On the Vet Forums, I wrote:

The issue specific to the Druid Staves is in its Click Effect. We where informed that this expansion would see the highest end raiders bagging their epics for newer weapons, but the click effects would still be very useful for a long time to come. This is mostly true, except in our case, for two reasons.

The effect of Season’s Fury was not adjusted. This was mentioned in beta and will now only focus a level 75 Direct Damage spell for a maximum of 25% (down from 50%) and a average increase of 12.5% (down from 25%). The effects power was cut in half due to the new spell levels, a trait to my understanding limited to our effect alone due to the fact it is the only Epic Weapon with a hard level cap on the click effect.

In the case of the Staff of Living Brambles, the effects are far worse. Being the only 1.5 Epic with a Hard Capped limit, the totals for Nature's Blight go to 15% maximum damage, and 7.5% Average Damage. The second total, the average damage, is important due to the fact that Rank III spells as listed below, will surpass the 1.5 within the next upgrade to those spell lines.

The second reason which this weapon is going obsolete faster then the others have to deal with the new debuff attributes. Shortly after release we where told the Druid Epic Staves where based on the spell Hand of Ro, thus came the idea of spell damage increase. This skill was exclusive to the Druid set as it was not replicated in any other spell or effect on any other class or weapon. This is no longer the case.

The spells of: Skin to Vines, Icefall Breath, Echo of Tashan, Malosinise and Scent of Twilight all now also increase spell damage against the same slot. The Rank III copies of these spells are nearly 1/3rd as powerful as the Druid 2.0 click on level 75 effects due to the clicks degrading. It also moves what once was a Druid only ability to several different classes, which is - to my knowledge – without precedent in dealing with the 1.5 / 2.0 effects. The same slot I am wondering if it causes stacking issues, or if the hit is always determined and applied to the Season’s Fury effect prior to the other 4 debuffs. Prathun said in beta these should stack, and need to do so to keep the epic longevity anywhere nearly on par with the other 15 classes right clicks.

And, again, it was bounced to the Class Forums

Now, upon further reflection I do not feel the level cap being raised is a viable option, since we will simply run into this issue the next time levels are raised.

All other classes, in terms of their click, will *never* degrade. We should be pushing for removal of the level cap. We should be able to keep pace.

-Fenier

Got it. Removal of level cap.

Any word on this yet?

It will probably be fixed when we don't have to spend twice as much AA than a shaman on a similar skill that is limtied by a DS and a share timer, or when druid is actually desirable for group... ie never.

It's a clear case of something needs fixing since we're the only one of 16 classes whos epic degrades. Some like shaman and mage will slightly in a part of their effect due to mudflation, and some will never degrade any amount ever.. then there's druids who allready opperate at 50%.

But yeah, it wouldn't totally suprise me if this was never fixed.

Nothing, but I have submitted it as the next Question of the Week, so it can be ignored that way, too.... :)

Just wanted to let you know that there's been no response to this issue, which I submitted as the QotW two weeks ago (as of tomorrow). Sorry.

Yay SoE!!!

When I asked about this I got the general they are sposed to degrade reply

If they were to raise the level cap again druid epic would become worthless, yet every other class would function at 90-100% of the origional intent. We're currently half way there. So when someone says "sposed to degrade" they must specifically mean only druids...

Is there any word on this yet?

I've submitted it twice. No response at all.

Well another month has passed, another period of submiting /bug and /feedback reports and taking every given chance to point out the issue on forums... and.. nothing!

Short of trying to bring it up on a dev chat I'm geting the impression the devs want druids, and only us, to have gimp sticks.

Anything??

Lack of answers make me feel like this:

http://media.arstechnica.com/journals/science.media/Tai_Shan.jpg

If someone is in beta, it should be asked about

They are too busy between fixing the old expansion and developing the new expansion.

They are too busy between fixing the old expansion and developing the new expansion.

Problem of course is that they always are,

and that the problem with the epic is considered unimportant because it does not conform to this year's idea of what a druid should be.


Eri

this year's idea of what a druid should be.


Eri

a cleric?

a cleric?

And a crap one at that. That's what really gets me down... we're being pushed more and more into the healing realm, but we don't have remotely the ability that clerics do, and our DPS is becoming relateively worse and worse (a recent thread on the EQLive boards included much derision of druid DPS).

Someone listed the top-ten DPS classes... and druids didn't make it but chanters did. I know these opinions are subjective, but this went uncontested, and makes me a sad panda also. I hope TBS gives us back some BOOM, but I doubt it.

Unless we introduce another healing class (which seems unlikely) I think it's necessary that druids be primarily healing oriented. Lots of classes can do damage, but very few can heal efficiently, and that's a problem that results in unreasonably high demand for clerics and thus cleric burnout. And if clerics burn out due to a lack of healing alternatives, then we're stuck with druids and shamans healing anyway.

This has been my feeling for a few years now.

Now, that said, there is plenty of room to improve our damage without getting into the territory of damage-oriented classes. I think one of the problems is that the wizard, as the baseline for a spell-based damage dealer, had been lagging behind until TSS. Other casters fell behind as a side effect of this (with the notable exception of the necromancer). Now that wizards have gotten a significant boost in TSS, maybe other casters will get such a boost in the near future.

Unless we introduce another healing class (which seems unlikely) I think it's necessary that druids be primarily healing oriented. Lots of classes can do damage, but very few can heal efficiently, and that's a problem that results in unreasonably high demand for clerics and thus cleric burnout. And if clerics burn out due to a lack of healing alternatives, then we're stuck with druids and shamans healing anyway.

This has been my feeling for a few years now.

As much as I've always been a DPS druid, I've come around to this way of thinking. This is largely Fen's fault :twak:

Now that I am convniced we need to heal, I will feel marginalised by how superior cleric healing is, until serious ground is gained for druid healing. Druid blast healing is sufficient, but the rest of it is lacking sorely. And frankly, the game is old enough that an exp rez is due to all priest classes.

As much as I've always been a DPS druid, I've come around to this way of thinking. This is largely Fen's fault :twak:

Now that I am convniced we need to heal, I will feel marginalised by how superior cleric healing is, until serious ground is gained for druid healing. Druid blast healing is sufficient, but the rest of it is lacking sorely. And frankly, the game is old enough that an exp rez is due to all priest classes.

(emphasis mine)

Eri watches the hordes of angry Clerics storm the Druids grove to uproot the trees and burn down the Druids to stamp out this heresy before it can spread...

The biggest problem with healing is that the developers have only one real vision of healing, and over the years made a proper mess of it (I think in an attempt to keep the Clerics happy as they were absolutely vital to the survival of the game). To keep encounters interesting and to prevent excessively tedious CH chains heals must be fast cast moderate sized so that the cleric has lots of things to do rather than one thing every 10 seconds.

Of course that is rather limited. 'Healers' can also debuff the fight out of the enemy so that little healing is required. Or they can buff their own group so that the enemy is defeated. The game City of Heroes has 'healers' that have only a tiny direct heal. Their power comes through prevention and/or facilitating.
Unfortunately in Everquest all these strategies get mixed up, leading to a muddle of healing. And the developers insist on giving Clerics a superior version right away of just about every healing strategy, leading to classes that are never good enough for the job, if not in truth than in the player's eye.
(part of the problem is also that percentage gaps become rather extreme when the numbers keep climbing up. 70pct healing power sounds nice in theory but becomes a hole big enough to quad a tank to the graveyard through when the tank has 20000 hitpoints and the monsters quad 2000 per hit per round to be able to do more than tickle them)


Eri

I didnt make a druid to be a cleric. I created my druid to be a storm warden. Druid dps is like White Castle's hamburgers . It takes alot of them to get the job done.

Someone listed the top-ten DPS classes... and druids didn't make it but chanters did.
I wouldn't consider them to be in top DPS, not in the conventional sense thats for sure. Maybe in the sense that shamans provide DPS via panther and what not, sure, but not in the sense that they are the ones doing the damage themselves.


Edit: In fact, enchanters and clerics are obviously the lowest DPS classes in the game, ironically when you pair a cleric with an enchanter, you can manage to come out with one of the highest DPS classes. The DPS a cleric can put out with Mana Flare + Greater Avatar + Meleeing is redonkulous.

It's arguable any way you look at it, but I agree that with only three healer classes, Druid need to be focused as healers vice DPS. My list of casting DPS classes puts us behind Wizards, Mages and Necros (not necessarily in that order) and behind the general DPS output of Monks, Rangers, Rogues and Zerkers. But we are the second best healers.

So here's the rub: With some Druids complaining about our lack of major DPS, and others saying that our healing needs to be a better to meet the new content, we come off as whiners who want to "Nuke like Wizards AND Heal like Clerics." We're going to complain no matter what SOE does, so they are just going to give us marginal upgrades and ignore us like always.

If we want to be appreciated as a class, (the underlying issue is making druids sought out by others to be in groups) we have to go with our strengths. Healing (Rank 2) is our major strength, not DPS (Rank 8). DPS is a major part, but only a part of Druid Utility. Healing and Utility are the overall strengths of the class, and that's what we should be promoting among ourselves, and then to SOE.

To get back on subject: Removing the level cap on our Epic is crucial to giving the Druid back a tool in their toolbox. If anything, we should argue that once Druids reach a level 80 cap, there will be no reason for any new Druid to do any epic quests, while other classes still get great value from their epics. The question I have is whose email inbox do we have to fill with polite emails asking someone to address the problem? Who at SOE is the person we should be trying to get to listen to us?

Zajeer or Rashere

To get back on subject: Removing the level cap on our Epic is crucial to giving the Druid back a tool in their toolbox. If anything, we should argue that once Druids reach a level 80 cap, there will be no reason for any new Druid to do any epic quests, while other classes still get great value from their epics. The question I have is whose email inbox do we have to fill with polite emails asking someone to address the problem? Who at SOE is the person we should be trying to get to listen to us?

just removing the level cap on it alone won't do much, honestly, I still believe our epic needs to be upgraded to unlimited hits, much like I have since it finally got fixed to actually work at all.

And it also needs to either stack fully with the damage modifier on TSS debuffs, or change the effect entirely. Regardless of the potential for a level 80 gimp I'd be fairly certain once they started down the path of debuffs that increase damage those numbers will only inflate creating just another issue years away (assuming anyone still cares by the time mudflation would get there).

Actually, there are a bunch of TSS spells that will block Nature's Blight: Skin to Vines uses the same slot 1, as do Malosinise, Icefall Breath, Echo of Tashan, and Scent of Twilight.

Discussing this problem on my guild boards actually, since we're trying to incorporate Skin to Vines in our debuff stack.

Rajolae spoke of Unlimited Hits. I read an unconfirmed post on Allakhazam that says our epic effect was only good for 15 hits? Is this true?

It's 20 hits.

Currently the Epic effect should override (not overwrite) the debuff damage modifers since the Epic percentage is greater.

Skin to Vines would add damage by X% when the epic effect is not running.

I have submitted this question several times as a question of the week, with no response.

The QOTW is effectively dead until after the next expansion gets released, it now appears. Our best chance of getting a response is at the next summit (see thread below).

If we want to be appreciated as a class, (the underlying issue is making druids sought out by others to be in groups) we have to go with our strengths. Healing (Rank 2) is our major strength, not DPS (Rank 8).

As an aside -- and I suspect that I am not the first person to raise this issue -- back in the day there were many different roles that were filled by many different classes in different ways. There were obviously tank, healer and DPS classes just like they exist today. However, there were also "primarily utility" classes which provided value to the group in less direct ways. Ultravision was invaluable for blind humans/barbarians/erudites and very nice for non-DEs as well. See invisible was great in some cases (what was the name of that invisible mob that dropped a weight reducing bag in Solusek?) Enduring breath, levitation, SOW, charisma buffs for selling -- the list goes on and on.

Now, fast forward to 2007. Enduring breath is available as an AA. So is See Invisible. So is Ultravision. So is SOW. And even if you don't have the AAs, there are easily obtainable items, clickies and potions (like the invisibility potions in POK) that get the job done.

Granted, there are certain utility spells that are still very useful and in certain cases essential, notably snare. Other utility spells have evolved. For example, slows, which used to be in the "nice to have" category, are no longer utility spells per se and have evolved into a separate class of spells with their own rules and complexities. Debuffs have become more numerous and important on raids, but remain in the "nice to have" category for general grouping purposes.

Still, when you add it all up, "utility" is no longer as big a contributing factor as it was 6-8 years ago. A level 35 Druid's DS+regen+snare (the latter allowing various forms of CC/kiting) compensated for his weaker Greater Heal compared to a level 35 Cleric's Superior heal. Double the two characters' respective levels and things look very different.

P.S. This is from a level 68/casual Shaman's perspective, so take it with a grain of salt :)

It's arguable any way you look at it, but I agree that with only three healer classes, Druid need to be focused as healers vice DPS. My list of casting DPS classes puts us behind Wizards, Mages and Necros (not necessarily in that order) and behind the general DPS output of Monks, Rangers, Rogues and Zerkers. But we are the second best healers.

Druids need to be capable healers because of bad game design really. But regardless, by making them Cleric light (tm) the developers are badly undermining what used to be the class defining abilities.
Those were not 'healing with some token DPS' but 'DPS class with ability to heal (instead of having a pet like magicians had to increase their DPS)'. Players who signed up to be a DPS class five years ago have every reason to be upset by the constant redefinition of Druid abilities.
In fact every Druid player has every reason to be upset. Last year or so Sony decided that Druids were a utility class and gave us an entire expansion full of Roots. This year we need to be Cleric Light. And next year? More wolf form? Or maybe a charm bigger plants?
Druids can be a decent (though not specialist) DPS class as well as competent healer. But it requires more vision about Druid roles in solo, group and raid settings than picking which 25 of 50 necessary spells are going to make it into the next expansion.


So here's the rub: With some Druids complaining about our lack of major DPS, and others saying that our healing needs to be a better to meet the new content, we come off as whiners who want to "Nuke like Wizards AND Heal like Clerics." We're going to complain no matter what SOE does, so they are just going to give us marginal upgrades and ignore us like always.

That really is your take.
I could equally say with equal validity that there are players who say: 'I never signed up to be a cleric. I want to play a DPS class like I use to' and players who say 'I want to play a healer but in the modern encounters half my spells are useless and the other half are not cutting it'. Both players are absolutely right, and neither says they want to be wizard and cleric at the same time. The problem here is not so much player wants as well the ability of the developers to satisfy both vastly different playstyles that require a completely different spell line-up to be effective.
(and yes, I am aware that there are also players who want to be both at the same time but for the most part posters here are reasonable with respect to their expectations of the druid class).


If we want to be appreciated as a class, (the underlying issue is making druids sought out by others to be in groups) we have to go with our strengths. Healing (Rank 2) is our major strength, not DPS (Rank 8). DPS is a major part, but only a part of Druid Utility. Healing and Utility are the overall strengths of the class, and that's what we should be promoting among ourselves, and then to SOE.

You are right, except that of course there are a great many players who do not want to play a cleric like character and want to utilise the DPS strength of a Druid, like they used for several years since the beginning of Everquest. While it is certainly not possible in the current incarnation of the game, it is certainly reasonable of them to expect that the class they invested years in is not so completely redefined as the Druid class has been.


P.s. there are two fundamental solutions to the Druid dilemma that the developers are facing that would allow Druids to retain their class identity and still fit in the modern game. Both however require quite a bit of developer attention to rework 8 years worth of spells.
One is to focus on Damage and Healing over time. Druids have a good showing of DoT but have never had much in the way of Healing over Time (well there were the Regens, but those have been superceded by Out of Combat recovering and never were really powerful enough as a healing tool anyway).
The other is to focus on fast cast, long recast spells both for direct damage and healing. This allows for flexibility during combat (what always has been the Druid strength in groups) by tossing in a quick nuke (or heal) in between casting other spells. Kind of how the Sting of the Queen significantly increases Shaman flexibilty without impairing their ability to perform their primary functions. Problem with taking this approach with Druids is that every Direct damage and every healing spell must be adjusted and will gain different cast/greyout/recast timers and likely will gain some or considerable in power (to up the DPS to the point it can compete with raw Mage (sans pet) DPS again).
Both would allow Druids to balance their two roles and adjust smoothly from increasing DPS at the cost of healing, or focus on healing more at the cost of DPS. My personal preference would be the second approach even if it is more work for the Developers (but it would still be less than the Stances idea I think)


Eri

I don't want to be 100% cleric and 100% wizzy, but if I'm going to be pushed into a healing role I want the tools to do it. Give me a proper rez, give me a HoT. Druid healing relies on atk debuffing each mob - give me a combined atk debuff. Get the ridiculous recast time off moonshadow and adrenaline surge - manapool is more than enough restriction on the use of these spells.

Let me do some respectable DPS - druids got the shaft this time round, with mages getting a Fickle upgrade, wizzies and shammies getting superfast nukes. We're sorely left behind on nuke DPS. If the baseline is 80% cleric, 80% wizard (can't recall where I read that), then make it happen - it surely isn't the case now.

I don't think druid DoT spells are worth focussing on as a balance solution - we are very much a poor third cousin to Shaman and Necro when it comes to DoT DPS, and I don't see that changing any time soon. However, give me a modern dot that does efficient and fast damage - Vengeance of the Sun sorely needs an update, and I'm really hoping that Prathun's promised TSS spell-review sees the new fire dot replacing the "upgraded" regen. I'll be steamed if this sneaks its way in as a TBS spell when it should have been in game 6 months already.


[Edit: oops, a bit of a derail from the epic focus of this thread...]

Druid DPS is more like......

Rogue / Berzerker / Wizard / Necro / monk / ranger / warrior / mage / beastlord / bard / shaman

12th place.

For healing, if you disregard about mana then druid is at distant 2nd. However, shaman is actually a much more potent healer because they actually have the mana to heal. So we are more like at 3rd.

So you have a class that is the worst healer, and with DPS that even bard can laugh you at.

Just learn to give up. It is much more profitable to make new expansion than to implement things promise few years back.

The recast isn't coming off Adren Surge because we're not supposed to have a Remedy Line. It's there to prevent it being able to be chain cast. The spell was based off Desperate Renewal.

Moonshadow should have no recast.

I am against Rezzing, but would like an AA line to reduce CotW recycle. I do not feel we need HoTs. People who are worried about becomng a cleric shouldn't ask for such things, ask instead for new tools to be created, and - as of current I have not seen the 'need' for an Exilir spell. Yea, it'd be handy, but need? No.

We do need a new Disjunction spell.

The view that shaman healing is more potent because they have mana is flawed. Your talking about how long they can heal, not for how much / fast. Yes, they can Canni and they give up time / hp to do so, meaning they can't do it indefenatly unless that HP is replaced somehow.

Finally, Mellen's data sows our DPS is higher then a Shaman in Direct Damage. I am sure using DoTs only they are higher, but it is exceptionally dependant on the situation. I'ts not a clear black and white picture.

So here's the rub: With some Druids complaining about our lack of major DPS, and others saying that our healing needs to be a better to meet the new content, we come off as whiners who want to "Nuke like Wizards AND Heal like Clerics."

It's my take, Eri. Take it for what you want it to be. But my point, (I emphasized the "AND" in my little quote) is that in our zeal to want a stronger class, the face the Druid Community presents to outsiders is we're underpowered and we want better Nukes AND Heals.

Wizards and Mages get mad at Druids who compete with them for focus items that enhance damage, Clerics don't like it when the Druid puts in for the healing focus item. We're greedy Effers aren't we? Well, not really, we're just trying to be better Druids, but the perception is there.

Realistically, I don't know many casual Druids that expect to be able to effectively heal a tank in higher end content and DPS at the same time. We know that's nigh impossible. But we'd all like to be able to heal in high end content, and have our nukes be effective in that content, depending on the role that we are filling. But to those outside our community, who hear that Druids want faster, mana efficient, high HP output (Heals/Nukes), we come across as unsatisfied.

"What? You wanted better heals? What do you expect, you can Nuke! What? Better Nukes? But you want to heal too? Freaking whiners."

To get back on the subject:

You guys know what you want out of the Epic, tell me where I have to email to support getting it fixed. I'd like it to work when I actually get it, two small raids from now.

Finally, Mellen's data sows our DPS is higher then a Shaman in Direct Damage. I am sure using DoTs only they are higher, but it is exceptionally dependant on the situation. I'ts not a clear black and white picture.

It leapfrogs if a mob is not resistant to cold or fire... It's definatly a lot greyer than most make it out to be but overall it's still a really bad situation for us.

Where mobs are immune to fire or cold we'd fall behind fast, and even where they both land as soon as dots become viable they'd probably be able to turn out more dps, and even disregarding that option they have a clearer defined role, and a good 2ndary role in their proxy dps thru melee. Champ, panther, and their epic click (you probably have to play a melee to really understand how nice that is, I'll see if I can parse it though during this beta) all add considerable dps thru other ppl.

People still play EQ?

From the article I read last month in a magazine dedicated to MMORPGs, I think the number of active EQ subscribers is around 200,000 (down from a high of 400,000+). A small, but dedicated, niche in the current MMORPG pie.

Despite all the front-page press the WoW expansion has been getting, I don't think it will have much impact on the remaining EQ membership. The real danger lurks around the corner, with the release of Vanguard. The latter game is much more likely to appeal to the hardcore gamer that remains in EQ.

And I must admit that Vanguard's concept of a druid appears to be much more in line with what I had in mind when starting my EQ druid. The Sturm und Drang school of druid casting!

By the way, here's an interesting poll at our sister Vanguard Druid forum site:

http://van.forums.thedruidsgrove.org/showthread.php?t=12021

Question: For Druids, what is the right mix between healing and nuking?


100% pure pwnage nuker! 5.19%
75% nuker with some heals 68.83%
Equal capable at both, but weaker than "pure" classes. 19.48%
75% healer with some nukes (similar to EQ1) 5.19%
100% pure healer class 1.30%

77 responses.

Actually, there are a bunch of TSS spells that will block Nature's Blight: Skin to Vines uses the same slot 1, as do Malosinise, Icefall Breath, Echo of Tashan, and Scent of Twilight.

Discussing this problem on my guild boards actually, since we're trying to incorporate Skin to Vines in our debuff stack.
Off topic here but why does every mob knock off our mask spells?

Issue I raised before. Never got an answer.

I'm writing this in response to Scirocco's posts. Sorry if this is off-topic.

The design of Vanguard is different from that of EQ1. Vanguard's "dot" system split mobs of the same level into different challenge categories. 2 dot mobs are designed to challenge solo players, 3 dot challenge duo or trios, 4 dot for 4-5 players, 5 dot for full groups and 6 dot for a raid force. The difficulty of mobs scale exponentially with number of dots such that any solo player encountering a 4 dot white con implies certain death. The dot system sounds wierd and unintuitive until you realize what it enables Sigil to do with class design.

With the dot system, Vanguard Druids can pick up the slack of not having a healing class by being main healer in a small 2 to 4 man group fighting 3 dot mobs.

When a healer is found, Vanguard Druids revert to being the versatile offensive caster class against 4+ dot mobs. Here, we retain our trademark versatility and utility. We have 2 lines of nukes and 2 lines of dots - nuke with 2 second cast time, dot with 2 second cast time, instacast nuke and instacast dot. These 4 lines of attack spells enable us to dynamically slide between burst dps and sustainable dps roles.

Our utility spells include the usual EQ1 staples such as AC/hp buffs, resistance buffs, runspeed buffs (still called spirit of wolf), wolf form, rune, damage shield, "harmony", root and snare. New abilities include a proc buff that significantly increases weapon damage, temp invulnerability and a uncontrollable meleeing earth pet. If I am not wrong, the only EQ1 abilities lost are water breathing, camouflage and all our animal related spells.

I am really enjoying the fact that the Vanguard Druid is much more group oriented, with the ability to play different roles depending on group size and makeup.

Do we have a Druid Top Ten Concern's list anywhere? I've got a couple of inputs I'd like to give.

Top 10 List died about a year ago.

We tried Question of the Week for several months, but that died, too.

The new SOE staffer in charge of our little corner of the world is taking a fresh look at the role of correspondents. We'll see.

This may be the beginning of a large string of issues, but it needs to start somewhere. Maybe I don't understand the history of posting Top Ten issues and Questions of the Week to the Devs and have them ignored for years, but I think that our community needs to keep track of the major issues that really need addressing. Whether the Devs need or want them from us in that format, we need to maintain a record of them so that when the devs finally say, "what do you want fixed?" we all know and can tell them with one voice instead of having 20 Druids speak up with 20 different things that we think are the major issue.

The issues have to be more than "we need a better heals" or "we want to do more DPS". They have to be issues for all Druids, not just cutting edge Raid Druids. They have to be well thought out problems and hopefully thought out solutions which make the Developers believe that we know what we want. What blocks our united voice is the thoughts of rolling back Druids to being a superior DPS class like we were 5 or 6 expansions ago. Honestly, those days are over. We need to figure out the direction the class is going and make suggestions to make it stronger without trying to debalance EQ in our favor. SOE has obviously decided that we can't have EQ dependent only on Clerics to heal, and have been bolstering the Druid and Shaman classes to take up some of that burden.

I think that some of our major issues are the S2V fix, HoR upgrades, Druid utility upgrades (for all the spells that most druids don't use) and shared AA timers. Personally, I think our heals and nukes are fine, but crits for our ICH's would be great, because I don't see them just giving us CH at a comparative high level (like 55 or 60) than Clerics. I understand fully that our ICH is a not a tool that max level Druids use, but Druid tools are not just for max level characters. Our curing needs work: single target curing is useless when most cures are required for the whole group, and more at a frequency greater than our AA cures can handle. I'd like to see changes to increase our mana regen from our Mask line, and possibly the abilty to buff others with that line. I'd like to see zephyrs for old zones.

Scirocco, I don't want to seem like I am calling you out, but I'd really like to know what are the duties and responsibilities of the Druid Rep. I know I am relatively new here, but I don't know the difference between a Class Representative and a Class Correspondent. No disrepect intended, I'm sure that you have a ton more time doing things for the class and community that I can imagine, but you are just going to have to tell me what you are doing for the community, because I just don't know. I don't think that we have adequate representation with the Developers, nor do I think we speak with one voice, unlike the other healer classes. Shaman are not unhappy, Clerics are not unhappy. Druids are unhappy with their class. That needs to change.

If we continue on the road we are going, we will just continue to be viewed as a class of whiners who are both overpowered and weaker than specialist classes, who want to do it all without penalty, and not get anywhere fast.

I am willing to help gather and analyze issues for the community to start us on the road that we should be on. I am willing to discuss this with anyone that has an input, by PM or publically. Thanks for listening.

This may be the beginning of a large string of issues, but it needs to start somewhere. Maybe I don't understand the history of posting Top Ten issues and Questions of the Week to the Devs and have them ignored for years, but I think that our community needs to keep track of the major issues that really need addressing. Whether the Devs need or want them from us in that format, we need to maintain a record of them so that when the devs finally say, "what do you want fixed?" we all know and can tell them with one voice instead of having 20 Druids speak up with 20 different things that we think are the major issue.

You are not wrong on this, but the biggest problem is that there is so little consensus between druids regarding what is the role and focus of the class. At its most basic it is an issue of 'we want more healing' or 'we want more dps' as druids are capable of both and you will find players who prefer the one over the other. The last several expansions the developers have been strengthening the healing role of druids at the expense of the dps capabilities. But how much is open to intense debate. And that is just the interpretation of how the latest expansions have changed druid capabilities. It is not even about the direction for new expansions.
Reading on this forum, and on the everquest one, you will find several players arguing passionately for their vision and the problem is that, nitpicking each other's arguments aside, it is difficult to find fault in the general gist of what each says. Unfortunately that makes it next to impossible to come up with any one list or scenario to be presented to Sony. Unlike e.g. a cleric or a warrior, druids have many things they can do, many roles they can assume and many situations they can adapt to and generally the sum of those is too great for any single class. If you ask Kamion you come up with an entirely different druid class than if you ask Fenier, or Sciroco, or me. Or yourself.


The issues have to be more than "we need a better heals" or "we want to do more DPS". They have to be issues for all Druids, not just cutting edge Raid Druids. They have to be well thought out problems and hopefully thought out solutions which make the Developers believe that we know what we want. What blocks our united voice is the thoughts of rolling back Druids to being a superior DPS class like we were 5 or 6 expansions ago. Honestly, those days are over.

But here you are already making decisions for other players who may not at all agree with you. I know I do not. Your idea of where the class as a whole should be going influences what you see as important concerns. But that shared vision of where the class headed is, because of the very nature of the class, missing. And it is patently obvious that the developers are not aiming at one particular goal either. Sometimes healing is strengthened. Sometimes utility. Or debuffs. And dps is boosted every now and then too. But all those abilities do not work together (well) towards achieving a particular group or raid class role.
As an example, if you usually are in a group with a cleric then your healing ability is going to be pretty much irrelevant and the lack of dps is a major issue. On the other hand, if you usually are the healer in a group then healing releated issues are a lot more important to you. But both are equally valid druid concerns.


We need to figure out the direction the class is going and make suggestions to make it stronger without trying to debalance EQ in our favor.

Actually, it is not our job to balance our class. That is what the developers do. What we can and must do is point out to the developers where the class abilities break down. That is how we got the expansion of our healing spell lines in the last two expansions.
Curing disease and poisons is inceasingly becoming an issue due to our lack of group versions versus nastier and nastier AoE diseases and poison clouds.
Lack of DPS is also frequently cited as an issue, regardless of if we agree with it or not, as is the lack of desirability of druids. Most raid leaders agree that druids are at the absolute bottom of the ranking along with a few other classes (there is a difference between being needed and being useable though! Druids are typically barely needed for a raid. They can be used to pick up the slack of missing clerics, but no raid leader will bring a druid along if he can have a cleric instead).

SOE has obviously decided that we can't have EQ dependent only on Clerics to heal, and have been bolstering the Druid and Shaman classes to take up some of that burden.

That has been going on for a long time now. But again that is not our, as druids, concern


Scirocco, I don't want to seem like I am calling you out, but I'd really like to know what are the duties and responsibilities of the Druid Rep.


From what I understand it was emailing an issues list, and later a single question, to a special email adress once every month. But that whole project is pretty much dead by now. Top ten lists got discontinued when players kept putting things on their lists that the developers did not intend to fix. The question of the month ended up with a similar fate when the top issues the developers promised to adress turned out to be things they did not feel like tackling (at least not just then). The lists and questions appeared to be ignored as the same issues kept coming up every time without ever being resolved.


I don't think that we have adequate representation with the Developers, nor do I think we speak with one voice, unlike the other healer classes. Shaman are not unhappy, Clerics are not unhappy. Druids are unhappy with their class. That needs to change.


The developers have their own internal roadmap and their schedules which unfortunately leave little time for class correspondents. Or for fixing long standing issues now that the simple ones have been fixed already.
It is not so much a problem with the class representative as well as with the fact that druids have been a problem case for a long time whereas clerics have had a well defined, and essential, role since the start of the game and always have had the tools to fulfill that role. Druids never have had a stable role for their class.


I am willing to help gather and analyze issues for the community to start us on the road that we should be on. I am willing to discuss this with anyone that has an input, by PM or publically. Thanks for listening.

What I think we need first of all, and what I doubt we will ever see, is what the developers feel is the role of a druid in solo, group and raid environments. Why do they think would a group or raid bring a druid along, and is a druid supposed to be able to solo and if yes, how?
Without that information all we can do is argue what we would like the druid class to be but we can never match our ideas with how the developers see druids fit in the various classes.


Eri

I honestly believe that the closest we came to being able to meet both the desires of the DPS and healing proponents was stances, or something like it. (Don't worry...I consider stances dead and buried at this point, and I only bring it up to highlight the dichotomy.)

We won't have the druid community speaking with one voice. I don't consider our DPS to be adequate at all, for example, and I consider our healing to be more than sufficient. Just my personal opinion, and it reflects my view of a druid as "storm wizard." I can foresee a day, perhaps, where the population of druids has dropped to the point where one side predominates. But until then, we as a class will continue to have internal disagreements as to direction and needs.

Another point that I have stated before, but I have to repeat from time to time: Correspondents don't have direct access to developers. In fact, we're somewhat deliberately isolated from the dev team. I suspect that's why I've seen a relatively high turnover ratio in correspondents who come in expecting to be advocates for their class, with a pipeline to the dev team.

Last time this issue came up, I asked the SOE correspondent contact person if they wanted us to be more like advocates for our classes. I was told no.

So if you want advocacy, the class correspondents are the wrong place to look. Instead, you will find a small group of druids that have the ears of the dev team on a more direct basis. This group varies over time. Fenier, for example, has been a good advocate for the past couple of expansions (I don't agree with all of his points or positions, but there's no doubt that he's a good advocate for druids).

Also, since we have the attention of people on this issue, let's try this format for a feedback report:

Sample Feedback - Week of 3/19/07

Quests

Issue 1 title - Issue Description


Items

Issue 1 title - Issue Description


Spells

Issue 1 title - Issue Description


Abilities and Attributes

Issue 1 title - Issue Description


Alternate Abilities

Issue 1 title - Issue Description


Miscellaneous

Issue 1 title - Issue Description



I will post a new thread each week asking for input, and use it to form a report along the above lines. For this coming week, post your input here.

TY Scirocco, that's in line with what I'd like to see.

Two very straight forward issues I feel we have a strong case for:

Spells - curing issues vs. hybrids

AAs - unlink the SotW line and Convergence line timers

Both of these have been discussed here, on the eqlive forums, and in pms to the devs. I think it is in our best interest to keep pushing both on of these.

I wanted to thank Riverwinter for his questions to Scirocco and Scirocco's response. I have long wondered what the actual job description was but did not know how to post the question without sounding like a brat or that I was whining.

I personally feel that both Scirocco and Fenier have done a wonderful job at keeping the druid community posted on the changes that have happened and why, as well as future changes.

I am generally a very happy Druid, I am not a high end raider, although... LONG LONG ago I used to be. So, I understand the plight of both worlds and understand sometimes, sacrifices must be made.

Thank you both for your continued commitment to our class! :clap:

First off, there seems to be a bug in the 1.5 in Tox Forest, one of the skelly's is missing. I am going to check on this today. We might want to get that fixed for the up and coming.

Then everything else for me comes down to needs versus wants. My personal top three needs:

1) A group cure at least as good as Blood of Nadox. There are events that cannot be completed right now unless you have a spell type group cure for disease/poison, such as Redux's Death touch during the Rogue 1.5.

2) SoTW and CoS timers split. The only bad thing about asking to have these split is the Devs might link the Shaman timers and then they will hate us for getting them nerfed. (In complete agreement with Powdwar on the top two issues)

3) A Sting of the Queen equivalent as I hypothetically designed on Noken's Druid Problems (http://eq.forums.thedruidsgrove.org/showthread.php?t=15502) Thread. That would be a 3K fire nuke for 500 mana that casts in .5 seconds and refreshes in 12.5 seconds. It would let Druid healers get back into the fight, and give Druid nukers a second nuke to punch out there in between debuffs and Winter's Flame or Equinox Burn. (DPS Druids, I think about you guys, too)

The rest of the things I would like to see can be categorized as wants, so I'll just list them out. Santa, you listening?

Remove the no-criticals limit for Karana's Renewal, Tunare's Renewal and Kragg's Mending. It doesn't overpower high end healers at all, because they have more efficient heals, but will let the up and comings have a powerful tool, as well as revitalize those spells for situational use at the high end.

Decrease the refresh timer for Radiant and Resplendent Cure or split them out from the same timer. Why do upgrades have to kill off the old ability? If I could use Radiant and then a minute later still have Resplendent to use, I wouldn't cry to reduce the refresh timer.

Fix wolf forms to allow melee classes to use all their skills and abilities in wolf form. We've got an awesome long term +65 attack buff that no one wants because they can't bash in wolf form. I put FOE on a group and a ranger got mad because I removed his little +15 attack buff from Bih'li, and you can't zone with wolf form. Why have a utility spell that no one uses? (that's a rhetorical question)

Increase mana regen in our wolf forms to make it worth it to wear them. If you get more mana with our mask line, once again, why would anyone wear wolf form, except perhaps to, /gasp, roleplay?

Upgrade Karana's Rage. I was a bad ass from level 40-60. I gave Quad Kiting Clinics to high level Wizards. I miss it. I want to drop lightning again.

Upgrade to Mask of the Wild. If you don't want to upgrade it, how about a short term mana buff that I can toss on my group? There's one designed on the problem threads too.

Zephyrs to old zones. I don't want them for all of the zones, but a few ports on each continent or plane would be nice. In the least, let's have one to the POK and one to Bind. That's really not too much to ask is it?

I think that's enough for now. Thanks for listening.

Hmm. I was a little quick on the submit button it seems. So I will edit this post and just ramble a bit to make it look like I had something else important to say when I really just double posted and deleted it away.

Damn. I should have used my inside voice.

Sample Feedback - Week of 4/2/07

Items

The TSS BP Clicky isn't an upgrade to the Anguish Tunics like several other classes. This combined with the hard cap on the Anguish Tunic makes the click worthless when you are casting mostly level 71+ spells.

Two things should happen

The Click on the Anguish and OoW Tier 1 BPs should degrade
The Click on the TSS Tunics should be upgrades to the Omens Tunics. Spells

Curing of Poison / Disease effects need a look at in comparison to Hybrid / Other Priest cures. Currently Shaman, Clerics, Paladins and Rangers cure better then we do in most cases, we should at least have a group cure of at least 12 counters.

Alternate Abilities

Re-evaluate the cost of the Spirit of the Wood Line and Convergence if Spirits line. additionally, either unlink them or link the Shaman versions.

Miscellaneous

Add the ability to critical to the Percentage Heals for both Shaman and Druids.