raids in future moved to max 42

**OrmusTR**

http://eqdev.wordpress.com/2008/07/...-new-expansion/

Chanus

I'm still not really sure about this one.

I can see good points and bad points.

**Zunnoab-Stromm** · 07/22/2008 16:54:15

Oh GOD NO.

Don't lower the max, tune it for lower! Good lord! Now an even higher percentage of raids are going to need to be healers and such, or it will be even further dps focused!

SAY NO TO STRICTLY LOW HARD CAPS!

This is going to suck so bad for any guild that doesn't have extremely high attendance requirements!

Max 54, tuned for 42. DON'T LOWER THE MAX!

JazyaVechette

Zunnoab-Stromm wrote:

Now an even higher percentage of raids are going to need to be healers

Lol that's what I read too. 42 players, still 6-8 clerics.

**belgerrigmore**

NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO

this is a very very bad move, why can anyone in the dev team do somethign good for a #^$@&#$*@ change jesus this is a deathknell

**Abazzagorath**

Absolutely, idiotic.

Good luck any medium level dps class or any class that isn't top at a basic function ever getting in a raid guild they aren't already in.

And I am going to go out on a very short limb, and say that they are going to have similar tanking/healing requirements (cause if you lower those, everything becomes gimp, even with 42).

Rangers and monks aren't going to exist much more at even mid level raiding soon!

**Jebann_GuildPet_LC**

i think the devs are trying to work themselves out of jobs...

Half the reason most of the raiders still play is BECAUSE we still have the largest raid sizes accross all MMO's, thats what makes EQ special and unique... if the devs continue to dumb the game down why would we continue to play a 10 year old game when we could get the same experience in the newer and spiffier games.

For me at least THE reason i dont play WoW or EQ2 or any of the other clones out there is BECAUSE of the raid size and involved content.

renaden

huge risk, i dont think this is good idea. make easy/hard modes or something.

**Subucnimorning**

Quite possible the single worst thing you could ever do to raiding, limiting from 54 people to 42 people does not benefit any one in the spectrum of raiders. Mid range guilds? Won't benefit them as they will have to yield even more players to reach the optimum numbers to beat the events with even less people, making any class outside those optimum numbers 100% useless. High end guilds? Recruit for a good balance of 54 people, essentially make a ton of those people quit due to not being needed in their guild anymore. I will write more when raids are over, good work devs.

**Necropyre**

Is this ALL raids? Unbelievable. This is meant to help guilds that can't field 54, I understand that, but what about guilds that can? It will mean certain classes being decimated in this scenario.

**Calixto-Combine**

uh oh

Unhappy_Monk

It's April 1st right?

**Zunnoab-Stromm**

In PoP raids were NOT tuned for 72, correct? The cap in PoP was 72, but it was not TUNED for 72.

If they want smaller raids, design it for 42 and allow 54 in, just like in the PoP days. HARD CAPS suck, for everyone!

The guilds with strict % requirements will adjust to this better than others, but for the high end with lots of high % dedicated raiders, it sucks. For the mid end and low end with lesser requirements, who still progress but don't have the same force from day to day, a hard cap of 42 REALLY sucks.

Oh good lord this is bad, tune for 42 but put the max at 54, if they must be lowered. Yikes!

**-Kelefane-**

I do not agree with this at all.

LOTS of guilds are still filling 54 man dzadds/tasks with 10+ on the bench for some guilds. What happens to these guilds? You all the sudden have a 20+ person bench then. Your gonna start losing members etc due to riding the pine more than normal.

I honestly see this as being detrimental to the raid game itself in some cases.

This change makes zero sense to me.

Is this your way of saying that the game is losing population or something? I do not see any good coming out of this.

**belgerrigmore**

do these devs even realize that a lot of guilds have 54 + people on raids?

i really like the people in my guild now we have to "cut" 10 + people PER raid? are you fn kiding me?

we have a lot sitting out per night as it is, to do this is just plain stupid if i wanted to have small useless raids on easy mobs i would play god dam..n wow

**Raben-para**

Is it already April? I hope they re think this losing 12 people on a raid sucks. Especially if your raids are always full. Please Please dont let this happen i think 54' is a good number this is just going to break up some guilds.

**Eriient** · 07/22/2008 17:09:41

This is a BAD move. The guild I raid with raids with a wait channel with normally 10-12 ppl in it nightly. On rare nights do we have no wait channel. All you will do is make it harder for people to progress. This will hurt the community and if anything FORCE it to grow smaller. When GoD came out ppl werent happy now your cutting down to 42 means we loose two full groups of DPS on 90% of raids cause you cant loose tanks you cant loose healing and most support classes have been beaten down already to few on raids. This is a down turn to the entire raiding community

Edit: Btw Rytan your post makes NO sense to allow people to experience the content is telling 12 ppl sorry but we have to cut you and no you cant SEE the cotent you only get to hear about it or read about it.

**Dose_RN**

This is garbage.

We have 80-100 active raiders in our guild, and you just screwed our roster.

/rude

**londoTP**

Really stupid, but not for the reasons anyone else seems to be saying. 6 years ago this works fine. Now? How many of the many people who will be displaced and disgruntled do you think are going to keep playing instead of retiring? You should retract this stupidity now, before guilds start the inevitable kicking people out that has to occur, with the vast majority of those cut quitting instead of trying to latch on to a new guild and rebuild from scratch.

**Zunnoab-Stromm**

I'm surprised (so far) it's almost universal opposition.

We raid with between 45-60 per night, depending on how many are able to log on. Because a large core is still on even with 45 (most of the time), it's not that bad... but with 42 cap... it will be harder for guilds like us to keep a high % core without screwing over the people that can only raid 50-60% of the time. Heck, we even have members that raid 30-40% of the time even though they come after the other full members for loot! People like them are going to have a hard time finding raid guilds if this happens, because guilds can afford a few people like that with a strong core at the mid end now. I don't see how guilds will be able to afford too many people like that after the change.

**-Kelefane-** · 07/22/2008 17:11:57

My guild has anywhere from 10-20 people sitting out PER NIGHT and this is with 54 man raids..............

I mean wow, this change baffles me.

This is gonna force guilds that used to fill up 54 man raids to cut back on their roster..Or it'll do it on its own due to people quitting the game due to all the undeeded changes and the fact that they'll never get in on a raid due to a 30+ man waiting list bench style.

**---Sincro---**

I think this would be a fairly horrific idea if it is carried through, for many of the reasons mentioned already.

**Akinit** · 07/22/2008 17:13:24

At least it is not as low as the ldon raids but still it is bad....and how much do you want to guess they will not make it so that you will need less healers and tanks???

So this just makes it so that guilds will have to mini-max their raid choices and only the most optimal choices will be made.

**Palarran-AR**

I agree with providing a significant amount of content doable with 42 people, but doing so at the expense of 54 person content will be a big mistake.

Making both 42 and 54 person versions of a raid, with 30-50% more loot for the 54 person version, would be a much better answer.

TheStormes

The explanation for this is beyong boggling. It's also very self fulfulling because people will stop logging in to sit outside a raid and just quit and next thing you know you've shrunk the population yet again. Presto, 42 person raids and no wait lists.

Nathan_IL

I like it. Requires less of the elite classes to finish a bloody event.

**Kneesmasher_Torv**

It sure would be nice if they had a clue. Just another sign that they don't get it.

If you're going to drop it, why drop it by 22%? Why not go from 54 to 48? That is....if you have to drop it at all. If you want to tune content lower, then by all means do so. Tune it to 48 and for those guilds who can field 54 they get it a bit easier. For those guilds that can field 42, they have it a bit harder. And those with 48 get it about right.

**Zunnoab-Stromm**

Akinit wrote:

At least it is not as low as the ldon raids but still it is bad....and how much do you want to guess they will not make it so that you will need less healers and tanks???
So this just makes it so that guilds will have to mini-max their raid choices and only the most optimal choices will be made.

Either way it could be bad.

For a support heavy guild like us what if we need a ton of dps to raid? For a dps guild like some guilds what if they need much more healing than they have? This is going to limit things even worse I fear. Soft cap it at 42 and let a hard cap at least go up to 48-54, that's not great but it's better than chopping off two groups.

**Taleren_Bloodsong**

Nathan_IL wrote:

I like it. Requires less of the elite classes to finish a bloody event.

You'll still need all those classes, just not the 'more marginal' classes. Min-maxing will make it so more of the people that have a hard time now will have a harder time then.

**Ivocare**

Bad idea imo, for all the reasons already mentioned.

**Crovack**

worst idea ever.

anyone who isn't solely planning on doing "new" raids will basicly have the choice of dropping all old content (as it'll be all but impossible with a guild designed around new restrictions) or plan on just cutting members.

still curious how exactly reducing the raid size will allow more people to participate.

**belaaryourgodprxus**

Of all the ideas, in the history of everquest..... this is about as bad as they come.

**katatonicdreams**

this is the death of EQ if it is true, I do not know what is going through your mind devs. What will happen if you implement this. 1/5 of every guild in the game will quit. You will say O they can join another guild well face it, people do not want to leave their guilds, i would say 50% of people would quit before they leave their guild and join a new guild. Worst idea ever, if this is true it is truely the end of EQ, well it was nice while it lasted. We already have 10-15 people sitting out a night now half of the raid force can be sitting out....awesome.

**Rregguheert-DA**

Worst idea ever. EQ's diminishing population is only gonna get lower if you take away from the one thing that keeps many of us still playing. This isn't wow stop trying to dumb down the game.

**preacher413**

Wow.... really? This seems terrible for guilds that raid with 54 nightly and even worse for classes on the short end of the balance stick in raid content.

**Akinit**

I think that making content for smaller guilds with lower raid attendance is okay, but forcing everyone is very bad. I do not see why the can't have multiple choices like 42, 54, 72, normal, hard, insane, etc instead of just making every raid the same max number.

**Entreri169**

i like it. hell i'd love 24-30 man raids. that way it is much more likely that every player in a raid will be good at what they do, and less likely to just have filler people on raids. every guild, save maybe the bleeding edge guilds, have their core players and then everyone else on raids. i'd love to see raids where it's nothing but core.

Bulge-Scarlet

I do not raid, but I like threads where the EQ community is unanimous, so I think this change sucks too! Besides, I may raid again in the future when all my kids have grown up. That would be in like 12 years but that's ok. SMILEY

**Akinit**

katatonicdreams wrote:

this is the death of EQ if it is true, I do not know what is going through your mind devs. What will happen if you implement this. 1/5 of every guild in the game will quit. You will say O they can join another guild well face it, people do not want to leave their guilds, i would say 50% of people would quit before they leave their guild and join a new guild. Worst idea ever, if this is true it is truely the end of EQ, well it was nice while it lasted. We already have 10-15 people sitting out a night now half of the raid force can be sitting out....awesome.

QFT.

Most players have no interest in joining a new guild because it means starting over and lame probation periods. All of the dkp acquired from the old guild is worthless once you join another one. The choice of quitting is easy for any raider over essentially starting over in another guild with players you may not know or trust.

**Yella_TT**

There are probably many more guilds that run with less than 54 than more than that. Those guilds which do regularly have people sitting out do so because some other guild on the server has died from insufficient numbers. A 42 man format makes it considerably easier to maintain an effective raiding roster and this will be healthier for the high end game in the long run. In my experience when those mid-tier guilds collapse many of the old school players simply retire, they dont move on.

I don't think it will be a big deal. Full raids or allmost full raids were not that uncommon even in mid tier guilds in PoP, and the subsequent move to 54 didn't destroy them. They just didnt recruit until numbers re-adjusted from attrition.

**Sinthala_LoL**

This is absolutely one of the worst ideas hands down.

Alot of the mid range to higher level content guilds that raid are hitting 54 max easily on good nights and have to turn away people.

Now what are we supposed to do? Turn away more people so that guilds with lower player counts can have their piece of the raiding pie? Really, way to go on thinking of new ways to make Everquest die.

**Terminat**

I can't even begin to respond to this. Jaw dropping.

**belgerrigmore**

i really think that they want to kill off eq and this is one of the ways to do it

guess thier thinking is that people will just move to eq2 or something which is very far from the truth i would never play an soe game again

**Taleren_Bloodsong**

Yella_TT wrote:

There are probably many more guilds that run with less than 54 than more than that. Those guilds which do regularly have people sitting out do so because some other guild on the server has died from insufficient numbers. A 42 man format makes it considerably easier to maintain an effective raiding roster and this will be healthier for the high end game in the long run. In my experience when those mid-tier guilds collapse many of the old school players simply retire, they dont move on.
I don't think it will be a big deal. Full raids or allmost full raids were not that uncommon even in mid tier guilds in PoP, and the subsequent move to 54 didn't destroy them. They just didnt recruit until numbers re-adjusted from attrition.

Maybe, maybe not, but it almost killed EQ.

**-Kelefane-**

A lot of people play EQ to only raid. You cutting back on the # of people that can participate is detrimental and nothing good will come out of this at -all-. I know if I was all the sudden riding the bench on a nightly basis when last expansion I was hardly ever benched and IF I only played EQ to raid? Yeah, i'd think long and hard about canceling my account. The only fun I ever got out of EQ was taken away from me. Riding the bench isnt fun for anyone and this makes it worse.

Rytan - You need to rethink this idea. As someone else mentioned, this could very well be the death of the raiding game as far as EQ is concerned. You just made the raid game smaller with this decision and your forcing the guilds hands to do some things that they arent quite ready to do and thats cut back some guild members that they normally wouldnt do in prior expansions.

**Maeryn**

lame. i don't see how this benefits anyone, except for maybe cutting down on familiar lag on raids. there were a ton of good ideas floating around to improve server population and open raiding content for casual players, but all this is going to do is frustrate the guilds that are filling out 54 man raids every night. blurring the lines between casual and hardcore even further than they already are is a slippery slope, most people are only still here because they can't get EQ style raiding anywhere else =(

**Palarran-AR** · 07/22/2008 17:30:18

How about this as an alternative:

First 42 people on the hate list for mob X can engage and fight as normal. Everyone else in the zone gets a Divine Aura effect. As people die, people with the Divine Aura effect are randomly selected to be able to join in the fight. This way only 42 people at a time would be able to fight, and content could be tuned for that number, but additional people beyond 42 wouldn't be entirely excluded (and the power of the raid wouldn't change drastically based on the number of people beyond 42).

Basically it would be like Master Vule without having to count and keep track of how many people are on the hate list ourselves. Yeah, it would be cheesy and artificial, but it would be a MUCH better option than a hard cap of 42.

**bushman82**

I can imagine the emotionally-driven 'debate' over this during the Fan Faire forums already!

**Jebann_GuildPet_LC**

first of all, more than likely a guild that is having problems with fielding 54 man raids currently is almost certainly 1, 2, or 3 expansions behind...

Using that as a working assumption, these guilds wont have the gear to enter current content when the new expansion rolls around anyway, so they will still have to struggle through the previous X expansions at the 54 cap to get geared up enough even to get on to the current expansion content...

when they DO get to the 42 man content the next expansion w/ level raise will be out for most of them which partially trivialises the content anyway...

So basically this does nothing for guilds who cant field 54 man raids, and severely punishes those guilds that can.

These raids, if they get pushed live, wont actually show a tangible benefit to the guilds who have sub 54 man rosters for at least an expansion after this is launched.

This is a poorly thought out idea in all aspects.

**Sinthala_LoL**

Hybrids will end up quitting because high end guilds will min max the dps,healing and tanking to max the potential for a 42 max raid.