A few hours ago, Amnerys was kind enough to shoot me an e-mail with much better screenshots of the EQ2Players Sneak Peak from Thursday night. As I was poking around, I had a moment of sheer curiosity and checked what I knew to be the URL for the new EQ2Players site. To my surprise, I discovered that the site was up and running!

It’s February 16th, and EQ2Players is LIVE!

An Unbiased Review?

These days, I’m wearing at least two hats, one as the operator of an EverQuest 2 News & Commentary site (EQ2Wire), and as the designer of a competing site to EQ2Players — EQ2U.

We appreciate all the hard work that SOE has put into building a Data Feeds service so that EQ2Players can be just one of what will be a growing number of websites that build on EQ2 data. As Dan Kinney told me, each website will have different strengths and thus attract a different audience.

So with that, I did want to just do a brief, and what I hope is objective, review of EQ2Players.

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Today, EverQuest2.com has provided the necessary instructions to players so that they can Opt-in or Opt-out of EQ2Players data.

And at the risk of Inception, EverQuest2.com also made a point of mentioning our new EQ2U site, our FAQ which talks about the Data Feeds and matters of privacy, and our Transcript of the EQ2Players Sneak Peek Webcast!

With a few exceptions, the past few days have been a bit euphoric. Thanks all!

Today, players gain more control over their Privacy for EQ2, EQ2Players, and API-driven websites like EQ2U.

Starting today, you can now Opt-in the discovery of your Alt characters when players lookup or search for your Characters on EQ2Players or EQ2U.

If you DO NOT WANT players to be able to find/see your Alts, then do nothing. By default, the Link to Alt Characters setting is disabled for all characters.

If you want players to be able to find some or all of your Alts, then enable the Link to Alt Characters setting on EACH character that you want to be discoverable.

And as we have discussed before, if you don’t want anyone to be able to view or search for any of your characters, simply uncheck the Enable EQ2Players Updates setting on each character.

UPDATE: EQ2U is now supporting Alts for characters that have this feature enabled!

NOTE: Players with custom UIs such as DrumsUI and ProfitUI have reported problems enabling their Character and Alt settings. Until there is an update, we suggest renaming your \EverQuest II\UI\%uiname%\eq2ui_mainhud_persona.xml file, logging in each character and setting your permissions how you want, then renaming the file back.

So if you caught last Thursday night’s EQ2Players Sneak Peak Webcast, you know that the new EQ2Players site is coming very soon. If you missed it, the video has appeared on Youtube and we have produced a transcript, almost verbatim during the Q&A. Just for you!

Linda “Brasse” Carlson interviewed SOE’s Clif Bate (Director of Commerce Services & Web Presence) and Abby Watt (Associate Web Producer) about the upcoming EQ2Players site.

The transcript after the jump…

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Just 84 hours since EQ2U launched, we have some great news to report: We’ve reached 1,000 registrations!

Here are some anonymized statistics about what’s happening at EQ2U:

• Registered Users: 1,000
• Unique Items Looked Up: 39,170
• Unique Characters Looked Up: 23,824
• Unique Guilds Looked Up: 3,876
• Characters Being Followed: 6,167

And no, we won’t be sharing any more specific data than that about our users. We’re not Facebook.

From the EQ2 Forums:

ZONE PROGRESSION / POPULATION

Vallon’s Tower [Challenge]

• Players should get the correct message when entering the blue shielded dome in the Vallon Zek fight.

• During the final Vallon Zek fight, only 2 Vallonite Aces will spawn per wave of adds.  Fighters will no longer be hit with Tactical Dilema during the fight.

DUNGEON MAKER

• Fixed an issue with vitality not applying correctly in dungeon maker instances.

ITEMS

• Gnomish Anti-Camo Goggles can now be equipped by any class.

LIVE EVENTS

Erollisi

• Hearts a’Flutter: Antonica – The Essences of Erollisi should no longer spawn within unreachable tree roots or branches in the Central Farmlands.

QUESTS

Betrayal

• Betrayal popup warnings should more accurately describe what happens to your spells and combat arts when you betray.

Not included in the notes, so this is in my own words:

CENSUS / DATA FEEDS

A checkbox has been added to the Persona window under EQ2 Share allowing players to Opt-in some or all of their characters to be discoverable when viewing their character’s Alts.

Karen Bryan interviews us about EQ2U for Massively:

This past week, we got a glimpse of the newly refurbished EQ2Players site, but what’s really exciting is that th EQ2 team has been working with fansites to provide the data feed and allow community figures to create their own resource sites. Morgan Feldon and Dethdlr, who do an amazing job with EQ2Wire, did just that, and on Friday, they officially launched EQ2U.

It’s a thorough and regularly updated database of things ranging from character stats, gear, and AAs to spell lists and warder pets. What’s more, you can look up gear, track spells, and create your own wish list for your character. Feldon and Dethdlr have been working on this for the bulk of the past year, and Massively had a chance to talk with them about the project.

Read on for a glimpse into the site’s early beginnings and learn how EQ2U will help you get your characters up to snuff!

The Tattered Notebook: Build a better character with EQ2U

EQ2Wire is proud to introduce a new website built on the remarkable new EQ2 Data Feeds API. As a guest, you get all the functionality of the original EQ2Players site such as searching for Characters, Guilds, Items, and Spells in EverQuest II. But we see that as just the beginning.

We strongly encourage EVERYONE to take just a few moments and read the Help & FAQs page as it contains answers to a lot of questions you may have about Privacy.

Please remember that EQ2U is a Beta site and we have many more features in mind, as well as tweaks to the style and site layout.

Search for Characters, Guilds, Items, and more at EQ2U

• Report a Bug, Feature Suggestion, or Feedback — Use the EQ2U Contact Us form hosted here at EQ2Wire.
• Post Comments or Questions about the site below!
• Please remember that the site was developed for free as a service to the EQ2 Community.

NOTE: If you have been helping us test the site, please feel free to post your experiences!

Several months ago, Dethdlr and I were put in touch with SOE’s Platform and Game teams (including Dan Kinney and Nandor “Zoltaroth” Szots) about a new Data Feeds API that would allow websites to access the same kind of Character, Guild, and Item data which has traditionally been available on EQ2Players.

We have been testing, giving feedback, and developing on this new API since the moment it was available. It’s been a long haul to say the least, but Dethdlr and I have been blown away by how receptive and motivated the folks at SOE have been towards allowing us and others to produce the best possible EQ2 API-powered websites. The answer to most of our questions has been “Sure, we can add that”, or a useful discussion about the best way to organize and present the information.

Equipment View shows Items at-a-glance and which ones have Adornments.

After months of intense development, we are proud to show the first teaser images of the new EQ2U. We are still working on adding site features and styling, but already, we have been getting very good feedback on the site so far.

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From the EQ2 Forums:

The Beta version of the new and improved EQ2 Players site is nearly ready to launch! Join host Linda “Brasse” Carlson as she sits down with SOE’s Clif Bate (Director of Commerce Services & Web Presence) and Abby Watt (Associate Web Producer) to get a sneak peek at what we’ve been working on.

Join us on Thursday, February 9, 2012, at 4:30 p.m. US Pacific Time* on Twitch TV! The webcast is expected to last about 20 minutes.

If you have questions you’d like to see answered, Brasse will be collecting them from this thread. You do not want to miss Abby and Clif answering them live!

Come take a drive with us in this week’s webcast! See you on Twitch TV!

Time Zone Conversions

• PST: February 9 @ 4:30-5:00pm
• EST: February 9 @ 7:30-8:00pm
• GMT: February 9 @ 0:30-1:00
• CET: February 10 @ 1:30-2:00

A new website from the makers of EQ2Wire is almost here…

If you have any Questions, Comments, Bug reports, or Feedback about EQ2U, please fill out the Contact Us form below. If you had a problem on a specific page, PLEASE include the link to that page or the steps to reproduce the problem you had and we will take a look at it!

It is important that you use a real e-mail address so we can contact you with followup questions, troubleshooting, etc. We spend a lot of time reading and responding to your comments. Submissions with a fake e-mail address will be deleted.