Feldon
If you’re a Scout, a Fighter, and maybe even a Cleric, Druid, Enchanter, or Mystic in EQ2, and you push yourself to play the absolute best (even if you’re not geared the best), you’re probably already familiar with the concept of Autoattack. Game Update 61 introduced a new type of Autoattack called Spell Autoattack for Mages and Priests. You might be tempted to jump on the DPS bandwagon, but before you run out and equip a Wand, there are some things you really ought to know! UPDATE: This article has been updated thanks to feedback from Ferk, Anaogi, Barx!
Year: 2011
Are you ready for some concrete info about Beastlords? The decision to bring Beastlords to EverQuest II was made less than a month before Fan Faire according to an SOE source, and a lot of things were said at Fan Faire, including what type of armor and weapons they’d use, what class they’d be, and how Warders would work. Now that the team has been working on them for four months, there have, not surprisingly, been a few changes. Here is EQ2’s Lead Designer Akil “Lyndro” Hooper talking about Beastlords on EverQuest2.com: Q. What is a beastlord? What makes...
On Saturday we reported that some players had started receiving their 8 Year Veteran Rewards. Of particular note in this collection of loot was an item called “Veteran Revival” that would allow you to revive your group once every 24 hours. However when players tried it, they immediately discovered that it only worked if you (the caster) were still alive, greatly reducing the value of the item. SmokeJumper initially posted that the item was “being fixed”, however he later responded with this: Sorry for the confusion, but the item is currently working as intended. It cannot be used while...
From EverQuest2.com comes this notice about ‘very exciting news for EverQuest II’: Come check out this week’s EverQuest II Webcast! Host Linda “Brasse” Carlson (Director, Global Community Relations) will interview Dave “SmokeJumper” Georgeson (EQ2 Executive Producer) and Emily “Domino” Taylor (EQ2 Associate Producer) to talk about some very exciting news for EverQuest II! You won’t want to miss it! Join us on Thursday, November 10, 2011, at 4:30 p.m. US Pacific Time*, as we live stream this webcast on the Twitch TV! The webcast is expected to last about 20 minutes. Note that SOE has switched live stream services from...
It looks like any kind of big news affecting EverQuest II: Age of Discovery might have to wait until tomorrow Thursday. Here’s SmokeJumper‘s announcement of the Eight Year Veteran Rewards (which we covered on Saturday) and a free Lucan D’Lere Statue: Huzzah and yippee-ki-ay! We’re seven! The EverQuest franchise is near and dear to our hearts here at SOE and we really appreciate all of you that have also grown to love Norrath over the years. As a small token of our appreciation, and to tie in with the “Freeport Reborn” game update coming up soon, there is a...
From the EQ2 Forums: POPULATION / ZONE PROGRESSION Challenge Mode NPCs Several challenge mode NPC effects that were incurable are now curable as curses. These include Paralyzing Venom, Mesmerizing Web, and Corrosive Residue in the Aaranae Arcimae fight. Combat Madness in the General Aakita fight. Deathtouch in the Lichlord Skulldugger fight and several others. Cooperative Strike is no longer always fatal each tick, it does about half your max health in focus damage with each tick now. Temple of Rallos Zek: Foundations of Stone [Challenge] Greater warboars during the statue of rallos zek fight have less maximum health. Tallon’s...
A growing number of players on the Splitpaw, Valor, and Storms servers (located in Amsterdam and serving the UK and English-speaking Europe) have been reporting unplayable gameplay lag and connection delays. Some players are reporting no problems while others are experiencing 5-6 second cast delays. Further confusing matters, there seems to be no geographic pattern to the problems, as some living in close proximity to Amsterdam are reporting the biggest problems while those far away are getting fast responses. UPDATE: We’ve updated this article to address the Valor and Storms servers. In the absence of further information, this would...
It seems that SOE has also been caught up in the difference between when the US goes off Daylight Savings Time (changed in 2007 to the first Sunday in November) and Europe which goes off Daylight Savings on the last Sunday in October. It’s now 1 hour and 20 minutes past the scheduled time for SOE’s Bonfire Night celebration on the Splitpaw server and there’s no sign of an event happening. Hey it could happen to anyone…
A tip of the hat to Rixan of Antonia Bayle for bringing this to our attention. After hearing that there might or might not be an eight year vet reward at Fan Faire, it looks like we are getting a doozy of a set. We’re talking a once-every-24-hours group resurrect (20% health and power), a 150% flying disc mount, a 110% XP potion, and an equippable illusion that adds a green glow around your eyes. You also get a “the Veteran” player title. UPDATE: According to several sources, players will get a choice of several different 150% flying disc...
Yesterday we received an e-mail from SOE informing us of a 25% discount on their SOE Authenticator keyring security fobs licensed from Vasco. These devices can be ordered from the SOE Station Store for $7.49 plus shipping and handling. This promotion ends November 17, 2011 at 8:59am PDT (11:59am EDT; 16:59 GMT; 17:59 CET). Note the free SOE Mobile Authenticator app for iPhone and Android is still listed as ‘Coming Soon’. You can read the SOE Authenticator Frequently Asked Questions at SOE.com.
So we’ve just posted our transcript of last night’s Freeport Revamp webcast. If you don’t want to read the whole thing and just want the top five items you should know, here you go: 5 You will not be able to fly/leap/glide in Freeport. This is something that was promised by SmokeJumper at this year’s Fan Faire before the art team had put in the development hours. They found that framerates were absolutely abysmal if you were able to fly, leap, glide, etc. 4 You will not be able to start characters in Freeport. The revamped Freeport provides a...
Last night’s SOE Community Webcast talked about EverQuest II’s Freeport Revamp. Present were Linda “Brasse” Carlson, Akil “Lyndro” Hooper (EQ2 Lead Designer), Nathan “Kaitheel” McCall (Designer), Jonathan “Prathun” Caraker (Designer), with Dave “SmokeJumper” Georgeson (EverQuest franchise Executive Producer). And here’s a transcript of most of the Webcast:
Brian “Omougi” Ferguson has spilled the beans on Tradeskill Apprentices at EverQuest2.com: What exactly IS a tradeskill apprentice? A tradeskill apprentice is an NPC that you can hire to work for you in your house. You will need to be tradeskill level 10 or higher before you can work with a tradeskill apprentice. Who are these tradeskill apprentices anyway? The first tradeskill apprentices available for hire will be Coldain dwarves. Now that Velious has been reconnected to the rest of Norrath, the Coldain are eager to learn the advances in tradeskills that have taken place during their years of...
From EverQuest2.com: A couple of weeks ago, we invited EQII players to participate in a Haunted Homes Decorating Forum Challenge. All participants used their own homes, their own currency, and their own items to decorate with the Haunted Homes/Nights of the Dead theme. We received about 118 qualifying entries. It was an amazing turnout and as such, it was very difficult for the Community Team to judge so many fantastic houses. Thank you to everyone who participated and we are hoping to do this type of contest again soon.
Axe
From RadarX at 8:48 Pacific, 11/3/11 on the EQ2 Forums: We are currently investigating login issues with Launchpad and apologize for the inconvenience. Thank you for your patience as we resolve the problem. UPDATE: This issue was resolved approximately 30 minutes after the above status post.
If you use Twitter, you’re probably following EverQuest II. EQ2’s new Community Manager Isulith has been making use of the service largely by posting questions to readers. We found Yesterday’s question to be most interesting: What are your most used fan sites? If you’d like your opinion to be heard, reply on Facebook. UPDATE: 33% of 71 respondents said they read EQ2Wire. Thanks for your support!
Tuesday’s update seems to have disabled the 48 hour grace period for trading loot/items between the members of a group or raid. This change was pushed straight to Live with no testing. And now it may be that the reasoning for this “fix” was to stop a low-priority “exploit”. From Crismorn of Nagafen: SoE tried to fix Contested Kael quest pieces from being traded between group members and thought it was so important and such a huge issue that breaking the entire ability to trade any type of dropped loot would be an acceptable loss, or they [did] just...
As a matter of course, we have left the marketing of StationCash Marketplace items to the forums, EverQuest2.com, and the Welcome window when logging into EQ2. However this week’s haul includes a set of in-game paintings, something players have been requesting for quite some time. We got a giggle out of the title of this painting ‘Seeking the Burned Woods’. If you don’t know the backstory on that, read the story. Maybe the next bunch of paintings will include Fansy the Bard. These 5 paintings are $2.50 each (.83 cents each if you got triple SC).
Thursday, November 3, 2011 brings a new Webcast about the upcoming Game Update 62, specifically the Freeport revamp. If you have a Facebook account, you can Submit Questions for this Webcast by posting here. Those of us who refuse to get a Facebook account can apparently pound sand. 😉 From EverQuest2.com: Host Linda “Brasse” Carlson (Director, Global Community Relations) will interview Jonathan “Prathun” Caraker (EQ2 Game Designer) and Akil “Lyndro” Hooper (EQ2 Lead Designer) and learn all about the upcoming changes to Freeport. Are you wondering what this historic city will look like, what new quests are on the...
From EverQuest2.com: With the Everquest II: Age of Discovery expansion just around the corner, it’s the perfect time to give players the inside scoop on what exactly is going on with the Freeport re-design. EverQuest II Community Relations Manager, Jennifer “Isulith” Bridges got the chance to sit down with Timothy Heydelaar, Senior Artist for EverQuest II. He was able to give a great overview of what to expect and why the changes to Freeport were made. … The Freeport City revamp is coming winter 2011 with Game Update 62, which is coming out at the same time as the...
From EverQuest2.com: We will perform maintenance on all games and services beginning at 4:00 a.m. US Pacific Time on November 1, 2011. You may experience the following: Logins for all games, websites, and forums may be unavailable between 4:00 a.m. and 6:00 a.m. US Pacific Time. Commerce transactions, including purchases on our websites and in-game marketplaces, may be unavailable between 4:00 a.m. and 10:00 a.m. US Pacific Time. We apologize for this interruption and will resume all affected services as soon as the maintenance is completed. This maintenance window corresponds to 11:00-13:00 GMT or 12:00-14:00 CET.
From the EQ2 Forums: POPULATION / ZONE PROGRESSION Strategist’s Stronghold Severed Windpipe is now curable. Tallon’s Stronghold [Non-Challenge mode] During the Tallon Zek fight Decorin Deahbringer will cast Deathbringer’s Touch and Impending doom less frequently. Tallon’s Stronghold [Challenge mode] During the Lieutenant Klaatuus fight the aviak trooper adds have less health, no longer memwipe, and will always spawn at the bosses feet. Vallon’s Tower [Challenge Mode] During the Gindan Commander Angler fight the Diaku Deceptors will wait a while before casting their stunning strike spell. Kael Drakkel All dropped quest items that were previously flagged no-trade now consume the...
If you’ve been following the somewhat unfortunate adventures of the Gnoob the Gnome character, you’ll recall he had a big part to play in the introduction of Mercenaries to the original EverQuest when it was faced with its own problem of no new blood to help new or returning players leveling up alts. There have been over a dozen Gnoob videos in the past but this one touches on the upcoming Age of Discovery and its Mercenaries feature. It’s worth a watch and comes with a laugh. From EverQuest2.com:
The upcoming Age of Discovery expansion will include the Mercenaries feature. These player-controlled (or perhaps just guided, depending) NPCs will help players in groups or raids, for a small fee. You can read a lore-based/mock interview with one of these upcoming mercenaries at EverQuest2.com: Recently, we have caught word that mercenaries will start to offer their services in Norrath come the end of the year. We were lucky enough to grab an interview with one of these soon to be job-seeking mercenaries! Her name Vittia Direshadow and she is a Teir’dal Shadowknight. She’s quite scary-looking but assures me she...
Dethdlr
From Everquest2.com: SOE Trick-or-Treat Event is Here! It’s time to trick-or-treat in your favorite games*! Today through October 31, 2011, get treats and tricks when you visit your participating games each day. For EverQuest® II and EverQuest® II Extended, check the mailbox for your tricks and treats! For more details visit www.soe.com/trickortreat. Participating games include: EverQuest EverQuest® II,;EverQuest® II Extended, Free Realms®, Star Wars®: Clone Wars Adventures™, PoxNora® and Magic : The Gathering – Tactics™ Note: This actually started on Friday, Oct 28, 2011