Board News.old [context]
Sender Astark
Date Tue Jul 9 08:09:25 2013
To all
Subject EQ Changes Spelled Out
One of the changes we're making to EQ is lowering the "rating" on many pieces. The rating is something invisible to players, but it's used by builders to determine how powerful a piece of EQ can be. Many items in the game have been given artificially high ratings over the years, and it's time to tone them down. A few examples of EQ that is rated too high : Weeping Blades - Rating 2 - You can get two of these in ten minutes with one or two players Ward Ring, Ruthan's Diversion - Rating 2 - Two quite easy to obtain pieces of L93 EQ. Granite Sandals - Rating 4 - A relatively easy to obtain piece of foot gear given a high rating so that the "random" stats on it would have a chance to be decent In all, there were a lot of pieces that were changed. I'll link an excel spreadsheet with the pieces I've changed once I get home from work. So, the main concern of many players is that if ratings are being lowered then does that mean their EQ is getting a nerf? No, not necessary. In a few situations the rating was increased. Ok, so what about all the other pieces? We've also changed the way that EQ can be built, and the number of OPs that are granted by each rating. OPs are "Option Points" used to assign stats to EQ. +10 HP costs 1 OP, 1 damroll costs 1 OP, etc. A major issue in the past was that older-remort-EQ with a high rating, was more powerful than newer-remort-EQ with a lower rating. Here's an example: Shock Absorber - Rating 3 - L94 - 44 OPs Illuminati Bracer - Rating 1 - L97 - 38 OPs Why would you ever want to run a new zone when your EQ from 12 years ago is better than the new stuff? The higher remort stuff? Chances are, you woudln't, unless it was built specifically better for your class. With the new ratings, the OPs will look like this: Shock Absorber - Rating 2 - L94 - 40 OPs Illuminati Bracer - Rating 1 - L97 - 42 OPs Shock Absorber gets its rating changed because the run isn't exceptionally difficult. It's less powerful than before, but not tremendously so. Lets look at EQ that doesn't have its rating changed and see what happens to it: Old: Motaro's Hooves - Rating 1 - L90 - 28 OPs Sword of the Cube - Rating 2 - L93 - 37 OPs Steel Ring - Rating 0 - L94 - 29 OPs New: Motaro's Hooves - Rating 1 - L90 - 28 OPs Sword of the Cube - Rating 2 - L93 - 38 OPs Steel Ring - Rating 0 - L94 - 32 OPs As you can see, many pieces are seeing no change, or actually becoming better. In addition to the rating changes, we're changing the way that EQ is built. You will no longer see +20 and 30 stats on equipment. Yes, this means that some specific stats will be low, but all around you will have higher stats. We will also be allowing larger bonuses to hp/mana/move, and negative stats will not be as prevalent. Restrictive flags like anti_mage and anti_cleric will grant small individual OPs bonuses. This allows niche EQ to be a little bit more powerful. Tattoos / Translucent EQ will be covered in a separate note as there is a bit to cover with them.