitting around doing nothing but that?

As I said, someone who repeatedly wacked the sense heading button.

I certainly don't have a problem with multi-tasking (my ranger is quite good at turning off auto attack long enough to forage*), but in my view, dual mapping a key is not working on sense heading. It's using an in game out of character feature (key binding) to improve a skill. It's certanly legal, but to then attempt to explain via pseudo-RP reasons why you feel you've "done the work" to raise sense heading when, in my opinion, you didn't removes your ability to complain.

It would be like me complaining about Kunark era itemization when I started after Velious came out.

* - let's consider my ranger.

Let's say for the sake of arguement that they removed the ability to forage within, say, 2 seconds of auto attack or auto run being pressed to try and represent the undivided attention you need to forage.

If I were to say that's stupid, that would be a legitimate complaint, which I may or may not agree with (and I think that would be stupid to be honest).

If I were to write psuedo-RP explanation of how my ranger being an expert in both combat and the outdoors was able to duck in the middle of combat, forage and still not miss a swing (and the "removed feature" of not being able to turn off attack, forage and turn on attack without missing a swing because of delay and the way the combat code works), and say this change was OBVIOUSLY unreasonable from a RP perspective, I'd greet that with the derision I thought that deserved.

I hope the difference is clear.

[max76487]

Well, I have SH maxed, I have never tied a hotkey to a movement, etc. for anything; I tapped the button all the time without even thinking about it, as a habit. I rely Heavily on SH, lol, as I am one of those who cannot look around and find my way very well. I Can, however, picture the zone in my head, and by knowing which direction I am going in, find my way. Yes, I did the SH button all the way to maxed on my main by hitting the button. And YES, I am glad I DO NOT have to do it on my alts, thank you very much. Do I feel as if the game has been 'dumbed down' more? No. 4 and some odd years ago, Norrath was a LOT smaller. Now, even with books, and port stones, and spires, there is still a **** of a lot of walking/running/getting lost to be done. As Norrath gets larger, I expect there will be even more modes of travel, and more conveniences added to the game.
Things have been added that I did not have as a newbie. Does this affect MY game? Not at all. Has adding more conveniences brought in players who maybe should stick w/Nintendo for a few more years? Probably. Do they affect MY game? Not at all. There have always been immature and or idiot players in any game. Trains were always just as bad. Spammers in /shout or /ooc were just as annoying, remember East Commons? 14 year old hormone factories /drooled all over my chars just as much. I do think there are more beggars showing up, but that may just be because there are now a few zones that have massive numbers of people in them all the time, and they are just concentrating there ie-Bazaar, PoK, Nexus.
I do agree that a lot of new players do not get to 'know' the game as well as the 'old-timers' do, maybe never. I doubt that many of these will hang around too long, though. For those people who get frustrated easily when things become difficult, this is not the game for them, and they will move on. Those that stay, will become as addicted to EQ as we are . They will eventually come to love the challenge, and the difficulties, and hate the RNG, and time-sinks, as we do. Everything changes-those who complain that 'WE never had it this easy' sound just like my (deceased) mother-in-law, who used to drive me NUTS. Every time she started on another long rant about how 'they' didn't have this stuff, whatever her current complaint was, I always wanted to say (but never did), you didn't have flush toilets or penicillan either, want to give THOSE back? By the way, she died at 84. Funny how quickly people can sound like their parents in a hurry, ain't it? WE didn't have it, so you shouldn't either; that's just plain sour grapes.

45, and trying NOT to sound like my parents.

[KyrosKrane]

Something curious that I noticed about sense heading.

On my main, I had sense heading maxed from before the patch. Whenever I click the sense heading button, I always get a directional message. ("You think you are heading northeast" or whatever it is.)

On an alt (*cough*mule*cough*) that I had from before the patch (with sense heading of 5 or 10 before it was reset to 200), the compass is rock-solid and always points the right way ... but if I click the sense heading button, I almost always get the fail message ("You have no idea ..." etc.)

On an alt (yes, a real alt) I made after the patch, I also consistently get the fail messages.

My hunch is that somewhere internally, where the game processes what happens when you click the button, sense heading is still doing a check against either your actual skill before the patch (zero for all the new toons) or your level-capped max for SH. Anyone have a level 39+ toon they made after the patch? Try clicking the sense heading button; I'd be curious to know what happens.