From EverQuest2.com:

Station Access has a new name, lower fees and more plan options!

Why pick just one of our amazing games to play when you can get access to an exciting line-up of all of our most popular titles for one low price? We’ve listened to your feedback and we are happy to announce the launch of the SOE All Access game pass!

Formerly called Station Access, SOE All Access will allow you access to play many of our most popular games including: DC Universe™ Online (PC version), EverQuest® (PC and Mac versions), EverQuest II, EverQuest II Extended – Gold Membership,  EverQuest Online Adventures™ (PlayStation® 2), Pirates of the Burning Sea® – Captain’s Club Membership, PlanetSide®, Star Wars Galaxies™, Vanguard: Saga of Heroes®, Free Realms® (PC and Mac versions) Membership, and Star Wars®: Clone Wars Adventures™ (PC and Mac versions) Jedi Membership.

EQ2 ZAM were paying attention during SOE’s live webcast from the E3 show floor and among other things picked up the news that the multi-game Station Access accounts will see a price cut to $19.99. Not only does Station Access grant 12 rather than the 7 character slots of a normal account (although additional character slots can be purchased for either), but it also allows players to access other games like EverQuest 1, Vanguard, Star Wars Galaxies, Pirates of the Burning Sea, etc.

From EQ2 ZAM:

Sony Online Entertainment just confirmed during their live E3 stream that Station Access will soon be dropping to $19.99 per month from the current price of $29.99 per month. That means you can get access to all of SOE’s games for a little more than the price of one game subscription!

One aspect of the EverQuest 2 Live vs. EverQuest 2 Extended (Free-to-Play) debate has been how Station Access fits into the picture. Many Station Access players are using the account not to play multiple SOE games, but for the extra 5 character slots.

With the “EQ2 Subscription Perks” announced by SmokeJumper for monthly, quarterly, and yearly subscriptions, designed to offset and contrast against the EQ2 Extended servers, Station Access players have been feeling left out.

In a thread entitled “Station Access Accounts – No Multi-Month, No Extras, No Nothing“, SmokeJumper has hinted at some possible changes going forward.

Players on standard EQ2 accounts with more than 7 characters in a region, or players on Station Access accounts with more than 12 characters in a region were locked out of accessing these “hidden” characters with a change in Game Update 57. Although intended to close an exploit, the primary motivation for this change has been to protect the monetization of character slots, which are for sale on EQ2 Extended servers.

Note: This change has been rolled back as of Tuesday, August 24th, to allow players to “get their house in order”. On Tuesday, August 31st, players who have more characters than are allowed by their account type will only have the option of deleting characters to access “hidden” characters. The /camp command will not load any character not visible on the character select screen, and changes to the character list INI file will be ignored.

If you have no more than 7 EQ2 characters on your EQ2 account, or no more than 12 EQ2 characters on your Station Account, you do not need to do anything.

So the aftermath of our brouhaha yesterday about players who have been (admittedly) taking advantage of having more than 7 characters on an EQ2 account (or more than 12 characters on a Station Access account) has been rather swift and conciliatory.

The good news from SmokeJumper:

We’ve talked it over further and there is new news on this front:

1. We’re going to rollback this feature next Tuesday (8/24). You’ll be able to access all your characters at that time.
2. You’ll have seven days to get onto your account and pull items off any characters you desire if you want to shuffle stuff around.
3. On Tuesday (8/31), we’ll turn the feature back on and all accounts will be limited to the proper number of character slots.

If you ensure that the characters you want to keep are the last ones you have logged in before 8/31, then those are the ones that will be available when the feature is re-implemented.

Again, the feature rollback will be in this coming Tuesday’s hotfix (8/24) and you’ll have access to all your characters again starting on that day until the following Tuesday (8/31).

Asked why this wasn’t responded to sooner, or why such a grace period was not offered earlier:

Well…to be honest, I admit we made a mistake here. In hind sight, it’s kind of a “no duh” thing to do. Our only excuse is that we’ve been very busy, yet that’s a pretty lame excuse. But we’re making good as rapidly as possible.

After a lot of questions and a lot of waiting, we finally get an answer on what the “perks” will be for the EQ2 Live Subscription servers.  This thread on the official forums outlines the perks that you get for a multi-month subscription.

We may not have heard the last word for players with extra or “hidden” characters on their EQ2 accounts. From Rothgar:

Unfortunately this is not an easy fix, as I think the characters are sorted by code based on some pre-defined criteria.

I’ve reviewed the code and may have a potential solution but before I provide more details I’ll need to confirm this with Customer Service and make sure its something we can do.

We’ll keep you apprised. Although, most of you know, I’m on European time zone now, so most of the big news happens while I’m asleep. 🙁

UPDATE:

SmokeJumper has added these comments:

We’re discussing this internally and should have something to share with you either later today or tomorrow.

Just a heads-up to let you know this is not being ignored.

UPDATE: We have renamed this article, as there has been conciliatory action taken on this issue.

So if you read our article today about EQ2 customers who have had more than 7 characters on their EQ2 accounts who woke up to found that additional “hidden” characters are inaccessible, you probably have little sympathy for these players.

However, this is a customer-oriented business, and given such a situation, advanced warning so players can “get their house in order” is always the recommended course of action. Handled properly, some players would upgrade to Station Access again (maybe for a month or two to sort things out), most players would shuffle things around and delete characters to come “into compliance”, and a small handful of players would ragequit.

However SOE is trying something different it seems. Tough love? Too bad, so sad? We’re not clear. But here’s your answer ladies and gentlemen…

For years, players have been asking for additional character slots, either for free, or as an optional one-time purchase.

Seven vs. Twelve

An EQ2 monthly subscription runs approximately $14-15 a month depending on your choice to pre-pay 3, 6, or 12 months in advance, or stick to month-to-month payments. Despite the introduction of new races, and a new expansion each year, currently, EQ2 subscribers have access to 7 character slots.

So far, the only option offered to increase the number of character slots has been to buy Station Access.  This $29.95/mo package was originally intended as a way to provide access to SOE’s entire stable of online games (EQ1, EQ2, SWG, etc.). But over the years, this deal has been sweetened with the addition of more character slots. An EQ2 player with Station Access receives 12 character slots.

It’s worth noting that those are 7 and 12 slots per region. Players can start 7 characters on US, EU, and Test servers, making for a total of 21 characters in all if you include all 3 regions.

What happens when you downgrade, and today’s changes after the jump…