Feldon
UPDATE: I have stricken out all parts of the strategy which are no longer applicable as of July 14th hotfix. Venril Sathir, leader of the Sathirians, will challenge us in ways we have not had to deal with before. Venril Sathir is not a DPS fight. Venril Sathir does not hit very hard or require a lot of healing. Venril is just a totally different kind of fight than most of us have ever had to deal with before. What Venril Sathir does is require intense concentration by each and every player on what is going on with your...
Feldon
This comes to us from EQ2Traders. As we mentioned last week, GU51 is getting a new HEIRLOOM tag. There were theories that this might be applied to The Proof in the Pudding quest combines (Master Sage/Jeweler/Woodworker/Carpenter/Armorer/etc.). We now have confirmation that this will in fact be the case. If you have a level 80 sage and level 80 carpenter and both are on (or have completed) the quest, you’ll be able to make the combine for your alt, put it in the shared bank, log out, log in, claim it, and update your quest. What we did not know...
Today (Jan 27th) at 3pm PST is Aeralik’s GU51 playtest over on the Test Server. This is the second one of these hate/agro playtests with developer involvement. These changes are espected to go live February 3rd according to this missive by Kiara: The estimated date for GU #51, Lucan’s Art of War, to go to the live servers is Tuesday, February 3rd, 2009.
Kander slipped an interesting comment into the raging TSO Stinks topic: FYI: Stay tuned for the Shard of the Day solo quest, with some additional solo content. Cannot say more, but keep your eyes peeled for GU52. The current plan is that it will take a time investment similar to that of running an entire instance. So there you have it folks, while people have found a variety of more or less legitimate ways (which not everyone else approved of) to load up on Void Shards, now there is going to be an official way to get 1 shard...
Looks like substantial changes are being made to agro control and hate generation on the Test server in response to the Topic I linked here. Aeralik has hosted one play test and is expected to host a second one tomorrow. Time will tell which classes benefit the most, which ones are the losers in all these changes, and whether this will really rewrite the book on tanking in EQ2.
The complaints about GU51 are rolling in. Even the biggest fanboys who usually cannot find fault with any of the EQ2 team’s well-intentioned changes are not happy with what seems to most to be a rushed, massive change to something that has taken 4 years to develop in its current form. The issue that many are bringing up is not only have fighter stances and taunts been changed dramatically, but most Hate transfer from Swashies, Assassin, Coercers, Rangers, and most other classes have been reduced dramatically or eliminated. It would probably have been wiser to make all the taunt...
Originally posted on EQ2 Forums (Heirloom Flagging) Looks like SoE have been listening to the overwhelming feedback from many gamers feel that the NO TRADE flag has been overused in The Shadow Odyssey. You’ll recall that TSO offers 20 closed (instance) dungeons and no open (contested) dungeons. As a result, all of the LEGENDARY and FABLED items that drop in these popular zones cannot be traded, even amongst character alts of the same account. This also includes the much vaunted Void Shards used to buy special Legendary armor. In a future update, some items will be changing tags from...
From WorthPlaying Sony Online Entertainment has signed a distribution agreement with Valve to bring its MMO titles to Steam, starting with the EverQuest and EverQuest II collections, as well as Vanguard: Saga of Heroes and Pirates of the Burning Sea. “We are always looking for additional ways to introduce our great catalog of games to new audiences. It’s hard to think of a larger group of PC gamers interested in multiplayer games than those connecting to Steam,” said John Smedley, president of SOE. Inexplicably, old versions of EQ and EQ2 are being offered through Steam as well. Users have...
I was really surprised to see this item linked in open chat. Bjorn’s Whistle Summons Bjorn, Elder of the Western Wastes FABLED LORE NO TRADE Applies Summon Bjorn when Activated. Summons a mount to ride that increases your speed by 70% If level 80 or higher Increases Heal Crit Bonus of caster by 1.0% Increases Heal Crit Chance of caster by 3.0% Increases Max Power of caster by 350. \aITEM -329826907 573012519:Bjorn’s Whistle\/a DROPPED BY Gynok in Tomb of the Mad Crusader. There is also a Fighter bear whistle that drops from Anasthi Sul in Palace of the Ancient...
The fighter rebalance in GU51 is coming, whether we want it or not. There is a lot of “The Sky is Falling” responses about it both Pro and Con. Here are some useful quotes: Originally posted by Aeralik: Prior to this change, tanks relied heavily on hate transfers and hate gain/hate reduction while dpsing to gain aggro. Now the emphasis is more on the tank achieving this with their abilities… Originally posted by Flaye: NOBODY should be getting a “set it & forget it” hate transfer, if we’re ALL supposed to be playing more intelligently, paying more attention, &...
As scheduled, the Test Update #51 notes have been posted. Substantial changes to Tanking and Hate Generation are included. Test Update #51 is promised to run on the test server for 3+ weeks to allow adequate time for feedback. GAMEPLAY Taunts and detaunts can now critical similar to how melee and spell criticals work. Threat output and hate position changes will now be displayed to the chat windows. You can find it under Combat in the Hate Adjustment category. Hate gain mods will no longer affect taunt adjustments. Area of effect spells and combat arts will no longer spread...
According to Kirstie, Game Update #51 will be coming to the Test Servers on or around January 7th. [link] What should we expect in GU51? Here are some quotes from Aeralik: The focus of part 2 is looking at the different ways players gain ( or lose ) hate and putting more emphasis on player responsibility. You will likely see the numbers scale up on taunts a lot and hopefully fighters will start to look more at their threat per second while tanking and less so on the raw dps output we see now. With the changes offensive and...
Game Update 52 Notes from Timetravelling: As a New Year’s Resolution (a few days early, admittedly), we pledge to create within a few months (aka GU52): A brand new two-group instance with 9 bosses—over half of whom drop Void Shards—balanced for players in legendary gear A very challenging brand new four-group raid instance Brand new tradeskill instance in the Void A Lavastorm revamp Brand new areas added to Lavastorm with level 80 solo content A new faction with gear to gather from the new Lavastorm content 12 new armor sets All of them with brand new armor appearances Including...
December 18, 2008 Update A ton of changes small and large have been implemented throughout Norrath, “as a special gift from the developers” The master scroll drop rate in Desert of Flames has been increased to more closely match those of the rest of the game. The twin dragons in the Pedestal of Sky now drop 3 pieces of fabled armor. Godking Anuk now drops 3 pieces of fabled armor. When clearing a filter your last scroll location will be restored. Collections can be sorted by: Ready to turn in status (Default) Name Level Category Progress – sorts by...
On December 11th, Allakhazam had a developer chat with the EQ2 development team on Dec 11th. Some relevant quotes: Anon: Is there any plan to at Raid x 2 content to TSO? Ilucide: Yeah, absolutely. Though not necessarily ‘part’ of TSO, we will be adding a pretty nice sized chunk of x2 content in the not-so-distant future. Keep your eyes peeled, it will be part of a larger content release with a new x4 zone, and a whole bunch of new solo content in Lavastorm for level 80ish players. Ilucide: Timetravelling and Kander are hard at work on the...
It seems that a LOT of people have been raising a stink and filing /bugs and /petitions about how easy it is to get void shards in certain TSO dungeons. I will admit that the current situation is exploitable in a couple of different ways. The first exploit that people discovered was the sharing of cleared instances so that other members who had not initially been present during the group could come into the zone and get harvest/clickable updates and get their Void Shard. The first attempts by SoE to close these exploits was to close the Lava Wall...
From http://forums.station.sony.com/eq/posts/list.m?topic_id=144049 First of all wanted to say “what a crazy launch”! Many of the developers have spent countless hours in the Station Wallet design and implementation. Our morning started pretty early (1am) and we wanted to make the downtime as quick and painless as possible. As part of our new update roll out we aim to have the servers back up at 8am so that everyone can jump back into the game after getting a few hours rest I know that Station Cash surprised many of you and I can assure you that we planned it that way! We...
It’s interesting to see this posting from John Smedley, President of Sony Online Entertainment from Dec 22, 2007: I’ve been a regular lurker on this site for a while but I wanted to step in here and dispel something that’s just plain not true – I don’t have my name highlighted here, but anyone that doubts it’s me can email me at jsmedley@soe.sony.com and I’ll happily reply. We aren’t going to be allowing RMT in any way, shape or form on the non-exchange enabled EQ II servers. Period. End of statement. EQ2Flames Posting by Smed He responded today with:...
Here’s the FAQ: http://forums.station.sony.com/eq2/posts/list.m?topic_id=438343 Here’s the Official Website: http://www.station.sony.com/stationcash/ Conversion Rate for Dec 9, 2008 is $1 (or 1 Euro) for 100 Station Cash. But what I think most people are interested in is the LIST of items. Cosmetic Pets Knight of Shadow’s End Summons a pet shadow lich knight Duration: until Cancelled 400 Zhog, Groz’s Little Brother Summons a pet Zhog, Groz’s Little Brother Duration: until cancelled 700 Equipment Seafury Buccaneer Armor Crate a 7 piece set of statless/appearance armor with only one adorned shoulder. 1000 Tunarian Alliance Armor Crate a 7 piece set of statless/appearance armor (identical...
Although there have been ways to get plat with money (for instance, buying packs of LoN cards and then selling them in-game), selling looting rights to items, and “buying” mythicals, there has been no official RMT in EQ2 other than the Station Exchange servers (which fell under the management of LiveGamer last year). Until now. The servers are presently down and the Live Server has the following Update Notes: Live Update December / 9 / 2008 STATION CASH Station Cash is a new virtual currency from SOE that has been created to allow for the purchase of premium in-game...
Frequent readers of EQ2Wire may be wondering where to buy the Ykeshan Warbears which were teased at Allakhazam last month. I know several folks were looking forward not only to the 65% runspeed but the various buffs available on these warbears. A price of 50 void shards was given by Kiara late in the “Retail vs. Download” firestorm for this bear, but as yet nobody has been able to buy them. Turns out this was a bug. In a future hotfix, they will be available from the Void Shard Miscellania Merchant for 50 void shards. EQ2 Forums: Void Shard...
Frostfell Frostfell appears to be in full testing mode, with some new zones and quests being added. There is supposed to be a group instance similar to the Haunted Mansion during Halloween. Update Notes Mobs in TSO dungeons will have an appropriate number of hitpoints for mentored instances; Tupta, Grobb, and Survival Accord faction merchants require less faction to sell; [Dec 3 2008] Stability update for Windows Vista; [Dec 2 2008] Fix for Repeatable Missions; [Nov 25 2008] As you know, I had further problems with these Repeatable Missions. I was unable to get either the mission for Deep...
Hey folks, I’m back from Big Bend National Park. First up, the bug with Void Shard Missions being unrepeatable was supposed to be corrected on the 25th. EDIT: This is still broken, as I am unable to get missions for Deep Forge or Tradeskill Group Missions. I hope it is properly fixed in the near future. In other news, a bug with the amount of AoE damage being put out by the boss of the Atrocious Amalgam in Miragul’s Phylactery : the Anathema will be corrected in the next hotfix. Thanks Kander! There were reports that the “Daily Double”...
Aside from the 3 new TSO dungeons located in the Void (including Obelisk of Ahkzul), the other 17 TSO dungeons located around Norrath each contain a “bonus” void shard quest. Find the key and loot it, and your party each get void shards. Until a bug is fixed, the group leader must temporarily switch looting to “Lotto” before everyone clicks on the chest. Each of these chests has a key hidden somewhere in the zone. Some are harder to find than others, and fastidious EQ2 players have been documenting and reporting the locations of these “key” mobs and some...
The TSO Mission system is, how shall we say, VERY buggy at the moment. Especially if someone shares a mission with you. Some people are getting totally locked out of missions if someone shares the Double Void Shard mission from Moors of Ykesha and they complete it. Quest Sharing is often not giving people the items necessary to do the missions (Holy Water, etc.). All of this is being investigated by the Developers according to Kiara: http://forums.station.sony.com/eq2/posts/list.m?&topic_id=436585