How is this Compared to Uthgard?

Greetings! I’m currently playing Everquest Project 1999 ands it’s awesome! I left EQ when DAoC went live and it quickly became my favorite. I have Uthgard and like it but the population isn’t that great.
My question is how is Phoenix? I miss RvR and wold love to get into this again. Are there lots of people and active guilds?
Thanks!

Fri 31 May 2019 2:22 AM by Bentleyzsht

Its def worth a try. The PVE is old style, like daoc before you could just chain BG quests on live. You find yourself in 8 man groups camping mobs. The xp isnt as grinding as the first days of DAoC but its a good medium of grind but not dumping your entire life into. It really captures the classic daoc days I remember. Its old frontiers and old BGs. The pop is decent, can't speak much on RvR but while leveling finding a group isnt hard. Id give it a shot, drop in and level a char to 50 and try it out. Its pretty tight.

P.S. Its not Flaky like alot of the other freeshards, seems to have the same stability as uthgard.

Fri 31 May 2019 10:54 AM by USMCbudder

Great! Thank you. I will defiantly give it a shot. I hope it isn’t too hard to install. P1999 is kind of confusing to install. I’ll probably start a character on Midgard so any help would be greatly welcome. Maybe a good guild as well. I look forward to seeing everyone in game!

Fri 31 May 2019 3:57 PM by Horus

They are based on a similar snapshot of DaoC ~ 1.65 version.

However Uthgard is/was much more strict to the 1.65 rule set with a few small tweaks..

Phoenix has much more QoL customization which most agree is an improvement for the most part and makes things more enjoyable/playable for a wider breath of players.

Fri 31 May 2019 11:42 PM by Andryah

Keep in mind... populations are declining notably on Phoenix. So by the end of the year, it is hard to say how active the server will actually be. Fatalists are already proclaiming the server to be racing Uthgard to the bottom of the population metrics... but I disagree with that extreme viewpoint.

Some of the decline is to be expected as there are a lot of veteran DAoC players in the wild who can and did come in to try it out. Some left, because once they hit 50, they remembered the less positive aspect of DAoC. A notable number though appear to have either left, or simply taking a long break, due to changes made to the server over the last 6 weeks or so. Different people react differently to change, and some changes affected some classes more then others. Honestly, I think the notable recent farming nerfs and pet class changes have had the largest effect on population trending downward... because you need plats in quantity as part of your level capped templating for a character(s). AND.. with the owners continuing to make changes in the classes and other adjustments... people are having to re-template.. so total economic depth required for a player is increasing, not decreasing, currently.

In the first couple of months we generally saw close to 3000 online at peak times, and evenly dispersed across the three realms. If you check today, you will a server run rate closer to 1000, though still roughly balanced between the three realms. It would not surprise me to see the server running around 300 (still evenly split across the realms +/-) by later this year... UNLESS the server owners take steps and changes to bring the servers veterans back in notable numbers.

Basically.. the honeymoon is over.

Sat 1 Jun 2019 2:05 AM by Pops999

Come on in, the water's fine. Pop has declined from the bulge at release, like every MMO nowadays, but still more active than some old servers from the halcyon days.

Got the usual cries for nerfs and complainers ( I might resemble one). But overall it's a nice place to get your DAOC fix.

Sun 2 Jun 2019 12:59 PM by Bentleyzsht

Pops999 wrote: ↑
Sat 1 Jun 2019 2:05 AM
Come on in, the water's fine. Pop has declined from the bulge at release, like every MMO nowadays, but still more active than some old servers from the halcyon days.

Got the usual cries for nerfs and complainers ( I might resemble one). But overall it's a nice place to get your DAOC fix.

Agreed.

The pop is fine, its part of the reason it brings back memories of classic DAoC for me. While your horsing somewhere you'll pass some groups leveling, when you jump to head off to your xp spot you'll pass by some camps being xped.

Also if you need any help on installing, there is a support forum on here which covers basically everything. OR you can just post on here and I can try to help you. Its a really easy process, like really easy. Don't over complicate it.

Also what MID class was you looking at starting?

Sun 2 Jun 2019 1:47 PM by phixion

Pop dropped when the devs decided to remove charges.

Sun 2 Jun 2019 5:20 PM by lurker

phixion wrote: ↑
Sun 2 Jun 2019 1:47 PM
Pop dropped when the devs decided to remove charges.

Come on now... there is little to no evidence to support this. You are either being niave, at best, or purposefully trying to use the decline to support your own grievance.

The population stats show a steady decline over time that doesn’t seem to be impacted much by any particular change.

Interestingly enough the stats mimic almost exactly the decline on uthgard over the same time period. In fact, You can see similar population decline on any newly released game/mmo.

I suspect that this I’ll level off at some point and you will be left with the realistic freeshard sustainable population... probably somewhere in the 500 - 1000 concurrent players at peak time, IMO. Hopefully somewhat larger than uthgard’s sustainable population (due to QoL and a broader appeal) of 4–500 (when there was no competition).

None of us should be surprised to see this decline, nor should we arbitrarily attribute that decline to whatever supports our own particular view point / argument / beef.

Sun 2 Jun 2019 5:28 PM by florin

There is ample evidence!

Things that dropped pop:

Domination tasks
Charge nerfs
Pet and salvage nerfs

Things that will add pop:

None of those

Sun 2 Jun 2019 5:41 PM by lurker

So... show me the evidence?

Hint: your opinion is not evidence...

Use unixgeek population stats. Take a look at the decline the weeks prior to the changes you specify. Then look at the decline in the week(s) post those changes you specify... can you demonstrate there difference in the population trend? Did any of those changes accelerate the decline? Slow it? Or did they make little difference to the trend?

Numbers, not opinion.

Sun 2 Jun 2019 5:46 PM by florin

lurker wrote: ↑
Sun 2 Jun 2019 5:41 PM
So... show me the evidence?

Hint: your opinion is not evidence...

Use unixgeek population stats. Take a look at the decline the weeks prior to the changes you specify. Then look at the decline in the week(s) post those changes you specify... can you demonstrate there difference in the population trend? Did any of those changes accelerate the decline? Slow it? Or did they make little difference to the trend?

Numbers, not opinion.

The evidence is in conversations with people who have clearly stated why they have left. If you think I’m about to plot graphs for you then you’re delusional. Read the boards, talk to people it’s an mmo you dork

Sun 2 Jun 2019 5:54 PM by lurker

Your anecdotal evidence is not backed up by the data. The data suggests that the rate of decline would be very similar even had those changes never been implemented.

Anecdotal evidcence such as ‘My 5 friends didn’t like X and two of them did Y because of it’ has so many flaws. It universally seen as ridiculous both here and everywhere else.

There is an argument to be had that those changes are not needed and have had little impact on slowing the decline but no evidence to suggest they have hastened it.

So you call me a dork, I’ll just assume you naive and not purposefully misrepresenting. Not sure which is worse.

Sun 2 Jun 2019 6:12 PM by florin

Anecdotal and qualitative evidence are both evidence. I would expect you to know that. But go ahead keep carrying water.

Sun 2 Jun 2019 6:18 PM by lurker

That’s why I called it anecdotal ‘evidence’.

More often than not, and certainly in scenarios like this, anecdotal evidence is discounted as unreliable, unverifiable and inherintely misleading. Often it is literally said not to be actual evidence at all.

Honestly if you genuinely have a grasp on what differentiates anecdotal evidence against other forms of evidence and are still arguing this then perhaps your are not naive and genuinely are just trying to be misleading.

Just in case...
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anecdotal_evidence

Sun 2 Jun 2019 6:24 PM by florin

There’s one person who is naive here and it’s not me. Next you will tell me that numbers are down due to good weather and that summer is coming. My sweet summer child - have you been reading anything beside the encyclopedia?

Sun 2 Jun 2019 6:34 PM by lurker

Errr, I think I explained exactly my oppinion on what’s happening with the player numbers in my first post. Feel free to go read that again. Never mentioned weather, etc.

Just based upon observations of previous freeshard a and other mmos. And qualified by stating ‘in my oppinion’ rather than stating ‘this is why’ which is what I’m suggesting doesn’t hold water.

Honestly if the 3 things you listed were clearly causes then it would be very evident in the data and wouldn’t require any ‘charting’ by yourself... it would just be very obvious looking at the dates those 3 changes were made and the significant population drops immediately after them. A very quick glance at the data shows this clearly didn’t happen.

Enough enough though. Got stuff to do, you do you and I’ll do me. Good luck out there.

Sun 2 Jun 2019 11:59 PM by phixion

lurker wrote: ↑
Sun 2 Jun 2019 5:41 PM
Use unixgeek population stats.

When was the last time you looked at that site? You do realise it was down for 11 days around the period these changes hit?

And yes, we're not in a court of law here. People can have views on what caused a population to drop, especially when those views are backed up by actually knowing people who left due to said changes.

The charge change went from being a QoL change to a nerf, one which actually caused people to quit the game.

Not good.

Mon 3 Jun 2019 1:12 AM by lurker

phixion wrote: ↑
Sun 2 Jun 2019 11:59 PM
lurker wrote: ↑
Sun 2 Jun 2019 5:41 PM
Use unixgeek population stats.

When was the last time you looked at that site? You do realise it was down for 11 days around the period these changes hit?

And yes, we're not in a court of law here. People can have views on what caused a population to drop, especially when those views are backed up by actually knowing people who left due to said changes.

The charge change went from being a QoL change to a nerf, one which actually caused people to quit the game.

Not good.

'Views' are fine, but that's not how you framed it...

"In my opinion, the buff changes could have had a negative effect on game population, certainly a few people I spoke to left because of this"

Vs

"Pop dropped when the devs decided to remove charges."

Your statement was very much 'X because of Y' whilst we know X is true, you only know the second part for a very small group of people (those you have spoken to) and even then, people don't always tell the whole truth.

yes stats were down for a few days but that's the wonderful thing about trends, you can fill in missing data.

I'm not doubting that some of the people you know said they left because of that change. I'm just sceptical that A) they wouldn't have left anyway in or around that time period and B) for those that did leave purely due to this change another equally sized group of people wouldn't have left had the change not been made (e.g. due to having to farm too much for charges/annoyance at charge juggling/ etc) the trend certainly seems to follow/suggest that.

Mon 3 Jun 2019 5:51 AM by Fooj Fujiyama

If we are comparing this place to uthgard 2.0 then definitely it's a million times better. By the time I can get 4 50's here I would probably only have one 50 untemped on uthgard 2.0. I give them big props for doing balance changes here, like getting rid of old sos for instance. Daoc in general is a masochistic game but uthgard 2.0 was on a whole other level of suck. As the population goes down here it is starting to feel more like Genesis which was a server I loved to play on dearly. The solo game seems more decent lately and with the new port system it's feeling better to attempt solo.

Fri 7 Jun 2019 3:00 PM by cuuchulain79

I think we're now seeing Uthgard getting closer to a 1.65 w/ added QoL server, and Phoenix getting further and further from that. While Phoenix has been issuing sweeping changes to classes, RvR, buffs, and economy...Uthgard has been plodding along doing what they promised since last summer when they publicly left behind strict 1.65.

Recently, we've seen a large uptake in bug fixes, and QoL landing on Uthgard:

Added new Hills of Claret BG for 48-50
Red spec charges for all realms
Tons of new XP loot (hibs get 4.5 bubs of lvl 49)
Insta port option

It's still 9 charge potions...and end pots last 2 mins....but you can get end4, and spec LW past 1.

Recharging remains cheap @ 7.5g in housing...and the economy is stable...templates are cheap, and all realms have lucrative places to farm....if you want to focus on RvR as a solo, you can probably farm one session every couple weeks to keep your (new) charge items rolling.

As Phoenix wanders towards NF, the server we all wanted it to be in Beta is evolving on Uthgard....I think when RvR missions come (soon(tm)) that fans of classic DAoC will really have a fun server again.

Fri 7 Jun 2019 3:10 PM by florin

cuuchulain79 wrote: ↑
Fri 7 Jun 2019 3:00 PM
I think we're now seeing Uthgard getting closer to a 1.65 w/ added QoL server, and Phoenix getting further and further from that. While Phoenix has been issuing sweeping changes to classes, RvR, buffs, and economy...Uthgard has been plodding along doing what they promised since last summer when they publicly left behind strict 1.65.

Recently, we've seen a large uptake in bug fixes, and QoL landing on Uthgard:

Added new Hills of Claret BG for 48-50
Red spec charges for all realms
Tons of new XP loot (hibs get 4.5 bubs of lvl 49)
Insta port option

It's still 9 charge potions...and end pots last 2 mins....but you can get end4, and spec LW past 1.

Recharging remains cheap @ 7.5g in housing...and the economy is stable...templates are cheap, and all realms have lucrative places to farm....if you want to focus on RvR as a solo, you can probably farm one session every couple weeks to keep your (new) charge items rolling.

As Phoenix wanders towards NF, the server we all wanted it to be in Beta is evolving on Uthgard....I think when RvR missions come (soon(tm)) that fans of classic DAoC will really have a fun server again.

Red charges - well that was the reason I left - so tho is interesting

Fri 7 Jun 2019 3:35 PM by Pops999

https://unixgeek.com/uthgard.html

Tens of players. There is no renaissance.

Sat 8 Jun 2019 4:42 PM by Bentleyzsht

Pops999 wrote: ↑
Fri 7 Jun 2019 3:35 PM
https://unixgeek.com/uthgard.html

Tens of players. There is no renaissance.

Servers come and go, uthgard will be fine.

Tue 11 Jun 2019 3:18 PM by Frug

Bentleyzsht wrote: ↑
Sat 8 Jun 2019 4:42 PM
Pops999 wrote: ↑
Fri 7 Jun 2019 3:35 PM
https://unixgeek.com/uthgard.html

Tens of players. There is no renaissance.

Servers come and go, uthgard will be fine.

If "fine" means "gone", then sure.