Feldon
Today’s July 27, 2011 update notes address issues with the Spires and Dragon Ring Events on those servers where the events are still running. This update does not yet include a fix for servers that have already completed the events and those affected players who were present but didn’t get credit due to crashes, not having the right quest, or their mob despawning.
Game Updates & Maintenance
Here are your update notes for July 26, 2011 from the EQ2 Forums: GENERAL Fixed a bug that would cause /camp login to sometimes go to character select even if a character was given. POPULATION / ZONE PROGRESSION Sullon’s Spire and Tallon’s Stronghold x4 raid zones (NOT challenge mode) Several of the encounters in these zones have been made less powerful so that the challenge from these zones is more in line with the rewards. QUESTS Heritage It should no longer be possible to create a situation where the Head Usher in the Tower of Frozen Shadow cannot be...
Here’s our fifth video from SOE Fan Faire 2011 “Programming for MMOs”. If you’d like to view the transcript from this panel, check out our Geek Panel: Programming for MMOs writeup. We’ll upload an HD version of this video soon.
The Spires and Dragon Ring Rebuilding events have relaunched, albeit reluctantly on some servers. For servers that had already surpassed 50% progress when the event was taken offline last week (Antonia Bayle and Freeport had reached 99%), they were rolled back to 50% to give other players on the server a chance to complete it. But it looks like this week’s changes to the events may not have done enough. After 12 hours, Antonia Bayle has already reached 69% completion on Spires. So what changes were made to these events while they were offline?
When SmokeJumper unveiled Build Your Own Dungeon at Fan Faire, it took the audience about 0.3 seconds to notice that a key item on the announcement Slide: Players would drive Adventurers or avatars through these Player-built Dungeons, rather than playing their own characters. From the look on SmokeJumper‘s face when he read this line, the collective unrest from the audience was not unexpected. Since the announcement, there has been plenty of discussion on the EQ2 Forums foretelling the feature’s doom, using the abandoned Arena system as an example. Players want to play their own characters in DYOD designed dungeons,...
From Gninja on the EQ2 Forums: The event will be turned back on Friday at 5pm PDT. That’s 8pm EDT, 01:00 BST, 02:00 CET. As previously stated, the events will be reset back to 50% complete per server if they’d reached that point. We’re hoping that the event will run for a few days at least so that players get a chance to participate. While the event is running, there are different quests and events to acquire tokens. Once the event concludes, I believe the only way to get tokens between then and Game Update 61 will be a...
From SmokeJumper on the EQ2 Forums: Hmmm…Valor didn’t go off as planned and we got a hitch in our plans for the other US servers. But the upgrades are still coming! Valor should be upgraded next week (in other words, before the end of July). We’re still getting info back from the hardware folks for the remaining US server upgrades, but it shouldn’t be too long after that. More info soon.
Today’s update changs the flag on the new Incandescent Swiftwing (Phoenix Gryphon) to HEIRLOOM, restores the ability to switch accounts without completely closing the EQ2 client (previously ProfitUI users had been using /camp) with a new command /camp login, as well as a couple of other fixes in Zek and Drunder. From the EQ2 Update Notes: GENERAL You can now use “/camp login” to get back to the client login screen. POPULATION / ZONE PROGRESSION Temple of Rallos Zek [Challenge] The Idol of Rallos Zek’s falling debris should work normally now. ITEMS The Heirloom tag has been removed from...
Today’s Update includes numerous tweaks to the harder Velious dungeons, further reducing the difficulty of many zones, as well as the aforementioned reduction in the cost of Velium Shard armor (Ry’Gorr armor is now 25 shards per piece, 20 if crafted). A glitch with Leaper or Glider mounts and pets (especially Coercer pets) has also been resolved.
While we don’t have a definite date when the Dragon Ring and Wizard Spire Rebuilding events will be coming back, there have been a series of updates and questions about them which is worth consolidating into one place. Due to the Spires event running every 30 minutes instead of the planned hourly interval, and some underestimation of players’ desire to participate, the event had been nearly completed on several servers less than 18 hours after it began. Perhaps the availability of Velium Shards on the vendor was a stimulating factor. Either way, the event was suspended and the devs...
If you’ve been thinking of plunking down your hard-earned Velium Shards on Ry’Gorr armor, or burning up stacks of Legendary and Fabled gear from Drunder zones to get enough ore to craft Drunder armor, you may want to wait. Wednesday July 13th’s Test Update Notes included an item we initially overlooked: ITEMS The first two tiers of Velium Shard Armor should now require less Velium Shards. The amount of ore obtained from smelting down a piece of Drunder loot has been doubled. Thurgadin shard armor currently costs anywhere from 33 to 90 shards per-piece when purchased from the vendor,...
Here’s our second video from SOE Fan Faire 2011 “EverQuest II: Art and Animation”. New this year are Kilts, Animation Retargeting, a New Outfit, and new flying mounts including a Flying Squirrel. If you’d like to view the Slides from this panel in higher quality, check out the updated EQ2 Panel #2 – Art and Animation writeup. We’ll upload an HD version of this video soon.
I’ve posted our first video from SOE Fan Faire 2011 “EverQuest II: Freeport and Beyond” which is an overview of everything we can expect from the EQ2 team until November 2011. If you’d like to view the Slides from this panel in higher quality, check out the updated EQ2 Panel #1 – Freeport and Beyond writeup. We’ll upload an HD version of this video soon.
Today’s update notes for EQ2 are on the brief side: GENERAL Fixed a bug where clients could crash when viewing a flythrough.
From the EQ2 Forums: GENERAL Fixed a bug where you could relinquish your home and cause your guild hall to be relinquished too! MOUNTS Gliding mounts will no longer port up into the air after using certain teleports. Players using leapers and gliders should appear to move smoother when viewed on other player’s clients. POPULATION / ZONE PROGRESSION The normal mode x4 raid zones (Temple, Throne, Kraytoc’s and Drunder zones) require less critical mitigation than before. Players with less critical mitigation should have a better chance for survival.
(left is just the Kilt, right is the entire outfit) If you followed our live blog of the EQ2 Art & Animation panel from Fan Faire 2011, you know that Kilts is something the team has been working on and off for the last 18 months. It’s been a long road to get them done! So it is not a surprise that, at least the first kilts will be on the StationCash Marketplace. The first Kilt choice is the Clan Icereaver set and costs 950SC ($9.50 or $3.17 if you still have Triple SC leftover). When you buy it,...
EQ2 and EQ2X servers are back up after an SOE-wide maintenance window. The window was planned for 7 hours, so 9 hours isn’t too bad. 😉 As for whether there were any changes/patches specific to EQ2, unfortunately EverQuest2.com remains down, so we’re unable to view the EQ2 Patch Notes. we noticed a ~25MB patch before we were were able to login, with most of the patched files being character files, so maybe SmokeJumper‘s suggestion that we’d see Kilts on Tuesday (today) will come to pass. We’re keeping an eye on the Marketplace. More as we have it…
SOE President John Smedley opened the SOE Fan Faire 2011 Welcome Reception with a personal apology. He apologized for the downtime, the hassle of changing passwords, and the service outage that affected all of Sony Online Entertainment this May. He wasted no time in announcing that all Fan Faire attendees would receive a Vasco Security Authenticator key fob. I personally was provided with an EverQuest II-branded security key fob.
This announcement was posted last week, but we knew it would get drowned out by Fan Faire coverage, so here we go… from EverQuest2.com: Beginning July 12, 2011 at 1:00 a.m. US Pacific Time, we’ll be performing maintenance on all games and services. During this maintenance, our forums, websites and games will also be unavailable. The estimated downtime for the maintenance is 7 hours. We apologize for this interruption and will resume the affected services as soon as the maintenance is completed.
Starting Saturday’s EverQuest II Q&A Panel… Update: This is a video of EverQuest II Panel #7 “Q&A #2” added on July 24, 2011.
Starting the EverQuest II: Content and Zone Design panel… Jonathan “Prathun“, Paul “Cronyn” Molina, Nathan “Kaitheel” McCall, Carlos “Gninja” Mora
Starting the EverQuest II: Itemization, Class Balance, Mechanics panel… Salim “Silius“, Carlos “Gninja” Mora, Greg “Rothgar” Spence, Paul “Frizznik” Carrico, Mike “Xelgad” Ganz
Greg “Rothgar” Spence, Nandy “Zoltaroth” Szots, Alex “GermInUSA“, Josh “Autenil” Kriegshauser
Starting the EverQuest II: Freeport and Beyond panel… Pre-panel Buzz: EQ2Players is being replaced with a new site. Sometime this year, it’s a priority, which it hasn’t been before. Dave Georgeson starting the panel. There’s so much info, they’ll be giving that first and then Q&A at the end. Update: This is a video of EverQuest II Panel #1 “Freeport and Beyond” added on July 14, 2011.
Today’s update notes from the EQ2 Forums have fixes for group and raid zones.