I don't want to come off sounding like every person who throws his/her hands up and walks off in a fit that this certain MMO didn't meet our expectations. However, I want to at least point out why I'm unsubbing, and why I keep doing this every time I retry the game with each expack. Perhaps something can be learned or perhaps I should just give up trying to settle into this game.

First, I like the game. I like the setting, I like the music, the spell effects, the guild tools, the alternate advancement model, the collections and the housing.

Second, because I like the above, I will gladly buy each expack and resub to the game to give it a good shot each year. This is where I come to the crux of my situation.

I have leveled at least 2 toons fairly high, for me. The first, an erudite Wizard. Got him to 61. Stopped Playing. Came back a year later, leveled a Fury(awesome class) to 53. Am about to stop playing again. Something about these level ranges bores me to tears. I don't know if it's lack of direction, recycled content through each zone, just different graphics, or something else. I just lose that urge to continue playing.

Part of it has to do with getting groups for dungeons. Now, I'm in a decent guild, but I always see the same group of people in a party together running stuff. They never talk in guild chat either. Not the first guild I've seen this in,mind you. Perhaps a better LFG tool or a dungeon finder would help in this area.

Another part of it has to do with the quest progression in each zone being basically the same. I grab solo quests, kill about 100 or more of the local wildlife/bad guys, maybe collect a few things here and there and move to the next zone where I rinse and repeat. I try to find a good theme to each zone, but these quests bog me down and just don't "immerse" me at all. I personally like to have a quest hub give me quests, at my level, I go do them, they make sense, they flow into the next quest hub, etc. In a way similar to the Halas quests and Everfrost. Those 2 zones are great. The rest of the game's zones, at least up to 60, not so much.

The other part, the classes. It just seems that once you play a druid of any type, or a wizard, or tank, or scout, you've played them all. I'm a huge altoholic, but I find in this game, I can't stand playing half the classes because they aren't unique enough or don't bring anything new to the table. An example of a game that does better with class differential is Vanguard. Class wise that game has some great ideas and I love playing each one separately.

Anyway, I know I'll probably get flamed or told to go back to "insert name of game here", but I thought I'd give my impression of the game as I've been playing it over the years. I find EQ2 to be my "let's play it again, Sam" because certain aspects are downright awesome(as mentioned in the beginning of this diatribe).

Cheers,

Elocke

I posted this in the official forums as well, and I have to say the response there has been very mature. Another good point to EQ2 - fairly decent community.

I pretty much agree with you. I left after TSO came out, just more of the same.

I can completely see your point,

i myself have multiple high lvl chars and a good guild with people i regulary group with,

but when you are on your own and are not able to find a group or part group to play with

in an easy way its hard to keep playing and lets your motivation drop like a rock.

Hope you will give the game another try in the near future, keep an eye on the forums,

as far as i can read some chances are on the way to make life for starters / returning people a bit easier.

Greertings,

Ortahr.

oh, I'll definitely check back, when I get that itch to check it out. Although, come next year, it is going to have a new slew of games to compete with my attention for. SWTOR, FFXIV, TERa, Rifts, etc. to name a few. SOE better wise up, heheh.

Honestly, if i was told today that I can only play the level 40-70 content in EQ2, I would immediately unsub as well.

For better or worse (and despite efforts to the contrary by the developers) EQ2 is a pretty linear game.  Stuff that's made for level 50 was fun when the majority of the population was level 50.  It was new and shiny and most people were doing.  When 50-60 content came out, what was fun is the 50-60 stuff, the 50 stuff was still ok, but already starting to fade.  Then 60 to 70 came out, then 70 to 80, then 80-90.   The game is great fun at 80-90, moreso at 90.  This is where the cool new content is, this is where the people are.  

So you did the right thing.  If you can't bear to grind it out, I wouldn't stick around to play outdated content with little to no people.  (And i mean "grind" in very loose terms as "grind" in EQ2 means you have to spend like an hour per level doing quests and exploring new zones, it's not nearly as bad or as boring as many other games.  But it's still "Grind" because in this day and age you're only doing it to get to the "main" part of the game.)

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Originally posted by arieste
Honestly, if i was told today that I can only play the level 40-70 content in EQ2, I would immediately unsub as well.
 
For better or worse (and despite efforts to the contrary by the developers) EQ2 is a pretty linear game.  Stuff that's made for level 50 was fun when the majority of the population was level 50.  It was new and shiny and most people were doing.  When 50-60 content came out, what was fun is the 50-60 stuff, the 50 stuff was still ok, but already starting to fade.  Then 60 to 70 came out, then 70 to 80, then 80-90.   The game is great fun at 80-90, moreso at 90.  This is where the cool new content is, this is where the people are.  
 
So you did the right thing.  If you can't bear to grind it out, I wouldn't stick around to play outdated content with little to no people.  (And i mean "grind" in very loose terms as "grind" in EQ2 means you have to spend like an hour per level doing quests and exploring new zones, it's not nearly as bad or as boring as many other games.  But it's still "Grind" because in this day and age you're only doing it to get to the "main" part of the game.)

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Exactly. The content is there, but its sooooo boring. And yes, I feel like I'm just stumbling behind the main playerbase unable to really ever get there because I have to plod through that content that they already have. I will admit, this is the area where Themeparks fail. Some rides get old fast and you never want to get on, but at least in a RL themepark you can skip them lol.

If innovation is to come in the Themepark MMO realm, I think it is going to be focused on this aspect. Making old content just as fun and viable at ALL times in a games life.

It all comes down to wondering why you are gaming in the first place. As with anything, it's the journey, not the destination that matters. If all you are worried about is hurrying up to catch up to the end-game content then of course you are going to get burned out, that's a no-brainer.  

Let me ask you something OP... why are you even playing MMO's? You're complaining about what makes an MMO an MMO. You want forced grouping, with people being forced to chat all the time in chats. Sorry, it doesn't work that way.

As for guilds... every one of my characters are in different guilds and they chatter away so much that sometimes I turn off the guild chat just so I can play without the interruption.

Sounds to me like you'd be better off playing by yourself.

And btw... if you don't post this on the official forums, NOT MMORPG, you are only shooting yourself in the foot.

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Originally posted by Moirae
Let me ask you something OP... why are you even playing MMO's? You're complaining about what makes an MMO an MMO. You want forced grouping, with people being forced to chat all the time in chats. Sorry, it doesn't work that way.
As for guilds... every one of my characters are in different guilds and they chatter away so much that sometimes I turn off the guild chat just so I can play without the interruption.
Sounds to me like you'd be better off playing by yourself.
And btw... if you don't post this on the official forums, NOT MMORPG, you are only shooting yourself in the foot.

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You apparently didn't read my entire post.

Originally posted by arieste

Honestly, if i was told today that I can only play the level 40-70 content in EQ2, I would immediately unsub as well.

 

For better or worse (and despite efforts to the contrary by the developers) EQ2 is a pretty linear game.  Stuff that's made for level 50 was fun when the majority of the population was level 50.  It was new and shiny and most people were doing.  When 50-60 content came out, what was fun is the 50-60 stuff, the 50 stuff was still ok, but already starting to fade.  Then 60 to 70 came out, then 70 to 80, then 80-90.   The game is great fun at 80-90, moreso at 90.  This is where the cool new content is, this is where the people are.  

 

So you did the right thing.  If you can't bear to grind it out, I wouldn't stick around to play outdated content with little to no people.  (And i mean "grind" in very loose terms as "grind" in EQ2 means you have to spend like an hour per level doing quests and exploring new zones, it's not nearly as bad or as boring as many other games.  But it's still "Grind" because in this day and age you're only doing it to get to the "main" part of the game.)

True ...

i left eq2 with few month after the tso release, i grindet 8 chars to max lvl since eq2 came out.i played the game on and off.

and now days the endgame dungeon grind content gets boring too after hours of hours doing the same dungeon to get that rare item drop.

but eq2 is by far the best game with max content on the market.

best pve , pvp is fast paced and fun 2 , great questlines , the grind to max level can be less then a day when done right, and the item grind is more enjoyable the for expamle wow or .. lol age of conan .

but jeah after more then 10 years of playing mostly fantasy mmos , its time to play some scifi shit ;)

I saw your post on the official forums too (that is if you're eloc there) and postted in the thread.

DoF is a confusing mess to me.  During my last sub stint I spent a huge amount of time there and I felt like I was spinning my wheels.  I was grinding rep with lots of factions (not just the 3 in Maj'Dul) and wasn't really sure why.  Everytime I came close to earning a cool gear reward the quest needed a full group.  That was insanely frustrating.

The KoS stuff (TT/BS/Bonemire) in the Over Realm is much better, but really geared towards 55 - 60+.  There are some great gear rewards there and some can even be finished solo.

What I love most about the game is collections, housing, and quests that give me cool gear or housing rewards.

What I hate is the best gear and shinies are all group and raid content.  I just don't want to do that stuff anymore.  I used to do light raiding and a lot of grouping and now that's just not interesting.  I enjoy solo content and small group content I can duo or trio with my friends and family.  It is discouraging paying for a game so other people can get the good gear.  Hopefully some development studio will "get it" and make a game where there are multiple golden paths to fun shinies and that many people like to group and solo, but want a choice as to when they do that.  I'm sure group oriented people don't want to solo when they're with their friends.  SoE still hasn't figured this out.

I'm in a good guild that is very small.  I have no interest in joining a large guild so I can help gear up the "A-Team" first and play by someone elses schedule and rules.

I do think there is some interesting content in the 55 - 70 range and now that I'm in Kunark it's a bit more fun.  If you want to stick with the game I would suggest power-leveling past the 40's (turn your AA slider to 0%) and do yellow and orange con content.  Once you get to the Over Realm it's a lot more fun.

Those are the level ranges that really need work.  When we see guild members new to the game suddently stop playing never to log in again, it's almost always in the mid 50's to  60's range.  Content gets harder, especially if they haven't been upgrading armor and spells, they get tired of having to farm rares for their spells each and every level, and the zones at these levels just aren't very fun.  You have a lot of options at low levels but the options get smaller as you level.

I played for four years and was never a fan of those levels myself.  Just had to force myself through it because I liked other aspects of the game.

I fully agree with everything the OP says. I'm currently chugging away with my main who is level 83 to get him to 90 and see the rest of the game's soloable content. Then I think I'm finally done with eq2 although I may come back for a bit as they add more zones and such in future expansions. Since I'm not in with the in crowd I'm pretty much locked out of the endgame anyway so as another poster said unless they would make alternate methods to aquire similar shinie's that don't require raiding not much point at just hitting level cap to not have anything fun left to do.

I think that part of the problem with those levels is also the way that they messed up armor itemization. They did a revamp of the lower level armor and stopped around level 50. So you can have some nice treasured armor with nice effects at level 45 and then for the next 20 levels everything that drops is worse, which totally diminishes the sense of progression and improvement.

I just took advantage of the double xp long weekend and I got my coercer from 65 to 80 by running all the DOF, KOS and EOF dungeons and instances. I started out geared in my level 45ish treasured armor that I had bought on the broker and was dismayed that almost every piece that dropped was worse. I got several of the level 70 eof legendary set pieces and they had less abillity mod and int on them than the 45 treasured. Its sad to have to wait 20 levels for kylong plains quests to get any upgrades. I can see how new people can get discouraged at the lack of progress, especially since they don't know at what point it will improve again.

Originally posted by elocke

oh, I'll definitely check back, when I get that itch to check it out. Although, come next year, it is going to have a new slew of games to compete with my attention for. SWTOR, FFXIV, TERa, Rifts, etc. to name a few. SOE better wise up, heheh.

 I agree with all the new games coming out they need to be worried.

And GL to where ever you end up at .( Still playing myself but time will tell for how long )

I have to agree with most which was said, definitely about the higher levels not really having any real directions, i remember my grind from 76-80 it was all over the place, quest lines suddenly end and you have to go from zone to zone looking for another line.  But EQ2 will always be The fantasy mmo for me, but more than anything my guild was a huge factor in my continuous playing. (If anyone knows anyone in or is in "Strangers with Candy" (blackburrow) then thanks for the memories :))

But other than that, what EQ2 has that no other game has is customization, the fact that you can choose between 19 races and 24 classes, 3 unique AA trees with individual trees, (for me the only thing that made me got me through Char creation: Alternative character models), lore and choosing a god. Just loved every aspect of the game.

In fact now that you mention it, I think I'm starting to miss it...

[Edit:] Oh well I'm one of the many who jumped aboard the Guildwars 2 Hype train.

That's a problem everyone I know came up against with EQ2 and how the classes all felt bland and the same. Why people loved WoW so much because each class was so unique and you could really get into any of them, where as EQ2's are boring to play. They need to condense them into 8 and make each one really unique. 

Originally posted by Miffy

That's a problem everyone I know came up against with EQ2 and how the classes all felt bland and the same. Why people loved WoW so much because each class was so unique and you could really get into any of them, where as EQ2's are boring to play. They need to condense them into 8 and make each one really unique. 

Matter of opinion I think.

A monk is nothing like dirge which is nothing like a ranger which is nothing like an inquisitor, etc.   There are a couple of classes that are similar to each other  (2 brawlers, 2 bards) but the majority are quite different.   There is some room to condense, but certainly not to only 8, maybe about 15.  

I've been playing a defiler for 6 years and also have a max level ranger, i've never felt the classes to be "bland" or the same.  I've also played (not to cap) a dirge, brigand, zerker and warlock and none of those felt the same either.

Unless by "bland and the same" you mean "similar to other games", in which case yes, I agree, EQ2 has pretty unimaginative classes - i mean, EVERY game seems to have a paladin and a ranger!   I much preferred the more unique classes of AO and AoC.

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Originally posted by arieste

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Originally posted by Miffy
That's a problem everyone I know came up against with EQ2 and how the classes all felt bland and the same. Why people loved WoW so much because each class was so unique and you could really get into any of them, where as EQ2's are boring to play. They need to condense them into 8 and make each one really unique. 

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Matter of opinion I think.
A monk is nothing like dirge which is nothing like a ranger which is nothing like an inquisitor, etc.   There are a couple of classes that are similar to each other  (2 brawlers, 2 bards) but the majority are quite different.   There is some room to condense, but certainly not to only 8, maybe about 15.  
 
I've been playing a defiler for 6 years and also have a max level ranger, i've never felt the classes to be "bland" or the same.  I've also played (not to cap) a dirge, brigand, zerker and warlock and none of those felt the same either.
 
Unless by "bland and the same" you mean "similar to other games", in which case yes, I agree, EQ2 has pretty unimaginative classes - i mean, EVERY game seems to have a paladin and a ranger!   I much preferred the more unique classes of AO and AoC.

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The bland and similar is referring to the dirge being almost identical to the troubador. Or the assassin similar to swashy and brigand, for the most part. Sure they have a few unique aspects but not enough to make them worth rolling multiple alts. Once you play one type of scout, fighter, healer, caster you have basically played them all. I give you a game like Vangaurd to compare class uniqueness to. If EQ2 could match that quality, it would be hands above most MMORPGs.

Originally posted by Miffy

That's a problem everyone I know came up against with EQ2 and how the classes all felt bland and the same. Why people loved WoW so much because each class was so unique and you could really get into any of them, where as EQ2's are boring to play. They need to condense them into 8 and make each one really unique. 

 That is the mentality that gave us the SWG,  no thanks.  Folks play eq2 becasue they find that niche in certain classes that they love to play.   I have an sk who makes an awsome tank,  a lock for dps aoe dammage, a wizard that does huge single target dammage and a trouby that give lots of good buffs for a raid.

Cutting all that down to 8 classes would nerf the game just like they did swg, and would be the final nail in the coffin for that game. 

However I got to say after they let go some of the dev staff last week I think were headed for rough watters anyways.