This is a post I submitted on the developers corner. I wonder if anyone else is as frustrated as I am. Here is what I posted.
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Well the latest patch just adds to the long list of nerfs that have made the game unplayable. I play a druid, but not for much longer. I can’t get anywhere anymore. I was once able to solo, but no longer. I have been quadruple nerfed and have limited ability to move forward. Once I could successfully solo in POP, but no longer. Lets see what has been taken away:

Solo exp has been reduced.
Charm exp has been reduced.
Charm spell does not hold for longer than 1 battle any more.
Must recast charm on average once a fight.
Root won’t stick reliably.
When root does stick, it breaks quickly.
Spells fizzle two and three times before landing.

Perhaps you could speed the process of killing by pulling the next mob prior to your current mob dieing. Oh, Wait! You nerfed that too because I won’t get exp if I am too far away.

The exp I can now achieve is pitiful. The exp bar hardly moves when I kill a POP mob. If this is by design, it is a bad design. So I am left with the option of being forced to group. I don’t want to group. I want to raid. That is when I want to hang out with other people. Otherwise I want to be able to get exp in the fastest manner possible. That is no longer possible.

So as I look at my character progression I have to evaluate where I am. After 2 years of play, I should be further along. I am stuck. I can’t move forward on gear very well as that requires a guild. Guilds require enormous time commitments. At the present, my guild cannot take out the mobs that will drop the loot I want and need. So what do I do? Abandon the current guild in search of a new guild? Well then I am low man on the totem pole and have to wait months for my turn on loot. Besides getting a guild to the upper planes is very difficult. I am not sure that my guild will be capable of getting past BOT or HOH. Even if they are, the time commitment required is too much. I am a casual player at 20 hours per week. That’s an insane amount of time for a stupid game, and yet I can’t get where I want to be.

Well I have a druid, and I have two accounts. Maybe I should just play my two characters and group them together? Oh wait, that doesn’t work because it takes the same amount of time to kill the mob and I get half as much experience. Well maybe I should be happy that I got that extra 20%, even if it does take twice as long to do the same thing. Well maybe I could use my Druid to powerlevel a character up so I could play something else. Oh wait! You nerfed that as well.

I am wondering if I should continue this game. It is just gotten too hard and not much fun. In fact, it really sucks! So in summary, it is difficult to solo because you nerfed all the exp. I won’t see the upper planes because its to much of a time commitment with a guild, and then I can’t gear. Oh and I didn’t even mention how difficult it is to get spells from lvl 63 on. So give me a good reason why I should continue to play this game?

Branoc
63 Heirophant

I'm sorry, but posts like this are extremely dumb. If you need the game designers to give you a reason to play the game, you shouldn't be playing. Bye!

May I suggest a trip to Ravinj. It is on the Istrian penisula in the Adriatic Sea.

For about 30 to 50 Euros a day you can rent a nice studio with a terrace over looking the sea.

The weather, water and women are beautiful.

If this does not recharge your batteries you're in deep trouble.

If druids have solo'ed so much till now, it was because the game features gave us a significantly better experience doing so. We had a good reason to solo... sometimes at least. Other (non soloing) classes had no other choice but to adapt.

Now it's the other way around. We can still solo, but get the same if not better experience grouping. This time it's our turn to adapt.

Don't like it ? Too bad, but, sorry, you will find no compassion in me. This is exactly what built up our class a bad reputation for so long.

*waves you bye bye and wishes you good luck in RL*

Branoc says: This game isn't fun anymore.
. . . .
I am wondering if I should continue this game.

I think you answered your own question. It's just a game, not a career or a life.

I'm teetering towards cancellation yet again, since I haven't played even 1 minute in the past 3 weeks. If it ever gets much better, I might reactivate. In the meantime, there are lots of other things to do.

Having played the game since release, I've seen the difficulty of Everquest decrease over the past 4 years. You'll get no sympathy from me either. If EQ is too challenging for you, maybe you should try something a little more your speed - like Solitaire.

Interestingly, I tried introducing my dad to Everquest but he says he doesn't like it and that he prefers Solitaire any day over EQ.

Call me contrarian but most of the time I like the changes that Sony puts into the game (summoning mobs in HoH excluded, thank God they fixed that). Change requires adapting the way you play your character, something that other games dont offer. Each time Sony makes a change I have to learn to adapt my playstyle to overcome whatever change they made. To me I find it invigorating that things are NOT always the same. I agree with others that in many ways the game has gotten easier. Thank God for the KEI nerf to lower levels and the fact that people will actually have to group with Enchanters again. This change has brought the game back to what I liked about the game. Its not the destination, its the path. I have rarely if ever powerleveled any of the alts on my second account, other than maybe to past level 16, because its part of the fun to actually play my alts as well as my druid. Why the hell is everyone in such a silly hurry to get to the end of the game? It is Everquest, I doubt there will be an end anytime soon. I am balanced enough with the game that if it ever got to the point where I did not enjoy it I would quit. However my friends in my guild and the challenge of trying new areas still excites me. When I get bored playing Lhittle I have a monk and a shaman that I really enjoy playing. The only constant in life, just like in Eq, is CHANGE.....

My dad plays.. I got him hooked and now he is higher level then me =/

Sony has trivilized this game way too much. Taking the flags away was dumb. Just yesturday I zone into HoH and I see a massive argument in occ over someone ninja looting a PERIDOT!. So they let all the newbs in high end zone for free.. great.. lets make the game much easier for the unskilled.

They have toned it down so much in fact it hardly takes any skill to do anything in EQ. Now they are taking the one thing that takes skill away.. soloing. Yes i know you can still solo, but whats the point? the exp for soloing is trivial now.

I see the 1st posters frustration and I agree.

Sancta Nox

the frustration that you destroy soloing as a viable option and due nothing to add to our desirability in PoP zones, i think is valid.

i canceled my account after 4+ years. (see other post by me) and agree. Sony and their staff have ruined this game. i would rather go back to the old-school text MUDS than pay Sony to take it up the @$$ on a weekly/monthly basis.

You can still solo.

You can still get buffs that you shouldn't have, just not a level 65 cleric buffing a level 1 player.

If you don't like dealing with other people other than to raid, EQ is not the game for you. You should never have played the game past level 20.