I would imagine Verant's decision to upgrade Paw was based on analysis of
hard data. They know how many true EQ newbies there are from sales totals.
They know what the mean level is for each server is. They know how many
people do not renew their account once the subscription runs out. They have
heard all the complaints about lack of things to do for high level players.
The expansion is scheduled to come out in March 2000. Prior to then, if
their analysis indicates that the number of high level players who will quit
is higher than the number of new subsciptions, then I would guess we are
likely to see it happen in more places than Paw and Kithicor.

Galtin of E'ci

Bunch of stuff snipped

> I suppose what I'm saying is that Verant is increasing the difficulty by
> leaps and bounds of *existing* zones in order to compensate for the high
> level player base. This is detrimental to the true EQ newbies. If *I*
> started a Gnome Enchanter right now, I'd know that I could invis (lvl 4
> spell for them) and travel the boat to Freeport, EC, NRo, Oasis, SRo,
> Innothule, Feerrott, Rathe Mts, SK, NK, WK, HH, HK if I really wanted to
> avoid Kithicor. OR get a high level escort during the day and save a
> bunch
> of time and zoning. But a real newbie has no idea of what awaits him when
> he zones from the tranquil WC in to Kith. Mayhem, madness and swift death
> and exp. loss. What would *you* do if you had no friends in EQ and got
> killed with one spell by an Undead Cleric somewhere between WC and the
> Rivervale entrance?
>
>