107 thoughts on “EverQuest II Forums Undergo Streamlining — Guide, Fan Site, Lore, RP, Off-Topic, and PvP Forums Closed”

        1. There is a post on ZAM about the GM changes – basically, if you lost, broke, or deleted a character or item, or your guild leader disappears for years, too bad, so sad, GMs can’t help. Get the item over again, make a new toon from scratch, or start a new guild

  2. History and Lore? Has someone saved this forum elsewhere? This is an RPG, how do you close a history and lore forum for an RPG? And how in the world does this save them money? Storage is cheap… and apparently so is Daybreak.

  4. This is solely a pre-emptive move to transitioning from EQ 2, to whatever is next. Sadly, both Skidmark and EQ futurewhattheheckitwillbecalled look horrible to me. Thank goodness for single player games from the 80’s and 90’s that work on current machines!

      3. I will be going to EQN in the hope of reigniting the early days of EQ2 and how much I loved the game. I don’t play any more as it just lost it’s spark for me. Despite returning twice in the last 2 years, I did’t last longer than a month.

        We need you in EQN Feldon, and Daybreak need to make sure it is not a pile of *&^*.. If it ever gets released of course… dear knows when that might be now.

  9. Wow, this is a sad day, the forums have been going down hill for a long time but this seems like a drastic step. I relied 100% on the Guide forums to find out when events were taking place on my server, now what? To top everything off RadarX’s post saying “reopen all of the threads in General Discussion” Seems like a slap in the face by someone who used to be a great community manager. 🙁

  10. TBH most pvp out there sucks in comparison to eq2’s bugs, lag and all…but…since the 2013 layoff of the last dedicated pvp developer…its been downhill…which is funny as many other mmo’s out there are trying to imitate elements of eq2’s pvp pretty much unsuccessfully.

  13. While it was consolidated long before today, I’d love to have some class-specific forums again. So many players already come to this site for information, I think EQ2U forums could easily be an extension of that.

  14. “bring our structure in line with community needs”

    So making it impossible for the community to find out when Guide events are happening is in line with our needs? Right.

    I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that they’ve been told to use less machines, or are planning to migrate the forums somewhere else and are reducing the stuff they need to move.

    I have zero interest in EQN (or Landmark) either.

      1. I hope so.

        My point was more to highlight that the reason given was, as usual, simply a corporate line. I really hoped they’d stop treating us like idiots once away from Sony and say it more as it is, but it seems not.

        1. It’s not so much treating people like idiots, but watching what they say. If you look at the forums and certain issues that have come up, they do seem to be improving in what they actually communicate, but now that fewer people are there to actually communicate, it becomes a different issue.

        1. …because this company would rather that Reddit gets the traffic. Yyeeahhh, doesn’t make much sense, does it? You’re right, ‘though. I’ve often ended up over there looking for information you’d expect to find in the official forums. Nuts.

  16. When they redid the forums they canned nearly every one of the forums they ditched today and it was a total and complete mess. Somebody over there figured it out and most of the forums were put back. It wasn’t THAT long ago… I guess whoever learned from that snafu is gone or was ignored this time 🙁

    1. Agree, EQ2Wire forums would be amazing and I think almost everyone that plays EQ2 would use forums here over official ones. That being said I just hope there is still a game to have forums for a year from now.

  19. It’s almost as if SoE is going out of their way to discourage roleplaying entirely. EQN lost its lore forums a week or so ago, and now all the relevant lore topics (a lot of them that former lore dev Moorgard was active in, no less) are buried under pages and pages of mechanic speculation threads and chicken little “the sky is falling” threads. Roleplayers for years had to rely on their own little niche communities, most of them as toxic and as awful as your generic “General” chat in any game, when it comes to Everquest games and instead of embracing the roleplay community (which us roleplayers really want!), SoE/now Daybreak just continues to make it harder for us to have a voice. Roleplayers generally turn off anything listed as “general” and avoid those channels and forums like the plague.

    Shutting down the fansite forum? Why? What purpose does that serve. It’s becoming clear how ridiculous Daybreak is getting. Trion, of all companies, treat their fan site operators better.

    1. Agreed. I don’t RP, but I’m on AB and feel the pulse of the RP community through channels, and they aren’t happy. RPers are probably among the most loyal player bases in MMOs as they are driven more by community relationships than more traditional modes of gameplay. And if you’re managing to alienate them, you’re in dangerous territory as far as player happiness is concerned.

      Singularly, these changes wouldn’t be so bad, but strung together like this they feel very much like a game that is being wound down to some kind of conclusion. What that is only time will tell…

      As for a eq2wire forum, I think that’s a great idea! It would serve as a free, honest voice for the player community that Flames used to fill, but which has since languished in a kind of caretaker mode. A place where people are free to speak their minds without fear of moderator persecution. Something that is desperately needed since the official forums are more about projecting a positive outlook than a realistic one. Devs need to hear the voices of the playerbase, not the Pravada-esque newspeak of the moderators that the forums currently act as.

  21. This is highly discouraging. I already stopped playing a couple weeks ago when all those wonderful SoE employees were laid off, it was killing things for me. Honestly been playing Rift quite a bit. I was hoping that things wouldn’t go downhill and I would make my way back but I really don’t think I see that happening. 🙁

    1. I play Rift when I get tired of EQ2 by the looks of it I will be switching it to the other way around very soon.
      My husband and I are already talking about it and at least in RIFT you can get the expansions as game updates and save at least a little money by just buying roles you want.

  23. They get rid of GMs the close forums, guys this is the beginning of the end. We’re going in ‘vanguard mode’ im sorry to say

    Just last month I accidentally bought an item from a status vendor worth 9 million status points (took me 10 years to accumulate that amount) I felt like an idiot but petitioned and within a day I received a nice email from a GM stating that I was a loyal sub of EQ since its inception and my status would be returned without any trouble – what a brilliant GM I was so happy and thankful he was aware of my loyalty to SOE

    I will miss being part of such a brand and miss that extended service

  25. Sadly this really isn’t a surprise. I haven’t been feeling good about this game for over a year. That being said I have been more then willing to hang in there because I love this game. Unfortunately as things continue to move in this direction I am losing hope.

  26. Whilst I no longer play it, my first non-MUD MMO was ‘Horizons’. It slumped and was sold, becoming eventually reborn into ‘Istaria, Chronicles of the Gifted’.

    Whether you like the actual game or not, it is a great example of how to do things right. The new company, Virtrium, was open and honest about every tiny detail from day one – they knew the mess they had bought and talked about not being able to do things because of money, or time, or lack of people, were honest about the reasons things did or didn’t happen, time scales, downtimes etc – there was no corporate speak. They talked to the players as intelligent equals. They also worked closely with the players as they reconstructed the game, and still do. I never got round to unsubbing from their newsletters and remain impressed at their attitude to their game/world/lore and how they treat their players.

    SOE/Daybreak could learn a lot from them about not bullshitting/corporate speaking and being honest, and also that working with your players is what makes a game successful. Maybe explaining exactly why these particular forums were really chosen in plain English would be nice, or letting the players vote on which ones are removed.

  27. Hilariously sad. The fan sites, guide events and rp community were about the only places were you found any positivity left.

    It’s almost like watching a relative you’ve known for many years lay there on life support while the doctors slowly unhook the diagnostics, knowing full well of the inevitable outcome.

  29. I really hate to go all negative Nancy on things. But honestly with the changes to to the gm policy, and now the forums. I got to ask why do they hate the customer base so bad. Do they not realize that folks will become upset and move on. There is only so much bs you can do before you upset your entire customer base.

  31. They crippled the forums by not allowing editing of posts. I know their reasoning but it discouraged people from trying to keep helpful threads up to date.

    I don’t see how this step will help the forums.

    1. What are you talking about ? You can still edit your posts. In firefox, you right-click the edit link for a new tab and editing works there. In chrome the edit link works right on that page.

      1. For 20 minutes. That’s a ridiculous joke and we’ve been asking them to change it for years. The old EQ2 forums had unlimited edit time.

        Don’t get me started on no Custom Avatars, super limited Signature size, etc.

        1. I bought Xenforo for my site over a year ago, I am still learning it as there is no Polish version of it, but there is so much options and possibilities that I am surprised DBG uses only small amount of it. It looks also like they are not updating forums as some errors you still get on eq2 forums I don’t get anymore on my latest version.

  33. Anyone heard from Smed? He is the CEO and should be keeping everyone informed of the status of the games under his control.

    Guess he is too busy playing with his zombies. At any rate, HE is the dead weight sinking the ship.

    1. Smed is probably sitting in his corner office playing solitaire or Eve while the new Columbus Nova guy settles in. Once the layoffs and any other public negatives have been finished it will be announced Smed is leaving, they will give him his golden parachute and he will walk into the sunset while the new guy hopes the bad feelings of the customers will go with him.

  34. Pingback: Daybreak is apparently out of touch with MMO realities, which doesn’t bode well for EQN… | EverQuest Next News

  35. I’ve weathered a LOT in the years I’ve run fansites for EQ and EQ2 tradeskills, including several times where folks have proclaimed it is “the end” of the game(s). While we may weather this, too, I am finding myself less and less eager to play these days, and it is becoming more and more likely that I will find something else to play soon. 🙁

    Color me a disheartened birthday haflling right now.

    1. I keep looking for something else to play .. Nothing ever seems to hold my interest like EQ2 did for so many years (2nd only to UO).

      I was watching Next hoping it could be great. but the game will need to walk a very delicate balance to really work and I don’t know that Daybreak will be able to pull it off with the way things are going.

  36. ..wow that GM cut back thing :/ Those new rules seem very “anal” for a game with such longtime players. *tuff luck is basically it across the board now. And many could be updated like other games with more methods for a player to fix it himself in game w/o exploiting.

    I guess it really is done :/ Its like they are going into wind down mode.

    I fear these changes will destroy eqN too. Why buy and mmo company to make single player games… This is so horrible *they started everything.

  37. been saying this since the daybreak JERKS took over…the game WILL be shut down by years end, count on it…cant you see the pattern forming? i guess hope and change made it here now to….say bye bye to eq2 and i know this from a very, VERY, reliable source!! watch and see all you nay sayers lol

    1. …and what if it does, Rob? Will players lose a single thing that will impact their future livelihood? Doubt it…no matter how many drama queens would suggest that their life would suddenly end.

      Your tone suggests that you WANT it to end…practically begging for it…generating “very very reliable” rumors that should drive any sane person right out the door to avoid the certain demise by the end of the year. The “nay sayers” dare to HOPE that people will find a way for EQ2 to endure rather than becoming part of the cancer in the community bagging every attempt to save the game.

      So, Rob, what’s your point? If it’s a lost cause…so what? If you’re connected and can see the future…so what? Should people delete their characters? What are you suggesting?

      Some will ride the wave until it dies on the shore…and others just…won’t. Either way there will always be another wave. 😈

  38. Radarx clearly states discussion can continue in other appropriate forum sections. You guys are a bunch of whiners about anything and everything. If you’re that passionate about the RP and Lore forums why was there less than 2 posts a day on them? If they’re that useless, throw them into another section. End of story. I have bigger issues than having the Lore section of forums being merged into General Discussion, I mean really.

    1. We’re a bunch of whiners for wanting to be able to keep up with Guide Quests and for Fan Sites to be able to post news? Really? What do you contribute to the EQ2 community? Oh right. Nothing.

      1. My main being Gindotto, I contribute quite a bit to the EQ2 Community on Antonia Bayle everyday.

        You can keep up with the Guide Quests in General Discussion, as stated in Radarx’s post. I don’t see why everyone is up in arms, as if they said “No longer can you discuss these things in EQ2 Forums”.

  39. Restructures and acquisitions are ugly (saying that VERY close to such a problem RIGHT NOW!). The recent activity to try to make things more lean and push people together is uncomfortable, but it’s not the end of the world…and if they believe it helps them…then it does. (somehow that sounded like I was describing a prostate exam….strange). 😯

    I think that the folks at Daybreak Game Company (DGC) are aware that their painful restructure is ALSO the fans’ painful restructure. The uncertainty about the future…the worry of lost ‘investment’…the concern about friends. It’s just like a business reorg (except you won’t lose a place to sleep, your car, or a regular meal if they fold EQ2. Well, some bot makers might struggle, but that’s another discussion).

    So, just as you keep employees productive during restructures by keeping them focused and unified to provide a bit of a support network…condensing the player community makes a certain amount of sense. Is their approach perfect? NO, but unless you’re sitting on a firing line with a mountain of work and thankless customers bitching constantly…STOW IT! You don’t understand; you can’t…even if you have a similar thing in memory to reference.

    1. if they believe it helps them…then it does

      That’s possibly the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever read. I think therefore I am? Sorry that shit doesn’t fly with me.

      The Forum closures aren’t a case of a time-strapped team making tough choices. They literally fired up Metaverse (an extremely blunt instrument for judging forum activity), picked the 6 least active forums, and targeted them for closure, never mind that some of those forums were populated with the most motivated, positive, helpful players around. If they wanted to close down the forums that generate the most community moderation, there were far richer targets to pick.

      The number of subforums has little impact on how much effort a forum community takes to run. However shutting down forums populated by your most passionate players can have a huge impact on your company’s bottom line if people quit subscribing. The Customer Service and Forum cutbacks are causing huge blowback and loss of confidence by players for no good reason.

      1. “…can have a huge impact on your company’s bottom line if people quit subscribing.”

        Exactly. How that is supposed to render the properties more valuable for the investors beats the hell out of me. (Likewise, giving Reddit the traffic instead of keeping it at home…)

  40. Removing what they did from the forums has totally upset me. I feel like they killed the best parts of the forums. If they had removed homeshow as well, I don’t know if I could bring myself to even log into the game. Its sad enough feeling like I need to join facebook…..don’t want to do it no no no. How can this possibly be in line with community needs.

  41. eq2 emulator has been out there for years now. It is time for everyone to start being proactive and get involved. Your desires matter, they can still make a difference and there is time left to make a contribution before the main servers get shut down.

  42. My wife and I have been looking at cutting out some of our time playing DnD 5.0 and Pathfinder to make more time for things that we need to do… but i am thinking if things keep going this way we may go back to the DnD and Pathfinder games and just cut out EQ2, Sadly

  43. Love the way the thread about the forums being removed was closed without a red name even saying why they were closing it. Guess discussing another Daybreak screw the pooch move is anathema to them.

  44. This latest change targets the very heart of the game, imo. The people that contributed to those forums weren’t necessarily highly visible, but they are the ones that put life and enthusiasm into the whole effort. EQ would have died out long ago without someone holding that heart of things close and giving it time and attention.

    Those attitudes informed everything – the direction of the game, the interaction with the community, everything. Especially the GMs. Can you imagine caring enough about a game – the concept and community of a virtual world – so much that you would volunteer your own personal time in order to take care of and give to that world? So many people have over the years, consistently. And that, to me, is what’s kept this world vibrant, alive and fun to be in. It matters that it’s cared about.

    These latest changes are discouraging, and now with the dismissal of the people and places that so much springs from in terms of what shows up on the screen and also in terms of what’s invisible but vital, makes me very sad.

    I have played these games for about 15 years and what has had me coming back was not the mechanics, the numbers, the loot system or the graphics even. They are a part of it, but they’re a part of every game I’ve tried. What’s kept me coming back and paying my money to support is the people whose interest and passion created a world that’s fun and even comforting to be in. It’s been a world with humor and delight.

    Now it’s well on its way to being an echoing ghost of that. What a shame.

  45. Merging forum sections by itself is indeed not the end of the world, however what’s definitively wrong with this company is HOW they do it: lack of communication, lack of preparation, no good alternative etc. You basically try to post in your fav section only to realise it’s no longer there and people are to wonder if they have been banned from editing.

    Not to mention the change in GM policy – couldn’t find any clear statement on this on the official forums but maybe I’m blind, again with no alternative (Blizzard has totally automated the item and char recovery process via their website while we get a “too bad for you just roll an alt/guild”).

    If you want to create a bad feeling for your clients – this is the way to go.

  46. Sadly, it appears someone there does not understand this community.

    The community adds how much value to the game?

    Why downsize the community when the community’s investment costs so little to maintain? DBG doesn’t pay the players for their contributions to making Norrath live and I am not saying they should, but why disrespect the community when they are no small factor in the game’s continuing success? That is what this decision. And why should any of us challenge DBG on it? Because we can and we already gave up too much as it is.

    Don’t take something away that costs nothing to maintain and has little or no downside and then promise that we’ll figure out something better. This is the very kind of approach to problem solving that is so discouraging. And DBG does not appear to have the organizational intelligence that is required to understand how very stupid this is.

    I kept a promise to myself I would never play WoW but broke down and started playing it. There is some fun to be had, but it’s true what many have already said, compared to EQ2 it is a big letdown. I say that going in with low expectations so it’s even sadder. How did we ever get to a place where such a superior product doesn’t receive it’s due. Could it be what Feldon has been saying all along,. The investment company should be tripping over itself right now having a listen to what Feldon and others of similar passion have to say. The people scared about their jobs cannot speak with the kind of freedom we in the community can. I would really like the everquest series to be around for a long long time. My wishlist would include updated graphics, great story telling and underwater zones and I’d be pretty damn happy.

  49. While the consolidation (okay, removal) of some EQ2 forum section is not a positive step for the community, I do not believe it will be the catalyst for many posts entitled “I cancelled my sub and here’s why…”. This sort of stuff is not the likely behavior of a company that is solid, growing, and expanding. It does cause me to pause and think, okay what’s next on the hit list of things that will be eliminated as we continue to witness the right-sizing the Daybreak world. And if this is what the future holds of EQ2 – same price, less “stuff” each week – then it does make me wonder if I want to continue paying for it.

    I am surprised by one thing that this article overlooked – that while some EQ2 forums have been removed, other forums still do exist. There are other titles in the DGC portfolio that completely lost their only forum – – namely Legends of Norrath.

    While, yes, the LON traffic was very light compared to other titles – it was the ONLY place to communicate with fellow players, ask questions, and learn strategies. In a game client which such limited chat functionality it really was the only place.

    So while folks including myself are not impressed or pleased by RadarX’s recent decisions and actions concerning the EQ2 forums, keep in mind that at least EQ2 has something. There are other active titles that are worse off.

      1. The game is actually really really solid at its core, but it was: 1, ahead of its time, 2, involved a major change to its structure that made a lot of cards useless, 3 expensive. Compare to something like hearthstone where boosters are half as much.

        I actually own a few LoN decks in real life (printed out and stuck in front of mtg cards) and break it out once in a while for a bit of fun,

  50. It truly breaks my heart to watch the slow demise of a game that I played from day one and had became a huge part of my life. So many good memories, such frustration at the poor management by SOE, Smed and the like.

    EQ2 should have been bigger than WoW and now, now… now reading stories like this literally brings tears to my eyes.

  52. Having had personal contact with RadarX a few times, he has always come across as not having the slightest idea how a forum should be properly run, nor caring very much about it.

    All he is there for is to support his equally clueless group of sycophant moderators.

    There is 0 good reason for this change, they can’t even spin it due to the fact it makes no sense at all.

  53. This really looks to me like the begining of the end clearly they are downsizing now first the forums then surely merges to servers the writing is on the wall for my money.

  54. The forums removed were all important to certain players:

    Fan Site News and Announcements
    History and Lore
    Guides & Player Events
    I used those three frequently. All of them were geared towards the players, not the company. Is that why they were removed?

    The other three:
    Roleplaying
    PVP & Battlegrounds
    Off-Topic

    Those were not important to me specifically, but two of them were important to specific types of players.

    Question, do they ban people at the forums for complaining? If so, will they ban you from the game too?

      1. I’m not sure the threshold for banning these days. But they can ban for whatever reason they feel is worthy. Usually you won’t get banned unless you repeatedly do something they have moderated you for.

        Forum bans shouldn’t have an effect on your access to the game, I would hope. Historically it would have to be pretty severe to ban access from the forums and the game. But I’m not sure these days if you lose access to both.

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