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Longing for the days of classic EQ

#1

bigcountry23

bigcountry23

Before all the expansion garbage. I'm talking about hunting bixies for Honeycombs in MT, dodging trains in CB, and that long ass run from Qeynos to Freeport. No magical books that poped you to various places on the planet. No Grinding AA's because you hit the level cap. Exploring the world and cursing as you went back to find your body.

Any other old school EQ fans know what I'm feeling?


#2

Shegokigo

Shegokigo

I miss everything up to Velious. After that I could have done without.

As far as classic EQ servers, I'm not sure of many running at the moment but I'm sure something is out there.


#3

Frank

Frankie Williamson

You old school EQ people are full of madness. One of my co-workers is one of you. He still talks about playing EQ until it almost cost him his job and current wife and how much he misses it.

MADNESS.


#4

Shegokigo

Shegokigo

I don't miss staring at a spellbook everytime I needed to regen mana though....


#5

bigcountry23

bigcountry23

That's why I only played Mele classes. Couldn't stand looking at the spell book all day.


#6

Bowielee

Bowielee

Yeah, my main was a Necromancer. I still can't believe I ever found that game fun.


#7

CynicismKills

CynicismKills

I played a Cleric from release until the Lost Dungeons expansion, none of you know true pain as I do.


#8

Shegokigo

Shegokigo

Complete Heal chains for the win!


#9

CynicismKills

CynicismKills

Shegokigo said:
Complete Heal chains for the win!
Click to expand...
I actually didn't mind that so much, moreso:

Being unable to solo past 10-15
No decent DD spells unless you're fighting Undead
No melee ability to speak of
Constant whispers "come to (insert far-off zone here) and rez plz"
Even MORE of those whispers once I had my Epic Weapon
And more!

Then watching my best friend's younger brother solo Plane of Storms mobs with his Druid and level stupid fast, or my other friend solo his way to the level cap with a Necro. I think the reason I enjoy WoW so much is I don't have to have other people to do things. :tongue:


#10

Shegokigo

Shegokigo

I think I spent more money paying Clerics for rezes (and necros for corpse summon) than I ever spent on anythingelse when "item camping".


#11

CynicismKills

CynicismKills

Shegokigo said:
I think I spent more money paying Clerics for rezes (and necros for corpse summon) than I ever spent on anythingelse when "item camping".
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Yeah, I never asked for money if it wasn't far to the rez spot, but sometimes people were such jerks about it, like, not even a thanks. Got to the point I had to go /anon just to get some peace and quiet.


#12

Bowielee

Bowielee

You better believe I charged for corpse summons. those coffins were expensive.


#13



Pojodan

I cannot say I actually -want- to relive those days, since they were full of pain and grind, but I do have very fond memories and occational flashbacks of those olden days of yore.

The main reason it was so great was because I had no concept of scale at the start and as it gradually unfolded I was utterly awestruck.

I remember being actually, truely frightened as I descended the lift on my fresh Wood Elf Ranger and steped out into the black of darkness in the forest, looking for treasures and saw a walking skeleton crest a hill coming towards me.

Shortly after a friend of the friend that had brought me onto EQ showed us off to Freeport and I was utterly dumbstruck at how far we had to travel and how careful we had to step to get to the docks and then boggling over how incredibly long the boat trip was, partway through which I saw islands with dangerous creatures lurking on it that I could, some day, go out and combat.

It was truly awesome when, quite some time later, I actually did go out to those islands and fight those monsters.

EQ captured the essence of adventure in the notion of there being things that you truly should not do or suffer really bad consequences until you're truly ready (or have a lot of friends to help you)

The ONLY time WoW has done that for me was flying between Stormwind and Ironforge and looking down into Searing Gorge and watching valuable metal nodes fly past on my minimap, guarded by huge monsters. Other than that, WoW has basically spoon fed dangers to me, all of which I could defeat from the very start, save for a few (Hellfire Peninsula anyone?)



I'd love to go back and feels those sensations again, but I know I wouldn't today and would simply cringe at the awkward interface and boring grind-fests.


#14



WolfOfOdin

NO NO NO NO NO NO NO

I played on Rallos Zek, the first FFA pvp server. Pvp with full loot on kill for anyone you offed. We had bandit guilds prowling the server at all times. I believe it was a 10 gold tax to actually leave your starting city.


#15

Shawn

Shawn

Tag a drake, tag a drake, tag a drake, tag a drake, circle circle circle, root, blast, repeat.


#16

Shegokigo

Shegokigo

Quad kiting as a druid.... fun times.


#17



meyoumeyou

:paranoid: I still play eq :paranoid:


#18

Shegokigo

Shegokigo

EQ 1?


#19

bigcountry23

bigcountry23

My very first char was a Barb warrior. I remember the feeling of accomplishment of breaking through the Gnoll cave of BB and being out of the frozen lands. Then finding Qeynos and taking a boat (and the boat going away half way through the trip and losing that corpse compleatly because I didn't know about petition, and being pissed because it had a fire beetle eye).

I remember the feeling of Aww I felt when I finally made that cross continent treck and saw Freeport for the first time, or when I saw my first named creature (Lockjaw) in the oasis and I was the only surviving member of the group (meaning I got first dibs on loot, because things like rolling hadn't become popular yet).


#20

Thread Necromancer

Thread Necromancer

Old School EQ oh how I miss that adventure of the game. Not the game so much, but as others are saying, the adventure, the massive new world, the excitement of the game.

I played since nearly day one. I was there on the front lines for the invasion/conversion of Kith. That was exciting. For about the 2 minutes I survived.

Then there was the time I went travelling over to wisp isle and decided I was going to jump off the boat and swim instead of waiting to land at the docks. Yup, lost my corpse under a shark for bloody ever having to make that boat ride time and time (and time and time) again to try and get it back.

ah the stories.... *twitch*


#21

Shegokigo

Shegokigo

Going into a dungeon and screaming "Camp Check", having to wait 45mins for a camp to open, then 8hrs straight killing the same 5 npcs over and over for an item. Yeah that was an "experience".


#22

Frank

Frankie Williamson

Anyone here want to mow my lawn? Seriously, you grind it out for a few months and there may be a slight reward in it for you.


#23

CynicismKills

CynicismKills

Shegokigo said:
Going into a dungeon and screaming "Camp Check", having to wait 45mins for a camp to open, then 8hrs straight killing the same 5 npcs over and over for an item. Yeah that was an "experience".
Click to expand...
I know, right? Like the "wonder" of camping a 14 hour spawn for my Cleric's Epic Weapon, having to let other guildies on my account because I had to work. Or grinding out experience for 4-5 hours in the Planes, and one bad pull wiping my group and losing 3+ hours of said experience.


#24



meyoumeyou

Shegokigo said:
EQ 1?
Click to expand...

Yes, its a very different world now


#25

Terrik

Terrik

Speaking of old MMOs...any old Asheron's Call players? How I miss those days....


#26

Draxo

Draxo

Heh, I was an Iksar from the days of Kunark.. I remember getting killed by those two annoying escaped Froglok slaves as a newcomer.. and then slaying them every time I saw them since in revenge.

I remember getting to know the other Iksar around quite well.. back then it was difficult to leave Kunark, and most of us were confined to that city. I still know the layout of Cabilis by memory.

I remember making written notes of quest objectives etc. I actually found a notepad ful of that stuff a few months ago, and fondly looked it over before throwing it away.

Ah, field of bone.. I still miss it. That place was a nightmare for newcomers, and could easily get out of hand due to the level mixes. Dang scalebone skeletons. Trooper Teir was never around when you needed him.. and always killstole when you didnt want him. I think that was his name anyway.

I remember the lake of ill omen well.. hah, I remember a halfling friend making his way all the way there to deliver me bags and a set of fine steel equipment, plus armor.

I lost it less than 30 minutes later trying to find my way back to Cabilis. And corpse countdown was 30 minutes at that low level. I remember the tell I got. "You mean I made the trip for nothing!?" I later learned to bind find direction to left turn, so it was auto worked on and I always knew the way I was going.

I remember my first trip outside Kunark.. a friend showed up to take me to Karana for leveling. It was a long arduous and dangerous trip.. I arrived there and I was terrified. I did not know my way back, where I was.. I had no option but to just follow, staring around in wonder. A small groud gathered to stare at me like I was some rare beast. I suppose Iksar were a rare sight outside Cabilis / Kunark back then.

Amazing what nostalgia does to perceptions. These days, I couldn't stand it.


#27

Shannow

Shannow



#28

sixpackshaker

sixpackshaker

I miss fishing for rusty knives so I could work on my black-smithing. Or foraging as a ranger in different forests for chunks of wood to make my next upgrade bow. I also miss lying about how much I loved EQ...

I did get to meet some interesting people and have adventures, but I don't know any of them any longer.


#29

fade

fade

I miss CircleMUD.


#30



meyoumeyou

As far as the original posts sentiment about a "classic" version of eq:

I don't know of any current unofficial servers out there that have been consistent at all. There was a recent classic/PVP one that was fairly populated for what it was, but got shut down by the creators due to excessive hacking and the like.

Also, though it is well past just classic EQ, EQMac has been virtually untouched by any game changing patches since the PoP expansion release, preserving a lot of the old school parts of the game that the main game has long changed or evolved from.


#31

ScytheRexx

ScytheRexx

I was a beta tester of EQ1, played for a long time through various characters including a halfling druid and a human monk. EQ was great in that is was the first real 3D MMO I had played and the scope of the world was amazing. You would travel from places like Freeport out to Qeynos and just the run over would be an experiance, finding a random dungeon that no one told me about, or that time I accidently wandered into Mistmoore. When I started WoW I even named my first pet, a crocalisk, after the famous EQ crocodile, Lockjaw.

Really, the issue is that over time that massive world loses it's magic. I have a similar feeling with WoW all the time. I remember when walking into Stormwind as a little human rogue during phase 2 beta blew my mind, the huge statues, the way the music starts up in a chorus, and finally entering the city with the keep looming in the background. After a few weeks though? It just became that place that was not Ironforge, and even Ironforge just became that place with the AH.

Wonder comes from seeing things we never saw before, but over time, those things become old and familiar, and a lot of the magic gets lost in them. I found myself quitting EQ1 not because the game lacked expansive and interesting locations, they still had some charm, but because those things that started out as wonderful (the long trips, the long boat rides, the huge cities) over time became tedious, familiar, and after awhile, boring to me. They were unable to grab me back with the expansions.

Now I play WoW, and every time I consider quitting that game, they remove something that was annoying me and suck me right back. Crafty little bastards.


#32

sixpackshaker

sixpackshaker

Need a list of things that irked you about EQ.

I did not like the long travel times, even with in the beginning areas.
Fishing for Knives.
Coins had weight, and would not convert to the next size coin when you had 100 copper. I always ended up buy and selling back at a loss just to make change when far from The Bank.
Staying logged in just to sell stuff at the bazaar.
Not being able to kill a single MOB of the same level, unless you were a Bard, Druid or Enchanter.


#33

CynicismKills

CynicismKills

sixpackshaker said:
Need a list of things that irked you about EQ.

I did not like the long travel times, even with in the beginning areas.
Fishing for Knives.
Coins had weight, and would not convert to the next size coin when you had 100 copper. I always ended up buy and selling back at a loss just to make change when far from The Bank.
Staying logged in just to sell stuff at the bazaar.
Not being able to kill a single MOB of the same level, unless you were a Bard, Druid or Enchanter.
Click to expand...
Don't forget Necros once they got the pet, and then Wizards once they got Snare. I used to leech xp off of my friend and his wife because they played a Wiz and Druid, so I could just buff and heal them here and there.


#34

sixpackshaker

sixpackshaker

I was a Human Ranger, never got much group love. Until I established a good rep in a well known guild.


#35

CynicismKills

CynicismKills

sixpackshaker said:
I was a Human Ranger, never got much group love. Until I established a good rep in a well known guild.
Click to expand...
Yeah, playing a healer made grouping easy, thankfully. I don't know about now but back then it was impossible for me to solo anything.


#36



meyoumeyou

CynicismKills said:
sixpackshaker said:
I was a Human Ranger, never got much group love. Until I established a good rep in a well known guild.
Click to expand...
Yeah, playing a healer made grouping easy, thankfully. I don't know about now but back then it was impossible for me to solo anything.
Click to expand...
Some type of fruitful soloing is actually (gasp) possible now in the game, with varying degrees of success...NPC healers/tanks for hire...specific mobs designed with melee friendly soloing in mind (less xp but still decent)...buff potions galore...mana/health/endurance regen in 3 minutes or less when out of combat...

its crazy different for the old timers who seen it in the past..



As for the nostalgia bit, I still play and enjoy the game lots, but I totally get it. I first played in the Luclin era, but only had the trilogy pack of expansions (i.e. still relegated to travel on foot). So much of that fun was simply the amazement of exploration and wandering without a clue/hope/prayer of what to expect.

Including the near-ubiquitous boat related horror story everyone has from that era, though to be fair it was never the death of me, just a very intense trip surviving the swim through the ocean of tears after being ditched by a boat upon zoning in.

Running around Greater Faydark as a High Elf pally, constantly getting lost in the forest with trains of mobs on my tail, desperately hunting the familiar sight of the fires outside felwithe in the distance, and the safety of the guards there.

Those godawful basilisks in G'fay around the orc hill *shudder*.

Being on the run from an orc legionnaire that I couldn't finish off myself, spotting a dark elf and running to them yelling for help...only to then realize it was a scowling npc that then gave chase along with another named orc.

Surviving that mess upon finally spotting the Felwithe gates after another 20-30 minutes of desperate running with no clue where to turn.

Being the stereotypical "noob" in Crushbone, joining groups with no clue that I had a specific role to fill as a paladin, a serious lack of important class spells, and a bad habit of ridiculous trains when i just knew i could escape to the zoneline...only to get lost and build a much larger, deadlier train while fleeing.


Like most I would love to have that experience again but I really don't know if thats realistically attainable.

I really do have fun in EQ to this day but it is much more of a "powergamer" experience, trying to be the very best I can be at the game.

Back then it was simply exploration, survival, and adventure. I would really have my interest piqued by a game aimed solely at those experiences, but I don't see it happening anytime soon when the majority of new MMOS are merely hoping to replicate the WoW cash cow experience.

Plus, it would probably fail.


#37

Bowielee

Bowielee

For me, soloing with my necro was more fun than grouping because when grouping i was just a great big mana battery.


#38

Shegokigo

Shegokigo

Bowielee said:
For me, soloing with my necro was more fun than grouping because when grouping i was just a great big mana battery.
Click to expand...
Yeah, solo you got to run in circles for 2hrs while you had a mob pissed at you and your pet biting its ass.


#39



Chazwozel

I remember when I first played WoW, it had an epic like feel to it. I had only heard of the game a week prior to its release, and was really excited to be ONE soldier in the vast armies I used to control in Warcraft 1 through 3. Anytime I start an Orc in Durotar, man nostalgia for that first day of WoW hits me like a ton of bricks. I never played a video game for 8 hours straight until then. I thought the world ended with Durotar too (total MMO noob). Imagine my surprise when I found Ogrimmar and then the Barrens. I was so amazed by how huge the world was.


#40



Aisaku

fade said:
I miss CircleMUD.
Click to expand...
Ooooohhhh that does take me back... CircleMUDs were alright, easier to manage, reliable... played some of them in the day. High five! :aaahhh:








Although, LPMUDs were my thing... I learned C to program items in them. XD


#41

fade

fade

Aisaku said:
fade said:
I miss CircleMUD.
Click to expand...
Ooooohhhh that does take me back... CircleMUDs were alright, easier to manage, reliable... played some of them in the day. High five! :aaahhh:








Although, LPMUDs were my thing... I learned C to program items in them. XD
Click to expand...
You know what amuses me? All the WoW-kiddies who think it's new. Even the slash-commands and emotes are ported straight from MUD-land. Maybe that's why I'm not a huge WoW fan. I already killed the fun back in the early 90s, playing Circle and Diku based MUDs until my eyeballs fell out.


#42

Jay

Jay

I never played EQ much. I played UO religiously till they fucked things up then skipped to AC (and DAOC) until I got bored of it then SWG till the damned CU upgrade to WoW till they fucked up raiding.

I do agree with you, classics cannot be beat. The first few weeks playing a new game are cherished and enjoyable. Nothing will beat the feeling I got during my first Covetous PK run.


#43

Shegokigo

Shegokigo

SeriousJay said:
Nothing will beat the feeling I got during my first Covetous PK run.
Click to expand...
*sighs dreamingly*


#44

AshburnerX

AshburnerX

That was one of the things I loved about UO: If you were dedicated enough and good enough, you can basically claim a territory and most people would stay the fuck out... and if they didn't, they full well knew what to expect from you if you ran into them.


#45

Shegokigo

Shegokigo

One of the many servers that I ran a PK guild on, and probably my favorite: We took control of "Cyclops Island" in T2A. It was the biggest money/rare item farming area in the entire xpac. We ruled it with brutality. Anyone who attempted to come farm would either be killed by one of us who were "hidden" and watching the area, watched until they got a good truck load of money then ambushed and killed, or just unlucky enough to be there one of our patrols would come recalling in.

We made so much money then, our little "community" of homes went from medium/large to huge. :twisted:


#46

Jay

Jay

I wonder how good those emu UO servers are... I've been craving but.... it'll be like tasting stale bread.... :(


#47

bigcountry23

bigcountry23

So a slow day and some googling found some info on clasic EQ emulated servers (many pre-SOL or POP). I'm gonna spend a couple days on one called PEQ and see if it is EQ "how I remember it".


#48

Shegokigo

Shegokigo

bigcountry23 said:
So a slow day and some googling found some info on clasic EQ emulated servers (many pre-SOL or POP). I'm gonna spend a couple days on one called PEQ and see if it is EQ "how I remember it".
Click to expand...
If it is, I'm sure you'll remember how much you hated it quickly. :slywink:


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