oneADseven said:I agree with everything you're saying @GoofyWarriorGuy except the idea that Feign Death shouldn't take up a slot on the hotbar. It's an iconic ability and if that type of abilitiy takes up a slot for any other class, it should require a slot from monks as well.
Agree, ability giving you tools to counter some situation or fill some role should be Limited, wether it is FD, Sneak/hide, Mez, Taunt.
If you only do hard farm, as a rogue you won't need your invis except for a CR, thus you can keep more combat oriented situationnal skills on bar. If you're open world travelling/gathering, you probably want that avaliable all the time.
oneADseven said:I agree with everything you're saying @GoofyWarriorGuy except the idea that Feign Death shouldn't take up a slot on the hotbar. It's an iconic ability and if that type of abilitiy takes up a slot for any other class, it should require a slot from monks as well.
I agree with Goofy too, BUT, if you go by what EQ did, it will work the way Goofy says. In EQ Feign Death was in a hotbar, not a spell gem and they were different. Whether it *should* or not is, yes, a different matter.
Having been playing EQ Project 1999 for the last few days and getting an Enchanter and a Druid to around level 10...
It's not the hotbars that are a problem. There is a hotbar window that contains 10 different hotbars with 10 buttons on each, potentially 100 'actions' that you can switch through even in combat (SHIFT+2 to switch to hotbar 2, etc).
With my Monk, even at level 55, I had hotbar keys for every single thing I could do with little macros made for some. I could even switch hotbars (or create new buttons) *in combat*.
It's the spell memorising and spell gems that's the problem. Even at level 1 you have utility spells you will simply never use. Cure Poison? By the time you've finished combat so you can sit down and momorise it, the poison has done its damage and gone. Keep it memorised at the expense of another much more often needed spell? Not going to happen. Memorise it every time you come up against a snake that might poison you then swap back to a more useful spell for other fights? Ugh. Painful.
Can you put spells in hotbars? Only those you have memorised... Even at level 9, my Druid is having to often get out the spell book and swap in 3 buffs, then swap them back out and continue. Then do it again for someone you want to buff. Then again when you die. Swap, swap, swap...
I don't think Pantheon has gone this way, though. It looks like (from the streams) melee folks currently are also using a spell-book-like codex to drag abilities to their single hotbar. This means melee classes are more restricted than EQ even and casters are slightly less restricted (a 12 button hotbar instead of an 8 button gem bar).
This is pre-alpha though...
Personally, I can't imagine they won't have multiple hotbars for abilities and macros and clickies and whatever, but perhaps only have one 'active combat' hotbar that can't be swapped around until out of combat?
The big question for me, having recently played some P99 as I said, is will they restrict the number of memorised spells/abilities and will it be the same for melee and caster?
It looks to me like they haven't settled yet, so we do need to make our voices heard.
If you were used to 'combat abilities' in multiple hotbars in EQ (ie. melee class) you perhaps aren't going to be happy with all those abilities sharing a single hotbar like spell gems do.
If you were used to spells in a single gem bar you perhaps will be fine with having 12 slots, even if it's shared with clickies and potions and whatnot.
Personally, I am happy with 12 'ability gems' which you are restricted to in combat and having 'non-combat' (text macros and whatnot) usable in combat from other hotbars but what about things like potions? Do they have to take up a potential spell or ability 'gem' slot? What about clickies and racial abilities?
disposalist said:oneADseven said:I agree with everything you're saying @GoofyWarriorGuy except the idea that Feign Death shouldn't take up a slot on the hotbar. It's an iconic ability and if that type of abilitiy takes up a slot for any other class, it should require a slot from monks as well.
I agree with Goofy too, BUT, if you go by what EQ did, it will work the way Goofy says. In EQ Feign Death was in a hotbar, not a spell gem and they were different. Whether it *should* or not is, yes, a different matter.
Having been playing EQ Project 1999 for the last few days and getting an Enchanter and a Druid to around level 10...
It's not the hotbars that are a problem. There is a hotbar window that contains 10 different hotbars with 10 buttons on each, potentially 100 'actions' that you can switch through even in combat (SHIFT+2 to switch to hotbar 2, etc).
With my Monk, even at level 55, I had hotbar keys for every single thing I could do with little macros made for some. I could even switch hotbars (or create new buttons) *in combat*.
It's the spell memorising and spell gems that's the problem. Even at level 1 you have utility spells you will simply never use. Cure Poison? By the time you've finished combat so you can sit down and momorise it, the poison has done its damage and gone. Keep it memorised at the expense of another much more often needed spell? Not going to happen. Memorise it every time you come up against a snake that might poison you then swap back to a more useful spell for other fights? Ugh. Painful.
Can you put spells in hotbars? Only those you have memorised... Even at level 9, my Druid is having to often get out the spell book and swap in 3 buffs, then swap them back out and continue. Then do it again for someone you want to buff. Then again when you die. Swap, swap, swap...
I don't think Pantheon has gone this way, though. It looks like (from the streams) melee folks currently are also using a spell-book-like codex to drag abilities to their single hotbar. This means melee classes are more restricted than EQ even and casters are slightly less restricted (a 12 button hotbar instead of an 8 button gem bar).
This is pre-alpha though...
Personally, I can't imagine they won't have multiple hotbars for abilities and macros and clickies and whatever, but perhaps only have one 'active combat' hotbar that can't be swapped around until out of combat?
The big question for me, having recently played some P99 as I said, is will they restrict the number of memorised spells/abilities and will it be the same for melee and caster?
It looks to me like they haven't settled yet, so we do need to make our voices heard.
If you were used to 'combat abilities' in multiple hotbars in EQ (ie. melee class) you perhaps aren't going to be happy with all those abilities sharing a single hotbar like spell gems do.
If you were used to spells in a single gem bar you perhaps will be fine with having 12 slots, even if it's shared with clickies and potions and whatnot.
Personally, I am happy with 12 'ability gems' which you are restricted to in combat and having 'non-combat' (text macros and whatnot) usable in combat from other hotbars but what about things like potions? Do they have to take up a potential spell or ability 'gem' slot? What about clickies and racial abilities?
Mass quoting because of smartphone. But did the monk have so much skills in the end ? AA, kick/round/kick/eaglewhatever/flying kick which are just improved version of each others, sneak, fd, intimidate, range attack, disarm, mend wounds.
Macros for pulling and such, only text based or text triggering one of the mensionned skills.
Eq's baseline monk had no use to keep low level "special skills" in the kick line, so... they are basically one slot. Which ends up 8 skills counting AA and ranged attack, not so big with the caster s 8 gem slots, right ?
MauvaisOeil said:disposalist said:oneADseven said:I agree with everything you're saying @GoofyWarriorGuy except the idea that Feign Death shouldn't take up a slot on the hotbar. It's an iconic ability and if that type of abilitiy takes up a slot for any other class, it should require a slot from monks as well.
I agree with Goofy too, BUT, if you go by what EQ did, it will work the way Goofy says. In EQ Feign Death was in a hotbar, not a spell gem and they were different. Whether it *should* or not is, yes, a different matter.
Having been playing EQ Project 1999 for the last few days and getting an Enchanter and a Druid to around level 10...
It's not the hotbars that are a problem. There is a hotbar window that contains 10 different hotbars with 10 buttons on each, potentially 100 'actions' that you can switch through even in combat (SHIFT+2 to switch to hotbar 2, etc).
With my Monk, even at level 55, I had hotbar keys for every single thing I could do with little macros made for some. I could even switch hotbars (or create new buttons) *in combat*.
It's the spell memorising and spell gems that's the problem. Even at level 1 you have utility spells you will simply never use. Cure Poison? By the time you've finished combat so you can sit down and momorise it, the poison has done its damage and gone. Keep it memorised at the expense of another much more often needed spell? Not going to happen. Memorise it every time you come up against a snake that might poison you then swap back to a more useful spell for other fights? Ugh. Painful.
Can you put spells in hotbars? Only those you have memorised... Even at level 9, my Druid is having to often get out the spell book and swap in 3 buffs, then swap them back out and continue. Then do it again for someone you want to buff. Then again when you die. Swap, swap, swap...
I don't think Pantheon has gone this way, though. It looks like (from the streams) melee folks currently are also using a spell-book-like codex to drag abilities to their single hotbar. This means melee classes are more restricted than EQ even and casters are slightly less restricted (a 12 button hotbar instead of an 8 button gem bar).
This is pre-alpha though...
Personally, I can't imagine they won't have multiple hotbars for abilities and macros and clickies and whatever, but perhaps only have one 'active combat' hotbar that can't be swapped around until out of combat?
The big question for me, having recently played some P99 as I said, is will they restrict the number of memorised spells/abilities and will it be the same for melee and caster?
It looks to me like they haven't settled yet, so we do need to make our voices heard.
If you were used to 'combat abilities' in multiple hotbars in EQ (ie. melee class) you perhaps aren't going to be happy with all those abilities sharing a single hotbar like spell gems do.
If you were used to spells in a single gem bar you perhaps will be fine with having 12 slots, even if it's shared with clickies and potions and whatnot.
Personally, I am happy with 12 'ability gems' which you are restricted to in combat and having 'non-combat' (text macros and whatnot) usable in combat from other hotbars but what about things like potions? Do they have to take up a potential spell or ability 'gem' slot? What about clickies and racial abilities?
Mass quoting because of smartphone. But did the monk have so much skills in the end ? AA, kick/round/kick/eaglewhatever/flying kick which are just improved version of each others, sneak, fd, intimidate, range attack, disarm, mend wounds.
Macros for pulling and such, only text based or text triggering one of the mensionned skills.
Eq's baseline monk had no use to keep low level "special skills" in the kick line, so... they are basically one slot. Which ends up 8 skills counting AA and ranged attack, not so big with the caster s 8 gem slots, right ?
That's right and that's sort of the point I was making. Monks had everything they wanted and more in hotbars. Casters were painfully swapping and memorising in spell gems from level 1.
I think the melee classes in Pantheon will have more to do, though, so may have similar issues to EQ (and Pantheon) casters. I'm glad to see some parity, but I don't want anyone to have to struggle painfully with spell swapping.
I enjoy the tactics of having a restricted primary hotbar, but it doesn't have to be painful swapping abilities around in order to 'enforce' tactical decisions.
I'm currently giving some more analysis and thought to the whole subject and will make another post soon.
I bet you can't wait!
Ok so the basics of what I'm thinking isn't that different to Goofy...
Action types
- Primary (When in combat, can only be used if in the primary hotbar. Core primary class abilities such as Warrior Taunt, Wizard Fireball, Enchanter Mesmerise, Cleric Heals, Rogue Backstab)
- Secondary (Can be used any time, but in combat from secondary hotbar adds a delay. Things like short-term combat buffs, damage shields, secondary heals)
- Utility (Can be used any time without penalty delay from any hotbar. Things like long-term buffs and utility spells like summoning food)
- Game (Can be used any time. Things like Sit, Stand, Camp, Invite, Chat macros)
Hotbars
Any action can be placed on any hotbar
Primary hotbar
Primary actions must be on this hotbar if you wish to use them in combat
Secondary hotbars
Primary actions on secondary hotbars cannot be used in combat
Secondary actions can be used in and out of combat from any hotbar though in combat from a secondary hotbar adds a delay/penalty
Out of Combat
Because secondary abilities can be used from any hotbar out-of-combat, secondary hotbars are good places to keep long-term buffs, utility and travel abilities. Stuff you don't need in a hurry and aren't quick to use anyway.
When a secondary is primary
Perhaps you might want them in the primary hotbar if your current situation relies heavily upon them and you want no delays getting them active (like being in a cold biome where being without your Protection From Ice buff can lead to a quick death)
Hotbar swapping or saving
A method of promoting a whole hotbar from Secondary to Primary (Requires time and activates cooldowns. Can be interrupted)
Supports the concept of having alternate primary hotbars depending on the 'role' you are playing and relieves the pain of changing 'role', eg. tank to off-tank, main heal to buffer, etc.
Alternate Primary hotbars
Whilst typing about swapping, there, it makes me think you might want alternate primary hotbars that you swap in as opposed to promoting secondary hotbars just from an organisational point-of-view.
I guess we're getting to semantics now, though. The concept is the same.
In-combat swapping
Mechanism to enable the use of primary abilities on secondary hotbars for 'emergencies'
- Allow codex-to-hotbar swapping like 'the old days'. At any time, but of course interruptable.
- Allow full hotbar swap, like you can out-of-combat (incase you had the wrong hotbar in place when attacked, for example) obviously takes a while and can be interrupted.
- Important new concept: Allow single use of primary skills on secondary hotbar (or maybe casting direct from spellbook) without the need for 'swapping' hotbar buttons, but with additional time delay/penalty.
Hotbar saving/loading
You know once you've got several versions of hotbars for your different roles and for different playstyles (soloing, crafting, etc) you might want to save one set and load another.
I wouldn't suggest you would be able to do this in combat, but out of combat, it would be great to have named hotbar setups so you could save and load all hotbars at once.
That's it. It's tweakable because you can change what you allocate as a primary, secondary, utility or game action and you can adjust the penalties for in-combat use and swap with longer delays or use times or cooldowns or all three, but I think the basic concept of wanting 'secondary' actions to be 'available' even when not on hotbar one is the important thing.
oneADseven said:I agree with everything you're saying @GoofyWarriorGuy except the idea that Feign Death shouldn't take up a slot on the hotbar. It's an iconic ability and if that type of abilitiy takes up a slot for any other class, it should require a slot from monks as well.
Well, VR will probably agree with you and make FD an active skill that requires one of the restricted active slots, but that doesn't mean I will like it. I guess it depends though on if all the other classes have iconic abilities that they would never be caught dead not having on their bar. Maybe a Taunt on a tank? Or Rogue vanish (if they get it) type ability?
disposalist said:(ibid - comparing from EQ1)
It's the spell memorising and spell gems that's the problem. Even at level 1 you have utility spells you will simply never use. Cure Poison? By the time you've finished combat so you can sit down and momorise it, the poison has done its damage and gone. Keep it memorised at the expense of another much more often needed spell? Not going to happen. Memorise it every time you come up against a snake that might poison you then swap back to a more useful spell for other fights? Ugh. Painful.[/Blockquote]
Bringing it back to Pantheon... I think that for casual play where you are pulling a range of non-named (Not bosses) mobs, then you are right that some abilities like Cure poison might not be needed most of the time. But once you get into a dungeon crawl down to named bosses, perhaps with specific types of guards and such, you will find that specific abilities/spells will need to be on your active bar. Thus why VR is saying that your decisions matter on which spells you use situationally. And yes you may have to give up a 'useful' spell in order to have Cure Poison ready when you fight the boss.
[Blockquote] but perhaps only have one 'active combat' hotbar that can't be swapped around until out of combat?
I really hope that this kind of thing won't be tied to an 'in combat' or 'out of combat' flag. In EQ1 you could still swap spell gems in combat, it just took time and often triggered a cooldown on the new spell so it couldn't be instantly used as soon as it was memorized. As long as they do something like this where you could choose to swap a spell in combat, but it took you time and the new spell isn't instantly ready, I would be ok with it.
Even though they want your decisions to matter, I still think there should be ways you can adapt and change depending on situations. If you engage a boss, and then find yourself getting hit by a poison effect, there should be some opportunity for you to adapt to it and have your Shaman or Cleric switch to a Cure Poison spell and try to salvage the attempt. You shouldn't have to say "Well crap, we didn't have cure poison mem'd so now we need to whipe and do a lengthy corpse recovery and try again".
So you shouldn't be able to just start casting Cure Poison instantly when you realize you need it. But you should be able to make a swap out and hope the group survives long enough for you to be ready to start curing the poison effect.
The big question for me, having recently played some P99 as I said, is will they restrict the number of memorised spells/abilities and will it be the same for melee and caster?
This is exactly the subject we have been discussing... The whole thread got created because of the fact that there was discussion on if VR was going to restrict us to just 1 hotbar with only 12 slots. Thus limiting how many spells we could have available to use. Some people like this, and some people hate this. Thus the discussion.
As I pointed out in my first post on this thread, I personally like the idea of the limited number of actions, but think that some things could be exempt from this limitation. And as I suggested, it should be easy for VR to tag each ability/spell to either be a Limited or Non-Limited. If a spell is Limited, it MUST be on the main action bar (only 12 slots?) to be used. If it is Not-Limited it can be on any action bar and can be used freely at any time. I could also see them lowering the Limited Bar down to less slots if they don't need to have things like Potions and such on that main bar.
Now obviously VR will decide how they want it to work, and we will need to deal with however it ends up. But since they themselves said that it is still being discussed, I don't think my idea is far off what they themselves might be thinking.
It looks to me like they haven't settled yet, so we do need to make our voices heard.
Exactly.
MauvaisOeil said:But did the monk have so much skills in the end ? AA, kick/round/kick/eaglewhatever/flying kick which are just improved version of each others
Eq's baseline monk had no use to keep low level "special skills" in the kick line, so... they are basically one slot.
This is a little off the topic of the thread, but I will respond to it anyway :-)
This is one thing I think VR is hoping to improve upon. The idea of keeping skills/spells relevant throughout the entire game. Back then the "Round Kick" "Tiger Claw" "Eagle Strike" "Dragon Punch" "Flying Kick" line all just being upgrades to each other and once you had the new one you stopped using the old one. In Pantheon I think the idea is that each one of these skills would have a specific niche.
For example they have said that there will be damage types that Mobs can be resistant too, such as "Blunt", "Peircing" or "Slashing". So Flying Kick and Dragon Punch would clearly be Blunt type effects, while Eagle Strike could be Peircing, and Tiger Claw is Slashing. Thus you might need to swap to the one that is most effective for your enemey.
They may also create synergizing effects with other classes. For example, perhaps Tiger Claw has a bleed effect, and perhaps the Rogue class has a "Taint Blood" skill which causes all bleed effects to do 25% extra damage. Or Dragon Punch has a chance to Stun, and your enchanter has a spell "Mind Melt" that will do damage, but also cause stunned targets to be confused and attack it's allies for a few seconds.
Of course this is all just made up idea's, and they will likely have skills with totally different names, but the point is that VR wants Pantheon to have consistant uses for various skills and spells so that nothing becomes obsolete as you level up and get new ones.
I was simply making the point that the monks, and even more the warriors and rogue, had little to no flexibility in their kits with no more "active" abilities than casters during EQ classic era.
However, this won't be the same in pantheon, and I'm happy of it.
Looking forward to your next long post of course !
Edit : posted withouth refreshing the bar.
Since monks will be tied to blunt-ish weapons, thoses strikes could change the damage school of their skill from blunt to piercing, slashing or even magical on a "short cooldown short duration" skill, like the current blackjack kick for rogues.
However I agree I was off topic, answering to disposalist about the numerous skils of the monk that I considered to be a bit exagerated.
disposalist said:Ok so the basics of what I'm thinking isn't that different to Goofy...
Action types
- Primary (When in combat, can only be used if in the primary hotbar. Core primary class abilities such as Warrior Taunt, Wizard Fireball, Enchanter Mesmerise, Cleric Heals, Rogue Backstab)
- Secondary (Can be used any time, but in combat from secondary hotbar adds a delay. Things like short-term combat buffs, damage shields, secondary heals)
- Utility (Can be used any time without penalty delay from any hotbar. Things like long-term buffs and utility spells like summoning food)
- Game (Can be used any time. Things like Sit, Stand, Camp, Invite, Chat macros)
I apologize for snipping away all of your explanation of your idea. It's not that your idea's don't have merit, it's just that it's not very likely that they will be making a change to as complicated a system as you suggest. Especially this far along in the development. You may think that it is straight forward and simple. But what you are suggesting would take a lot more back end programming to make work than you may think. Do you really want them to add a few more months of coding before we even see Alpha?
I also don't think that VR is planning to have an "In Combat" and "Out of Combat" distinction. Other games have these kinds of limits where things can only be done while not in combat, or vice versa. VR though seems to want to keep things simple. If you have the spell on your hotbar, they want you to be able to use it any time you want. They also have already stated that there WILL be limits on how many abilities you will be able to use. The debate seems to only be about how limited your hotbar is going to be, and if there are some things that should be usable outside of these limits.
GoofyWarriorGuy said:disposalist said:Ok so the basics of what I'm thinking isn't that different to Goofy...
Action types
- Primary (When in combat, can only be used if in the primary hotbar. Core primary class abilities such as Warrior Taunt, Wizard Fireball, Enchanter Mesmerise, Cleric Heals, Rogue Backstab)
- Secondary (Can be used any time, but in combat from secondary hotbar adds a delay. Things like short-term combat buffs, damage shields, secondary heals)
- Utility (Can be used any time without penalty delay from any hotbar. Things like long-term buffs and utility spells like summoning food)
- Game (Can be used any time. Things like Sit, Stand, Camp, Invite, Chat macros)I apologize for snipping away all of your explanation of your idea. It's not that your idea's don't have merit, it's just that it's not very likely that they will be making a change to as complicated a system as you suggest. Especially this far along in the development. You may think that it is straight forward and simple. But what you are suggesting would take a lot more back end programming to make work than you may think. Do you really want them to add a few more months of coding before we even see Alpha?
I also don't think that VR is planning to have an "In Combat" and "Out of Combat" distinction. Other games have these kinds of limits where things can only be done while not in combat, or vice versa. VR though seems to want to keep things simple. If you have the spell on your hotbar, they want you to be able to use it any time you want. They also have already stated that there WILL be limits on how many abilities you will be able to use. The debate seems to only be about how limited your hotbar is going to be, and if there are some things that should be usable outside of these limits.
Don't apologise! I love the discussion :)
I do realise it's not a trivial thing, but I'm also sure it's not massively complex, relatively. They will almost certainly be adding hotbars over the initial one for things like text macros, clickies and potions and whatnot. Even EQ had 100 additional hotbar button slots for those kind of things.
The Pantheon situation is slightly different, though, because they have seemingly combined the concept of spell gems and hotbar. In EQ there was no hotbar restriction. The was only spell gem restriction. In Pantheon there are 12 hotbar slots that you fill from the codex and in streams so far it looks like melee and caster classes *both* use a spellbook (codex) and drag abilities to the hotbar.
That being the case, when they add new hotbars, will you be able to drag codex abilities there? Will you be able to cast them from those hotbars? I don't think it's unreasonable to question this.
I don't think it would be much more coding to use class abilities from a second hotbar with extra delay, use time or cooldown.
I don't think it would take much more coding at all to be able to trigger abilities from the codex like that either.w
I don't think it would take much coding to make some actions trigger only from hotbar 1 and some from others and some from the codex.
In short, I think they may well be coding these kind of things and talking about these kind of things right now, so let's discuss and 'help them' hehe.
I just wanted to answer about a specific point :
GoofyWarriorGuy said:
I also don't think that VR is planning to have an "In Combat" and "Out of Combat" distinction. Other games have these kinds of limits where things can only be done while not in combat, or vice versa. VR though seems to want to keep things simple. If you have the spell on your hotbar, they want you to be able to use it any time you want. They also have already stated that there WILL be limits on how many abilities you will be able to use. The debate seems to only be about how limited your hotbar is going to be, and if there are some things that should be usable outside of these limits.
Hard to say, in the last stream, Brad said the cleric would have a "battle rez", a notion that only existed in Wow and wow clones since now, due to "in combat" beeing a thing locking you out of some actions.
However, the term can be simply added to a swift to cast rez spell, with a cooldown tied to it, to allow more flexibility than the usual 10s cast rez.
See here's my problem with the 25+ skills on hotbars, A) there is never any real tactics in it, and you can only reword a skill so many times. In EQ2 I played an assassin, and had all my bars set up so all my highest dps skills were up front and my lowest were at the end. Eventually I got bored doing the same thing over and over.
EQ had limited skills for a long time, and i loved it, you turned on auto attack, which yeah in itself was kinda boring, but you also had to watch for wanderers and all that stuff, not to include you had to decide when to use what skills, because most of them had very long cooldowns, so if you were a warrior and activated your parry every hit ability, you weren't using it for like 6 or more minutes, i forget the exact cooldown, so it made people have to decide when to use these abilities and eventually the game became more tactical because of it.
I hate these button mashers where you hit 25+ skills over and over again, mostly because of point B) you had no time to interact with your group mates. If you did you sucked because you lost so much damage or dropped hate or weren't healing the group/tank enough. It was horrible. I don't want 25 buttons to push unless they all come with like an hour long cooldown. It's stupid to just sit there and spam skills. Left no time for talking, which EQ was the game where i made most of my friends. It left no time for interacting and goofing off. Even if you want to you weren't doing your job properly. It's not tactical to have 25+ skills that you spam, it's tactical having 10 skills with long cooldowns. Or only 8 spells up on your spellbar when you could really make use of 10 or more. You had to decide what to use and when to use it, otherwise you were likely gonna wipe.
Dubah said:See here's my problem with the 25+ skills on hotbars, A) there is never any real tactics in it, and you can only reword a skill so many times. In EQ2 I played an assassin, and had all my bars set up so all my highest dps skills were up front and my lowest were at the end. Eventually I got bored doing the same thing over and over.
EQ had limited skills for a long time, and i loved it, you turned on auto attack, which yeah in itself was kinda boring, but you also had to watch for wanderers and all that stuff, not to include you had to decide when to use what skills, because most of them had very long cooldowns, so if you were a warrior and activated your parry every hit ability, you weren't using it for like 6 or more minutes, i forget the exact cooldown, so it made people have to decide when to use these abilities and eventually the game became more tactical because of it.
I hate these button mashers where you hit 25+ skills over and over again, mostly because of point B) you had no time to interact with your group mates. If you did you sucked because you lost so much damage or dropped hate or weren't healing the group/tank enough. It was horrible. I don't want 25 buttons to push unless they all come with like an hour long cooldown. It's stupid to just sit there and spam skills. Left no time for talking, which EQ was the game where i made most of my friends. It left no time for interacting and goofing off. Even if you want to you weren't doing your job properly. It's not tactical to have 25+ skills that you spam, it's tactical having 10 skills with long cooldowns. Or only 8 spells up on your spellbar when you could really make use of 10 or more. You had to decide what to use and when to use it, otherwise you were likely gonna wipe.
I don't totally disagree, but constantly spell-swapping leads to little time for chat, also ;)
I'm only at level 14 Druid in EQ P99 now, but already I have 15 spells I use quite often having rotate in buffs every 20ish minutes and change 2 or 3 depending on target or situation and there are a few that I simply never use because I will never use like Cure Poison because there are always more needed spells and if I have to finish combat, sit, memorise and cast, the poison has run its course by the time I do it.
Maybe 12 in Pantheon will be a sweet spot. In EQ 8 spells is horribly restrictive.
Maybe in Pantheon, because melee are using the same method (Codex and limited hotbar) it'll be fine. In EQ melee don't have many skills and use hotbars with 100 slots so never had a problem.
I like the idea of tactical choice, but even in EQ you could sit and swap a spell if the party kept the monsters off you. I hope there is at least an equivalent function in Pantheon.
disposalist said:I don't totally disagree, but constantly spell-swapping leads to little time for chat, also ;)
I'm only at level 14 Druid in EQ P99 now, but already I have 15 spells I use quite often having rotate in buffs every 20ish minutes and change 2 or 3 depending on target or situation and there are a few that I simply never use because I will never use like Cure Poison because there are always more needed spells and if I have to finish combat, sit, memorise and cast, the poison has run its course by the time I do it.
Maybe 12 in Pantheon will be a sweet spot. In EQ 8 spells is horribly restrictive.
Maybe in Pantheon, because melee are using the same method (Codex and limited hotbar) it'll be fine. In EQ melee don't have many skills and use hotbars with 100 slots so never had a problem.
I like the idea of tactical choice, but even in EQ you could sit and swap a spell if the party kept the monsters off you. I hope there is at least an equivalent function in Pantheon.
Level 14 in EQ, trust me, not necessary to need more than 8 spells. IDK what happened to EQ, but you used to get what was called sitting aggro. If you sat down to meditate in the middle of combat, you were likely gonna get your butt beat lol. But, all that being said, at level 14 you don't need those spells, making the choice tho ise xactly what I'm talking about, you had to decide what you really needed and what you didn't need.
@disposalist
You seems a bit obsessed with that "100 button hotbar things", while on a class with less than 8 useable skills.
It's like having a basket of 100 apples and only 8 apples to put it, while others have an 8 apples basket with 12 or 15 apples to put in, and simply war/rogue/monks have litteraly no choices of gameplay, no buffs or no flexibility at all.
It's a non sense argument as 92 buttons will be filled with text macros triggering nothing usefull outside of thoses 8 abilities.
Buff swapping... trust me you don't cat's grace or firefists.
A question for those who play(ed) P99: Does it have spellsets already? So you can just define/save/load different sets of spells in your spell bar? I think I would go mad over having to flip through my spell book each time I wanted to change a spell, but spell sets make this process very comfortable.
I hope Pantheon will have something like that, it is a real quality of life feature.
MauvaisOeil said:@disposalist
You seems a bit obsessed with that "100 button hotbar things", while on a class with less than 8 useable skills.
It's like having a basket of 100 apples and only 8 apples to put it, while others have an 8 apples basket with 12 or 15 apples to put in, and simply war/rogue/monks have litteraly no choices of gameplay, no buffs or no flexibility at all.
It's a non sense argument as 92 buttons will be filled with text macros triggering nothing usefull outside of thoses 8 abilities.
Buff swapping... trust me you don't cat's grace or firefists.
It's hardly obsessive to talk about a relevant and similar feature from EQ is it? And even on my Monk I had more than 8 things I might well need to do in combat. Start-stop auto-attack. Assist. Ranged-attack. Dragon Punch (or whatever). Feign Death. Bind Wound (yes, you can do it in combat, even solo if you know the trick). Intimidate. Disarm. Mend. Sneak. Sense Heading (getting turned around when pulling is bad). I also had a clicky robe I liked to keep the buff up from.
I'm not using it as an 'argument' for anything - I'm just saying what EQ was like because some were talking as if it was very restrictive. With hotbars (for melee), it was not. It was only spell gems that were.
Anyway... my 'obsession' aside, as I say, Pantheon is clearly different, since it uses an apparent restricted hotbar for both melee and caster and a codex (spellbook) for both melee and caster and both melee and caster appear to have a hotbar already full of abilities at level 20.
As for buff-swapping in EQ. Yeah, I do need my self-buffs. I'm not a twink and I have to melee a lot as there aren't many groups to be had in P1999 (it's a but top-heavy, character-level-wise).
In Pantheon, maybe they will design it so you can fit all your damage, buff, de-buff, utility, travel, etc abilities on one hotbar. I doubt it, though, and I hope not, beause that would mean very little variety of abilities.
So I'll continue to discuss how I'd like it to be...
Sarim said:A question for those who play(ed) P99: Does it have spellsets already? So you can just define/save/load different sets of spells in your spell bar? I think I would go mad over having to flip through my spell book each time I wanted to change a spell, but spell sets make this process very comfortable.
I hope Pantheon will have something like that, it is a real quality of life feature.
In classic it didn't. I don't know about how it is now.
In classic you had to write spells into a spellbook (like the Pantheon codex) from scrolls mostly bought and eventually crafted/quested. You could write them in the book as you like, but not have copies. You would then click the spellbook ability and click the spell gem hotbar one at a time to make them castable. If you died they would be unset.
Dubah said:disposalist said:I don't totally disagree, but constantly spell-swapping leads to little time for chat, also ;)
I'm only at level 14 Druid in EQ P99 now, but already I have 15 spells I use quite often having rotate in buffs every 20ish minutes and change 2 or 3 depending on target or situation and there are a few that I simply never use because I will never use like Cure Poison because there are always more needed spells and if I have to finish combat, sit, memorise and cast, the poison has run its course by the time I do it.
Maybe 12 in Pantheon will be a sweet spot. In EQ 8 spells is horribly restrictive.
Maybe in Pantheon, because melee are using the same method (Codex and limited hotbar) it'll be fine. In EQ melee don't have many skills and use hotbars with 100 slots so never had a problem.
I like the idea of tactical choice, but even in EQ you could sit and swap a spell if the party kept the monsters off you. I hope there is at least an equivalent function in Pantheon.
Level 14 in EQ, trust me, not necessary to need more than 8 spells. IDK what happened to EQ, but you used to get what was called sitting aggro. If you sat down to meditate in the middle of combat, you were likely gonna get your butt beat lol. But, all that being said, at level 14 you don't need those spells, making the choice tho ise xactly what I'm talking about, you had to decide what you really needed and what you didn't need.
I'm playing it right now as a 14th level Druid and I regularly have to change spells. Sitting aggro happens, yes, but not often if someone else has built aggro.
I want to have available: -
Heal
Root
Damage shield
Snare
Damage over Time
Direct Damage
Harmony
I have one slot left, but I'd like to have: -
Spirit of Wolf (it's really bad if that drops when you need to escape combat)
Panic Animal (if there are animals near that might interfere)
Flame Lick (a smaller DoT I could combine or just use to finish of a monster)
Cure Poison (if I'm fighting something poisonous)
An AoE damage spell (if the group pulls multiple small creatures)
And the there's the buffs, which because there are 4 that I have to spread out (else use up all mana in one go) I'm re-casting every few minutes.
Look, I get the theory and I like the need to be tactical, but what you actually get is some spells just never getting used and a lot of irritating switching because it's not tactical to need buffs, it's constant.
It may well be that 12 is actually plenty BUT we don't yet know if other hotbars will be usable in combat and what can be put on them, so the 12 slots on the hotbar might not be 12 spells/abilities.
There's a balancing act that VR may very well get right, but there's limitations that cause a tactical choice and then (as I'm feeling in EQ) there's limitations that *reduce* tactical choice.
I like to discuss those concepts. VR like feedback. Here we are.
Zorkon said:Currently EQ has loadable and saveable spell sets. You can also right click on an empty spell gem and get a catagorized list of all spells to select from to load an individual spell.
As disposalist points out that was not the case in early EQ
That would be less painful yeah.
It's not the end of the world, but as we all know, some quality of life changes are just that. I'm not sure it brought about the end of MMORPGs for EQ to evolve loadable spells sets.
Don't they even have more spell gems now?...
disposalist said:Zorkon said:Currently EQ has loadable and saveable spell sets. You can also right click on an empty spell gem and get a catagorized list of all spells to select from to load an individual spell.
As disposalist points out that was not the case in early EQ
That would be less painful yeah.
It's not the end of the world, but as we all know, some quality of life changes are just that. I'm not sure it brought about the end of MMORPGs for EQ to evolve loadable spells sets.
Don't they even have more spell gems now?...
I wouldn't mind seeing this system or similar in Pantheon... that pop up list shows all spells sorted by cold fire heals etc and the inside that by level.. eleminates the searching through an endless spellbook.
Yes you can get more spell gems now via AA's. Off the top of my head I think at lvl86 I have 8.... that could be wrong I haven't even logged in my Wizard for months.Definitely can have more... not sure the numbers.
Having played EQ for years, while there were times that I would have liked one or two more slots, creating situations where I could switch spells on the fly became more of a challenge/skill than a hinderance. Specifically, I like the need to be situationally aware and to have to either be prepared or be resourceful to survive. I had 6-7 spells that I kept up at all times for combat, and 1-2 utility slots that I could swap out for buffing/travel/other situations.
The only times I really needed to change a massive number of spells out was for raid preparation, or sometimes for infiltrating KoS areas.
I could get behind spell sets though, as long as they are implemented right. It should only un-memorize the spells that are being swapped, and should still memorize spells one at a time going down the list. And they should still take a nominal amount of time to memorize. Swapping spells in combat should not be without some cost. Though honestly, if there is a /book command, I will probably just do it manually, as I find that to be faster than EQ's current over-over-the-gem menu system.
Just my 2 cents from an enchanter's point of view.
Irriaden said:Having played EQ for years, while there were times that I would have liked one or two more slots, creating situations where I could switch spells on the fly became more of a challenge/skill than a hinderance. Specifically, I like the need to be situationally aware and to have to either be prepared or be resourceful to survive. I had 6-7 spells that I kept up at all times for combat, and 1-2 utility slots that I could swap out for buffing/travel/other situations.
The only times I really needed to change a massive number of spells out was for raid preparation, or sometimes for infiltrating KoS areas.
This. I have a level 100 cleric and enchanter, along with the my level 60-70ish necro (can't even recall now) in EQ1, and I managed just fine with 8, then 9 and then 10 slots in my spell bar. I had a travel set, a solo set, group set and raid set. Done. Whole lineup changed maybe 3-4 gems at most and took maybe 20-30 seconds out of an entire play session. Yeah, what a huge burden...not.
Same for action bars and clickies. It wasn't really much of a burden, or not one I ever really paid attention to.
One more thread where page after page, people are demanding the game be lik EQ2/WoW. SMH.
Venjenz said:Irriaden said:Having played EQ for years, while there were times that I would have liked one or two more slots, creating situations where I could switch spells on the fly became more of a challenge/skill than a hinderance. Specifically, I like the need to be situationally aware and to have to either be prepared or be resourceful to survive. I had 6-7 spells that I kept up at all times for combat, and 1-2 utility slots that I could swap out for buffing/travel/other situations.
The only times I really needed to change a massive number of spells out was for raid preparation, or sometimes for infiltrating KoS areas.
This. I have a level 100 cleric and enchanter, along with the my level 60-70ish necro (can't even recall now) in EQ1, and I managed just fine with 8, then 9 and then 10 slots in my spell bar. I had a travel set, a solo set, group set and raid set. Done. Whole lineup changed maybe 3-4 gems at most and took maybe 20-30 seconds out of an entire play session. Yeah, what a huge burden...not.
Same for action bars and clickies. It wasn't really much of a burden, or not one I ever really paid attention to.
One more thread where page after page, people are demanding the game be lik EQ2/WoW. SMH.
To defend disposalist, low level buffs are not really long in duration and as classes like shaman, you end up eating a lot of mana and time if your whole party want hp/ac/str/dex/agi/sta , but in most case they don't need everything, especially AGI that has a marginal effect on AC, or DEX that is useless out of proc weapons or warriors.
However, I do think there is a difference between "I want" and "I should", I remember with my 20ish SK on P99, removing one of my spell to take shadow step for pulls, because caster mobs tended to root me far from my group and I would end up blasted if I couldn't break it.
Of course, I would have prefered a more practical spell on my bar, but I had to use it or I would face nasty consequences. And that was interesting, because outside of that scenario what good was Shadow Step for ?
Of course you can avoid beeing rooted with proper LOS usage, and that happened most of the time. But sometimes even when wall hugging, one root is enough to be slain while pulling and the consequences are far worse than having a spell for emergencies on your bar.