Feldon Itemization of any MMO is a thankless job. If I had my way, EQ2 Itemization would be a Senior Designer position with foot massages, baskets of fresh fruit, and refreshing margaritas. Instead, it seems to be the hot potato job that everyone prays they’re out of before the music stops.
A systemic problem we’ve been talking about for years with EverQuest II is that even the most obvious Itemization imbalances tend to take months to straighten out, all the while players spend hours farming and working towards items that will eventually be nerfed into oblivion.
Four months after the release of Game Update 63: Skyshrine, it seems the time has come for those Mythical weapons — which have been perplexingly dropping from Skyshrine Solo and Group zones — to undergo the knife. When these exceedingly rare but otherwise easily acquired Mythicals first popped up, players rightly expressed concern.
Now, in what has become a too-common refrain, months of silence has been followed by a “So sorry, but we have to nerf these items” note. Again, I consider this a systemic problem which has been present in the EQ2 team for years so let’s not shoot the messenger…
From Kander on the EQ2 Forums:
Many current mythical weapons were given an extra damage multiplier. They are currently receiving twice the damage they were intended to. We pained over how to not make a reduction [nerf], but the overall cascade would affect balance and content for years. Unfortunately, the damage is too high to be balanced properly or ever be replaced over the long term. We are going to be bringing current mythical weapon damage down as a whole.
Yes, this mythical change will include the current Skyshrine mythical drops and end line Beastlord mythical weapons. These weapons will remain significantly higher damage rating then anything Fabled that is currently available.
Some mythical item drops from Skyshrine will be coming up in quality as some shields and other items were not as good as was intended.
This issue is being discussed on the EQ2 Forums.
Maybe we should start campaigning now for the “Fabled Crate of Endless Plunder” (which requires one Dozekar’s head) to at least EQUAL the other items sold by the same vendor. Completing the Underdepths group zone should provide the best group gear in the game, yet players who have purchased dozens of these crates have received almost entirely useless Legendary gear.
What bothers me is the fact that the BL myths have been out for a lot longer than 4 months and now they decide to mes with it. If they do to much it won’t even be worth going and doing that insane fight. It will also kill a lot of interest in those zones. I know peeps only going there for a chance at that myth.
Itemization in EQ2 has become such a disastrous mess that there is no fixing it at this point.
obtaining and working on items is a major part of MMO games for players.
nerfs for items come and go, but the inability to have a good progression of items is very distressing to most.
From the way the design appears to be, the order of zones should be
Contested Skyshrine –> Covenant District –> Lyceum –> Dracur Prime –> Underdepths
However, due to the way the gear was built, it’s actually easier to simply run Contested for 136 stat items until you get factions to max, then run UD to get heads for the faction equipment.
Oddly, the item names and comments tend to be actually interesting and amusing, although the trend to have financial issue names is a bit disturbing. Someone on the team recognized that there is import in items.
Seriously, my guild’s managed to get three of the things. We’ve run CD repeatedly for a shot at the things, and now this?
It’s almost as if they don’t want people to enjoy this game anymore. Dungeon Maker, crappy zone rewards, Mythical nerfs…do these people actually know what they’re doing at all?
Oh, and while we’re at it, why on Norrath is the loot out of Underdepths worse than what you get out of the rest of Skyshrine, with only a couple of notable exceptions? How about the continual dropping of ranged weapons, shoulders, and foot armor, at a point where none of it is even close to what players will have already gotten from the access quest line that got them there? Can we talk about the absolute lack of differentiation between gear for melee classes, or between healers and casters?
Sorry to rant here, but this is on my last nerve, and if I posted these questions on the forums (if they stayed up more than 15 minutes at a time) SOE-MOD-666 would send them to the cornfield anyway…
OK, read through the thread showing the state of play on Test. The nerf seems rather subtle and relatively minor, except in a couple of rather glaring cases (the bow).
So the nerf isn’t quite as radical as feared…but the rest of my statements stand as written.
Ok people seriously, you cannot expect devs to care about the game anything close to the way even the more casual players do. After all, they’re only getting paid for it and undoubtedly expecting to draw their livelihood from it for some time into the future.
Reality check, please.
TBH seems like too much of a narrow focus just on apparent probs with mythical damage ratings (gear across all of skyshrine and the rest of dov for that matter are in an abysmal state…dont get me started on the mc fabled gear and the rarity of some drops)
btw I can relate to the “cornfield” comment, Anaogi. When they took the SC subs out right after selling everyone triple SC I called them out for fraud and linked http://www.fraud.org on the forums and I think it lasted 11 or 12 seconds before getting the shepard’s hook. lol
I love censorship tho. Ranks up there with 55% of the 92/320’s on the servers being geared in level 1 newbie trash cloth.
well after lookingon test bl and melee weapons got buffed while 2nd and bows got raped :/
Since the “Fabled Crate of Endless Plunder” also requires 50k faction along with the rest of the armor from that vender i also agree that the reword needs to be bout up inline with other things on that vender.
They found another way to nerf the rangers out there. What did you guys do to make SOE hate you so much? lol
I wish I could be upset about this, but I’m having a hard time feeling any emotion at all about EQ2 recently. One too many gear resets and far too many abandoned, irrelevant zones seems to have finally broken my spirit. The world I have spent the last 8 years of my life exploring has just lost its magic these days, and that saddens me deeply.
Did they nerf their websites as well? Each of Feldon’s links to the official forums far too frequently come up with the error:
Unable to load the webpage because the server sent no data.
This isn’t just today, and it’s not just the EQ2 site. The Station Pass forums take 3 forevers to load, and when they finally do load, you have a ridiculously high chance of being logged out simply by using the Back button in any given thread.
SOE’s been having serious problems with their networks, from the looks. I suspect, but have no solid evidence, it may be linked to the abominable levels of chat and mail lag, as well as troubles some folks have been having staying logged in.
Which, as usual, they utterly deny, claiming it’s on our end.
Idiots.
I think SoE has their priorities skewed. Itemization is the reward, it is the incentive for doing things. This should be handled by an expert. Instead we see more sc items (I will admit I use my free SC for better looking outfits) I’m so bored with Skyshrine. My husband and I can duo CD and Lyceum for the Myth. The mythical is the only reason we go to those zones. But I have reached a point where I don’t care anymore. At least now I can get an EM Breastplate… personally Mythicals never should have been available in heroic. Just my opinion.
I don’t see what the big deal is with the mythicals. I have the mythical ss bow and it makes about 15k total difference in my dps as a ranger. That is less than 3% of my dps. They can nerf whatever they want, but they aren’t making happy customers after they let people run those zones 1000 times for a tiny carrot that was immediately snapped away.
Another change that makes SS even more boring than it is. I have noticed a change in the trash drops, too — seems to be less than a few months ago, when trash mobs did drop exquisite chests.
I have lost a lot of my motivation to log on lately. I like more variety than is being offered.
who cares about 25 dr when you can get to 300000 CB
The healer 2h myth went from a rating of 264 to 229 if anyone cared.