Sony's always been good at throwing "chores" at us. At least this system is more player and click-friendly than old EQ. They sometimes seem to confuse "give the player a challenge" with "test his stamina to the limits of his sanity". To be brutally honest I'm surprised Sony didn't go out of business from Carpal Tunnel Syndrome lawsuit damages from the "Shawl Quest" in old EQ (shudder!).
"Come on over baby, whole lotta clickin' goin' on!"
Speaking of these limited instanced parts of our hallmark quests....
I with they'd been more creative with these instanced dungeons - they're okay - some are even good. But I'm not blown away by them, either. And there should be more of them - optional ones. Yeah yeah, everyone's tired of us Sony-bashers bashing Sony - I know (and I'm honestly not trying to bash here - constructive criticism is actualy a healthy thing). But I just expected more. What we have so far are small, few in number, and... not "the next generation of mmo type of blow-me-away stuff". Most are ho-hum. Had they had these 4 years ago ... hey, I'd have been impressed. But the envelop is getting pushed and pushed fast, and imo they need to try a little harder to keep up w/ it. Honestly, LDoNs in old EQ are arguably "better" and "more advanced" in many respects compared to these instanced encounters.
Anarchy On-Line showed years ago that you could have zillions of solo and team instanced dungeons running in these mmo's. Like I said in another post, I get the feeling w/ eq2 that the developers started on a cool "let's give them some awesome instanced places to explore" ... and then got cold feet and backed off - leaving us what imo is a rather parismonious offering. Hopefully they're onto some good ideas here, and hopefully they'll get them running soon. If not they're missing a really good bet - and some other company is going to show them up in this area.
(you may think I'm crazy - but think about it a minute - think about what could go on in special instanced encounters - rules can be different - I mean, some can be pure tactics, some can be brain teasers, some can be pure color and fun - some can be a mix - some could be so different every time that spoilers would be almost no good ---- the potential is awesome if you let you imagination run w/ it - if you LDoNed in old EQ - just imagine what could be done if you ran w/ that concept and went a little wild with it - what if you went beyond "missions" and made "LDoNs" that were ... how to say it - Disneyland's Pirates of the Caribbean ride as opposed to a merry-go-round --- sorry I can't find the right words to describe what I'm feeling here)