Nights of the Dead starts October 16th

Written by Feldon on . Posted in Art, Appearance, Housing, Grouping, Itemization, Live Events, Tradeskill

From EQ2Players:

The leaves are turning and the air has become crisp in the land of Norrath. Ghoulish activity has started to increase. It can mean only one thing; the return of the Nights of the Dead. Norrath’s annual Halloween celebration will be returning from 12:01am PDT on October 16th and will run through 11:59pm PST on November 9th.

New this year:

  • New Haunted Hedgemaze in Nektulos Forest!
  • New holiday collection.
  • New Headless Horseman in Nektulos Forest.
  • New rewards for some of the old Nights of the Dead Events!
  • New illusions from the goblins.
  • New costume illusions available from holiday merchants.
  • New holiday recipe book.

Returning favorites:

  • Trick-or-treating in Qeynos and Freeport.
  • Haunted house in Qeynos and Freeport.
  • Ponchy’s quest line in Antonica.
  • Decorations in the cities.
  • Goblins who cast costume illusions.
  • Haunted Mansion in Loping Plains.
  • Candy drops for tradeskilling.
  • Holiday tradeskills are back.
  • Purchaseable costume illusions.
  • Neriak’s clandestine (and smashable) decorations!

Some Nights of the Dead Wallpapers

October 7 Update Notes

Written by Feldon on . Posted in Art, Appearance, Housing, Game Updates & Maintenance, Grouping, Live Events, Raiding

Here are your EQ2 Update Notes for October 7:

GENERAL

  • Legends of Norrath (LoN) cards and booster packs that drop in game are once again tradeable.

ACHIEVEMENTS

  • The Maj’Dul Monitor Achievement now accepts quests completed in the Courts.

MIRAGUL’S PLANAR SHARD

  • The dire and alpha snowbeasts associated with Enraged Haladan now have somewhat less health.
  • Hard Mode: Brilliant Adepts have less health.  Boreas and Argos should no longer cast Trio of Teeth on players while they are leashed.  Curse of Confusion now lasts 18 seconds rather than 30 seconds.

PALACE OF THE ANCIENT ONE

  • Anashti Sul will no longer reset her ring event (the Manta Ray) when raids wipe to her (after the ring event was completed).

Player vs Player

  • Novice of Discord ward will no longer place you into combat when hit.
  • You may now purchase the Crystal of Discord from the general merchant.

QUESTS

  • Quests now sort properly by name.
  • The section of the heritage quest for the dark mail gauntlets, Tie up Some Loose Ends, should now update properly upon entering Miragul’s Phylactery: The Crucible.

SPELLS

  • Spell Trainers will now provide you with the latest information about spells.

SPIRES EVENT

  • The Magic Mouth now can be placed in guild halls, as originally intended.
  • Boss encounters will once again spawn for full groups in The Ethereal Rift.
  • The quest “Connecting Threads” should now be a little less confusing.
  • The Ethereal Rift would sometimes be empty if the player entering it was very lagged. This should no longer happen.

VEESHAN’S PEAK

  • Magics in Veeshan’s Peak are no longer able to restrict players from entering certain wings of the stronghold!

More Shaders 3.0 Snapshots

Written by Feldon on . Posted in Art, Appearance, Housing, Game Updates & Maintenance

Imago-Quem has posted more screen snapshots of Shaders 3.0, the graphical upgrade coming to EQ2 in Game Update 54. I believe these are all images of North Freeport.

EQ2_day-before-000325EQ2_day-after-000326
“Day”
Before | After
EQ2_rainy-before-000351EQ2_rainy-after-000352
“Rainy”
Before | After
EQ2_night-to-morning-before-000371EQ2_night-to-morning-after-000372
“Night to Morning”
Before | After
EQ2_indoors-before-000377EQ2_indoors-after-000378
“Indoors”
Before | After

Previous screenshots shown of Nektulos Forest:

1024x768_EverQuestII_Shader1a1024x768_EverQuestII_Shader1b
“Nek Castle”
Before | After
1024x768_EverQuestII_Shader2a1024x768_EverQuestII_Shader2b
“Nmarr’s Ascent”
Before | After
1024x768_EverQuestII_Shader5a1024x768_EverQuestII_Shader5b
“Nek Forest 1”
Before | After
1024x768_EverQuestII_Shader4a1024x768_EverQuestII_Shader4b
“Nek Forest 2”
Before | After
1024x768_EverQuestII_Shader3a1024x768_EverQuestII_Shader3b
“Underwater”
Before | After

Memory Issues and Chronomages

Written by Feldon on . Posted in Art, Appearance, Housing, Game Updates & Maintenance, Grouping, Uncategorized

Memory Issues

Despite the updated EQ2 Client, some players are still reporting issues with running out of memory in EQ2.

One workaround users are reporting, is to periodically minimize and then maximize the EQ2 application. This seems to reclaim some memory. The EQ2 dev team continue to search for the cause of these issues and intend to release another updated EQ2 client in the next few days.

Chronomage Missions

Thanks to Atan for testing out and reporting back on the Chronomage Missions. If you read EQ2Wire, you know that 3 new NPCs have been added in East Freeport (on the Inn patio) and Qeynos Harbor (across from the docks) to encourage playing level 15-70 content and provide additional rewards.

  • The first of these Quellthulians NPC will mentor you down (without another player present) in 5 level increments from level 10 to 75 for a small fee (5 g and 100 status).
  • A second NPC offers one of 37 Chronomage Mission quests to go back and explore a dungeon ranging from level 15 to 75.
  • The third NPC offers Rewards including some appearance armor (requires 10,000 faction with the Quellthulians) but more importantly, a house item related to the aforementioned zone. There are presumably 37 different house items you can claim by completing these missions.

When Game Update 53 went live, once you completed one of these missions, you were locked out from picking up any others, no matter how many days you waited. Today’s Hotfix corrects this, and each quest is deleted at midnight, allowing you to do a new quest each day.

Just remember that now that the quests are being deleted each night, you should return to the Quellthulians immediately after completing each mission and pick up your decorative house item (if you want it), because it will not be available after the quest disappears from your quest journal.

Bonus XP Weekend – September 25~28

Written by Feldon on . Posted in Art, Appearance, Housing, Game Updates & Maintenance, Grouping, Tradeskill

Bonus XP Weekend

To coincide with Game Update 53, we’ve got a 40% bonus to all forms of EQ2 experience weekend! This applies to Adventuring, Alternate Advancement (AA), and Tradeskilling. Kiara posted the announcement on the EQ2 Forums. Remember folks, if you are between level 10 and 79, you can now adjust the amount of combat and quest XP gets converted into AA XP. I’ve found this to be quite lucrative when doing quests which already award a high percentage of AA and quest XP. 🙂

It was quite nice to login and see:

bonusxp-40percent

There will be a bonus applied to all forms of experience this weekend, starting at 1:00 p.m. PDT on Friday, September 25th and ending at 10:00 a.m. PDT on Monday, September 28th.

Spire Rebuilding — Do we get Hazard Pay? 🙂

Apparently all this rebuilding and re-linking of the Ulteran Spires throughout Norrath is getting the attention of the creatures who do not want these links re-established! They’ve started to make their presence known around spires which are already at a certain percentage completion. Keep an eye out for Heroic and possibly Epic mobs which seek to stop your progress!

spires_rebuilding

Shard of Love

Written by Feldon on . Posted in Art, Appearance, Housing, Game Updates & Maintenance, Grouping, Live Events, Tradeskill

The Shard of Love

A lot of folks have been asking me where the Shard of Love is and how to get there.

First, it should be noted that the Shard of Love is not a group zone like any of the other group zones in The Shadow Odyssey or Rise of Kunark.

The Shard of Love is a very casual group zone that can be completed with 3-4 players. It scales to level (50-80) and rewards appearance items, house items, and reusable cast items. It does not reward the typical armor, jewelry, weapons you are used to in other zones. Some of the mobs, you actually heal them instead of killing them. Think of it more like the Haunted Mansion from last year’s Nights of the Dead event, which was just a fun zone for 3 players.

EQ2 Wiki has drawn a blank, but fortunately EQ2 Zam is on the ball here and has a writeup on Shard of Love and a list of names and quests.

The Shard of Love Access Quest

As for how to access the zone, thanks to Kreanne (Butcherblock) for posting this information:

  1. This quest is picked up at the North Qeynos or Commonlands gates.
  2. Speak with Priestess Annalisa Swornlove in Antonica’s Coastal Grove {-2233, 24, -699} near the druid ring. Harvest a virtuous component.
  3. Travel to the Commonlands where the Avatar of Valor spawns (near the Mourned location).
  4. Return to the Priestess and give here the valorian bloom. Speak to her again and she will tell you that the arrow has been blessed.
  5. Travel to Greater Faydark and find a place that had meaning for Lady Shea. This is around the base of Tunare’s Sapling {-92,0,0}. Find an ethereal arrow the size of a spear and click on it. A Disciple of Hate will spawn and attack you.
  6. Find the weakest point between the Shard of Love and Norrath. As Everfrost is the world of the E’ci, this is where you should go. 🙂 Head to the north end of the dock {-57,-9,56} and click on a scatter of rubble.
  7. Return to the Priestess and give here the valorious bloom.
  8. Return to Everfrost and meet the Priestess there. Once she completes the ritual and opens the portal, you will be able to return here any time to visit the Shard of Love.
  9. Don’t forget to speak to the three Disciples of Love.

Rebuilding the Spires

Also some have been asking where the Rebuilding the Spires events are. You can pick up a quest in the Moors of Ykesha, but this is optional. Just head to the ruined spires in Everfrost, Lavastorm, Zek, or Loping Plains and get started.

You’ll be happy to know that the vendors here have a large selection of items, including those Bracers/Epaulets/Leggings/etc of Imperceptible Beauty, which allows you to hide armor and go “au naturel”.

There are adventure and tradeskill quests alike for aspiring Spire Rebuilders.

Exact Locations of the Spires (EQ2 Zam delivers again)

Chronomagic

If you are wanting to relive the glory days and run lower-level group zones for AA or special appearance armor, you’ll want to check out the Chronomages. There is one that mentors you down to level 10, 15, 20, 25…70, 75 for a small gold and status cost. Another one offers one of 37 quests which reward clearing these underplayed old zones. And a third offers some rather… interesting looking plate armor you might be interested in.

The Qeynos Harbor clan are not hard to find, they’re just across from the docks.

However, the East Freeport group has bumfuzzled a few. They’re living it up on the patio of the bar/inn. If you are a recovering alcoholic, you’ll just have to gather your strength and run through the building, or I suppose you could swim…

Exact Locations for the Chronomages (thanks EQ2 Zam)

Streaming Client (the Tiniest Little Dragon)
Some folks have noticed a new Dragon window on their screen. This is part of the Streaming Client we’ll be getting in Game Update 54. You can read more about it on EQ2 Forums.

Shards of Destiny (Game Update 53) Summary

Written by Feldon on . Posted in Art, Appearance, Housing, Game Updates & Maintenance, Grouping, Live Events, Raiding

Shards of Destiny (Game Update 53) goes live tomorrow, Wednesday September 23rd.

Most notably absent from the Game Update 53 notes are whether the Avatar Gear changes are going live, and whether the Racial Traits received any changes based on the significant feedback posted on the forums.

If you want to read the full Gu53 Update Notes you can read them by clicking right there. I did some significant cleanup for readability and a few clarifications. It’s worth a read, even if you’ve read the official notes.

HOWEVER… we do understand that the full Update Notes are a lot to read and some folks might want just the key points. I can’t guarantee it’s much shorter, but maybe it’s more pleasant to read. So we present them here…

Shards of Destiny (Game Update 53) Notes

Written by Feldon on . Posted in Art, Appearance, Housing, Game Updates & Maintenance, Grouping, Itemization, Raiding

UPDATE: Servers will go down September 23rd from 6am to 10am PDT.

And you can read the complete update notes from EQ2Players. However you might want to read my revised notes…

NOTE: I have gone through these notes and slightly improved them for readability specific to issues I’m familiar with. If that bothers you, go and click on the EQ2Players link above.

Double StationCash

Written by Feldon on . Posted in Art, Appearance, Housing, Daybreak Cash

If you meet these criteria:

  • Live in the U.S.
  • Have access to a big-box store or games store.
  • Desire some item or items on StationCash.

then you may be interested in the retail-only “Double StationCash” deal cooked up by the EQ2 Marketing Department.

Head to Wally World, Buy More, etc. and look not for the 30 day EQ2 cards, but the FreeRealms-branded 500, 1000, or more SC cards. If you redeem them this weekend, you will get double credit. You can then spend those points at any time.

More Details at EQ2 Forums (and for a snapshot of what these FreeRealms SC cards look like — thanks Calthine)

There are always new appearance and furniture items being added to StationCash. This week if you are feeling particularly down in the dumps, you may feel that having a black cloud follow you around matches your mood:

sc_blackcloud

Details at EQ2Players

More Game Update 53 Notes

Written by Feldon on . Posted in Art, Appearance, Housing, Daybreak Cash, DGC Wants Feedback, Game Updates & Maintenance, Grouping, Itemization

While we wait the last 1 1/2 hours for the EQ2 servers to come back up, I thought some of you might like to check out a few more tidbits expected to come in Game Update 53 at the end of the month. I’ve focused on new features here. If you want, you can read the full EQ2 Test Update Notes courtesy of EQ2 ZAM.

GENERAL

  • Runic Deflection should proc slightly more reliably.
  • House layout files now properly save the scaling of an object.
  • The save_layout and load_layout commands now properly save and load positions of NPC amenities.

ACHIEVEMENTS

  • New crafting Achievements have been added.
  • Certain Achievements have had rewards added to them.
  • The Antonican Adventurer Achievement should now be able to be completed. The Achievement has been reset.
  • The Lavastorm Nomad achievement has been reset to allow completion.
  • Some Slayer quests will no longer be added back to your player after converting them to Achievements.
  • The guild event for members earning achievements will now show up in the event list.
  • Achievements can now be expanded even if they are completed.
  • Achievements that give rewards will now display the reward when expanded.  The rewards can be clicked to open an examine window or control-clicked to view in the dressing room window.
  • The Commonlands Colonist and Ykeshan Trekker achievements have been reset to allow completion.

CHRONOMAGIC

  • The Chronomagi Taskers (quest givers to complete older Norrath content) have moved to be near the Timeless Chronomages [article at EQ2 Zam] (causing them to change zones from Qeynos South -> Harbor and from Freeport North -> East. In Gorowyn and Kelethin, they simply moved)
  • When mentoring or chronolocking scaled down item bonuses will now be applied correctly.

ITEMS

  • Rare drops from Tradeskill instances (Deadly Mixing Spoon, etc.) have been flagged as LORE-EQUIP ATTUNEABLE HEIRLOOM.
  • A large number of the Station Cash and Legends of Norrath items are now HEIRLOOM.
  • House items placed in moving crates will now stay in those moving crates, even when you are not looking!

USER INTERFACE

  • Tooltips for Books inside of packing crates will now look correct.
  • The Threat window now resizes properly.
  • The Welcome Screen now displays the name and zone of the Daily Double mission.
  • Hotbar windows no longer have as much empty spacing around them making it easier to stack them close without overlapping.
  • There are now Save Layout and Load Layout buttons on the /house window to help make it easier to manage your house layout setups! You can save the location and size of all your house items, and restore it later (Frostfell setup anyone?)
  • The raid window has been put on a diet and is now slightly more compact.
  • The raid window progress bars are slightly larger and more readable.
  • There are now placeholder icons for the detrimental icons on the raid window.

Lifting the Ceiling on Kelethin Housing

Written by Feldon on . Posted in Art, Appearance, Housing, DGC Wants Feedback, Game Updates & Maintenance

Within hours of our reporting on some drawbacks to the otherwise fantastic revamp of housing throughout Norrath, Haohmaru chimed in indicating that he agrees with some of the concerns folks had both with the size of the Qeynos addition, as well as the loss of space in the Kelethin acorn. He’s already posted screen shots of some additional changes he’s made on the EQ2 Forums.

The additional room in Qeynos is quite nice, and the changes in the Kelethin 3 room acorns should go a long way towards addressing some of the issues. Sorry I didn’t get this posted sooner, as the changes happened in a remarkably short time after Gu53 was pushed to Test.

The Acorn becomes the Tree becomes the Acorn (Gu53)

Written by Feldon on . Posted in Art, Appearance, Housing, DGC Wants Feedback, Game Updates & Maintenance

There have been mixed reactions to the additional rooms which have been added to housing throughout Norrath. They say no good deed goes unpunished. 🙂

Seriously, I do understand the plight of owners of 3-room acorns in Kelethin who took advantage of the unique geometry of these houses to craft some truly fantastic homes who are now affected by how the 4th room was added. Specifically, the ceiling was lowered, and a ramp was added where there was previously space. Fortunately, Art Lead Haohmaru has been quick to respond on the EQ2 Forums that this is something he will look into as it was not intentional to block areas which were previously open.

In other news, those who are lucky (or affluent) enough to have taken up lodgings in the 4 room Maj’dul housing (this requires warmly faction with one of the Courts) will notice some upgrades to their desert-based digs. Specifically, a skylight which provides a splendid view of the Tower of the Moon:

housing_majdul4

And as you may have already seen, the view from the windows in the Kelethin acorns is breathtaking:
kelethin_1room_window1_th kelethin_2room3_th

housing_kelethinoutside

– Shards of Destiny Housing Preview –

   

More on Achievements (Gu53)

Written by Feldon on . Posted in Art, Appearance, Housing, DGC Wants Feedback, Game Updates & Maintenance

Think you’ve seen all there is to see in Antonica? Think you’ve explored every ice floe of Everfrost? Now you can be sure! The new Achievements system coming with Gu53 will allow you to, at-a-glance, determine if you have discovered every Location there is to discover in Norrath. This is broken down by Zone.

achievements_discovery

One of my top requests over the years has been a means to figure out if we have already toppled the reign of a specific enemy, or named monster. We saw improvements here, with the addition of a white star above the name of any targeted named encounter that we have never been victorious over.

The new Achievements system adds to this, by listing the major named creatures (and sometimes groups of named) by Expansion, and whether we have killed them.

achievements_named

There is one issue that those fastidious players who have already reached 200 AAs will face with the new Achievements system. Because named kills are not tracked for characters who have reached the current cap of 200 AA points, there is no way for those Achievements to be retroactively recognized until the Achievements system is in place. You’ll need to repeat any of those kills after Gu53 to get the Achievement for it.

achievements_armor

User Interface Steps Up a Notch (Gu53)

Written by Feldon on . Posted in Art, Appearance, Housing, DGC Wants Feedback, Game Updates & Maintenance

If you have not read the EQ2 forums much, you might not know Rothgar. He has been working very hard on improving the User Interface of EQ2. Specifically cleaning up and improving windows.

It was a pleasant surprise to me that the oft-forgotten Claim window has been rebuilt using existing assets, namely the Station Marketplace. It’s a lot easier to navigate and can be browsed by Expansion, special Events, and you can easily view which Claim Items you have already acquired.

claimwindow
New Claim Window

Although some alternate User Interfaces have existed which provide a more advanced Quest Journal such as ProfitUI, Fetish, etc., it is nice to see a two-paned Quest Journal arriving in EQ2. Using tabs at both the top and bottom, the window becomes more vertically space-efficient. The Quest Journal is also home to an exciting new feature in EQ2 — Achievements.

questwindow
Quest Journal

Not to be confused with Alternate Achievements (AA), Achievements are game tasks such as:

  • Defeating Venril Sathir
  • discovering every Location in Greater Fay
  • Rolling a 100 in a Need Before Greed loot roll
  • Acquiring a 400 skill in Alcohol Tolerance
  • Slaying 25 Werewolves
  • Obtain 400 Transmuting

and then further achievements for clearing all the achievements in a particular Expansion or Zone.

achievementsjournal
Achievements Window

Looking at the Achievements currently in place, it is clear that while this is just the beginning, the sky is the limit on possible Achievements that can be added. On Test, there are achievements for killing 25 Gnolls, or completing 10 Heritage Quests, or 100 Quests. I expect we’ll see many more Achievements added by the time Gu53 goes live, as it is intended for this system to replace the Slayer Rankings.

I should add that while not every Achievement has a reward (sometimes the journey is its own reward), a select few do have some very nice rewards, including Titles (replacing the Slayer Poster/Title system), a teleportation device, as well as some exceptional clothing and armor appearances.

Supper at the O.K. Corral (Gu53)

Written by Feldon on . Posted in Art, Appearance, Housing, Game Updates & Maintenance, Tradeskill

Now that the Norrathian Health Department has certified that beasts of burden may be housed in Guild Halls and Personal Homes alike, many citizens have been having a tough go at corralling and feeding their 4 legged friends. Fortunately, carpenters have discovered a variety of recipes that will aid in this endeavor and perhaps keep the mess to a minimum. 🙂

housing_animalfarm

Game Update #53 (Shards of Destiny) on Test

Written by Feldon on . Posted in Art, Appearance, Housing, DGC Wants Feedback, Game Updates & Maintenance, Grouping, Itemization, Raiding, Tradeskill

Shards of Destiny (Gu53) appeared on Test just moments before midnight last night. This update is expected to go live in late September (the initial date was September 22nd, but this was an internal target). Here are the Test Update Notes:

Test Update August / 27 / 2009

FEATURED

Achievements

The new achievement system gives players a fun new way to track their accomplishments!  Most achievements will award players with achievement points that can be used to compare their progress against other players.  Some harder to complete achievements will offer non-stat item rewards.  The basic categories are General, Quest, Exploration, Combat, Slayer, Tradeskills and Triumphs.  Triumphs are large scale achievements that combine multiple achievements into one large one.  An example of this would be to do all of the combat, quest, and exploration achievements in a specific area.

Chronomagic

A number of mysterious erudites have set up in Qeynos, Freeport, Neriak, Gorowyn, and Kelethin. Any player level 20 or higher can speak to them and for a small fee temporarily lower their adventuring level.

This works very similarly to mentoring except:

  • You do not need a mentoring target.
  • You can only choose levels in increments of 5 (10, 15, 20, etc).
  • You do not receive the bonuses granted from mentoring other players (currently you receive a very large bonus to AA gain while mentoring another player, this is not granted by the Chronomagic system).

The chronomagic will last until cancelled (right-click on your nameplate or /unmentor). Once cancelled, you must return to any Timeless Chronomage to reactivate the effect

Additionally, 37 new missions have been added that work similar to The Shadow Odyssey’s daily doubles. They task players with slaying various bosses within zones of all levels throughout Norrath  And, of course, these missions reward players with an array of exciting new items!

Chronomagic works the same on PvP servers as it does on PvE servers. However, it also has all the same restrictions as mentoring—namely that you cannot engage in PvP combat while the chronomagic effect is on your character. This makes it quite a bit more dangerous on PvP servers, so good luck and be careful!

Bosses and Events

As part of the chronomagic initiative, a pass was made through old-world overland and contested dungeons to greatly increase the frequency with which bosses and events spawned or occurred. Many placeholders and placeholder ring events were either removed or weighted much more heavily toward actual bosses spawning. Some of the notable highlights include placeholders being removed from:

(Note: These are all from forum feedback)

  • Crypt of Betrayal – Specter of Ire
  • Enchanted Lands – Chomper
  • Everfrost – Chieftain Iceburn
  • Feerrott – Screaming Mace HQ targets Agony, Hukulan, Kaxor, Xilarga, and Tzugaax. Also Bouncers Prud, Hurd, Fug, and Flerb who were also changed to no longer despawn
  • Greater Faydark – Crushbone Expedition Leader, Chef, Weaponsmith, and Planner
  • Lavastorm – Fire Toad, Magolemus
  • Nektulos – Dannian Blackleaf – removed respawn time and despawn time, should always be up now
  • Obelisk of Lost Souls – Mediums of Dyrt, Cron, Iza, Odris, Norrath, and Lysys, Soul Harvesters Kul, Na, Gron, and Zej, Avulsor
  • Old Telescopic Lens (quest starter for The Staff of Observers) drops much more frequently
  • Zek,  Orchish Wastes – Sentry Goorlux
  • Palace of the Awakened – Skylord Stormclaw, Advisor Soliddar
  • Rivervale – Willowmaw the Rotting
  • Ruins of Varsoon – Weavemaster Esh’rax, Tome of Life, Tome of Death, The Creator
  • Solusek’s Eye – Enforcer Maj’Fahd, Soulslaver Djar’veh, The Speaker of Fates, The Castigator, Lord Crana, Onyxlam
  • Steamfont – Bulka Bloodhorn, Digmaster Pechpooka, Slave Pechmooka, Scout Pechyooka
  • Thundering Steppes – Stiletto, Bloodtalon
  • Stormhold – a caveroot horror, Battlepriest Alexandria
  • Stormhold – The Scions – Archiovianix, Hephinntari, Qelinatias, Tumarinan
  • The Vestibule – The Medium of Hykor
  • Tombs of Night – The Leucous Maw

There are a large number of ring events that work similarly in the zones: Antonica, Commonlands, Everfrost, Sinking Sands, Enchanted Lands, Feerrott, Nektulos, Orcishwastes, and Thundering Steppes. They had a very high chance to spawn a placeholder, a small chance to spawn a boss, a small chance to spawn a shrine that buffs the player, and a small chance to spawn a number of different merchants. The chance to spawn a placeholder was greatly reduced and there is now a very high chance for one of the ‘events’ to occur. The merchants were all combined into the ‘rare’ merchant, who will now always spawn for that event. They also have a much larger merchantlist, and will buy, sell, and repair your gear! Contested Epic spawns in lower level zones were lowered to spawn every three days (with a large variation) instead of once a week.

A number of x2 and x3 contested mobs were downtiered because they had a 0% chance to drop fabled gear. They were lowered to triple-ups and their spawn times were adjusted accordingly. The contested epic mobs who did have fabled loot were given a 100% chance to drop at least one fabled item each time they are slain. Some of the mobs changed include:

  • Allidax the Ancient
  • Alrendi Thoughtsong
  • Broog the Banished
  • Commander Nagrat
  • Cragshell
  • Cyenadros, Lord of the Sanctum
  • Doomsquall
  • Equestrielle
  • Grimfeather
  • Haraghur the Deathless
  • Haywire Opticron (lowered to one-up and added loot)
  • Lavin Dusk
  • Mangler
  • Meathooks
  • Scytheclaw
  • Spiregazer
  • Ssilth Rageclaw
  • The Unseelie JumJum Thief
  • Vox

In general, most named mobs (with some exceptions) changed by this pass have a very high chance to drop treasured. Those with rare fabled items had their chances to drop raised significantly as well.

  • Named mobs in New Tunaria should have a 100% chance to drop legendary gear, and a much higher chance to drop Cloak of Flames pages now!
  • A new boss has found his way into Sebilis.
  • Bosses in Sebilis and Chardok should match Karnor’s Castle and spawn every 45 minutes + variation.
  • The despawn timers from all of Kylong Plains’ rare mobs have been removed.
  • The Fiery Apparition in Lavastorm should spawn once again

Note to testers:
Because of the size of Norrath, a number of placeholders may have slipped through our net. Please /feedback these with two pieces of information:  the full name of the zone and the full name of the placeholder-challenged named mob.

Shard of Love (heroic zone)

The Sisterhood of Erollisi has returned to Antonica with grave concerns! Adventurers interested in helping them should seek out a Disciple of Love in Antonica, Kelethin or Gorowyn. Those with more devious intentions should seek out Disciples of Hate within The Commonlands, Neriak or Gorowyn.

GENERAL

Illusions cast from petamorph wands will now last for two hours and persist through zoning.

Melee, defense and casting skills should now be easier and more straightforward to level up.

Swimming will now skill up faster.

You can now buy the Translocate and Druid Portal spells from the trainers.

Racial choices have changed.  As a result, your character development choices have been reset.

Adventure writs are now offered to a player’s effective level, so that mentored players can complete adventure writs at any level!

You can now convert adventure experience into the achievement pool from level 10 and higher by adjusting the slider in the achievement window.

Examining a ranged combat art will now display the ranged critical bonus properly.

Fixed an issue where items might trigger when they are restricted to a certain damage type.

The /auction channel is now server wide!

You will now receive chat feedback for dispels and cures.

Scouts will automatically disarm chests now when attempting to open them.  As a result, the disarm verb will no longer display.

Pets will no longer be hit by AoE autoattack unless they are considered in front of the attacker.  This should in turn make it easier to position pets to avoid it since the avoidance range for them is now flanking or behind instead of just behind.

Beneficial Poolburn effects will now display to the chat log.

Target locking abilities will now terminate if the locker is no longer a valid target.

Triggered Spell based effect tooltips will now update appropriately if your intelligence or strength change.

Player-written books will now be editable when transferring to another server.

Fixed a bug where when sometimes editing a very large player written book some text would be lost when closing and reopening the book.

Zoning into a new raid instance will no longer clear your raid looters.

Turning the avatar autoface option ON and the camera autoface option OFF will keep your character facing the target regardless of what direction your character is moving while autoattack is turned off. Toggle autoattack off to toggle off autoface if you just need to turn and run and toggle it back on again to make a final stand.

CHARASIS

  • Players who leave Charasis: Vault of Eternal Sleep and return later will no longer find their progression blocked.

GOROWYN

  • Players will find that Gorowyn has become a good deal easier to navigate.

MIRAGUL’S PLANAR SHARD (x4)

  • A quest has been added to assist with certain progression within Miragul’s Planar Shard!
  • Items that can assist in certain elements of the Planar Shard fights are now random drops in the Miragul’s Phylactery group TSO zones.

MUNZOK’s MATERIAL BASTION

  • Umzok and Ozyk now drop the less specialized cloaks and charms more reliably.
  • Certain items in Munzok’s Material Bastion have become slightly more desirable.

NEKTULOS

  • The Nerius pirates camping along Nektulos beach are now armed (and still) dangerous.

THUNDERING STEPPES

  • Turgen Bremhurst now offers a more interesting way for you to earn the key to the gates of Bridge Keep.

ALTERNATE ADVANCEMENT  (formerly Achievements)

  • Ooze Crawler will now benefit from Wrath of the Undead Servant

Mystic

  • Spirit of the Ancients will apply properly to Ancestral Sentry when another player is targeted.

Summoner

  • Pet Achievement Spells now have a higher priority when casting.

Warden

  • Fixed Shattered Infections to cure the correct person.

Warrior

  • Cry of the Warrior will be resisted less often now.

ITEMS

The Heirloom flag has been added to a large number of items in the game with the exception of quest items, heritage items, PvP items, and items gained from patterns (but the patterns themselves were flagged as Heirloom). This will allow players to join groups with the character that can help the group the most without the worry of not being able to gear up the character of their choice! As a side effect, items affected by this change will unattune and be sent to overflow initially upon first login.

Fixed a case where some item based triggered effects would begin to critical.

The Brethren of Night quartermaster by Soul Eater Falls in Nektulos Forest has improved the appearance of the armor and robe he sells.  (Existing armor purchased from him previously will not be affected.)  The Hand of Marr quartermaster in the nearby camp has also begun stocking a robe.

The Cudgel of Obviation’s Spirit Tap Effect is now unresistable.

Old Telescopic Lens (quest starter for The Staff of Observers) drops much more frequently.

Volcanic Knight’s Tempered Helm now has spell and heal crit chance to match its melee crit.

The ‘Deception’ effect on the Bracelet of the Trickster no longer affects fighters.

Unbound Elemental Essences from Lavastorm are now heirloom and the items that are purchased with them are now easier to obtain.

Balanced Ayr Stones may now be applied to fist weapons of any damage type.

Saita’s Glowing Gem will automatically cast on the user when activated. Amazing Presence now shows up in the Maintained Spells window.

The Bangle of the Spiteful now slightly increases spell crit bonus.

Anashti Sul and Ykesha now have a chance to drop new items for Mages.

The descriptions on Petamorph Wands and their spells now declare that they will only affect combat pets and not cosmetic pets.

MAIL

  • Going linkdead while accessing your mailbox will no longer cause your mail to be inaccessible if you log back in before your character leaves the world.
  • After sending a guild mail or ranks mail the “to” text box will no longer have a random guild member name in it.

Player vs Player (PvP)

The Priests of Discord have returned.  Reports state that they are currently teaching young adventurers the path of discord.

New Shattered Lands, Faydark, Kunark and Void Discord tokens have been created.  The Discord tokens will now replace all previously used currency.

Faction merchants have agreed to reduce their status and faction costs!  In return, their items have been enhanced to be more desirable to prospective buyers.

EoF, RoK and TSO Faction items have been enhanced to be more desirable by prospective buyers.  All previously purchased items have gained the attributes as well.

Writ givers are eager to see more adventurers in battle and are willing to ignore previous requirements for their job completion.

Spawn location near Dreg’s Landing and Teren’s Grasp have been moved to be favorable for all factions.

The Kylong Plains writ giver has moved to Teren’s Grasp from Dreg’s Landing.

The dirge epic triggered effect (Intrepid Strike) will no longer force an attack to inflict maximum damage while in PvP combat.

Hate will now age faster while you are on a server controlled mount.

You will no longer gain immunity while on balloon platforms.

Reactive should no longer trigger incorrectly.

PLAYER HOUSING

Player houses have been given an extra room! Note to testers: Currently homes in Qeynos and Freeport will be unable to customize the new room. This will be updated shortly.

Players can now save and restore their house item layouts.  Use the commands save_layout <filename> and load_layout <filename>.

House layout files can only be loaded in houses of the same type.  This also works in guild halls!

QUESTS

Creature mastery quests (Lore & Legend) now use a system of progressively increasing luck that eventually guarantees an update.

The third scout for “Connect the Dots” in Kylong Plains is now easier to find.

The quest “A Strange Gem” Has been re-introduced into Antonica.

The quest “The Final Report” from the Qeynos Claymore progression in Kingdom of Sky should now allow citizens of all evil and good aligned cities to obtain the quest.

The quest “Aelia and the Butcher” can now be completed properly in North Freeport.

The respawn time on a named needed for the Screaming Mace quest within Temple of Cazic Thule has been shortened.

The difficulty of the waves of orcs that spawn at the beginning of Bloodskull Valley has been lowered to be more in line with the difficulty intended for Return of the Light Heritage quest.

SPELLS

Cheap Shot will now last the full four seconds on single up arrow NPCs.  Higher difficulty NPCs will remain at two seconds since they are not typically used for solo encounters.

Group and self targeted buffs which do not expire will persist through death.  This does not apply to pet spells.

Deity Spells now have a two second casting time.

Ranges have been adjusted to many spells to more consistent.

Maintained spell descriptions from cast items will now look like if you examined the item directly.

Spells that are hostile and beneficial will now apply their beneficial effects to anyone in the group with an AOE avoidance spell on them.

Conjuror

  • The Earthen Avatar line will now break invisibility spells when cast.
  • Communion should inherit the proper names from Fiery Magician now and use the appropriate Hydromancer appearance.

Druid

  • Druid Portal spells have been consolidated into one spell and now work similar to the druid guild hall amenity.

Inquisitor

  • Inquisition will now overwrite existing copies of the spell properly on a target.

Paladin

  • Amends 3 has been removed from the Paladin Training choices like it was prior to GU51.

Shadowknight

  • Miss your old skeleton pet?  Then visit your local Shadowknight trainer and get your new skeleton pet today!  Scrolls are going fast so hurry up and get yours today!

Sorcerer

  • Sorcerer translocate spells have been consolidated into a single spell that works similar to the druid guild hall amenity.

Warden

  • Faerie Ally will no longer attempt to save dead people.
  • Tunare’s Watch will now scale by level since it is not upgraded at higher levels.

Wizard

  • Rays of Disintegration will no longer interrupt the group and is now only cast by the wizard.  The casting time is slightly less while doing a bit more damage now.

TRADESKILLS

The tradeskill society tutorial books now have an improved appearance.  If you do not have a copy and would like one, visit your local tradeskill society merchant.

The recipe for the Flame Tapestry found in Najena’s Forge is no longer limited in uses.

Carpenters can now provide a few essentials for those stabling their mounts in their homes.

Byproducts from tradeskilling will no longer have the crafter’s name on them.

Tradeskill level will now count for purchasing racial traditions.

USER INTERFACE

The recipe window now auto adjusts to fit very long recipe names.

Title lists on the Details tab of the Persona window are now sorted.

A new user-interface has been wrapped around the mentoring system.

Type /mentor to display the mentoring window.

You can also use the /unmentor command to cancel mentoring.

The mentoring window will be displayed when you join a group if your level is too high to allow all players to earn XP.

The Welcome screen now shows the number of unopened LoN booster packs you have.

The examine recipe window will now use multiple lines for very large recipe names.

The threat window now has an improved tooltip and will only show when it is relevant.

Timers on quests in the group quest window will now have correct times.

Double clicking an item in the Marketplace section of the welcome window will now open the Marketplace window with that item pre-selected.

You can now alter the hotkey for the zone reuse timer window in the options window.

The confirmation box for destroying a player written book with special characters in the title will no longer displayer gibberish.

EQ2Players.com

Critical damage will once again be tracked properly.

Shards of Destiny (GU53): Housing Renovations

Written by Feldon on . Posted in Art, Appearance, Housing, Game Updates & Maintenance

EQ2 Housing is getting an upgrade! The biggest changes include the Faydwer acorns  which have received a nice window which looks out into Kelethin. And the Maj’dul apartments which have been lacking in charm have really opened up with skylights and the like.

Here at EQ2Wire, we’re anxiously awaiting Gu53 being pushed to Test (scheduled for today) so we can go grab screen shots of all the new housing options. There have been some unconfirmed reports that existing spaces were reduced to make room for the new areas. We’ll be checking this out

kelethin_2room3
Preview at EQ2Players

Game Update 53 – Shaders Update

Written by Feldon on . Posted in Art, Appearance, Housing, Game Updates & Maintenance

Rothgar brings us an update on Game Update 53. The EQ2 Team wants to get Gu53 on the test server soon, to allow 1 full month of testing. However Shaders 3.0 won’t be ready within the next few days. As a result, Shaders 3.0 are slipping to Gu54 expected in November.

If you attended our last Fan Faire or have been following the forums you’ve probably heard about a major overhaul to the EverQuest II rendering engine where we are upgrading all of our existing shaders from version 1.x to version 3.0.

This upgrade will result in a performance gain for many of you with a Shader 3.0 compliant graphics card.  In addition, you’ll notice a visual improvement in just about everything from zone geometry to character armor.

This is an enormous undertaking that Ryan “Imago-Quem” Favale has been devoting nearly all of his time to for the past several months.  Ryan has shown an amazing level of commitment to this feature and has spent countless nights and weekends working his way through the shader system.  Not only does this upgrade involve the conversion of thousands and thousands of shader files, but we’ve had to modify existing art tools, create new tools and maintain backwards compatibility with the old system.  In addition, each shader must be individually tested by our QA department.

At Fan Faire we announced that this upgrade would go live with Game Update 53 which is just around the corner.  Unfortunately I’m here to let you know that we will be pushing this upgrade back to Game Update 54.  We always hate to push a feature back after we’ve announced it but we feel that this is the best thing for the game overall.  We are making a new commitment to quality and want this feature to be everything that we’ve promised.  Simply put, we need a little more time to complete the conversion and make sure that its as bug-free as possible.  The work is almost completed and we’re very excited about it.

On another note, Game Update 53 is still packed with lots of great content and features that I’m sure you’ll love.  We have a new raid zone coming, auto-mentoring, the new achievement system and so much more.

We’re also aware that some of you are still experiencing client crashes.  The latest version of the client will be delivered to the Test Server within a few days and we expect that some of these issues should be resolved.  Game Update 53 will be available on the Test Server almost a full month before it’s scheduled to go live.  We’ll be listening to your feedback very closely and making sure any new issues are looked into right away.

Again, I’m sorry to have to ask you to wait a little longer on the Shader 3.0 upgrade.  We feel strongly that something of this magnitude should get the time and attention it deserves to be perfect.

Thanks for your understanding and most of all thanks for continuing to play EQII!

Moonlight Enchantments is Back

Written by Feldon on . Posted in Art, Appearance, Housing, Tradeskill

It’s the 20th of the month, and that means it’s time for Moonlight Enchantments again!

Some incredible house items and a few unique mounts can be obtained in the Grottos of Norrath.

These mushroom rings will appear in five locations (click the Grotto name for a list of rewards):

Gu53 One Month Countdown

Written by Feldon on . Posted in Art, Appearance, Housing, Commentary, Daybreak Cash, Game Updates & Maintenance, Grouping

Even though we do not have a specific release date for Gu53 (Shards of Destiny), “late September” has been posited as a timeframe we should be watching for. As we approach the duly appointed time, more information is coming out about what we can expect in this update.

Unless you follow the EQ2 Dev Tracker, you’ve probably missed some salient details.

Skill Up Catch Up

Not every EQ2 player has access to a Guild Hall, specifically the Training Dummy amenity. This is relevant because at the great speed most folks now level up into their 50’s or 60’s, many players find themselves deficient in certain skills such as priest skills (Ordination), mage skills (Subjugation), scout/fighter skills (Piercing, Slashing) and want to “catch up”. So far, the only easy means to do this was to grind kill mobs or fight a training dummy.

You get better at Ranged (126/400).

According to Aeralik, this issue has been identified and in Gu53, if there is a large gulf between your skill level and the maximum, you will skill up faster. From this Dev Tracker post:

If you are really low in skill it will be much easier to level it up and the skill gains will come along much faster.  Then once you get closer in skill to your level you will then slow down to a more gradual level.

AA XP Slider

One of the features I am the most excited about in Gu53 will be the AA XP Slider. On PvE (regular) servers, we will be able to channel up to 100% of our combat XP into AA XP.  PvP servers will allow up to 50% of combat XP to be converted into AA XP (until the AA cap is reached). I intend to roll an alt and see how feasible it is to level from 20-80 entirely by grouping all while earning sufficient AA points.

I am very hopeful that this AA XP slider will encourage folks to group in the level 20-60 range again. Flying through Stormhold, Nek Castle, Runnyeye, Deathfyst Citadel, and getting a solid amount of both Alternative Achievement (AA) and levels will be a great thing. A lot of folks out there are soloing to 80 and have no clue what their character brings to a group/raid.

Once again Aeralik chimes in on the EQ2 Forums with the facts:

The aa slider enables at level 10.  Pve players can put all adv xp into aa if they want but pvp players will be limited to 50% while below the current maximum level.

The AA cap only applies on pvp servers and works to keep players relatively close in strength.  We don’t have any plans to adjust this cap because its just a spending cap and you can still earn additional AA levels while capped.

Racial Traits

When racial traits were added after the launch of EQ2, players were surprised at just how good some of the effects were. Specifically, erudites are clearly superior spellcasters, while ogres are the obvious choice for tanks due to their health buffs.

With the upcoming Racial Respec tokens we will be able to purchase with StationCash,  and with certain racial traits being such obviously good choices, there is a concern that all wizards will change to Erudite, all predators to Dark Elves, all tanks to Ogre, etc. As a result, we can expect racial traits to be rebalanced and reshuffled in Game Update #53.

Here are Aeralik‘s comments on the EQ2 Forums:

The racial trait changes are staying largely in line with how they have always really been oriented.  Fighter races get some nice fighter bonuses,, caster races get caster bonuses, etc.  This really goes back to the base race design.  The original stats favored certain archetypes for play and usually their racial packages complemented these using effects of the time.  The previous racial update made things a bit more specific with current effect packages but we tried to make each race a bit more unique.

This next race update tries to mix them together so you have a wider variety of choices but the race’s abilities come from common pools.  So if you picked a mage oriented race and play a mage you get some nice choices but nothing really amazing.  If you went off the normal path and chose something like an ogre mage you still get a lot of benefits to yourself but overall dps differences from a mage race will be minimal at best and easily overcome.  In fact the ogre mage is probably a really good choice for a number of playstyles because the fighter package is really nice in some aspects and the priest package shares a lot with the mage one.

Leather & Lace

And I leave you with some leather screenshots to tide you over until the next posting. Toodles!

Tier’Dal Executioner Leather Assassin appearance gear

-available today on StationCash-

Shards of Destiny (Game Update 53)

Written by Feldon on . Posted in Art, Appearance, Housing, Game Updates & Maintenance, Grouping, Raiding

As announced at EQ2Players…

EQII’s next Game Update #53, Shards of Destiny, is slated to go live in late September. We will be bringing some exciting new content to the world of Norrath with Shards of Destiny.

love1 love2

Erollisi Marr’s influence is felt once more in Norrath. Our players will be able to explore the Shard of Love and learn more of the popular goddess’ story. The Shard of Love is a single group zone.

There will also be a new x4 dungeon to test your skills. Miragul’s Planar Shard will continue the story of the powerful mage.

miragul1 miragul2

There are several other exciting additions coming with Shards of Destiny!

Auto-mentoring: Revisit content you may have missed!

Housing renovations: Enjoy more space to exercise your decorating creativity, or just more room to store your booty! Several housing types are receiving an additional room.

Achievement System: Killed 100,000 undead? Now you’ll be able to track your accomplishments and earn nifty rewards.

Shader revamp: The changes to the shader system are ready! Enhanced graphics and more realistic-looking shadows await.


We do not yet have an exact date for Shards of Destiny (Gu53) to appear on Test (ETA?) or be pushed to Live. But when we do, you’ll be sure to find that information ASAP. 🙂

SoE Art Portal

Written by Feldon on . Posted in Art, Appearance, Housing

If you’ve ever wanted to look at the artwork that goes into conceptualizing or marketing EQ2 or other SoE games, now’s your chance at the new SoE Art Portal.

If this is part of the Fan Faire-announced  plans to provide mail-order high quality posters and prints of this artwork, then I’m rather excited and intend to do some shopping when this next phase becomes available.


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