Top 10 Failed Ways to Discourage Camping in Everquest

10) Rare, expensive "No drop" items changed to "No pickup".

9) Spawn locations of popular camped creatures set to "Extremely Random". If players wanted that Halcyon Broadsword, they had to search for the Ancient Wyvern on all UO and Quake 3: Arena servers.

8) Area around Frenzied Ghoul labeled as "designated EQ marriage zone". There was eventually no room left to camp because it became completely full of guild members attending various weddings between AutymnWynd, the level 23 Wood Elf Druid female, and Strongcrusher, the level 31 Barbarian Warrior.

7) All items and weapons taken out of game and replaced with "large rocks". The coveted "very, very large rock", which was dropped by a dragon in Veeshan's Peak, weighed over seven tons and could not be used by any class or race.

6) Instead of dropping the item when killed, powerful new monsters in the Kunark expansion pack vocally told the player where the item was hidden. Too bad they ended up just making the default male / human pain sound.

5) Safety locks and DNA recognition system installed on all Shining Metallic Robes. If it ain't on the Froglock Archmagi, it ain't gonna boost your INT.

4) Newly created characters started with four bottles of water, four pieces of bread, the Priest of Discord Book, and a Short Sword of Ykesha.

3) Lower Guk converted into rare item strip mall, run and operated by Verant and Sony. It's down right now, no ETA on when it's going to be back up again. Any connectivity problems are external, and Verant has no control over them.

UPDATE: The problems have been found, and we are currently working on them. No current ETA on repairs.

2) Really strong winds put in around Sol B. If you ever sat down to meditate, you'd find yourself pushed all the way back to Freeport within seconds.

1) Any players caught camping were forced to read all the thousands of angry email letters Verant gets daily from furious (Druids / Enchanters / Bards / Clerics / Magicians / Monks / Necromancers / Paladins / Rangers / Rogues / Shadow Knights / Shamans / Warriors / Wizards) that complain how (balanced / unbalanced) the (Druids / Enchanters / Bards / Clerics / Magicians / Monks / Necromancers / Paladins / Rangers / Rogues / Shadow Knights / Shamans / Warriors / Wizards) are and how they can easily change it by (boosting / decreasing) their (STR / STA / AGI / DEX / WIS / INT / CHA) and giving them the most powerful 1H blunt weapon in the game. Insanity sets in after two minutes of being exposed to these messages, causing them to stop working and post hundreds of complaints about their class to EQ forums, complete with a sig file including a 100k animated gif of their character's name with the Photoshop lens flare plugin used in the background. So, essentially, no noticable effects.

– Rich "Lowtax" Kyanka