EverQuest Chat on November 24th at 6:00pm - 7:00pm pacific time. Melee System Enhancements! You've been asking for them and now we're ready to discuss them. We're taking a big departure from what many of you are used to when it comes to combat. With that in mind, here is a brief summary of these exciting enhancements to better help you target your questions to us during the live chat. Don't worry if you miss the chat, we'll post the logs on EverQuestLive.com

Increase the contributions melee classes provide in a group setting

Address the current deficit between the pure melee classes and other classes

Add more depth and potential for skilled play to melee combat

Provide a system that encourages attentiveness and decision-making skills, without focusing heavily on twitch gameplay Take advantage of an opponent's weakness. See an opening, strike home for the kill! Monks, Rogues and Warriors will gain the ability to recognize certain weaknesses in an opponent's defense. These "Openings" will be a variety of types and can occur based on several different situations during combat. Be quick though, an opening will not present itself for long. Strike quick with a new combat skill once your character recognizes an opening. These new combat skills are being designed just for this combat system revision. Using and maintaining these skills expends the character's Endurance (a new statistic, calculated from the character's basic stats). Here's a combat example: A warrior is serving as the tank for his group, standing in front of a goblin. While battling the goblin, the warrior makes an exceptional parry and is presented with an opening. An indicator appears with the "opening icon" and the word "Parry" next to it (this information also appears in the chat window). Now is his opportunity to strike back after the exceptional parry! Only certain combat skills can be used to react to a parry opening. Other types of openings will allow the use of other skills. Some skills may be usable in response to more than one type of opening. Also, your position in relation to the target can change the effectiveness of certain skills. In this case, our warrior knows that he can use one of three combat skills, each having some merit. One might stun the target, one might increase the hate generated by the warrior for a few rounds, and one might make it easier for everyone to hit the NPC. In this case, our warrior elects to try to stun the goblin. He presses the appropriate button and luck smiles upon him as he successfully executes the strike, leaving the goblin standing dumbly for a combat round. Increasing Your Endurance and Learning New Skills

Increase Endurance by increasing attributes or by acquiring special items that directly increase your Endurance pool

Find tomes or instructions manuals and take them to specific trainers to learn new skills

Choose your skills from skill categories (such as Tactical) containing skills focused to a purpose

Most openings are available only to a single character, but some are available to all nearby characters

Disciplines will be transferred to this new system

Existing Discipline timers will be reviewed, and several will probably be set to their own timer

Disciplines will require an Endurance cost

Hybrids will receive a limited Endurance pool for their disciplines There will be other changes as well. Keep your eyes on the Test server and our update messages for more details as we move forward. This new system is much more flexible than the existing disciplines. It will be relatively easy to add new combat skills, as well as new skills that are not limited to openings. This system creates the possibility for tremendous enhancement in the future, allowing groups a large number of options when it comes to melee combat. Talk to you in the Live Chat! Alan