SmokeJumper Comments on Runspeed
I posted my opinion about every ground-based mount in EQ2 getting increased to 130%. This change applied to everything from the 2 silver piece, level 1 horse, to 35 plat rhinos, to quested carpets, to raid-acquired war horses, to StationCash mounts. So far the responses to my Op Ed have been interesting, but we turn now to a comment by SmokeJumper.
In one of the many threads on the EQ2 Forums about the 130% Runspeed change, a player (vamp548548) theorized that all mounts got the same speed in order to shift mount progression from a ‘speed’ basis to an ‘appearance’ basis, SmokeJumper responded:
That’s exactly what we’re thinking. There is no need for a “speed progression” because there is more than one type of mount now and [for] you the “progression” is unlocking the different mount types at different levels.
These comments don’t change my viewpoint at all. Awarding the fastest car in a racing game the moment you put in the disc removes a major purpose of the game. While EQ2 is not a racing game, tiered rewards are the bread-and-butter of MMOs. Somewhere down the road, someone is going to say “EverQuest 2 feels small, I can run across the whole world in a few minutes.” SmokeJumper seems to be banking on players being Collectors rather than playing for Progression. We’ll go to the ends of the earth to get all different mount appearances, even if they all travel at the same speed.
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Comments (37)
Killusall
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When i first started playing eq2 i was pissed how long it took to travel. Questing is mostly moving from point a to point b and killing mobs. This should help improve the number of quests people can complete, which is the name of the friggin game. Thank you smokejumper for this improvement in mount speed!
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Kalako
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I’m with you on this one Feldon. Having played EQ2 for over 6 years now I can remember saving up the status and plats to buy my first expensive mount from the South Qeynos stables. Also doing the carpet & warg quests the first time. Not to mention looting some rare mounts over the years. It’s not all about appearances. It never has been for me anyway. Most mounts have had a significant speed or stat increase as I’ve progressed. Sure I’ve been suckered into to buying a few SC mounts here and there (void prowler and pegasus), but these have not meant as much to me as something I’ve actually quested or looted.
So SJ thinks I’d rather have new alts that run at 130% as soon as they get a mount? (which these days is ridiculously easy. Just do a moonlight enchantment grotto). Sure I might appreciate that speed when I’m in a rush, but it takes something away from the levelling experience. Or is that the whole point now, people don’t want to do the levelling experience, they want to rush to the endgame?
Travel in this game has been made stupidly quick already, which I agree has made things easier. But this is taking it a step to far in my opinion. Not only can we now port from one point ingame to another instantly rather than waiting for a boat of hitching lifts on griffons, but now we can zoom across a zone in a matter of seconds regardless of our level. What next? Teleporting instantly to any point on any map?
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Killusall
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Unfortunately this game only does expansions for the endgame, so i don’t blame anyone for wanting to get there as quick as possible.
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Lizzieanna
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I think the speed increase on the mounts is awesome! And am not concerned about the “progression” aspect. One of the few things I do not like about this game, or any other MMO, is travel time, especially when quests take you all over a zone.. or into other zones. I pop a potion that lasts for an hour, and spend much of that hour traveling. Increased speed cuts down on that time immensely. I thank the developers for this improvement in game play. I play the game for the adventure, not for traveling from A to B then back to A.
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Rick777
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Everquest 2 IS small, doh. It’s small because the vast majority of the population are concentrated into 1 or 2 zones out of the entire game. The other zones are used as very quick stepping stones to grind out solo level quests and they are so empty you just want to get out of them as quickly as possible. Yes I fondly remember the days when EQ2 was new, the days of having no mounts and that exciting and harrowing run through Antonica to meet up with other brave warriors for a Blackburrow run. I remember admiring the scenery, being deathly afraid of the numerous mobs overland who would kill me with one shot, and it was a ton of fun. Guess what, we don’t have that same game. The equivalent level 90 overland zones, Great Divide and Eastern Wastes nowadays, are extremely boring to traverse, they are filled with very weak solo mobs who couldn’t punch their way out of a paper bag and can be easily avoided by just threading around their aggro ranges. So tell me again why we need slow travel? Just get me to the instance where I will be grouping and have done with it, in fact give me a straight teleport to the instance and spare me the wasted time getting there, I don’t care if I’m wasting an hour or only 2 minutes, it’s wasted time to me. In relation to the new players, grouping is non existent until level 90, and even then until you get your AA up and all your PQ gear. Why make their journey that much more difficult, especially if it is an alt and you have already experienced this content? You are saying don’t give the new player a 130% speed mount because they haven’t earned it, I’m saying if you don’t speed up their leveling they will become bored and play another game. This old “when I was a kid I walked to school uphill both ways in the snow barefoot” mentality is really bad for subs.
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Kruzzen
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There is no incentive to get a different mount anymore. Especially when they ninja nerf them all the flippin time. My point in case is that flying mounts can no longer glide. Tell me how it makes sense that a flying mount can’t glide. Duh. I hope it blows up in smokeblowers face.
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cynamin
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I really do not like this change. The mount speed is too fast for me to navigate properly unless in a large open area. Perhaps i am clumsy or my pc doesnt react but I find myself banging my head into every wall or down right falling off places cause its so fast. Also, I agree there is no reason to get any of the other quested mounts now. It was a feeling of accomplishment. I firly believe that EQ2 has become the testing ground for their new EQnext console mix version. Lets simplify!!! its garbage.
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jasonmicron
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I agree with the author. I think that a mount should have certain rewards based on difficulty in obtaining, and runspeed should be one such reward.
Ok, so they want to make all mounts 130% runspeed. Fine. However, if there is a mount that takes months to obtain vs. a mount that takes only a few gold or a $20 bill then appearance should not be the only goal. Runspeed should be adjusted, even if just a little bit, to show others WHY it is desirable.
My feelings are that mounts that all have the same stats will reduce the overall desire of people’s drive to obtain a mount.
I remember when mounts came out. I did writ after writ after writ to obtain that ghost horse mount and I was PROUD of my 60% runspeed while everyone else was limited to only 50%. It’s small, but it’s still desirable to have the BEST.
Why would anyone outside of people that simply want as many mounts as possible even feel the need to acquire a mount after their first purchase?
If runspeed is not going to change at all, then make more mounts give stat bonuses that are harder to obtain, give *any* mount that you acquire in-game have some sort of bonus to them and make them desirable.
I know envy is one of the seven deadly sins, but in this case I think envy needs to be played against a bit more by SoE.
Just stating my opinion, not trying to start a flamewar.
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Dethdlr
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Could be that they have numbers from selling appearance only mounts through station cash that show a significant number of people are willing to spend actual money just for the appearance of a mount. It would seem reasonable to believe that if a significant number of people are willing to spent actual money on an appearance mount, that an even larger amount of people will be willing to do quests or pay in game money for what have now become appearance mounts. I’ve gone back on a few alts and run the quests in KoS for the class specific armor sets just for appearance. This puts the mounts in that same basic category. It still takes whatever it takes to get those mounts and anyone seeing them are still going to know what it took to get them. It’s just that they are now for the “look” instead of the speed.
Feldon wrote:
I don’t doubt that someone somewhere will say that. However, I also don’t doubt that somewhere down the road, someone is going to say “I wish there were a potion I could take that would turn me into a giant llama that allows me to step on and kill anything in my path and grants me 5 plat for each kill.” They shouldn’t make design decisions based on that possible statement either. 🙂
Norrath is a big place. So is Earth. The fact that I can take a car, train, plane, etc. and travel places at great speeds doesn’t mean I’m ignorant of how big the place actually is.
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Feldon
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One point I wanted to make. I DO think we should be able to have nearly every appearance of mount at 130% speed — Just not automatically.
I’ve been asking for a quest to upgrade our 40% sinking sands carpet for years. I think there should be a quest to turn the carpet into a true flying carpet too. The same for clouds and discs. I wasnt asking for a restriction of gameplay options or to take people’s fun away to create an artificial progression. My issue is this takes away one of the key goals in any game, mmo or not: speeding up travel.
If they wanted everyone to run at +130% normal speed, why not just raise everyones base run speed?
Obviously we are not going to agree on this point. Can we talk about geometrically tricky staircases/ramps in group and raid zones? Or cinematics that crash our computers? 🙂
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landiin
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Its all about instant gratification. People are lazy and want what the want now with out having to earn it. This games is done going forwards. When people like Dethdlr are standing around wondering where everyone is, oh wain nm they’ll be able to just press a button and have it.
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Karith
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Faster questing FTW.
Norrath is huge. Overload+Instanced it’s the biggest virtual world in existence that I know of.
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StepChylde
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College is stupid. I don’t know why you have to go for 4 years. The whole point is to get a degree right? I don’t see why they don’t just give it to you after 1 year. Then more people would have degrees!! Why should only the smart people get degrees? I’m paying just as much as they are, so I should get one too! Its so stupid that I have to wait 4 years to get a good job. I mean that’s the whole point right? They should give everyone good jobs to start with instead of making them waste their money and time for 4 years. Its just so stupid. That’s what runs through my head everytime I hear someone from the “Me Want Now!” Generation try to explain the “logic” behind their thought process. If you want it….EARN IT! Make the quests harder, put in more time sinks, make the mobs less forgiving, make the levels longer. Then getting the gear/level/ability/mount/etc will finally, once again, actually MEAN something.
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Bob
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“Awarding the fastest car in a racing game the moment you put in the disc removes a major purpose of the game. ”
If all you care about is run speed sure I guess so. Some of us actually care about how our mounts look. Being able to use the fast mount and it be the one I think looks best is a good thing.
Just goes to show, people will bitch even if you give them a million bucks.
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Anaogi
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So, just because you care how your mounts look, the rest of us get our accomplishments reduced to meaninglessness?
One step closer…
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StepChylde
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They solved that problem when they added an appearance slot for mounts. And you’re wrong, I’d only complain if they gave EVERYONE a million bucks. It would reward the lazy people and penalize those that worked for it.
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Felix
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I just want the fastest, I could care less what it looks like. I have them hidden anyways unless its the new ones that can’t be hidden and only use them when I need to fly but I can run 145% now so rarely even need the flying ones anymore unless I need to get to a spot off the ground I can’t get to while running. So I agree they removed a huge part of the progression for mounts. Now the only mount I really want is the raid one for the stats.
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Steve
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What exactly is the point of questing and levels in an MMO?
Why not just remove levels altogether?
We tolerate progression in one area but not others. Why?
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Maokomeeb
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My points exactly, Feldon. Raise the base run speed and set all mounts to %55 of that speed or whatever. One day I’m going to figure out the current velocity of our mounts. They must be going Mach 2 by now. lol
I also agree with the bigger problems. Line-of-sight is drastically problematic in this xpac due to most of the zones having bumps and ramps. Even the floor is just a little bumpy enough to cause line-of-sight issues in some zones. This seems more important for debate, mainly because the game seems broken due to it.
Cinematic crashes have a workaround. It’s either you target yourself or turn auto-attack on. Something like that. Sad but it works.
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Kruzzen
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This really does not have anything to do with what we want as progression so much as what is easiest for them to keep track of and sell. It is much easier to make everything 130% run speed than to actually build a progression. It is much easier to give all the same stats than to work out unique gear. It is much easier to make the game simple and sell fluff than it is to make the game challenging. Smokejumper was brought in to sell SC. This is the easiest way to make it happen.
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Zharxian
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I almost gave up on EQ2 because of the travel times. I don’t get to spend all day, every day playing a game, so when it takes me 10 minutes of precious game time to get from one place to another, that’s not my idea of fun. It’s about as entertaining as making your toon wash their dishes. I haven’t heard anyone complain about how long it takes to craft a suit of plate armor or a sword (something that should take several days, not less than a minute.) yet, now we hear complaints about something as mundane as traveling. I’m with Feldon, let’s move on to something else, please.
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Dethdlr
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As I posted in the original op-ed Feldon wrote about this topic, it isn’t about instant gratification and people not wanting to “earn” their faster mounts. It’s about taking out the boring time sink that is travel time. As I’ve said before, travel time is one of the tricks MMO developers use to make it seem like a game has more content than it really does. It slows you down so you can’t rush through all the content and “finish” the game too fast. When an MMO first comes out, you need this.
When EQ2 first came out, there were griffons to get you around Antonica and Commonlands, right? Why weren’t there any transportation options in Thundering Steppes or Nek Forest? Why not in Enchanted Lands or The Ferrott or Zek or Everfrost or Lavastorm? Why were their access quests to GET to some of those zones? Because the devs had to slow you down or else you would have finished all the content too fast and would have been standing around saying “now what?”
Three adventure packs, and seven expansions worth of content have been added since then. As they came out, the travel has gotten easier and faster. Griffons in Thundering Steppes and Nek Forest. Access restrictions being lifted from zones. Druid portals and wizard spires and eventually, not even needing a druid or wizard to use them. Horses in Enchanted Lands, The Ferrott, Zek, Everfrost, and Lavastorm. Bells that take you directly to the zones you want to go to insead of zoning through each one in between. Bells in the place of waiting for boats. Slow increases in mount speed throughout all of this.
These changes have been taking place slowly as more and more content has been added throughout the years. This isn’t a recent trend, it’s been happening since 2005. With all the content that is in the game now, the travel time trick is no longer needed. They don’t need to slow people down anymore. Aiming in the right direction and hitting numlock is not a challenge, it’s a waste of time. Time that COULD be spent actually PLAYING the content instead of getting to it. 🙂
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StepChylde
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Travel times is part of the challenge imo though. Its just as relevant as harder levels or tougher mobs as far as increasing the ‘difficulty’ of advancing in the game.
You’re right, it is a time sink. But so is every single other thing in the game that actually makes achieving something worthwhile.
Why should I have to spend 15minutes killing a named mob? Have it do a gear check, then have me fight it for 30seconds as a skill check. If I pass it should instantly die. Anything more is a time sink ‘trick’ to make the game last longer.
Why should I have to grind zones to get gear? If I can complete it once, I can complete it a million times. After I finish a zone once I should be given free access to every item that drops there. Anything more is a time sink ‘trick’ to make the game last longer.
Why should it take me so long to level? If I can kill 1 mob that is blue con, then I can kill millions of them. They should have me kill 5 max, and if I do advance me a level and test me again. Anything more is a time sink ‘trick’ to make the game last longer.
Get the point?
Everyone keeps saying they should eliminate travel time even more so you can spend that time ‘playing’ the game. I argue that travel should be harder, especially to the harder more rewarding zones, so that even getting from point a to b is part of the ‘playing’ required to succeed.
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Anaogi
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Granted, Dethdlr, but was it really necessary to reduce what were once significant achievements–the carpet quest, high guild level, a coveted raid drop–to meaning nothing more than ‘looks cool’? Because if that’s all those accomplishments are going to mean going forward, it’s really a disincentive to bother.
I started out way slow on this expansion because the combination of insta-gimped raid gear and the mindless PQ grind blew a fuse in my head. If the whole game has to get ground down as an accessible but bland pablum to facilitate the StationCash sales, that’s the slow strangulation of everything good this game has been.
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Luminata
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@Anaogi it doesn’t change the fact that the raid mounts have much better stats on them, and really since the appearance mount was introduced it never mattered which your main mount was you could just pop your favourite looking one over the top. I just think it is a way of keeping ground mounts relevant in the face of bouncing (omg <3 bouncing), gliding and flying mounts.
Personally the only thing I don't like about the change is that changing mounts means dragging items to places and my pc is in need of upgrading, which means it freezes when I need to change from one of my overland mounts to say my cloud for raid zones. Is there an easy macro I am missing to get this done more easily?
To change the subject for an moment who else is excited about this from Test update notes? "You can now use the /sitchair emote while on top of objects to make your character appear to be sitting on them" 😀
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Dethdlr
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@Anaogi: I’m not a fan of the PQ grind either. I don’t raid anymore so I don’t really have much of an opinion one way or another on the insta-gimped raid gear. For me, personally, I don’t mind having those once significant achievements of the carpet quest, high guild level, coveted raid drop, etc. no longer having it’s run speed part of the reward. I’ve wanted Fitzpitzles Hover Platform out of Deathtoll for as long as it’s been in the game, and not just for the 48% run speed or the +6 to focus and defense.. Seen it drop several times but never won it. Every time I see someone go buy on one, I still look at it with envy. The Icemare that I’ve been riding goes 20% faster at 68% runspeed but that doesn’t change the fact that I still want Fitzpitzles Hover Platform. It still takes the same amount of work to get both. When I see people on either of them, I know what they had to go through to get them. Their speed being increased to to 130% doesn’t change that for me. But that’s just my opinion.
@StepChylde: Apparently, you’re one of those that would prefer to go back to the way the game worked when it first launched. Where you had to go cash in copper pieces because you were overburdened. Where you had to craft certain items that you used to craft other items that you used to finally craft the item you were actually wanting to craft. That’s a valid opinion. I personally don’t share that opinion.
StepChylde wrote:
Again, a valid opinion. I happen to disagree with it but that doesn’t make it any less valid. If there were some challenge involved in getting from point a to point b I would at least understand. But I remember the days before all the travel got easier. I remember standing at the entrance of a zone for 15 minutes or longer waiting on other members of my group to work their way through the zones to get to the entrance. We were all online, at our computers, nobody afk, ready to do the zone. Instead planting a flag, having everyone port over, and zoning in, we would sit there for 15 minutes waiting on the rest of the group to get there. Now, we either plant a flag or CoV them and go do the zone. We are able to do a lot more zones these days than we used to be able to because we spend so much less time standing around waiting. The person carrying the flag can get to the zones quicker now with the increased speed. Others can be refreshing god spells, swapping out specs, grabbing cure pots, poisons, taking a bio break, grabbing a drink, etc. while the one person takes the flag out. Once the flag is down, the rest port over and we’re ready to roll. Before, we would all have to hoof it out to the zone entrance and everybody except the last one to arrive would have the challenging thrill of standing around with their thumb in their orifice of choice….. waiting.
And in some ways, you’re right that every single other thing in the game is also a time sink. The game itself is a time sink as is every other game that doesn’t have an actual real life reward (if, for example, you play poker and win a million bucks, it’s hard to consider that a time sink no matter how you look at it). Anything else though, depending on how you look at it, is a time sink. For me, if it is an aspect of the game that I enjoy, I don’t consider it a time sink. If it’s work I have to do that I don’t enjoy, that’s a different story. Travel time, cleaning out my bags, those are time sinks. Lets try to equate this to real life for a moment. I like where I work. I like where I live. I don’t like the 30 min to 1 hour travel time between where I live and where I work. It’s not a challenge. I don’t arrive at work or at home and feel this great sense of accomplishment that I managed to not die in a traffic accident between the two places. If my work said that they were going to be installing teleporters at all work locations and employee homes that would instantly transport me from home to work and back again, I wouldn’t complain that it was taking away some of the challenge of my job. Same thing in EQ2.
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Dethdlr
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If you’re willing to have the mount items in your bags instead of in your mount tab, I think you can kinda do that. Put your leaping lizard and your flying mount in your bags. Then drag those icons to your hotbar. Then put your ground mount and appearance mount in the slots on the mount tab, then drag that mount icon to your hotbar (probably already there). You could then be able to swap between your ground mount, leaper, and flyer by just clicking the icons twice (once to dismount, once more to get on the new mount). Pretty sure that will work.
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Necromancer
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I don’t like how every mount in the game has a base run speed of 130%, because MMO’s are all about progression on every level – from your character, to your gear, to your tradeskilling, to accessing newer zones, to doing different content – it’s all about progression and dumbing the game down even more by making all mounts base run speed 130% detracts more from the game than it adds to it.
I could have seen them increasing to speed of all mounts 10-15%, that way progression is still in tact, and people can get from point A to point B faster, but removing mount progression in favor of more dumbed down content is ridiculous.
Even WoW has mount progression, and WoW is the simplest, most retarded MMO on the market.
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Zharxian
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@ StepChylde: If you are upset that traveling is easier, you really should have been up in arms when flying mounts came out. Then again, maybe you were, I don’t know.
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Anaogi
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@Dethdlr: Word, for the platform. For me it’s Kotiz’ warg drop. I still lust after that one, after all these years…
Still, is it too much to ask that something aside from just appearance distinguish these mounts, if only to justify the wide swings in costs?
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Dethdlr
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@Anaogi: I see what you’re saying. They could have taken the fastest mounts in the game and bumped them up to 130% and then increased the rest of them by however much they increased the fastest one. So if the fastest ones were 65%, that would be 65% added to all ground mounts (65 + 65 = 130). So the 20% mounts would then be 85% mounts. The 45% mounts would be 110% mounts. That would have been another way to go with it and would have arguably been better. It would have left the progression in speed except for the leapers and gliders which is probably why they didn’t do it that way.
But I imagine that ship has sailed since it would certainly tick me off to no end if I had sold some of my faster mounts because all of them were bumped up to 130% and then later they knocked them back down again.
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Wurm
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Of course SJ is banking on people being collectors. That’s how SC makes money.
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Eschia
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They make these changes now, but knowing SOE’s track record, the next time they make a new mount it will be faster then any other and none of the older mounts will be updated. I’m calling it before it happens because i know it will.
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Kalako
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A SC mount faster than 130%? Nah… I won’t bother. 130% is already too fast for my poor fingers to steer.
I’ve read all your posts, and yes I see your points, but I still maintain that making ALL mounts the same speed takes something away from the game. YES, we all want fast mounts, fast travel, instant groupage. But owning those unique mounts, the ones that took time or pateince to earn has now gone. UNLESS your a mount collector, what incentive do you have to go after them? None. Just grab that cheap horse and get an appearance mount that looks nicer when you get the chance.
I just find all this fuss they’ve made about flying/leaping/gliding mounts lately, only to nerf all ground mounts to equal runspeed trivialises anything anybody does before that regarding ground mounts. IMO they don’t want us to have ground mounts now. at 30 we should be leaping, at 60 we should be gliding, at 85; flying. And ofc the best looking choices will be on SC.
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Drumstix42
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I dislike the mount speed change so much =(
I love having veteran earned rewards for new toons, but no free handouts of buying the cheapest mount and running at 130% runspeed. No effort required does not equal fun.
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StepChylde
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To Dethdir, I do see the point that things can be overly time sinks. I guess I just don’t like that the pendulum has swung so far to the other extreme. The work example you gave makes sense, but its not completely on target. If you worked your ass off for promotions and saved every penny and bought a Porsche, you’d have something to be proud of that would also make that drive more enjoyable. Then what if everyone else complained “well MY drive to work sucks tooooooooo!”, and to “fix” that problem they passed out a free Porsche to everyone. That would be the analogy there.
And no, I wasn’t up in arms when flying mounts came out. I’m just of the opinion that they, along with everything else, should be a reward that requires some work, skill, and dedication.
I’d rather have that “YES! I finally earned my flying mount!!” feeling than have that “yay ‘yawn’ I just got something that every other person in the game got.” The later just devalues the game and removes the ambition factor imo.
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Dethdlr
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Just curious, but where does the Highland Stalker 65% run speed mount from the collectors edition of SF fall into this mix? I bought the collectors edition for each of my accounts so that as soon as I create a new character, /claim and I have a 65% run speed mount. It now goes at 130% as well. I’ll admit that having the Highland Stalker available removed my desire to earn an Icemare on any of my other characters. But then again, I didn’t enjoy earning it on the one that has it. It was just something I did so I didn’t have to spend even more time doing something else I don’t enjoy: getting from point A to point B.
I kind of see your Porsche analogy, but it too is a bit off. What actually took place was instead of giving out a free Porsche to everyone, they gave out something that goes twice as fast as a Porsche to everyone. Something nobody could earn or buy before. Or even better, they retro-fitted everybody’s cars so that they now go twice as fast as the Porsche used to go. My Yugo will now go just as fast as your Porsche. But anybody who sees me still knows I don’t own a Porsche.
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