From Domino on the EQ2 Forums:
The festival is now active on those servers (Butcherblock and Permafrost) and has been for a while, but did start almost a day late.
We will extend the event on the affected servers. The Gorowyn city festival on Butcherblock and Permafrost this month will end at 11:59pm on the 8th [07:59 on the 9th GMT]. (The festival will still end on all other servers at 11:59 on the 7th). Apologies for any inconvenience!
EQ2 developers are trying to track down the exact cause of certain Freeblood characters unable to use (or see) their Inner Demon appearance. Zoltaroth requests feedback here on the EQ2 Forums:
Is anyone still having this issue? We are having trouble reproducing it and would like to see a sample character if possible. If anyone is having this issue still please PM me your character name and server.
I’ve been helping Feldon out here at EQ2Wire for about eight months now. My first post was on April 4th 2010 so I haven’t quite been here a full year. In that time I’ve sifted through over seven thousand items to bring you almost 100 articles here on EQ2Wire. Hopefully you’ve found at least a few of them useful.
I look forward to continuing my work in 2011 and bringing you all the latest highlights of what’s going on in the world of EQ2.
Happy New Year Everybody!
Wishing you a Merry Christmas Kwanzaa Hanukkah Solstice Festivus etc. and a Happy New Year.
Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Watterson
The new Freeblood race has a special “Ferocity of the Freeblood”, as well as access to housing “Freeblood Lair” and “Swarm of Bats” mount/buff. The details of how these are unlocked and what issues players will face if they change race have been addressed in different posts over the last 24 hours. Here are the highlights. Also inside, a glimpse of something we have heard rumors about before — that some new feature is coming to EQ2 housing with the release of the Destiny of Velious expansion.
Here are some news items we missed in the flurry of Server Merge and Freeblood news. They include Shaders 3 and Halas buildings, the look of the Freeblood, and Loitering NPCs in Freeport and Qeynos.
So with today’s official introduction of the Freeblood vampire race to EverQuest 2 as the first Premium race, the remaining secrets have been unveiled. Chief among them is that the Swarm of Bats premium mount/ability available exclusively to Freebloods will, when Destiny of Velious expansion launches and a quest has been completed, be usable as a full-fledged Flying Mount. From the official announcement:
Characters who go on to unlock flying mounts in the Destiny of Velious expansion will also be able to use this ability to fly.
The Freeblood vampire race as well as premium accessories are now available on the StationCash Marketplace.
From EverQuest2.com:
The Freeblood race is now available on the Marketplace in EverQuest II and EverQuest II Extended.
You can watch a video of the Freeblood race over at Facebook.
From SmokeJumper on the EQ2 Forums:
Fan Faire folks will be authorized to enter the beta on Jan 5th with everyone else but are automatically authorized (after they fill out the application!)
Players on Butcherblock, Crushbone, Everfrost, Unrest, and Guk just received the following message:
Greetings Norrath! The server will be coming down for a brief update at 02:30 PM PST [22:30 GMT] Wednesday December 22, 2010. Please find a safe place to log out before the server comes down.
We’ll let you know when we find out the cause of this unexpected downtime.
UPDATE: This update is apparently to address an issue with illusion forms and will require the servers to be offline for approximately 1 hour. Amnerys has posted an announcement.
The Freeblood Lair housing is now available in the StationCash Marketplace. For 1500SC ($15), any Freeblood character can purchase a tiny cozy intimate version of the Mistmoore Crag Estate (which was a 7 year Veteran Reward).
Cyliena has posted screenshots and more information about this new EQ2 Prestige Housing over at EQ2 ZAM.
Smokejumper posted this announcement today on Everquest2.com:
The time for Closed Beta testing of “Destiny of Velious” is upon us!
Applications are now open and available at the following link:
https://account.station.sony.com/au…9&theme=station
Go there, complete the application process, and your application will go into the queue for approval. (Hint: You’re not finished applying until you accept the NDA.)
We’ll be reviewing applications starting on January 3rd, and Closed Beta will begin on January 5th. If you are approved for beta, you’ll get an email letting you know, so check your email (out-of-game only) between the 3rd and the 5th!
PLEASE NOTE: Despite the fact that the beta registration site says that the beta runs from 12/21 to 1/4, the beta will actually run from 1/5 to 1/31. You’re seeing incorrect dates on the current reg site and that will be fixed shortly. Notifications of beta acceptance will not *begin* to be sent until 1/3/11.
Update: Smokejumper posted this additional tidbit for all the Fan Faire Attendees:
Fan Faire folks will be authorized to enter the beta on Jan 5th with everyone else but are automatically authorized (after they fill out the application!)
Yes, even though you automatically get into the beta, you still have to sign the NDA that is included in the application.
Here are your hotfix notes for December 22, 2010:
GENERAL
Fixed some issues which could cause raid zones to crash.
CheesePirate.com for EQ2Wire
SOE are trying something new with their EQ2 Bonus XP this time around. Past Bonus XP events have taken place over a weekend or during the holidays which has been good for some players, but not so good for others who are visiting family or working over the weekend. So this time around, the Bonus XP event is a Double XP Weekendish.
From SmokeJumper on the EQ2 Forums:
We’re doing Double XP Days from Dec 27th (Monday) to Dec 30th (Thursday). Most of you will be shocked to hear that we’re doing Double XP not actually on one of the holidays and on weekdays instead of weekends. Don’t fall down in shock.
Of course some players are not happy with the new arrangement. I’m not sure they could do an XP bonus event that would appeal to all players without running it for 2 weeks. I predict (educated guess) we’ll see some type of XP bonus in the days or weekend before Velious launches.
Cyliena over at EQ2 ZAM noticed new items in the StationCash Marketplace, specifically the new Freeblood vampire race. Remember, if you have an active subscription for December 14, January 17, and February 8, and buy the Destiny of Velious expansion some time in 2011, you will get the Freeblood race for free. However if you can’t wait, or don’t intend to buy the expansion any time soon, then it’s time to pay up.
UPDATE: This is expected to go live today, Wednesday December 22nd.
By itself, the Freeblood race will cost you 2000SC ($20 at normal price). It is an account unlock which means once bought, you can create as many Freebloods as you want on your account.
Now what about those extras, like the fearsome “attack mode” appearance, or the ability to turn into a swarm of bats and travel at 65% speed, or the special Freeblood estate? Well, they’re what we call extras.
If you feel that EQ2’s expansion betas have been unnecessarily long, we have some great news for you. For everyone else, prepare for a rather abrupt beta this time around. According to SmokeJumper, the Destiny of Velious beta will start “when we come back in 2011”.
I’ve finally managed to escape Charles de Gaulle airport which completely ground to a halt due to 3 inches (7cm) of snow. Meanwhile, our SAS pilot made a perfect landing in near whiteout conditions with heavy snowfall on a runway and at an airport positively blanketed with snow. Ah… Copenhagen… 😉
Anyway, ’bout those server merges…
Here are your update notes for December 21, 2010:
GENERAL
- This year you can support the Child’s Play charity by purchasing the new Cloak of the Snowfall from the Station Marketplace!
ITEMS
- Auto-consumed items such as the server merge titles will now be consumed on login if they were added while the player was offline.
AMENITESResearch Assistant amenities can no longer be purchased in a guild hall.
The latest from Rothgar on the merge:
Oasis should be unlocking now.
8 hours ahead of schedule isn’t bad!
Here’s the latest update from Rothgar:
Update:
Both merges are still going great, no issues so far. We hope to have the chat portion of the merge done in 2 or 3 hours.
FYI, this will be the last merge of the year.
Update from Rothgar as of 1:49pm PST:
Update:
We’re ahead of schedule on the merges today. Chat should be back up any minute now and the servers are being QA’d as we speak. Hopefully if there are no QA issues we will have the servers unlocked in an hour or two.
Also, if you happen to have characters on both of the servers that are being merged into one, Rothgar explains what happens with the shared bank:
If you have characters on both servers that are being merged, and both characters have items in the shared bank, one of the banks will have it’s contents put in your overflow. This is because we can’t merge the two shared banks into one bank due to slot conflicts. So if you log in and find stuff in your overflow, thats most likely the cause. Everything else should merge fine.
Befallen/Oasis and Nektulos/Guk (BONG for short 😉 ) Server Merges are underway.
From Rothgar:
Everything is going great on merge 1. Set to begin merge 2 in 20 minutes.
Everything is still on schedule. I’ll update again in the morning.
Our updates will be spotty as I was affected by airport weather delays. Best of luck to Rothgar, Zoltaroth, and all merging players. 🙂
Those servers which have completed their merges are experiencing crowding in main chat channels, specifically 1-9 and auction. Fortunately, some adjustments are being made to resolve the matter. From Zoltaroth:
We are looking into increasing the channel limits.
and later:
We have identified the issue and are working on a fix.
Barring any other major news, we’ll be rather content-light until just prior to Sunday night’s server merges. Just got back from the Eiffel Tower. Peace. 🙂
From SOEFanFaire.com:
SAVE THE DATE FOR FAN FAIRE 2011
July 7-9, 2011 @ Bally’s Las Vegas
Make the Trek, Meet New Friends and Get Your Game On!
Everseek.com, the ultimate EQ2 House Item Reference Guide, will be hosting a Frostfell Decorating Contest this year. I’m thrilled to be one of the four judges of this contest. From EverSeek.com:
From Sunday, December 12, 2010 (12:01 a.m., US Pacific Time) through Wednesday, December 29, 2010 at (11:59 p.m., US Pacific Time), Everseek.com will be hosting a Frostfell decorating contest to celebrate the Frostfell holiday season. Submit your entry for a chance to win a cool item for your home! Depending on the number of entries, winners will be announced on or around January 17, 2011.
The judges for the contest are known in the EverQuest II Community as: Aslita (Decorator) Feldon (The EQ2 Wire) Jesdyr (Layout Editor Creator) and Serenitii (Everseek).
We look forward to your entries. 🙂
