Pantheon

Anyone here making any plans to try out Pantheon?

 

I'm trying to migrate to the Xbox.

 

I think 7 outta 10 on the TLE server is just fooling around there until Pantheon.

 

i'm in the PA, as i am a moron with poor money decision making skills.

It is quite beautiful but it is very very early and they have a lot of work to go.

 

Here's an interview about crafting changes that is public so that you can see some of the stuff they are talking about. fairly recent, came out after the most recent February announcements.

 

Thank you, Inire!

I know you said there's still a lot of work to go, but what are your early thoughts? Are you enjoying what you're seeing so far?

 

early thoughts?

I enjoyed Everquest. But I can literally go play Everquest.

A lot of people involved in the Kick Starter and the PA want this game to be Everquest with the "easy mode" things turned off. I would be fine with that as long as the other parts that make people want to play games, instead of spending time dealing with meta game issues are minimized.

Right now, it feels a bit like Everquest. Big surprise, right? Brad McQuaid has a game that is similar to Everquest....

But a ton of systems/features/game world is cut off right now, as they are focusing on specific parts of the game play for each PA cycle. That is about all I can say about it without violating the NDA.

 

I am a backer and at my level I will hopefully get to see some of the alpha when it starts.
I have signed back up with my Vanguard guild as this is a group centric game and a lot of members are keen on coming back to play pantheon.

 

frankly, it is so very clearly a group centered game, that it is practically required to group starting even in the lowest of levels right now. one quest has so many aggro mobs around the quest goals that it is suicide to not have a group, and the quest can be obtained at level one.

 

That gives me a lot to think about. Telling me that it's a lot like EverQuest really has me torn. I genuinely loved EverQuest, but I don't know that I can dedicate that kind of time to a game now. I've had some life changes that have forced me to be a much more casual player than I used to be. EQ2 once struck the perfect balance for me, but EQ2 has lost its appeal now.

I'll keep following it and I'll probably make a small pledge in the near future.

 

All of your concerns I have had as well.

VR is really angling to make this a very hard core, time intensive game, and planning to have it grow slowly. As far as I can tell, VR wants to appeal to that subset of players that always complain about not losing levels when they die.

I will continue to play it, and will probably finish out to live, might even play a bit in live to see how it works out, but I doubt very much that I will be able to play it anywhere near the level of obsessiveness i used to have with original EverQuest, simply because I am no longer living in my parent's house in grade school.

 

Which means that I will not be playing it. I don't like being forced to group to do anything - bad experiences in PUGs have put me off that play-style forever. If it will be a resurrected EQ, that is also enough to put me off. I tried EQ for a couple of weeks, but unfortunately hated the graphics and the dedication required to do anything halfway meaningful in it. I am a seriously casual player, not a min-max hardcore, got-to-keep-spreadsheets-and-statistical-analysis-of-every-fight sort.

 

i agree with what you have to say here. I would like to add that I think Brad's concepts of what a game should be about are compelling, and I am excited to see what is done with it.

Brad also has a nasty habit of running out of money and having to sell out, which makes me sad, and I hope that this is not what will happen here.

 

Somebody's gonna be surprised when they have to casual-ise it to survive past launch. The conditions that made EQ a hit no longer exist except in people's fond and blurry memories.

 

one of those conditions was the complete lack of many other choices. i think there was Meridian 69, UO and uh... eq? was that it? maybe AC?

 

I like the idea of Pantheon, but in all reality I don't think I have the time/desire to play it. I may try it out when/if it comes out, but I'm not holding my breathe.

 

Same, and I suspect a lot of the other people looking forward to Pantheon are going to realize this too when it comes out and they start playing it. That said, hopefully they can strike the right balance between development costs and the size of the audience they're going for; even though I don't have the time for a game like Pantheon, I still think it's a good thing that it exists for those who do.

My other concern when I see people wax nostalgic for the old days is, are they going to be happy with a new game, even if it is remarkably like the old thing they were in love with?

 

Not only can I not play the way I once did EverQuest, I really don't think I'd want to. Don't get me wrong, I genuinely loved EverQuest, and if asked I'd always say it was once my favorite game. I have lots and lots of fond memories and I'm very nostalgic about it. But, I've also got no desire to play that way again.

I remember logging in about an hour before raid time just to get to the raid zone on time. Once there, a 2-3 hour raid window, which is common for games I've played since, would have been virtually useless. One wipe would have used up the entire window. A typical raid night for our guild was easily 6+ hours and our guild raided six nights a week. I just don't have that kind of time (or inclination) to do that now.

If Pantheon is on that level of hardcore I'll just need to keep looking. I was so hoping it was going to be more of a happy medium.

 

i can tell you that the pre-alpha forums are filled with people jonesing for more time on the servers. Literally complaining that they are only allowed to log in during testing windows. even with the very limited actual gameplay allowed currently. Not sure how much more i can say without getting into the derp.

 

none of the raids are live right now. only raid-ish level mobs we've seen are guards/NPC's and the chickens/dragons they spawned last month. and wooo boy... them animations on that dragon were awesome.

but yes, my concern is very similar, in that i enjoyed that TYPE of play for a very limited time of my life (college/high school) and i do not have that much free time anymore.