Since the most recent hotfix (and believed to be unrelated to the Server Merges), some players are reporting complete resets of their AA (Alternate Advancement) points each time they Log Out or Spend an AA point.

AA Mirrors to the Rescue

A workaround that some players have discovered is to use your AA mirror once and that apparently stabilizes the resets. If you don’t have an AA Mirror, you’ll need:

• a reflective smoldering shard — drops off trash mobs in Sebilis; since few people rae farming Sebilis, these shards have skyrocketed from 1p each to 5-7p each on some servers
• any tradeskiller of any class with 40k faction with either the Coalition of Tradesfolke or the Ironforge Exchange
• a common location for you to meet, since it must be done via commission crafting (it’s NO TRADE not HEIRLOOM)
• a house to place the item in

By the way, if you would like a website to help testing out AA setups, there is no finer website than Beetny’s EQ2 AA Calculator. It allows you to test out different ways of spending your points, and no cost to reset. 🙂

Also, if the “Are you sure you want to spend a point in XX ability?” prompts are about to get on your last nerve, go to your Options, make sure it’s set to Advanced and not Basic. Now navigate to User Interface -> Game Features and find the setting labeled “Confirm Alternate Achievements“.

Long Term Solution

SOE, specifically Rothgar, is aware of the issue, and some of the underlying causes and fixing this bug is a top priority for Monday or possibly Tuesday. In the meantime, use the workaround described above.

Just prior to Sentinel’s Fate, two different web designers set out to produce an updated AA calculator. We kept our eye on a really smooth one (but which had not been updated for Sentinel’s Fate) by Beetny.

We were stoked to find out that Beetny’s AA Calculator has been fully updated for Sentinel’s Fate.

This AA Calculator lets you browse, experiment, and spend AA points in all 3 AA trees for your character class without logging into EQ2. Also, you’ll notice there is a URL at the top so you can share your suggested AA setups with other players. I predict we’ll see extensive use of these special URLs along with tinyurl.com to easily share AA setups with other players.

Also, Brett has been quick to fix bugs and correct oversights, so if you see any problems, please be sure to e-mail him!

When Brasse went to work for SOE, it was not surprising that her awesome AA Calculator (which set the gold standard) would eventually go out of date. But now we have this great functionality available to us again!