[knowom]

Originally Posted by Silentrath

I like where this thread is headed, I love all different inputs from others as I still sculpt the server together to exactly figure out the direction I want to take.

Opinions on bots? 1 bot each? no boxing? Just curious what everyone thinks

I dislike bots and boxing they take away from the games social immersion and trivialize game content through account sharing and buff bots. Both players and developers can become co-dependent on it because it grows beyond what it can realistically sustain while being developed for it with that partially in mind. If you don't have a big player base scale content more to fit the player base. Honestly I'd prefer less players sometimes being forced to challenge themselves doing content the harder and riskier way at times than just the brute force way it's a more rewarding experience especially when group balance matters a lot more. They both kill social immersion because people can more easily just go oh I can box/bot this w/o you.

Originally Posted by rhyotte

Given that I am not entirely sure how much I can invest in my own server....

--- No bots
---(2) box limit.
--- Classes to be re-focused and "beefed up" a bit, but to remain complex in play. E.G. I once knew a Bad ASS Paladin... dude took playing his class very serious. In the right hands, a class should really shine, but Only in the right hands. Different strokes for different folks!
-^ (a)_ :: No Berzerkers, No Beastlords... Re-Concentrate on the original classes. E.G. Ultimate Pet Class should be an Enchanter!! Think about it a minute?! Rangers should have beasty type pets for certain "Ranger Type Spec..." choices that include deity and race. Some Rangers will spec out in Ranged damage, some Pets, while others will be Melee...see where I am going with this?
--- Level 46 starts AA's, Max level 72
--- Elemental Planes come first in planar progression. Deity derived planes are for Hard Core Mode, and thus come after the Elemental planes. This includes Plane of Hate, and Plane of Fear, which would be revamped accordingly...
--- Heavily revamp spells into a "Grey Core" // Environmental // Deity type system.
-^ (a)_ :: Grey Core is what it sounds like. A relatively simple, small core of spells each class gets that is unified across all Deities / races to get the ball rolling so to speak.
-^ (b)_ :: Environmental relates to standard quests, loot drops etc... these should be treated as "wild cards" in relation to Class development, thus kept to a relative minimum.
-^ (c)_ :: Deity is where the heavy action is. Deity heavily impacts spell types per class, and the class itself. E.G.: Not all Clerics heal the same, a Dark Elf cleric's serious heal spells are more likely to be derivative of "Blood Magic" or Taps, where as a High Elf Cleric's heavy heals would be more "Pure" in nature (and more purely defensive). So on and so forth...deity impact on class would be significant. Deity impact would also include upcoming Deity AA differences per class ...

*** *** *** *** *** ***

Level 46 starts both AA, and Planar Progression...
--- The Elemental Planes are the first places you go.
-^ (a)_ :: Earth and Water are cooperative planes...quests from one might very well lead to the other, and back again etc... This includes cross flagging for zone access. You can start by entering either / or, and work towards access to the other from within the first one you enter.
-^ (b)_ :: Air and Fire are cooperative planes as above.
-^ (c)_ :: You must choose what is Major to you, and what is Minor. Do you want to major in Earth and Water, or Air and Fire? You can go to all 4 of course, but you will quickly have to choose which Quest Series // Conquer path will be primary to you.
--- Giants Vs. Dragons...:: Somewhere in the midst of all this, you have the titanic struggle of Giants Vs. Dragon Kind. This touches on deity at the absolute end of it...Avatar of War anyone? How about Veeshan? That being said, this is a _Middle_of_Norrath_ type battle ground that is chaotic, hectic, and salt of the earth flavorful! The zone "The Hole" would very much play a role in this struggle...a mysterious one at that
--- The Gods...:: When you decide you are truly Hard Core, you decide the gods themselves must bow down to you... Need I say more really?
--- Trade Skills, implement mining, and harvesting. Housing might also be super cool here as well (See Sanctuary Server Closing Thread). Gear made by high end Trade Skills should be essentially Ultimate type gear. Sure, certain God Drops will be uber rare, highly desirable, and phenomenally powerful, etc... But Trade Skilled gear actually rules at the end of the day when you are planning your next step UP in difficulty. Some of the most highly sought after drops, are for trade skills for new gear!

Lots of ideas I have been toying with for a while now...
P.S. Bring back the Corpse Recovery for Hard Core Mode...nothing like meticulously combing and developing that extra gear in the bank...for Just In Case... Also nothing like biting your nails knowing a wipe will be truly painful. Are you boy scout enough...?

I like the idea of utilizing the planes and elemental types that would fit in quite nicely with both factions and deities. The spells based around Deities is a cool idea monks a oddity in general, but could probably do something like self rune on feign death failure proc chance enough to help, but not be abusive and reduced mend timer depending on human/iksar the mend timer would probably be for iksar as they have a slight ac/regen boost due to race itself. The cool part about deity based spells though is it could play right into elemental hybrid deities it would be brilliant as you progress you could unlock more flexibility choices.

Perhaps EQ up through PoP, but skip Luclin entirely because it was just plain awful use some of the mobs if you want, but skip those zones please even Ssraeshza Temple I can't say I particularly liked since it had those annoying floor level tubes for some god forsaken reason rather than a much easier to utilize ladder or ramp. If you skip Berserker & Beastlord that's 14 classes in total.

Factions and balance could be somewhat tricky due to monk's only have human/iksar as options unless you include froglok and drakkin though if you can tie the faction flag toggle to deity rather than race that's a clever work around and instead you could make each race have 4 deity choices instead tied perhaps representing different elements fire, water, air, and earth instead. This would enable deity based guilds too perhaps you could even change them like Order/Chaos in UO I mean that would be neat and content could even occasionally require a specific elemental deity. Late game you might even get hybrid elemental deities which some resistance perks, but obviously presents with it twice as much vulnerability to attack. It would be cool if the server was setup where you start with one elemental type and alternate between them the 4 basic elements then progress to hybrid phase 2, 3 and 4 the last of which is to take on a mob with crazy high magic resistance that does tons of elemental damage to all 5 schools of magic resistance, but as you progress the PVP becomes gradually more FFA.

The one you originally aligned with you'd need to eventually kill to get to the 4th elemental tier phase. It could be setup as follows tier 1 classic EQ, tier 2 kunark, tier 3 velious, tier 4 planes of power and tier 5 Luclin shits and giggles if you completed the other 4 tiers just so you can screw with the other players. You could have account wide bank sharing too so if you want to revisit it on another class.