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The Weekend Update...Follow

#1 Jan 15 2016 at 6:52 AM Rating: Excellent
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I'm asking Allakhazam users to revive this tradition. I didn't start it (Arismus sort of did in 2003 but the post is a dead link now), but over the post 2007 years I often did start this weekly thread.

I don't like the optics of the first page of the general forum being all threads started by me, hence I have not been doing this lately.

I believe it's good for our community to share what is up, personal if you want... in game for sure. Remember a bunch of us started a guild and fooled around on the Luclin for a couple of months based on inspiration from discussions here. I know that I personally have tried quests or even rolled a new alt based on things others talked about doing that sounded interesting.

Plus, it's a good way for our lurkers that are away from the game at the moment to keep "an oar in the water" so to speak. Reading Allakhazam's has brought me back to the game at least twice.

As an added bonus, you tend to get rated up for participating.

Here's a call-out to some people that pioneered the update back in 2003, we'd love a modern update from (and of course I will miss some of you):

Dalliance
Aadynn
MoebiusLord
Arasimus
OutcastNecro
Marisha
Tehom
Jophiel
SamiraX
Goalkeeper
@workslacking
Pandoriaa
Theraun
Smoggy the Mighty
yelsraek
paladiin
Empyre
Mikeinsb
Uaedaven
JennockFV
Jarlo
RPZip
Visagoth
Beanbag
Grimfar
KakarSmakar
Kiggulak
Hardbody
AegisFangBattlehammer
Kaolian
Jonwin
Debalic
KRSkeet
#2 Jan 15 2016 at 12:28 PM Rating: Excellent
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I've been on a mission to get my non-iksar alts liked in Cabilis. This past weekend, my Barbarian Shammy was killing Iksars and Goblins in Warsliks Woods for faction. I was also starting to collect items for the Iksar progression quests. I love those series of quests. My current bottleneck is actually getting started. I can't find any Outcasts up in Swamp of No Hope and for the life of me I cannot get him to jump out of the water into the tunnels and passages of the sewers. I found the drop down spot as mentioned in some posts, but there were zero, nada mobs where I was. Another mystery to be investigated, :)
#3 Jan 15 2016 at 2:13 PM Rating: Excellent
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I'm currently playing a level 10 cleric on Phinni that was started last week. Haven't played since around PoP or so, this game has changed a lot! I may end up making a monk, the cleric looks at health bars more than the action in good groups. Never played a healer before, it is a different experience.

Hopefully I can get out of crushbone this weekend. Unrest seems to be the next popular zone on the levelling path here.
#4 Jan 18 2016 at 7:31 AM Rating: Excellent
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Working on taxes. Always fun. Once I get rolling into it I don't like to be distracted so not playing at all till I get them done. Then it will feel like a nice reward to log into EQ.
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#5 Jan 18 2016 at 8:00 AM Rating: Excellent
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I've always hesitated to post on the Weekend Update threads, since I usually play less on the weekends than during the week. But in the spirit of community, here goes:

This weekend, I played my mains (Druid, Enchanter, Mage), and did a couple Teek quests each day under Lesson, and then finished the Lesson in Shard's Landing, working through quests there. Finished up Partisan of Shard's Landing last night (my first Partisan/Hero/Mercenary achievement of any kind!) Also, managed to buy the last of the Greater Dreadmotes I needed for the trio, since someone was selling in the Bazaar for a reasonable price. Also found the last two rank 2 spells my Mage needed from previous levels.

So, why do people charge such high prices for the last couple ranks of spell turn-ins (greater and glowing, cantrips, dreadmotes, etc)? Rank 2 spells are only a bit better, and all rank 1 spells are available for ~1500pp on a vendor. So why charge 20-40K for an item that gets you 1-2 rank 2 spells?

And then to make it even more confusing, the CotF spells (purchasable with Marks of Valor) can also have their rank 2s drop. And those spells sell in the Bazaar for a couple hundred, maybe 1000 tops.

Tat
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#6 Jan 18 2016 at 8:38 AM Rating: Excellent
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I continued and finished my Iksar factioning on my Barbarian shaman all for naught. Hierophant Oxyn will not give him the Cursed Wafer quest to get him started on the skull quest line. Hierophant Zand will also not respond to any phrase to get started on the Penance quest to get the newbie weapon. I rolled an Iksar Shaman on another server and Zand does not respond to Iksars either. I bugged both these quests. I have no room on my main server to create an Iksar Shammy to MQ the first skull quest anyways. Soooooooo, totally wasted time factioning. Smiley: mad
#7 Jan 18 2016 at 11:00 AM Rating: Excellent
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tatankaseventh wrote:


So, why do people charge such high prices for the last couple ranks of spell turn-ins (greater and glowing, cantrips, dreadmotes, etc)? Rank 2 spells are only a bit better, and all rank 1 spells are available for ~1500pp on a vendor. So why charge 20-40K for an item that gets you 1-2 rank 2 spells?

Tat


Usually GLOWING, the highest level, go for a big premium because they only drop off raid mobs or really difficult group mobs. Plus the highest level spells (100 or 105) are always the best and needed by all players. Greater shouldn't be much more expensive than the others; in fact, I've seen situations where Minor and Lesser turn-ins are priced HIGHER than Median and Greater, simply because they may be more in-demand due to a greater number of high-demand spells at levels like 101 and 102, than at 103 and 104. Plus at the time of the price imbalance, more players were 101-102 than were 103+.

At level 105, there's still a Rank 2 I need to be had from Cantrips and I never see a Glowing available. Even though they drop from "lower" content, those encounters are still raid-level and impossible to group---at least for now. Heck, the Rank III of Twincast comes from a raid encounter in Underfoot and I still need to go back and tackle that. At level 100 I failed that raid at least 10x and got fed up and promised myself I wouldn't try it again until 105. That's one lower level spell that's still necessary even at 105.

Why do players want Rank II's when the improvement is apparently so slight from Rank I? You really need to ask? Improving one's characters, even marginally, is an essential drive in the game. It's called EVERQUEST for a reason. And it does make sense in reality. A 5% improvement in heals, or dps, when factored into hundreds of casts in a play session, and thousands of casts over a month of playtime, has a real impact, especially when crits and other enhancement buffs are considered. Might as well ask why people bother to improve their gear every chance they get...

Edited, Jan 18th 2016 12:01pm by Sippin
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#8 Jan 18 2016 at 1:01 PM Rating: Excellent
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I logged my Hooman monk on Thursday night on the TLP Phini server and dinged 9. WOOT!

Early Friday morning I woke to the first, projectile vomiting phase of what today was diagnosed as full blown pneumonia and was too zombified to play much since. Hooray for azithromycin!!
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#9 Jan 18 2016 at 1:06 PM Rating: Excellent
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Sippin wrote:
Why do players want Rank II's when the improvement is apparently so slight from Rank I? You really need to ask?


Nope, I never asked that :)

If I didn't want them, I wouldn't have been shopping for them, and wouldn't know how they're priced :)

What I don't understand is why they are SO much more than the lower tiered items (lesser, minor, etc). When I look in the Bazaar on my server, there are fewer of the glowing/greaters available, but not that many fewer. That suggests that they're not THAT much more difficult to farm. But I guess, it comes down to, people charge that much because that's what the market will bear. In my case, it won't bear that much (can't afford that over three chars), so I do without.

Tat

PS - I thought raid mods dropped the rank 3 items? I thought rank 2 items were all off of group content.

Edited, Jan 18th 2016 2:07pm by tatankaseventh
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Snookims Whinslow, 112 Erudite Enchanter, 2 x 300 Master Artisan
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#10 Jan 18 2016 at 4:12 PM Rating: Excellent
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Tatankaseventh wrote:
What I don't understand is why they are SO much more than the lower tiered items (lesser, minor, etc). When I look in the Bazaar on my server, there are fewer of the glowing/greaters available, but not that many fewer. That suggests that they're not THAT much more difficult to farm. But I guess, it comes down to, people charge that much because that's what the market will bear. In my case, it won't bear that much (can't afford that over three chars), so I do without.


The bazaar farmers that farm the Glowing (at least on my server-AB) in many cases had a raid geared tank or a well geared group tank and a proper group with cc in many cases to successfully clear their way to some of the named and then defeat it ..in that level range.

When I was 100, I could not defeat the lvl 103+ named with my box crew at 100 to get the lvl 100 Glowing drops. My SK was crushed three or four times before I gave up, even by unwanted trash adds. So I bought most of mine and hoarded them any time I saw one for under 20K in the bazaar on AB when the asking price was 38-50KPP for one. This, knowing that I had up and coming alts close to that level range.

What I am getting at, is that I believe the farmers who farm them know it is difficult to get and they are by and large a demographic who can make it so they can play by purchasing Kronos for PP whenever possible. So this fuels the higher prices for many items that they farm and sell in the bazaar.

So they sell items and gear that they know is in demand for inflated prices now, with their next Krono purchase in mind.

Though you can do ROF quests to get them as a reward. I just didn't have the patience after getting my SK slapped upside the head a few times.. Smiley: blush

Good Luck.
#11 Jan 21 2016 at 4:11 PM Rating: Excellent
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The whole minor, lesser, median, greater, glowing rank system is a hold over from when spells were more powerful the higher level they were, and the best spells were always at the highest level you could get. The problem with this is that for the last decade or so, spells are all balanced with a 5 level "top range" in mind. There are very few new/unique spells introduced, with most just being a replacement for an earlier spell 5 levels lower. And all the spells are balanced to be roughly equivalent in power within that 5 level range.

So it's basically arbitrary which spells happen to fall on the 0/5 levels versus 1/6, with no significant power difference between them, but with a pretty massive price difference. Not sure why the game still does this, but it does. I chalk it up to concept inertia. It's what they thought should be more expensive back in the day, so they continue to think of it that way. It took them ages to realize that classes were balanced based on a number of factors, including armor, so it was ridiculously unfair to make plate armors drop more rarely and off tougher mobs than cloth. The devs were just looking at the stats on the armors, and making the "best armor" harder to get. They finally realized that this made no sense, but still haven't quite gotten there with the fact that level 105 spells are no more powerful than level 101 spells and thus should be no harder to obtain.

I guess it's just hard to adjust your thinking once you've already got it in your mind that things are a certain way. There's no game balance reason why spells should be harder to get the higher you progress within a given 5 level range, but they still are. Kinda sucks, but there is it.
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#12 Jan 22 2016 at 5:29 AM Rating: Good
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I rather beg to differ. Like with most things in life, the vast majority is "average" and only a small proportion is "superior." Rank 2 spells should be rarer, and therefore more costly (in terms of plat and/or effort) and Rank III spells still moreso. The higher ranks of spells are indeed "better", with definite "significant power differences". And this is the context of a game where players willingly spend a fortune, or attend long tedious raids, to acquire augments with purity of 30 instead of the more common ("average") 25. You ever figure out what kind of impact 30 purity has over 25 for one piece of gear in terms of your stats? Not much. But your toon is getting BETTER and that's what most players want. It's definitely a treadmill, but it's one where far greater output of time, effort and treasure yields incrementally declining benefit.

I buy Rank II spells as I can afford to buy them, focusing primarily on the most useful spells, and always keeping in mind that even a max level Rank III spell will become totally useless when the next xpac with a level increase introduces the easily acquired Rank I level upgrade of that spell. I take the same approach with gear. Isn't it funny how that gear upgrade you drooled over six months ago is now barely worth the trouble to delete it, once you can access far superior gear from a new xpac?



Edited, Jan 22nd 2016 6:30am by Sippin
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#13 Jan 22 2016 at 6:06 AM Rating: Excellent
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Sippin wrote:
I rather beg to differ. Like with most things in life, the vast majority is "average" and only a small proportion is "superior." Rank 2 spells should be rarer, and therefore more costly (in terms of plat and/or effort) and Rank III spells still moreso. The higher ranks of spells are indeed "better", with definite "significant power differences". And this is the context of a game where players willingly spend a fortune, or attend long tedious raids, to acquire augments with purity of 30 instead of the more common ("average") 25. You ever figure out what kind of impact 30 purity has over 25 for one piece of gear in terms of your stats? Not much. But your toon is getting BETTER and that's what most players want. It's definitely a treadmill, but it's one where far greater output of time, effort and treasure yields incrementally declining benefit.

I buy Rank II spells as I can afford to buy them, focusing primarily on the most useful spells, and always keeping in mind that even a max level Rank III spell will become totally useless when the next xpac with a level increase introduces the easily acquired Rank I level upgrade of that spell. I take the same approach with gear. Isn't it funny how that gear upgrade you drooled over six months ago is now barely worth the trouble to delete it, once you can access far superior gear from a new xpac?



Edited, Jan 22nd 2016 6:30am by Sippin



On the bright side, if you play WoW you will get a in-the-same-questline upgrade to the same slot piece of gear 3 steps later than your last one. At least in EQ some of the gear lasts you a while, or you have to try to get an upgrade.
#14 Jan 22 2016 at 7:10 AM Rating: Excellent
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snailish wrote:
On the bright side, if you play WoW you will get a in-the-same-questline upgrade to the same slot piece of gear 3 steps later than your last one. At least in EQ some of the gear lasts you a while, or you have to try to get an upgrade.


hehe QFT :)

Tat
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#15 Jan 22 2016 at 4:48 PM Rating: Excellent
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Sippin wrote:
I rather beg to differ. Like with most things in life, the vast majority is "average" and only a small proportion is "superior." Rank 2 spells should be rarer, and therefore more costly (in terms of plat and/or effort) and Rank III spells still moreso. The higher ranks of spells are indeed "better", with definite "significant power differences". And this is the context of a game where players willingly spend a fortune, or attend long tedious raids, to acquire augments with purity of 30 instead of the more common ("average") 25. You ever figure out what kind of impact 30 purity has over 25 for one piece of gear in terms of your stats? Not much. But your toon is getting BETTER and that's what most players want. It's definitely a treadmill, but it's one where far greater output of time, effort and treasure yields incrementally declining benefit.

I buy Rank II spells as I can afford to buy them, focusing primarily on the most useful spells, and always keeping in mind that even a max level Rank III spell will become totally useless when the next xpac with a level increase introduces the easily acquired Rank I level upgrade of that spell. I take the same approach with gear. Isn't it funny how that gear upgrade you drooled over six months ago is now barely worth the trouble to delete it, once you can access far superior gear from a new xpac?


I wasn't talking about ranks of spells. I was talking about the level within a 5 level range that a spell happens to fall. The devs long ago balanced spells to be in sets within the highest 5 level range. The fire based nuke my wizard gets at level 0/5 is identically balanced against the ice nuke he gets at level 4/9, yet one of them will cost significantly more to obtain the rank II than the other. Same with my paladin's stuns. He gets two stock 4 second stuns, one of them at level 1/6, the other at level 0/5. They are exactly identical spells, except on different timers. The only difference is which level they happen to arrive. There's no reason why one should be super cheap and the other really expensive.

They are different prices because for some reason, the devs still cling to the idea that the highest "level" spells are more powerful. Yet, that's not actually the case at all. It may have been once, long ago, prior to a host of spell balancing changes to the game. But they are not today.
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#16 Jan 23 2016 at 2:19 PM Rating: Good
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I honestly don't get what you're saying. First of all, on price, you talking about the cost of the base (Rank I) spell from a vendor or the market value of a Rank II turn-in item in the Bazaar?

Second, you might want to name spells because while maybe I can see stuns not differing much between levels (except for maybe the max level of mobs they can affect, which isn't a trivial issue) nukes for casters do indeed do more damage the higher the spell level, "all things being equal", meaning factoring out other variables which can make a higher spell more powerful beyond just damage output, such as cast speed, resistance, "side effects" (like stun, etc.) and more.

Even with Rank II's, the price in the Bazaar for quest drops doesn't go up precipitously all the time, except perhaps for Glowing, which provide the spells which are legitimately the "best in class" for whatever expansion is current at the time.

Right now, on FV, Bazaar prices for Briny Essences, which you can turn in for level 101-105 spells

Minor (Level 101): 50k to 110k
Lesser (Level 102): 19k to 98k
Median (Level 103): 15k to 195k
Greater (Level 104): 44k to 245k
Glowing (Level 105): 100k to 125k

That's a pretty flat price distribution, considering the higher level spells are often more potent and more important than lower levels.

What I do not see at all is any support for your contention that spells vary between "super cheap" and "really expensive", depending on level. If you're NOT talking about Rank II costs, then what are you talking about since the Rank I spell scrolls for level 101-105 spells vary, for a wizard as an example, between 1400pp and 1600pp, hardly a spread from super cheap to really expensive.

Maybe I'm missing your point entirely... Smiley: banghead

Edited, Jan 23rd 2016 3:22pm by Sippin
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#17 Jan 23 2016 at 6:57 PM Rating: Excellent
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What he was saying is, in a given 5 level range (so, all levels from a common expansion), you can't say the last rank of spells (the ones for a level ending in a 0 or a 5) are the best ones in the expansion. I have found this generally to be true. For my class, the best spells are not at the final level of an expansion, for the most part. So, if I'm shopping for cantrips (VoA) or dreadmotes (RoF), it's not necessarily true that I would pay a lot more for the final rank (glowing). Yes, they are harder to come by, but judging by numbers available, not that much harder.

Also, the prices you are looking at are for the current expansion. Since I haven't gotten there yet, my question at the beginning of the thread didn't include those, so I should have said so. For the previous sets of items (cantrips and dreadmotes), the price difference as you go from minor to lesser to .... glowing really is quite dramatic. If the current expansion's items are at the level you show, on my server, I'll likely be sticking with the rank 1 spells until I can loot my own Brinies. I don't have the bankroll to pay those prices. But at least there's more consistency in the pricing as you go from minor to glowing.

Tat
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#18 Jan 23 2016 at 7:31 PM Rating: Good
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Level 105 "important" spells for caster classes I box:

DRUID:
best druid group skin
best druid group heal
best druid self vision and mana-regen spell, plus another version which also includes an excellent damage shield
another spell which combines druid's best heal (adrenaline torrent) with very strong short duration damage shield

ENCHANTER:
best group mana regen ("crack")
best enc mez (anodyne stare)
best enc nuke (mindsunder)
enc best runes, including "double-up" rune spells

CLERIC:
best self-buff
best group HP/ac buff
best group symbol buff

WIZARD:
best ethereal nuke
best cold nuke
best fire nuke
best stun nuke

MAGICIAN:
best magic nuke
(mage is arguable since all the pets come in 101-104 spells)

I think it's pretty obvious that many of these spells are MUCH better than any spells in the 101-104 groups and ALL significantly more potent than the 100 level versions. That explains why "Glowing" quest items are considerably costlier than the others. On the other hand, for the most part, I don't see why 104 spells cost more than 101, other than that fewer 104 turn-in quest items turn up probably because of game design. Tougher groupable named mobs drop glowing and greater and weaker ones drop the minor, lesser and median.


Edited, Jan 23rd 2016 8:32pm by Sippin
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#19 Jan 23 2016 at 7:31 PM Rating: Good
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I haven't looked at spells for other classes. It could well be the case that for hybrids like paladins, 105 spells ain't all that special compared to 101-104.

Paladins even get spells?? Who ever knew.... Smiley: sly

Edited, Jan 23rd 2016 8:34pm by Sippin
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#20 Jan 23 2016 at 7:48 PM Rating: Excellent
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Skin spell: Single target version two levels before, so don't need the super expensive group version
Group heal: Don't cast it that often

I play mostly DPS (evoc spec), so, of the spells I cast a lot, most are not of the last rank.

Again, nobody's saying the top level's rank 2s aren't desirable. And maybe even worth the high price, if I could afford them. But I can't, so I do without.

And again, you're looking at level 105. I was mainly referencing 95 and 100.
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Snookims Whinslow, 112 Erudite Enchanter, 2 x 300 Master Artisan
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#21 Jan 24 2016 at 6:00 AM Rating: Good
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Since the point has been made (to which I concur) that EQ's pattern has been to release spells in blocks of 5 levels going back as far as 75, I think, the point I'm making still applies to the 95 and 100 spells.

Let's just agree to disagree here.
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#22 Jan 24 2016 at 4:26 PM Rating: Excellent
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Sippin wrote:
Let's just agree to disagree here.


I agree completely :)

Tat
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Snookims Whinslow, 112 Erudite Enchanter, 2 x 300 Master Artisan
<Inisfree>, Tunare (Seventh Hammer!)
#23 Jan 26 2016 at 4:16 PM Rating: Excellent
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Sippin wrote:
I think it's pretty obvious that many of these spells are MUCH better than any spells in the 101-104 groups


I disagree. That may once have been true, but all spells are "balanced" across any given 5 level range.

Quote:
and ALL significantly more potent than the 100 level versions.


Correct. Because each of these is a direct upgrade from the exact same spell line 5 levels earlier. But the level 101 spells are equally better than the level 96 spells, and the 102s are equally better than the 97s, etc...

Let me give a few specific examples from classes I play:

Paladin spell Ardent Force is virtually identical to Force of the Darkened Sea. These are the two standard 4 second stun lines that Paladins get all along (at least from like the 60s on I believe). They are always at the same relative levels in a given 5 level spread. And yes, the 105 one does have a slightly better resist adjustment and slightly better hate generated (um, but basically irrelevant). I can buy the level 101 rank II for 40-50k on my server, but I've yet to see a glowing briny sell for less than 150k.

Wizard nukes: Tears of Narindi is virtually identical to Darkwater Torrent. One is fire. The other cold. One does slightly more damage but costs slightly more mana. They are balanced in terms of damage/mana/etc. One is a level 101 spell, the other a level 105. Why on earth should the one ending in 5 cost more than the one ending in 1? No reason at all. Same deal with the Ethereal nukes: Ethereal Rimeblast vs Ethereal Skyblaze. Again, one is cold, one is fire. One does slightly more damage but costs an equivalent amount more mana. Which you use really doesn't matter except with regard to mob resists. Over time, both will deal the same damage (assuming mana management is at all an issue).

This same trend occurs though the entire level range and for multiple spells. Wizards are a really obvious example of this, since they get more or less matched and balanced fire/cold nukes in each level range, for direct nuke, rains, and pillars. They come in at different levels, but are otherwise balanced across any given 5 level range. Yet, due to more or less arbitrary rarity differences, some of them cost significantly more than others. For no reason at all.

There is literally zero reason why a glowing should be any more rare than a minor. Period. Spells have long since been balanced across an expansions 5 level range. It's a holdover from an older time when the best spells really were kept for the last level, but that hasn't been the case for like 8 years or so.
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#24 Jan 26 2016 at 4:35 PM Rating: Excellent
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Here's another set of examples (from the wizard). Even if you assume that "bigger nuke" is better, even with a higher mana cost, then how do you explain these:

Claw of the Indigatori and Claw of the Flameweaver and Claw of the Oceanlord.

These are all the "claw" spells, which are mana efficient nukes, that come in fire, magic, and cold. They each have a chance to proc additional effects, and are otherwise balanced. And in this case, the fire version does the most for the most mana, but it's the cold version that is level 105 and is thus the most expensive to purchase. Again... Why? No reason at all. These spells are designed to be a balanced set. They have more or less arbitrary levels that they appear. Basically, they're just spread around semi-evenly across the 5 level range, so you pick them up as you level, but there's zero assumption that one is any more powerful than another.

Same deal with the instant cast nukes wizards get too. And the directional AE nukes. And... well, pretty much all their spells. Maybe some classes get their "best" spells at only the highest level, but from what I've seen it looks like all the spells are equally good, and all of them are spread across the level range, so there's no reason for the later ones to cost more.
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#25 Jan 27 2016 at 7:21 AM Rating: Good
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First, you dismiss higher damage for higher mana as NOT an improvement. If the dps/mana ratio stays the same (or, as it does sometimes, improves) this surely IS an improvement, and a significant one. Especially for wizards, since they're all about dps, but for ANY nuker as well. The 105 wizard ethereal nuke does 11% more damage than the level 104, an extra 3,195 damage off a base of 28,548. An 11% improvement in firepower---you don't see that as full justification for paying more for the glowing over the greater? Boy, I sure do. And that doesn't even begin to consider the impact of crits and damage-enhancements. My wizard rarely casts without amplification of her spells. Whenever I am leveling my toons during a new xpac with level increases I ALWAYS notice killing the same mobs becomes significantly easier once my group all hits 105. By significant I mean 105 >>> 104, whereas 104 > 103 and 103 >102, etc.

A lot of times, with very tough mobs (group nameds and the like) how FAST you can kill it is critical, especially with short-duration damage enhancement buffs and important AA's like SILENT CASTING. When SC is running (at least before it's recent semi-nerf) you can dish out unlimited damage without taking agro away from the tank. That named dinosaur on Thuliasaur Island, back when I fought him for the first time, the ONLY way I could win was to BURN, BABY, BURN, pulling out all the stops in terms of max high speed damage output. Mana preservation was irrelevant because there's no point in having mana on a corpse. Smiley: yikes

You also conveniently ignore the non-damage spells. Clearly the acquisition of spells like HP, AC, crack, focus buffs IN GROUP-CASTABLE FORM, is a BIG improvement. Sure, the single-cast skin, crack, symbol and various HP/AC/castspeed buffs come in the lowest level spell group usually. But it's disingenuous for anyone to say "well, I can always cast the single target buff on everybody so who cares about the group?" Tell that to any cleric, druid, shaman, ranger, paladin, enchanter, beastlord, whatever (that's half of the classes right there) who participates in raids and is asked to buff the entire raid of 40-60 players. Mass Group Buff doesn't work for single-cast buffs, don't you know. Not everyone raids, of course, but enough do that FOR THIS REASON ALONE, there will always be a marked premium for quest spell turn-in items of the "Glowing" sort.

And, I agree this doesn't apply to every spell, such as you point out with the three Claw line wizard spells. It also may not apply to stuns, mage pets, a lot of utility spells, etc. Although when I do use stuns I do note that spell level often relates to how high a mob they work on, and that's a HUGE deal. In fact, this is ALWAYS a problem for enchanters. The "entry-level" mezzes often don't work on all the mobs in the expansion and a higher level version is practically essential to work the progression. Rank II's of mezzes invariably are less resisted by mobs. I can recall this being a big deal when my group broke into Arx Mentis for the first time. I actually had to leave and come back later when my enchanter had acquired copies of the Rank II's of the higher mezzes.

There's room to argue here, for sure, which makes it interesting. But your closing statement,

Quote:

Maybe some classes get their "best" spells at only the highest level, but from what I've seen it looks like all the spells are equally good, and all of them are spread across the level range, so there's no reason for the later ones to cost more.


just isn't true. It's even self-contradictory! If "some classes" get their 'best' spells at only the highest level", how is it you conclude "all the spells are equally good"? And even you make the case against your claim that "there's no reason for the later ones to cost more."

I've also explained that at least on my server, FV, the price "gradient" between Rank II turn-in quest items isn't always rising. It depends a lot of supply and demand and whether the initial wave of raiders have acquired their raid-essential spell Rank II's.

Interesting dialogue, however. It's always intriguing to see how two people can examine an elephant and one sees a tree and the other sees a snake. I just hope neither of us is BLIND! Smiley: lol



Edited, Jan 27th 2016 8:46am by Sippin
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Sippin 115 DRU **** Firiona Vie ****Agnarr
FV: 115 WAR ENC CLE MAG WIZ SHD SHM Master Alchemist ROG Master Tinkerer & Poison-Maker
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#26 Jan 27 2016 at 7:28 AM Rating: Good
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Boy, we really did hijack this 'weekend update', eh? Sorry 'bout that!
____________________________
Sippin 115 DRU **** Firiona Vie ****Agnarr
FV: 115 WAR ENC CLE MAG WIZ SHD SHM Master Alchemist ROG Master Tinkerer & Poison-Maker
Master Artisan (300+) * Baker * Brewer * Fletcher * Jeweler * Potter * Researcher * Smith * Tailor
Agnarr: 65 DRU ENC SHD MAG CLE ROG WIZ BRD WAR
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