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Switching? FFXI >> EverCrack 2?Follow

#1 Dec 09 2004 at 9:58 AM Rating: Decent
OK I am a die hard FFXI player, my roomate got me started on FFXI and now he has switched over to EverCrack (as he calls it, hence his addiction).

For those of you that have switched, im considering it it but I dont know all that much about ever quest, could you weigh in on what aspects are better than FFXI and the things that you really miss about the game? Appericiate it!
#2 Dec 09 2004 at 10:09 AM Rating: Good
Ok the greatest thing about this game is if you never played Everquest it doesn't matter. This game is totally different than the original. My advice to you is go to your friends house and watch him play.

I am trying to put together a bunch of videos of my playing experiences too. You can see a video I made of a crafting process(which in my opinion is way better than FFXI because you actually have to pay attention to it) IN THIS THREAD

I switched over last month and haven't been disappointed yet.
#3 Dec 09 2004 at 10:16 AM Rating: Good
Seriously, you really won't regret the switch. The only thing about FFXI that I miss is some of the people. But the game is dead to me now.

Also, as weird as it sounds, I've been considering picking up EQLive since I started playing EQ2. I just want to experience what the origins of this game are for myself. :D
#4 Dec 09 2004 at 10:19 AM Rating: Good
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409 posts
This question comes up fairly regularly, but only premium members can search so here is a quick answer:

Leveling has a huge fundamental difference. If FFXI you go to one spot and grind off the same crabs for hours without moving. In EQ2 when everyone meets for the party you discuss which quests everyone has in common, and go do them.

Frequently this will involve going into a dungeon, and clearing the whole thing from start to finish. This is possible because you do not gain mana or health from sitting, you gain it whenever you are outside of combat. This of course means that casters do more than stand, cast a spell, sit.

The quests are much more interesting, and give armor and weapons appropriate for your level when you complete them. This, along with the fact that any mob can drop a treasure chest with good loot, makes it so that you will not have to farm endlessly for good gear.

You also get a good chunk of your xp from quests, and get xp just for discovering new areas in new zones. Despite that leveling seems to be at about the same speed as FF, just without the insane monotony.

There is a lot more to say, but without knowing what you like and dislike in FFXI its hard to know where to start. What level were you?
#5 Dec 09 2004 at 10:30 AM Rating: Default
I played for about a year now, mostly doin crafting. I have a 33 DRG, 31 WAR, 20 PLD, 15 THF, every job unlocked but NIN. I would just start to get bored with the monotony. So i would craft etc. mostly goldsmithing.
#6 Dec 09 2004 at 10:34 AM Rating: Decent
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3,293 posts
Allakhazam does have a multi game forum, these sort of questions should be asked here: https://everquest.allakhazam.com/forum.html?forum=22

I'm sure eveyrone else like me is tired of seeing these threads. All you need to do is go there or look back a couple pages, maybe not even a couple.
#7 Dec 09 2004 at 10:36 AM Rating: Decent
Quote:
I played for about a year now, mostly doin crafting. I have a 33 DRG, 31 WAR, 20 PLD, 15 THF, every job unlocked but NIN. I would just start to get bored with the monotony. So i would craft etc. mostly goldsmithing.
Definitly check out that video I made then. It gives you a great idea of how crafting works in the game. It is way more advanced than FFXI. You have to pay attention and there are 4 different levels of quality you can make per craft instead of regular or +1 like FFXI.

Also THIS SITE shows you the artisan tree, unlike FFXI you can only specialize in one aspect of crafting and THIS SITE is being updated on a regular basis to help all crafters out. Good luck to you.
#8 Dec 09 2004 at 11:02 AM Rating: Decent
honestly only thing I miss about FFXI are about 4 people, but sharing email addresses or AIM screen names fixes that problem..

in all other ways EQ2 is simply the better game to me... I'd have to say give it a try and be the judge for yourself. You'll be amazed at what you can accomplish with or without a group.

just last night I had an "orange" rated quest and figured I'd try it solo just to see what I could do.. 4 bears later quest was done. was it easy.. Heck no, but I didn't die once. It was a far cry from impossible if you plan it out.

the biggest issue will be changing how you think.. particularly if you are a mage player from FFXI.. in EQ2 you don't have to stay 5 miles away casting.. and in fact you can melee successfully if you're a mage or priest.

#9 Dec 09 2004 at 11:59 AM Rating: Good
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409 posts
Kouranx, he has a valid question. Who better to ask than the people who actually play the game?

If you don't want to read the thread, then don't. The title is not misleading, so you know what its about. The nerve of some people cluttering up YOUR forum with legitimate questions.

As I mentioned in my earlier post, unless you are a premium member you cannot search old posts. Cut the guy some slack.
#10 Dec 09 2004 at 5:18 PM Rating: Decent
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976 posts
I played FFXI.

I'm not anymore. I was playing it as monk (got tired of PLD AF woes) all the way up until EQ2 release. Then I figured, what the heck, and went and got EQ2.

Uhm, I don't log onto FFXI anymore. I was on a year. I have no desire to go back. This game is just so much...less stressful. Less of a level grinder.

Money generally not as hard to make. Quests are rewarding. Lots of RP going on to keep things amusing. You can chose to be either good or evil, don't have to just be good and do the right thing for Jeuno or whatever.

Parties are generally easier to find, and while waiting you can go solo as well. Much less down time, because you regenerate fairly quickly after a battle both health and mp, especially if you eat food.

You don't have to spend huge amounts on the BEST gear. Keep it updated, but really no one is going to knock you for having something not quite as good as theirs, or not the "uber" and whatever. And you can get most your gear to update by through quests too.

NPC's actually have personality, move around, do stuff...and speak with voices. Some are just asshats, some are hilarious, some are very stern. Adds flavor, wherein FFXI they stood in the same spot and had the same 1 loop of text over and over, and didn't really add to the feel the city was alive.

All in all this game just has an easier feel after the intensity of "gotta get chain 5 and hit lvl 50 tonight" sort of thing. I can log on for an hour, go do a quest or 3, and log off and still feel I got something done. Or I can play all day and do a variety of things both in a group or on my own. Go kill mobs, go harvest, go quest, go explore, RP a little.

With the recent issues with gil sellers and the economy of FFXI basically being torn to shreds, now is a good time to take a little break and just try EQ2. If you don't like it you can always cancel.
#11 Dec 10 2004 at 5:40 AM Rating: Decent
25 posts
I played FFXI for over a year, I was in the beta test, was a loyal follower of it for quite a while. But I also found it was definitely very time consuming just to do anything, you had to spend hourse, first getting a party, organinzing, making sure you had enoughfor gear. It was getting horrible, I ended up beign a beastmaster, as did many others because at least you could solo effectively, did need to wait around, you could move freely and fight. Only problem you could never really party. When evercrack II came out I thought about it a day or two, then I had a rash of deaths reducing me xp by a substantial amount, I was like okay I will try it. Logged onto FF maybe one more time, then canceled my account.

Thier is so much to do, and you can play casually parties don't take forever to form, and if no party can still solo no matter what. And leveling seems to be less of a grind, more of epic battles and close calls. Nothing like faceing a group of 7 monsters, and then having another group charge in, and somehow you and your party surviving. And even if someone dies I like debt a whole lot better then losing exp, and I know a lot of people don't like the shared debt, I do. 1 person in party dies entire party gets 1% debt, much easier to pay off than 6-10%. It makes everyone in the party acocuntabel for the death, which I believe most of the time is true, even when person dies on way to group several times...if he dies once you should arrange to meet him somewhere and travel together. But I have found it easier to recover from a death here than on FF. just my 2 bits
#12 Dec 10 2004 at 9:01 AM Rating: Decent
soulcat!!!

you should come chill with us on permafrost :)


and yes this game beats the pants off ffxi.
#13 Dec 10 2004 at 10:09 AM Rating: Decent
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133 posts
blah, I wrote a whole page of info and it just looked like a rant... this is short and to the point.

I was a huge FFXI fan, got bored. Tried out EQ2... got very bored. EQ2 was just no fun for me and is just an annoying game in my opinion. After 15 days I ran back to FFXI. Then WoW came out, I tried it expecting a game just as crappy as EQ2 but WOW was I wrong. I have not even thought of playing FFXI ever again because I am actually having way too much fun in WoW.

In my opinion: WoW > FFXI > Ultima Online > A lot of other MMORPG's > EQ2

(end of short rant)

But thats my opinion. I just did not like the look and feel of EQ2. It was like every damn NPC had a quest for you and everytime you walk by they were always spamming on my screen. I actually had to turn the sound off by the third day because while NPC's talking is a good thing, too much of it is well... too much. Getting a party is easy but playing in a party is completely different than FFXI and they tried to do something sort of like Skillchains but they call them Heroic Ops. these H.O. are absolutely horrible in trying to get them to work and if someone would hit anything besides a regular attack the H.O. would be lost. I would suggest that you try out both EQ2 and WoW and just see which is more fun to you.
#14 Dec 10 2004 at 10:15 AM Rating: Good
You do know that if you actually complete those quests that they give you, you get exp and useful items, right? And if you complete the quests, they shut up? It's true.

I think EQ2 is a fantastic game. The gameplay is great and the world is very immersive. Heroic Opportunities are going to take some time for people to get used to. By the time most of us started FFXI, the Japanese had already mapped out Skillchains for us. So we didn't have to do the work of figuring them out and working them into a group situation. I'm willing to bet that by this time next year, HO's will be a part of nearly every group in some way or another. :)

However, it's true that EQ2 (much like any game) isn't for everyone. However, I think it's dramatizing a bit to say that it's the worst MMORPG of all time.
#15 Dec 10 2004 at 10:16 AM Rating: Decent
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3,293 posts
Quote:
Kouranx, he has a valid question. Who better to ask than the people who actually play the game?


ohhh you mean that same question thats been asked several times already? Just go back a page or so and read away, thats where he is going to find the best responses and the most.
#16 Dec 10 2004 at 10:18 AM Rating: Decent
2 Characters in FF11, over 300 levels so i put in some time... And I find the switch to EQ2 refreshing. Much more complex game imho... imagine hitting that Heroic Oportunity for a self buff at level 6, you barely have that many tricks/powers at level 30 in FF11. Both are great games and i see things about each i like, but I encourage you to give it a try.
#17 Dec 10 2004 at 11:05 AM Rating: Decent
for the OP.. ask yourself this:

what is it about FFXI that I don't like? What is it I do like about FFXI?

for me it was several things: I utterly hated LFG for hours on end unless you were a WHM, I hated not being able to solo unless you were a beastmaster, and I hated the extreme cost to buy anything in the game relative to your basic income flow. The quest often required full parties or even full alliances to do.. or you wait til you're so high level that you can solo the quest (if possible).. course by then the reward (what little it is) is meaningless. FARMING.. gah.. =_=. Leveling down.. XP loss sux but I can deal with it.. but leveling down.. >_<

what I liked about FFXI: the community (for the most part) was nice.. the forced party system made people *HAVE* to work together and mind their manners or get seriously blacklisted. I felt the graphics were very nice, yes limited model choices but the options that were available were WELL rendered and I like the fantasy setting. I liked the storyline.

for me EQ2 fixed those issues I had problems with.. there's a WEALTH of things to do.. solo or in group. I've yet to actually LFG but I've gotten quite a few invites with all my characters. (2mages, 1priest, 1predator), all classes can solo VERY well.. particularly mages from my experience so far. my cash flow in game from the process of simply leveling and questing has funded my gear.. in fact I hardly need to BUY gear.. quests give great rewards. These are quest I've done solo mind you.. all grouping means is that you can do them a LOT sooner at lower levels or a lot quicker, but some Orange difficulty quest are doable solo with planning and strategy. The quest rewards are always useful, even if you *outlevel* the quest you still get XP for doing it.. and typically a little coin or an item to sell or both. In fact you get XP for just finding landmarks and points of interest which fosters a desire to explore...

also.. you do not level down in EQ2.

EQ2 doesn't use a forced party system.. so unless you're simply a naturally friendly person your friends list will not grow by a factor of 10 quickly like it did in FF.. you get to be a bit more picky about who you want to put on the friends list because you CAN solo.. as such, so far at least, the community in EQ2, though good, doesn't feel as *close knit* as the FFXI community. Honestly I'm fine with this.. it's a side effect of a game where you can solo should you feel the need. Plus the game world is VAST.. in FFXI you'll see a lot of the same people multiple times and that game world isn't small.. but I dare say you could fit the entire part of the continent that holds Bastok and San'doria inside Antonica with room left over. So it's very likely that people you started the game with you'll not see again for a LONG time if you don't keep in touch.

storyline wise I don't think anyone high enough to be a part of the core story has told the rest of us what's going on.. there's the underlying thread of exploration of the new post-shattering Norrath world to see what's changed and how.. and I suspect the leaders of both cities will be involved somehow.. but we don't know how yet.. and of course the microcosm of quest the tie into each other for the various NPC's is nice.

now things to consider.. the game is heavily quest based.. as such there's a LOT of going and doing.. and as with most quest in any game it's a lot of going to this place and going to that place and collecting these items.. etc.. etc.. so if you didn't enjoy things like the dragon quest in FF which required a lot of travel you may not like EQ2's quest either.. since they do require a good bit of travel (though so far not nearly as much time for an average quest) and unlike quest in FF you always get a more tangible reward.
#18 Dec 10 2004 at 2:56 PM Rating: Good
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409 posts
Quote:
Kouranx, he has a valid question. Who better to ask than the people who actually play the game?
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ohhh you mean that same question thats been asked several times already? Just go back a page or so and read away, thats where he is going to find the best responses and the most.


Again, there is no search function unless you are a premium member. I have to ask, why does it offend you that people ask the same question more than once? Just because you have found the answers you are looking for doesn't mean everyone has.

You do understand that in a few months 98% of the posts on this forum will be repeat questions right? There is no way around that, especially when someone new to the forum shows up. They don't know what happened before they got here, so they are just going to innocently ask a question.

And who appointed you forum police anyway? As I said cut him some slack, it was a legit question and one that obviously everyone but you was happy to answer.
#19 Dec 10 2004 at 3:46 PM Rating: Decent
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3,293 posts
Quote:
Again, there is no search function unless you are a premium member. I have to ask, why does it offend you that people ask the same question more than once? Just because you have found the answers you are looking for doesn't mean everyone has.


Ok so I've had a change of heart for Arkelias and the OP. so here goes some info he can read all for himself about other peoples opinions. Links start here:

This ones more or less just people carrying on conversation:
http://eq2.allakhazam.com/forum.html?forum=19&mid=1102049413852268077&num=47

A basic comparason:
http://eq2.allakhazam.com/forum.html?forum=19&mid=110222999762601788&num=4

Another person thinking of leaving FF11:
http://eq2.allakhazam.com/forum.html?forum=19&mid=1102097500785267459&num=12

Another person thinking of leaving, good info here:
http://eq2.allakhazam.com/forum.html?forum=19&mid=1102023141645052045&num=14

Another person expressing his fealing towards the game and telling all, why he's leaving:
http://eq2.allakhazam.com/forum.html?forum=19&mid=1101837400158567773&num=19


Hope these help you out. My apologies for expressing my fealing on an open messege board, won't happen again.


#20 Dec 11 2004 at 7:09 AM Rating: Decent
25 posts
Should of known you'd show up here Turtle, you complained about leaving the game several times and maybe I will make up a character on Permafrost, though I am enjoying Lucan right now.

#21 Dec 13 2004 at 1:34 AM Rating: Decent
hey thanks for the feedback everyone, and Kouranx you just have way to much time on your hands... seriously. I did buy EQ2 and you guys were right it is much better than FFXI. but my graphics card has trouble running it, whereas on FFXI it did not, any thoughts?
#22 Dec 13 2004 at 2:54 AM Rating: Decent
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976 posts
I use a Raedon 256mb 9550 vid card. It runs it pretty good, I prefer NVidia but Raedon was what was on sale :P

You might also want to consider that 1gig is pretty much the "standard" to run this game well. 512 mb you can do, but it's really boggy.

And your processor. I don't even like mine at 2.4ghz, I want to get a 2.8 or a 3.0, but it should at least be something over a 2.1ghz to run.

#23 Dec 13 2004 at 8:37 AM Rating: Decent
my processor is a AMD 2.08ghz and it works fine, also have 1gig ram and 128mb geforce fx 5500
#24 Dec 14 2004 at 4:59 PM Rating: Decent
I had a level 75 Thief on one account and a level 75 White Mage on another account. Probably a couple of the best NA toons on our server. I sold them and moved to EQ2. In my opinion it rocks FFXI in almost every aspect. FFXI can hold up in the graphics department but the mechanics of the game play are so pathetic. It was just too much work trying to get a party as I am sure many of the above have said. To throw a wrench into your debate, I am also playing WoW. I have not made my final decesion between the two. So far they are both great but they have different plus and minuses. EQ2 is more for a mature audience I think. Good luck and hope you find the right game for you.
#25 Dec 15 2004 at 10:44 AM Rating: Decent
FFXI is just a big grind, I had a level 70 hume rdm within the first 2 months of release in NA and every subclass unlocked. The worse thing about it was the people. Some of them were so elitist about how you should play that it became the same monotony every day. To get past lvl 70 required you to fight some mob with a hidden strategy that nobody was willing to share. Especially for a rdm it was almost impossible. It was so tedious that I quit after 3 months. It looks like EQ2 is much more tolerating atm and the quests are fun and will keep you going long after you get tired of killing millions of sheep just to get Mary to spawn.

70 rdm/38 blm/34 rng/31 thf -Siren

Edited, Wed Dec 15 10:47:44 2004 by MoonDragn
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