View Full Forums : Getting People Out of MMC


Aldane
10-15-2003, 04:38 AM
I think it's safe to say that the Mistmoore Catacombs is the most popular dungeon on most servers. I admit, I rather like MMC myself; the theme just has a cool-looking, er, theme. :) However, I find myself in the need of points in other camps so I can at least access the merchant lists there and actually consider buying some of my spells (no matter how weak they may or may not be to some). There's only one problem: MMC is TOO popular. I can't even convince my friends to go elsewhere, let alone talk a pick-up group composed of mostly strangers to go elsewhere. Clearly there needs to be more incentive for players to move around than just placing different loot in different camps.

Given how aggravated players are with finding the mission type they are seeking, why not have the missions rotate through the camps on a 4-6 hour basis? For instance, for 4-5 hours, adventure recruiters in MMC give out nothing but slaughter missions, adventure recruiters in Tak'Hish give out nothing but assassinations, Deepest Guk nothing but rescues, Rujarkin (?) Hills nothing but collections, and Everfrost gives out random missions. After 4-5 hours, camp adventure recruiters would rotate what kind of missions they give out. Of course, this would anger people who just want to farm one theme for a certain item...so it might not be worthwhile after all. /shrug Then again, say that your group wants a slaughter mission; all you have to do is bounce from camp to camp until you find the camp currently giving out slaughter missions, eliminating the "turning down a zillion collections and wasting bucketloads of playtime" phenomenon that aggravates some of us so much, so perhaps the benefit of getting the kind of mission you want when you want it would outweigh the anger some would feel at not being able to do the same mission over ad infinitum at one camp.

Alternately, perhaps SOE could code it so that every few hours bonus points are awarded to adventures completed from a particular camp. For example: for a few hours, a 10-20% bonus in points could be awarded to people completing adventures in MMC. After a few hours, that bonus would move to adventures completed in a different camp.

I just hope SOE can come up with something to entice players to move around more that doesn't involve serious nerfs to more popular themes.

Aldane Aglond
Ayonae Ro

Geddine
10-15-2003, 04:48 AM
The same happened/happening on Morell Thule. Over the last week or so I've noticed some people are branching out, I think you find there is a clump of people in each theme that do move around. EF was popular there for a while also on MT. I think now alot have maxxed their points in MMC and are starting to go elsewhere

Iilane SalAlur
10-15-2003, 05:40 AM
Aye, mmc was the most popular on my server too but since 2 weeks ago I am noticing an increasing number of people visiting miragul's in everfrost. This week ruj hills is *just* starting to attract some attention.

It takes a while, but when most people have maxed their reward points or gotten the item that they want, they will move on to other themes.

Northerner
10-15-2003, 06:31 AM
MMC is still central action on The Nameless but many quality groupmates can be found elsewhere. In fact, I'm pretty loath to take a pickup group in MM, even though I haven't fully unlocked it yet.

Takish is my usual haunt and Ruj seems to be pretty popular. Miragul's is a tough sell though (although there are a number of folks who presently will go no where else until it is unlocked) and Guk is strictly BYOG.

Some methodology for encouraging movement would be nice. I'd personally favor a point "bonus" for underused areas and even a decay on MM until things balanced out. Think dynamic ZEM only for points and it might be worthwhile. Heck, use ZEM for all I care and let it be known that certain areas carry more exp or more loot. As it is I've got a couple of thousand points (having spent a few hundred only) and still haven't unlocked anything that I am interested in.

It's not *that* bad though if you are bringing a group rather than doing pickup. Even there I've found a number of new friends who I'll trust with my back in any environment and I do like to go anywhere really.

Geddine
10-15-2003, 06:56 AM
Actually I can't see why a bonus system for underused themes isn't a hard thing to do. Although I'm not to sure about an XP adjustment to the zones (which would attract some, maybe even those not usually doing dungeons), but certainly a AP adjustment.

Sort of like what Planetside does for its teams, it looks at the population and adjusts teams abilities based on distribution. This would be a percentage based maybe on say the last 48 hours of dungeons, or could be based on dungeons running now.

The adjustment would be in the form of say 1 point for every 20% above/below the average a dungeon is, rounded to the closest 20%.

Say there are on one server 500 adventures being run.

300 in MMC
100 in Ruj
75 in EF
75 in Tak
50 in Guk

5 themes with 500 groups meaning 100 being the average. So no adjustment to Ruj. MMC being so overly populated would have a decrease of 15 points (36 points for success, scale this for non-65 adventures). EF and Tak would increase 1 point (not much but they aren't far off the average) and Guk would increase by 2 (3 maybe depending on rounding).

Just an idea, I know the facts and figures would need alot more refining, but I'm sure offering something trivial like more points in some zones would encourage more to try them at the least.

I have yet to get 1 Guk group (except for on one of my twinks) so my druid is gukless so far.

Stewwy
10-15-2003, 09:59 AM
Geddine I don't think there should ever be a penalty for a place being over populated, but just a bonus for under used areas.

It isn't a nerf per se, but suggesting we take something away to even things out always makes me cringe because a suggestion such as that always appeals to SOE.

Panamah
10-15-2003, 10:56 AM
Same on my server. My solution is to start the group. :) I'm 5 adventures away from 1492 in Miragul's.

I think MMC is easiest that's why people stick to it.

Geddine
10-15-2003, 11:20 AM
Actually the example I gave was a scewed in favor of MMC too much, I doubt that 60% of the population would be doing 1 dungeon theme. I think you'd find that you'd be lucky to push 40% in a single theme and the highs would likely sit around 30% while others went down to 10% (except Guk which is mostly 0%)

It was the idea I was trying to get across not the actual figures that were important. But as to the negatives, in most balancing something needs to be taken away. In this case if the over populated zones remained and under populated were bonused, then the bonus would not be enough incentive alone, unless that bonus was doubled (to account for no negative). That would just lead to major inflation.

King Burgundy
10-15-2003, 08:33 PM
I don't really know which is most popular on my server, but I can tell you that Guk is the least popular, just based on the leaderboard from that theme. :)

I just form my own groups there.

But I agree that it would be nice if there were more encouragement to use underutilized zones... OR, perhaps they should examine WHY certain themes are underutilized and fix them?

Tudamorf
10-15-2003, 08:45 PM
Originally posted by Aldane
Clearly there needs to be more incentive for players to move around than just placing different loot in different camps.
Why? For the first time in EQ history, camping isn't an issue. Even if everyone does Mistmoore or Takish (the two easiest themes, by far), there is no aggravation. If someone wants to go elsewhere to get faction or just for a change, they can.

The incentive to do another camp is more or less the same for everyone. So you shouldn't have a problem convincing groups to move elsewhere. I sure haven't had such a problem.

Panamah
10-15-2003, 11:46 PM
I think EQ people just gravitate to the most mind numbingly boring sure-thing option available to them 80% of the time. That's just a trait I think a lot of players have.

Geddine
10-16-2003, 02:48 AM
If someone wants to go elsewhere to get faction or just for a change, they can.
I believe that is the complaint. To get a group to go to any other theme requires a really big fry pan and a nice swing (but since EQ isn't PvP it not a feasible act).

The fact you need 4-6 people to enter these dungeons (so far haven't had one go with less than 6) means you can't go whereever you feel. You need to go where people are, with people not spreading themselves amongst the themes you end up having to join all the sheep in the popular zones and not earning favor where you want.

Scirocco
10-16-2003, 08:53 AM
Sort of goes against the whole premise of instanced dungeons to begin with, which is that a group is free to choose their own adventure and dungeon without concern for what other players outside their group are doing. If every group goes to MMC, that's fine.

Of course, what is still present is the fact that group choice prevails over individual choice. Each player is not free to do a dungeon in the theme of their choice whenever they want. Thus, the underlying complaint here is that individuals (or perhaps 3 or fewer individuals) cannot do instanced dungeons.

I shy away from solutions that force people to do things. Don't force people to move from one theme to another. Instead, allow instances to be created by individuals. Smaller size, fewer mobs, lower reward, of course, so they don't take up as many resources.

Aquila Swiftspirit
10-16-2003, 01:18 PM
Part of the decision making is based on who sees their high end desired loot in a dungeon theme area. Miragul has FT stuff, for example, so should be popular at some point.

There are only three leather classes, fewer than plate OR cloth classes, so wherever high end plate or cloth drop should be popular.

The other decision making factor is mob type: paladins and necros absolutely ROCK in Mistmoore, enough to make that a definite preference if they're in your group.

One group I was in for an afternoon had a really fun way of choosing themes: before starting an adventure, we'd random, and the high roller chose the theme. We did something like 3 different themes in four adventures, which added some nice change. (The Magi travel between camps is such a helpful idea!)

B_Delacroix
10-16-2003, 03:08 PM
On Karana server, you can go to Butcherblock and see most of the people there. A fair number go to Takish. Third most popular seems to be Miragul's. I rarely see anyone at Guk or Ruj.

When I pop on and announce LFA any theme. I always end up being invited to MMC.

I can't say exactly why that is.

Ariell
10-16-2003, 03:40 PM
"Then again, say that your group wants a slaughter mission; all you have to do is bounce from camp to camp until you find the camp currently giving out slaughter missions"

Yeah, because that's what SOE wants, thousands of players zoning over and over causing the zone info to be downloaded over and over .... if they implemented your suggestion, every EQ server would down within a day.

Aldane
10-16-2003, 08:44 PM
Originally posted by Ariell
Yeah, because that's what SOE wants, thousands of players zoning over and over causing the zone info to be downloaded over and over .... if they implemented your suggestion, every EQ server would down within a day.

Then, hey, if SOE were to make the change I suggest, they could take the opportunity to change the instancing system so that the zone instance info isn't downloaded until the adventure is accepted, which would make WAY more sense than having it download when it's offered. But, I could be wrong...wouldn't be the first time. :D

Unless, of course, I misunderstand you (which would be quite easy right now, given that I have about every cold remedy known to humankind in my system right now) and you are talking about stress caused by people zoning from BB to N RO to EC, etc. If that's what you are talking about, I doubt my suggestion would make that big of a difference in the amount of zoning going on. It would likely be common knowledge fairly quickly what zone is giving out what type of mission at any given time.

Aldane Aglond
Ayonae Ro

Tanluas
10-16-2003, 10:57 PM
Well met All,

The way I work my LDoN groups, with almost all of them being pick up groups created by me (not hard to do just a lot of typing getting people interested). Is either from class availablity in the group if I get a group with a pally and a necro amongst others I will choose MM theme due to class abilities being geared against the mobs in that theme, same goes for other classes like mages and druids with summoned etc etc.

The other thing I do is just ask the group if they mind heading to the LDoN zone you want, most people I find are pretty reasonable and to me it is about just getting together and playing the game.

I don't think any change is necessary, just when you go looking for an adventure group start in the zone you prefer first, try to get into a group there or to make a group there, if that fails try to get into a group elsewhere. I find it that these days it is harder to get people into BoT then a different LDoN adventure zone.

Good luck with it

Strength and Honor

Tanluas
Stormwarden of Tunare
Xev

Edit - Oooooh first post on these boards :cheers:

Stewwy
10-17-2003, 10:56 AM
Welcome to TDG Tanluas.

:)

Panamah
10-17-2003, 11:30 AM
One more adventure and I'm done with Miraguls!!!! Yay!

B_Delacroix
10-20-2003, 07:57 AM
Has anyone noticed the mobs in all dungeons except Takish-Hiz possess a greater degree of variety? The subbosses and assassin bosses in every dungeon so far except Takish-Hiz have a unique look. The Tak ones are just normal mobs with a special name.

Panamah
10-20-2003, 11:37 AM
Has anyone noticed the mobs in all dungeons except Takish-Hiz possess a greater degree of variety? The subbosses and assassin bosses in every dungeon so far except Takish-Hiz have a unique look. The Tak ones are just normal mobs with a special name

No. In Miragul's the bosses and named look like every other mob. Except there is one model that is reserved for bosses or named occassionally. It's the glowing energy force model, very cool looking.

Oh! Just remembered, someone observed that in MMC all the female NPC's die face down, the male NPC's die face up. I wonder why!?!

Romidar
10-20-2003, 12:00 PM
Mistmoore is certainly extremely popular on Xegony. It's my favorite theme by far, but I also spent most of my 40's in Mistmoore. :)

I don't have the LFG issues since our group moves as a whole. However, it's a thorny issue that we MUST split our time between different themes so group members can get their armor. Basically, we're trying to do it in 10 block chunks (seems a natural break point because of the charm augment) - win 10 mistmoore, then 10 miragul, then 10 takish, and so on.

However, there are some themes that we just want to be DONE with and ones that we LIKE playing in. Only done 2 in Takish Hiz but I like it. Have done 20 in Mistmoore and love the place. Just finished number 8 or 9 in Miragul's and I HATE it.

The "haze," the blue or pink color, etc. are just hard on the eyes. There's a sameness to the mobs there, despite the fact that some of them are so grotesque. I get stuck on the stupid torches all the time. I hate all of the ice stalactites (stalagmites, whatever) that interfere with casting, bow shots, etc. I hate the very long corridors. The long flight of steps up than leads immediately to the long flight of steps down. Fighting there, even MOVING there is just a pain. Blech.

Guk is even worse, IMHO. It's dark, you can't see mobs that are just a few feet away. The zone geometry is a pain for archery (my wife is a ranger) and even casting at times. Just a real pain in the rear to hunt there. For a long time we had ONE win there but were staying at around rank 500! Heck, my bazaar merchant might make the leader board at this rate and he's level 1. ;)

One of the problems with Miragul and Guk are the mobs - shaman and druid casters are a royal pain to deal with. Combine with that FLYING casters that can't even be rooted and it's a real nuisance when you get two of them. I'd much rather be nuked repeatedly than to have buff slots filled up with dots, etc. Also annoying to have so many healers in close proximity. It does happen in Mistmoore that you get 2 cleric mobs at the same time, but it is pretty rare. This is, again, the flaw in EQ where caster mobs melee like they were a melee class yet also cast spells. (It also means that my druid has to dispell a lot of mobs in Miragul, which he doesn't usually need to do in Mistmoore or Takish).

My group is naturally drawn to Mistmoore because we have 2 clerics and 3 paladins (usually not all at once, but we frequently might have 2 paladins and a cleric or 2 paladins and 2 clerics, etc.). My druid's anti-summoned spells aren't enough to make Takish Hiz appealing... maybe if we had a mage.

In any case, a combination of:

dungeon layout
mob types (e.g., frequency of casters and types of casters)
class abilities

will certainly make people gravitate toward some dungeons and avoid others like the plague. The only reason we'll bother fighting in some duneons is to get enough points to buy the good augments/armor there. Then we'll hopefully never ever go back. The problem is that the desire to be DONE with a theme appears to be consistent across many players instead of just being a matter of taste. They will probably need to either adjust the ZEM of the unpopular dungeons, have adventures there yield more points or whatever IF they want people to use them more equally.

On the other hand, if instancing doesn't really care what dungeon theme you are in, there's no drive for them to spread people out to the different themes. That is, there was some cost to having a zone like CT go unused, but maybe that isn't the case for the instanced dungeons (guess it depends on whether different themes are using the same "pool" of resources).

Panamah
10-20-2003, 01:36 PM
The "haze," the blue or pink color, etc. are just hard on the eyes. There's a sameness to the mobs there, despite the fact that some of them are so grotesque. I get stuck on the stupid torches all the time. I hate all of the ice stalactites (stalagmites, whatever) that interfere with casting, bow shots, etc. I hate the very long corridors. The long flight of steps up than leads immediately to the long flight of steps down. Fighting there, even MOVING there is just a pain. Blech.


Shrink thyself!

Yes, Miragul's did irritate me quite a lot. However, after doing 35 missions there, you do adapt. :p

I'd suggest to your group that you guys max out one camp at a time. Random for the order. Either that or you're going to have 20 million points saved up by the time you can finally buy something. :p I guess it depends on how good you are at postponing gratification!

Now that I've got one camped unlocked I don't care all that much where I go. I'd prefer to get Takish done and my EQ friend wants it too, so that's probably where we'll be next mostly.

One nice part about staying at one camp is you become VERY familiar with the dungeons and you don't get lost and you learn all their little variations and annoyances.

I do find that I'm to the point I'll take any adventure except collection. I enjoy the variety. And in a new dungeon, those assassinates and rescue make my sphincter tighten when you THINK the target is one way and the message says another one. Then I gotta go scout which often leads to me being dead by having stepped on a trap and become unhidden!

Very exciting.

Romidar
10-20-2003, 02:03 PM
Shrink thyself!

I carry a shrinking device but only use it when I absolutely HAVE to. I hate the change in perspective and it makes it harder to watch the whole battle (which I need to do to maintain aggro on multiple mobs). I used to get shrunk by our shaman in the old Mistmoore sometimes JUST to avoid the dang torches, though.

Yes, Miragul's did irritate me quite a lot. However, after doing 35 missions there, you do adapt.

I definitely think that's true of any dungeon - you either adapt or don't do it. We HAVE to adept to these in order to unlock the good stuff, though. Mistmoore also required adaptation, but not nearly the level that other dungeons do. Miragul's just has a lot of annoyances I'll be glad not to deal with anymore. :)

I'd suggest to your group that you guys max out one camp at a time. Random for the order. Either that or you're going to have 20 million points saved up by the time you can finally buy something. I guess it depends on how good you are at postponing gratification!

Actually we only need 1492 in two of the dungeons (Miragul for chain, Takish Hiz for plate). However, I needed a 650 point spell in Mistmoore as well as the lifetap proc there, so we spent a lot of time there first - also was a good spot to get used to some of the LDoN playstyle (focusing on big pulls, for example).

It would certainly be more effecient to do either Takish Hiz OR Miragul first, but this way everyone gets to feel like they're making progress toward their goal - it just means it will take everyone the same number of adventures to get there. We decided to do Miragul first to get it out of the way and forget about it instead of having it hanging out there to be dreaded.

(Also, it means I'll be able to immediately pop that Flowing Thought 2 item in my Royal Attendant's breastplate. :))

Now that I've got one camped unlocked I don't care all that much where I go. I'd prefer to get Takish done and my EQ friend wants it too, so that's probably where we'll be next mostly.

It helps that the one you have unlocked is the one with your 1492 armor. :) I've not yet paid enough attention to where the good augments are....

One nice part about staying at one camp is you become VERY familiar with the dungeons and you don't get lost and you learn all their little variations and annoyances.

Definitely true. It's nice to learn which mobs are casters by name when they look the same as mobs that aren't casters, for example. It's nice to know that there is a little spot where mobs like to hide, etc.

I do find that I'm to the point I'll take any adventure except collection. I enjoy the variety. And in a new dungeon, those assassinates and rescue make my sphincter tighten when you THINK the target is one way and the message says another one. Then I gotta go scout which often leads to me being dead by having stepped on a trap and become unhidden!

Well, if we had maps of Miragul's (have to check for updates), we'd do rescues. Not having a map just makes them too risky. We don't do assassinates - we don't always have a slowers and the casters are very tough for us as well (can't interrupt with stuns). The lack of additional reward just makes them too much risk for no more reward.

For Mistmoore, we'll take anything but Assassinates. For Miragul's we're pretty picky about only doing slaughters - we want to finish as quickly as possible with that place, so eating a loss is really annoying.

B_Delacroix
10-20-2003, 02:25 PM
My only rescue win was in Miragul's. I'm about sick of sand elves and I've had my 1500 points in that theme since just before the item nerf patch.

The force creature thing in Miragul's is the most interesting mob model I've seen. The bosses in the MM theme that I've gone to all had a unique look as well. One was a tall guy with a ming the mercilous like robe. I think he had a gold stick too but not sure.

I haven't been to guk but twice and both times were the same map.

I haven't been to Rujarkin at all.

I did enjoy the diablos in Miragul's. But now that my wife is going there for her 1500 points, they are getting old. Only did about 7 of them so far, so far to go. I do still enjoy the musical deformed 5 mouthed creatures.

NateByrd
10-21-2003, 04:23 PM
I did my first EF today. I've done 1 in NRo and like 5 or 6 in MMC. I loved EF. I am aiming for the 100 AP serpent sight aug for my human pally, so I need to work my ass off there. He's only level 40. But I enjoyed it..

We had myself, a beast, druid, necro, monk and shammy. I overpulled (4x Frost Skeleton students) and didn't have one death. 4 mob overpull in MMC is sure death. I also thought the EXP was better, as was the loot. I will be sticking to EF until I get my augment, then I wanna try more NRo, SRo and EC. I just wish I'd get more than 4 points per adventure... at the current rate, thats 25 or so adventures to get my augment :(

edit - I play on E'ci with a 39 pally (Caredil) and 30 druid (Rannollolas) and MMC is the most dominant type on the server. I didn't have a hard time convincing my group today to go to EF though!

Panamah
10-21-2003, 04:52 PM
Originally posted by B_Delacroix

I did enjoy the diablos in Miragul's. But now that my wife is going there for her 1500 points, they are getting old. Only did about 7 of them so far, so far to go. I do still enjoy the musical deformed 5 mouthed creatures.

I'm always making comments about the side of the mob I see... those big red flying ones have very firm buttockses. They must be fans of Buns of Steel or something.

B_Delacroix
10-22-2003, 11:25 AM
Its all that jumping they do.

Stormlin
10-22-2003, 11:41 AM
I have Tak, MMC, and Ruj unlocked, so I'm focusing on Guk and Mira now. There are reasons to go to all of them. I'll name mine!

Tak = ER4 Augment
Ruj = 40 HP type7 Augment
Guk = Leather BP and 20/20 HP/mana Augment
MMC = ID4 Weapon and 40 Mana Augment
Mira = 40 HP type8 Augment

So, ultimately, I'll need to unlock them all, I'd assume others would too. More than likely, MMC is the most appealing and will be most popular at first. Keep in mind, as more and more unlock MMC, they will want to move on to other camps.

NateByrd
10-22-2003, 02:56 PM
Originally posted by Stormlin
I have Tak, MMC, and Ruj unlocked, so I'm focusing on Guk and Mira now. There are reasons to go to all of them. I'll name mine!

Tak = ER4 Augment
Ruj = 40 HP type7 Augment
Guk = Leather BP and 20/20 HP/mana Augment
MMC = ID4 Weapon and 40 Mana Augment
Mira = 40 HP type8 Augment

So, ultimately, I'll need to unlock them all, I'd assume others would too. More than likely, MMC is the most appealing and will be most popular at first. Keep in mind, as more and more unlock MMC, they will want to move on to other camps.

How about my reasons for hating MMC/liking Mira?
Scythe of Eternal Ice (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=24732)
Some +15 dex/5 ac shoulder item
2 augments

All that in one adventure with a 39/40 pally. I love Mira's, pulls are generally really easy too.