Ancient Spells...Researchable now?

[Wyvernwill]

Cows are not the only mammals in the world that produce milk.

Personally, I don't really mind if ancients stay the way they are, but it would be nice to atleast research PoP spells. Especially since SoE implemented a very, very bad system in the random return on a spell.

[Nolrog]

Personally, I don't really mind if ancients stay the way they are, but it would be nice to atleast research PoP spells. Especially since SoE implemented a very, very bad system in the random return on a spell.

That's very true. That's why the stoped using it. In OOW, you get the spells in a set order. I forgot how it was in GoD (not sure if I know anyone that actually has GoD spells, LOL.) In DoN, they were 'quested'.

[Cyrint Aircaller]

GoD started with the spells dropped randomly of named mobs.
Since the named mobs who could drop the spells was very rare (and drop rate was rare) this was discarded for a special rune stone.
There is 4 diffrent rune stones and each give 1 specific spell (casters) melees get disiplines and i dont know how many spells hybrids get so basically its the same system as OoW, except the spell runes are rather rare and hard to get.
Just as a note

[Ngreth Thergn]

The gods did NOT make the laws magic is based on. That is very clear in EQ lore.

Which lore says this? Veeshan made the world. Other Gods influenced it. What lore says that they did not make up the "Laws" governing it?

A lot of the ancient spells are named after their creators and they were not GODs either just mortals like us.

ok that I can agree I may have been incorrect

And "can't explain it"? I am really NOT trying to offend but thats a cop out. If magic has laws (and it does) then like any advanced math it can be explained.

This game is rather loosely based on the D&D type thing. There are MANY items in that game that "cannot be made anymore". I am equating it to that.

[Wystler]

GoD started with the spells dropped randomly of named mobs.
Since the named mobs who could drop the spells was very rare (and drop rate was rare) this was discarded for a special rune stone.
There is 4 diffrent rune stones and each give 1 specific spell (casters) melees get disiplines and i dont know how many spells hybrids get so basically its the same system as OoW, except the spell runes are rather rare and hard to get.
Just as a note

I've seen this a lot lately... IF you followed the progression of the expansion, you got these spells VERY easily and VERY quickly. Much moreso than any other expansion. Once in KT, doing simple XP, augs and spell rune collection was academic at one of the crag spots(also rare nice items for the era). You only got more than one mob per pull twice for four different named at two different camps. Four hours of XP grinding in these spots invariably produced several augs, spell runes and AA's per outing. Except for the fact that it was a somewhat boring outside zone, was one of the more enjoyable progression spots I've ever hunted in since the rewards seemed appropriate for the risk and time involved.

What became difficult was later on when everyone in the group had most of their runes and you were basically looking for one or two certain runes. I'm fairly certain that's why they went to the same rune per level progression we see in OoW.

But to say these were rare is simply overstatement. It just took a bit of work to get them. If you didn't move through GoD progression and never got KT flagged, then I'd agree it would take a long time but you're supposed to move through that content in a certain order, that was by design (which they made even easier later!).

[Neebat]

The problem with that, is that it would require you to still farm up the parchments/runes. Part of the problem is getting them in the first place. Then there's the fact that they are NO DROP, so you'd have to farm them yourself, and of course, then once you do have all the ingredients, you can fail the combine.

Look back a page, Nolrog. I suggested a few recipes that would solve that problem. Allow everyone to convert those NO TRADE runes and parchments into tradable items. Of course, the result would only be useful to an experienced researcher.

One person asked that the step involving the Parchments be no-fail. I disagree. The parchments are common enough, it doesn't concern me. You always have the option of turning in a parchment and recieving a spell every time. The uncertainty of the result is reflected in the chance to fail the combine. You take your chances on a turn-in yielding the wrong spell, but still get a useful scroll. Or you take a much smaller chance on research.

[KyrosKrane]

I'm not gonna dive into the Ancients discussion; I just want to touch on one point.

Which lore says this? Veeshan made the world. Other Gods influenced it. What lore says that they did not make up the "Laws" governing it?

Actually, the game lore is quite specific on this point. The Nameless created the universe (and Norrath with it), along with the rules of existance such as magic. Later he created the four elemental gods, who in turn created a few lesser gods. Presumably, life (that is, mortals) arose either through traditional evolution or through direct intervention of the elder gods.

Veeshan was the first of the lesser gods to discover the world of Norrath (note: she didn't make it, she found it already there and, presumably, populated) and "make her mark" upon it -- this is the Great Divide. She deposited her eggs in Velious, which became the First Brood dragons, some of whom still live. Over time, other gods became aware of Norrath and came to it, creating or depositing their own creations upon or within the world to counter or diminish the influence of Veeshan on Norrath.

Side note: Other gods were created by some other method -- Bertox arose through some death worship rites of a Norrathian civilization called the Xulous, I think, which predate the arrival of Veeshan on Norrath. Rodcet Nife is believed to be the last member of an ancient, immortal race who grew powerful enough to be seen as gods by mortals.

The Sphinxes are likewise acknowledged as being of a race that predates Veeshan's arrival.

Just a few examples to get you thinking. =)

[Phantron]

On the issue of roleplay/real life argument that you should be able to research any spell, remember that Reyfin Malakawa (sp?) is the only one who knows how to interpret GoD from runes to spells. Karsok the Mad is the only one who can interpret Muramite Runes to spells.

To take it a bit further, even in PoP, only one guy per class knows how to work with the parchments to spells. So no it doesn't sound all that improbable that no player would possess the knowledge to make even normal spells let alone ancients.

Beyond availability, Ancients are flawed because they're very imbalanced with themselves. Ancient: Spear of Gelaqua doesn't even serve a purpose (worse ratio than Claw of Vox and it's supposed to be the mana efficient line). Ancient: Warslik's Mending is a great heal while Ancient: Hallowed Light is horrible (if your cleric can make good use of this spell they must have nerves of steel). Ancient: Bite of Muram (assuming those without it also don't have the 65 ancient) is FT 13.5 for the entire group. There are some cases where not having the Ancient does make the character noticeably weaker beyond the usual 'raiders get better stuff'. If you look at efficiency generally Ancients are about 10% better than their non Ancient counterparts, which is reasonable. However some ancients are a lot more than 10% better, and in cases like Bite of Muram, it's more like 100% better than non Ancient version (since you can do 2 bites instead of 1).

[Neebat]

But you can buy milk in EQ !
Alas then there must be cows to

No. You can milk goats. Pretty sure I saw goats on the Creator mission. But if we assume the milk comes from Goats, then where did it come from before DoN?

[Doremi]

No. You can milk goats. Pretty sure I saw goats on the Creator mission. But if we assume the milk comes from Goats, then where did it come from before DoN?

Minotaurs!

[Neebat]

Minotaurs!

From dictionary.com:
Min·o·taur n. Greek Mythology
A monster who was half man and half bull, to whom young Athenian men and women were sacrificed in the Cretan labyrinth until Theseus killed him.

I'm no farm-boy. Even I see a flaw in the idea of milking a bull.

The topic of researching Ancient Spells IS important, but I think we're done. There may still some argument left that hadn't been exposed. And if so, I apologize for derailing this discussion.

[Delores Mulva]

I support Ancient spells be researchable, as long as the No Trade tag isn't removed from the resulting spells and no spells of the current maximum level can be so researched. This would allow an INT caster to research all their sub-70 Ancients currently. This would give every INT caster in the game a path to some of their Ancient spells, which are getting pretty rare now that places like VT are no longer done. It also ensures balance, since in general the Ancients of level X are lower power than the commonly available spells of level X+1.

[Cyrint Aircaller]

I've seen this a lot lately... IF you followed the progression of the expansion, you got these spells VERY easily and VERY quickly. Much moreso than any other expansion. Once in KT, doing simple XP, augs and spell rune collection was academic at one of the crag spots(also rare nice items for the era). You only got more than one mob per pull twice for four different named at two different camps. Four hours of XP grinding in these spots invariably produced several augs, spell runes and AA's per outing. Except for the fact that it was a somewhat boring outside zone, was one of the more enjoyable progression spots I've ever hunted in since the rewards seemed appropriate for the risk and time involved.

What became difficult was later on when everyone in the group had most of their runes and you were basically looking for one or two certain runes. I'm fairly certain that's why they went to the same rune per level progression we see in OoW.

But to say these were rare is simply overstatement. It just took a bit of work to get them. If you didn't move through GoD progression and never got KT flagged, then I'd agree it would take a long time but you're supposed to move through that content in a certain order, that was by design (which they made even easier later!).

Im tvexu flagged and have xped in KT 100+ hours to get jiktu and eril, i never saw yiktu drop but got it through some friends and finally aquired chaos runes from Zoo in qvic so yea with all that time ive spent farming those they are rare.
And just to mention i have done a**** load on sewer runs for BiC adn saw 1 ! rune (eril) drop i have done a crapload of Tipt both farming adn to get flag and seen like 2 runes drop (removed).
GoD is probably the most rare spell runes to get with the exception of level 70 ancient (witch i have to btw)

[Wystler]

Im tvexu flagged and have xped in KT 100+ hours to get jiktu and eril, i never saw yiktu drop but got it through some friends and finally aquired chaos runes from Zoo in qvic so yea with all that time ive spent farming those they are rare.
And just to mention i have done a**** load on sewer runs for BiC adn saw 1 ! rune (eril) drop i have done a crapload of Tipt both farming adn to get flag and seen like 2 runes drop (removed).
GoD is probably the most rare spell runes to get with the exception of level 70 ancient (witch i have to btw)

(Edit), you're mistaking my comments. I'm Tx flagged as well. Not sure what bearing that has to this.

75% of our guild at the time (57 people at the time, I still have the chart we used to help get the spells to the right hands) got ALL their GoD runes in a reasonable amount of time by the progression process inlcuding the raids and all the misc BS that went along with early flagging including sewers, Vxed, Tipt, Rhondo and on and on.

Again, just do it right and it's not bad at all. Kill ALL the PH spots (very little pulling was needed to hit 4-6 named in the crag area). It took us some time to figure out the spots, but when there's a guild group there for weeks on end you kinda figure it out fast and the fast heals were huge at the time. We made sure to get it done.

I guess we were the wierd example though and the runes always dropped for us. All 50+ of us.

EDIT: As I look at that list again, four of those people with FULL rune sets were bots even... they just weren't rare for us. I'd think it'd be a huge statistical burp to have the entire guild always get the RNG to work for us so you tell me what happened.

[Lothay]

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