It was decided early on that all casting classes (not hybrids) would have
Gate, and only a couple classes would have Bind Affinity. As a matter of
fact, some of you early phase testers might recall that Bind used to require
a then hard to find and costly stone to cast.
After a lot of heated debate, the spell was given to all pure casters, and
after more heated debate the cost of the spell became mana only. You don't
want to know how ugly it got when the idea of the casters being able to self
bind anywhere besides in an adventure zone came up.
So, I wouldn't ever expect any of the hybrid classes to be able to bind. It
is not going to happen, it's something of a concession that bind even works
the way it does now. The idea of inns or static NPC's that could bind was
kicked around back in beta, and rejected.
This is akin to the exp loss reductions that have twice occurred, once in
Beta, and once again in Final. Both times, there was a very strong negative
reaction from many members of the development team, a schism if you will.
But in the name of the holy grail of "playability", the experience loss
reductions were implemented. This was partially offset by the increased
experience needed for levels after 25th implemented a few weeks earlier (but
much too late imho, the damage was done)
In the case of experience loss, the changes were made to help out the game's
actual market. The mass market, RPG newcomer. The game is complex by
design, lightly documented by design, and often daunting, and far too many
folks bypass the built in training curve via various methods, leaving them
at moderately high levels with very deficient play skills (and character
skills).
Those folks tended to die a lot more often than was necessary all of a
sudden, and watching that exp bar keep dropping was pretty discouraging,
especially when you didn't learn from your mistakes. And there are the
inevitable bugs and zone crashes that were fairly common early in retail and
still persist. After a bit of this, people start to vote with their feet.
And since the bulk of the player base fell into this category in one way or
another, from a business standpoint it was suicidal to stand by design
principles in this case.
With the success of EQ, I'm hoping the existing player base will in the
future be educated enough about RPGs in general, and Verant quirks in
specific, so that when EQ2 rolls out, the bar can be raised in terms of
experience and rate of progression/regression. Hitting the level cap in 45
days is appalling to me. Hitting it in 120 days, no matter how dedicated a
player you are, still makes me twitch and drool some.
In the case of Bind Affinity, there's more than enough bind capable players
online on any server at any time to accommodate player needs. The only time
this is not the case is when a fresh server comes online, and the race to
12th or 14th level is on, and those few casters that reach it first are
heavily in demand..but only for a matter of days or even hours.
This is still a strong balancing factor. Synergy. Interaction.
Now, you ask, why did I compare the experience loss changes to giving Bind
Affinity to everyone, either by spell or by NPC's? Well, both rank right up
there as the most requested changes to the game. One happened, one won't.
----- Original Message -----
From: Snicker Furfoot, Esq. <snicker@...>
To: <eqbards@onelist.com>
Sent: Tuesday, July 13, 1999 6:04 PM
Subject: [eqbards] NPC's Binding
> From: "Snicker Furfoot, Esq." <snicker@...>
>
> At 02:51 PM 7/13/99 -0700, you wrote:
> >From: scott@... (scott brisko)
> >
> >What I would like to see is an NPC that could bind for a fee, and limit
> >class based binding to one of a few classes. The advantage that the
class/es
> >would have is the ability to bind themselves away from a city, which is a
> >nice limit for the NPC's. Make sense to me if you want to foster a sense
of
> >being able to explore the world safely.
>
> Actually, that would make a heckuva lot of sense. J.M., mebbe you could
> suggest this idea:
> Inn-running NPC's could, when given the proper coin, cast a "bind" spell
on
> a player. To determine the cost, hail the Innkeeper, and ask the cost for
a
> night. It would make sense, RP-wise, and if you made it cost, say 1 plat,
> players could still undercut the merchants, but other players wouldn't be
> SOL. This would still encourage players to work together to get bound in
> certain areas (not every zone has an Inn, most Inns are inconvenient at
> best. Certain Inns have associated hazards...), but allow travelers to
feel
> safer traveling.
>
> Comments?
> Talies the Wanderer
> Still bound to Kelethin after all these years *grin*
>
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