Ebik’s Missing Parts

Over on the beach where the ambassadors are you will see a Gnome named Ebik Wooblecog. If you speak to him and click through his very long story he will ask you to find his 3 missing parts… hence the name of the quest ^_^. You will have to find the following:

• Size 7 clunker
  Copper-coated springer
  Triangle spinner

These items are rather large and kinda easy to find. The first one is located at:

Size 7 clunker is on top of the waterfall, just over the bridge. It is an area called Port View Bridge.

The second is at:

Copper-coated springer is located underwater. If you swim from the Gnome towards the starting beach you should find it. It is under water so just search between the two beaches.

The third is at:

Triangle spinner is located behind the tree house. The tree house next to the orc’s cave has big roots, and on the back of the tree between them you will see the missing part. However, the part is under a noxious cobra who is nestled in between two large roots. Kill the cobra and you can access the part!

Once you have found all 3 items return to Ebik to get the following reward:

Constructed Wrist Spanner

That’s it for Ebik, wave goodbye to the friendly little Gnome.

_________________________

Lasydia’s Call

This is second quest you’ll have where a damn shark is involved. To start the quest swim past where Bladefin spawns. You’ll see a rock with some crabs on it in front of a waterfall. Directly to the right of the waterfall is a statue of Lasydia. If you double click on it you are presented with the ability to breathe underwater and have an urge to kill the following:

• 10 Razortooth sharks

Since you can breath underwater just go to town slaughtering the 10 sharks before the ability wears off. I think the ability lasts 15 minutes which is plenty of time to kill them. Once you kill the 10 sharks you are presented with your reward:

Castaway Sash

That is all for Lasydia… leave her alone… seriously.. put the stick down…

_________________________

Stop the Saboteurs

To start this quest you have to kill one of the named goblins on the island, either the Siege Planner, or the Goblin Warmonger. When you kill them they will drop this note in a chest that tells you to go to the beach to kill them. I’d suggest taking at least a priest or another partner to kill them. They are on the beach across from the ambassador’s beach. Once you kill them you will receive the following reward:

Exceptional Goblin Crafted Helmet

That’s it once you’ve killed them and gotten your reward move on… no poking the dead bodies with a stick…

_________________________

Xaliea’s Request

This quest will lead to the last 3 quests on the island I’m going to cover. To start the quest find Priestess Xaliea and speak with her. She will ask you to retrieve the following:

• 3 bone chips

You can find bone chips on undead that are in the graveyard. The graveyard is in the top right hand corner of the map. Basically all you need to do is kill the skeletons until you get the 3 bone chips then return to Xaliea. She will give you the following reward:

70 Copper

Now I know what you’re thinking… I did all that for a few lousy copper… Well yeah but go to the next quests and you’ll understand.

_________________________

X Marks the Spot

To be able to get this quest you must have accepted Xaliea’s quest. Keep killing the skeletons until you get a chest with treasure map. Examine the map and it tells you to go to a tombstone next to a waterfall. The tombstone is around the corner from the orc’s cave. I’d suggest bringing a full group as this guy is nasty. Once you kill Rockbelly you will get the following:

33 Copper

Old Dirty Cutlass

If you examine the Cutlass you will be presented with another task to get it fixed. Take the Cutlass to the Mender beside the banker. Pay the 40 copper and receive the real reward for this quest:

Rockbelly’s Cutlass

That is all for this quest… go poke some gobs with your new sword.

Article found on everquest gold (dot) net

This quest writeup is a historical document of the Isle of Refuge. This zone was repurposed/revamped in Game Update 19.

Collection Quests

There are two collection quests on the island. You must be level 3 to have the harvest ability to be able to complete this quest. The first collection quest is on the beach. You’ll notice some gold sparkling ? marks. If you double click them you will harvest them and get a shell. The shell ? marks can only be found on the beaches of the isle. Upon examining the shell you can add it to your collection. You need the following shells to complete the shell collection quest:

Abalone shell
Clam shell
Conch shell
Mussel shell
Turtle shell

After you collect all 5 of the shells, go over to the second beach where the ambassadors are and look to your right. You will see an NPC named Rivicea Goldwind. When you speak with her, tell her you have a shell collection and she will give you the following:

Collected Shell Trinket

That is all for the shell collection. Now on to the feather collection quest. All around the woods you will see the same ? marks on the ground. They will have one of 5 feathers. The feather ? marks can be found anywhere in the woods. You need to collect the following 5 feathers:

Duck feather
Eagle feather
Falcon feather
Sparrow feather
Hawk feather

Once you have collected all 5 feathers return to Rivicea Goldwind and she will give you the following:

Collected Feather Necklace

This quest writeup is a historical document of the Isle of Refuge. This zone was repurposed/revamped in Game Update 19.

Arriving on the Island

After you exit the tutorial and hit the beaches of the island of a refuge, you’ll need to decide your profession. Head up to Garven who is standing up beside the dock. He’ll welcome you to your new home as a “refugee”, and ask your profession.

After answering his initial questions, Garven will request you “prove your worth” by killing one of the invading Goblins, which have suddenly plagued the Island of Refuge. Accept this quest without delay, and double click the weapons rack to grab a weapon and a few other items. Equip the weapon (likely the crude dagger) and bring up your map by clicking the “M” key.

The troupe of Goblins you’ll need to target to complete this first quest is a foolish bunch, mindlessly sprinting towards their deaths at the hands of the powerful guards manning the west entrance of town……where the action is! Head into town and then to the NW, heading out of the main western gate.

Run around, or jump over the wooden barricades and get a goblin in your sites, either by directly clicking on one, or by pressing tab until you have a suitable target in place. Once you have a target, run straight up to the poor sap and begin hacking away. These Goblins are extremely weak and are sure to drop in just a few hits.Once you’ve killed the Goblin, traverse your way back to Garven at the docks.

Garven Tralk awards you with your first free bit of armor, a sturdy pair of gloves, after you declare you’ve dropped your first slimy Goblin. Throw those bad boys on your digits and head into town to visit Braksan Steelforge.

Mr. Steelforge will be your main point of contact on the island for all Fighter quests on the Island. He hangs out at the forge just Northeast of the large tower in town. Bring up your local map by pressing “M”, and head up just NE of the tower.

Once you find Braksan double click on him to engage in a friendly chat, ignore any pointless spouting off at the mouth, and get him to offer you a quest.

Fighter Quest 1: Goblin Supply Raid

Braksan asks you to head west and take out 4 goblin supply runners. On your map, on the far east of the island (turn off fog of war on your map options) you’ll notice 6 tent. If you hover over them you’ll see they are “Goblin camps”. If you can’t hover over them check off the “fog of war” option on your map so you can tak a closer look at everything. The southernmost goblin camp is the one you’ll be targeting during this quest.

Head west out of town and navigate your way to this camp. When in range, pick out a goblin supply runner who is a safe distance away from other runners, and begin to bash his skull! Repeat this on 4 goblin runners, then head back to Braksan to collect your reward. Keep an eye on the quest dialogue box in the upper right hand corner of your screen to learn when you’ve dispatched enough of the slimy beasts.

Braksan will reward you with a fine pair of boots for your work, he has deposited them for you at the bank which is the building located just west of braksan’s workstation. However, before you go pick up your boots accept the next quest from Braksan.

Fighter Quest 2: Refugee Rescue

Time to take out 5 Gruttooth Aggressors! The refugees are located just NW of the Goblin Supply Runners. Head back west through the gate and up to the location of the human refugees, lined up pathetically on a natural stone wall. You won’t be able to miss them, they are surrounded by the very mobs you need to take out for this particular quest, Gruttooth Agrressors.

As you can guess by the name, they are indeed the first aggro mobs you’ll run into in the game. If you’re not familiar with the term “aggro” it’s MMORPG “speak” for aggressive, in other words they’ll attack you without provocation! So be careful. Only lure one Gruttooth aggressor at a time. Use your taunt skill, it’s great for this very purpose……..and pretty much required for this quest.

After dispatching the necessary amount of Gruttooths, head back to Braksan and you’ll be rewarded with a set of Footman Leggings along with a small amount of copper. Slip the pants on, and strike up another conversation…….Braksan immediately offers you yet another quest……

Fighter Quest 3: Striking Back at the Goblins

For this quest, Branson needs you to collect some Flint Head Spears for him. This is the most dangerous quest by far, and it is suggested you level up to at least Level 5 to be strong enough to ensure success. Once you are confident in your newfound abilities at level 5, head up to the very northwest of the map, where you’ll see 4 tightly packed goblin encampments. YOu’ll run into “Gruttooth Brutes” at the very entrance of these camps, and be warned……they are aggressive and they also assist one another!

Do your best to find some Brutes who have strayed from the pack and take them on 1v1. They aren’t horribly tough to defeat if you properly use your Taunt/Wild Swing special abilities. So head up north and begin taking out the Brutes. Keep a close eye on your life bar, as these initial quests are much more difficult for melee based characters opposed to mages who can take out the brutes from a distance using their spells and kiting. You’re up close and personal so you’ll encur much more damage.

Once you’ve killed enough Brutes to collect 4 flinthead spears, head back to Braksan for your reward. After you fork over the spears, Braksan hooks you up this time with a top of the line Footman Tunic. This is far better than your current “Threadbare Tunic”. Equip the newly acquired Tunic and strike up yet another conversation with Mr. Steelforge. Time for yet another quest………

Quest 4: Take out the Lead Orc!

This quest is available for all races/classes.

At this point, the in game host will notify you you are now ready to leave the island if you so wish. However, Braksan Steelforge offers you one final quest. This quest requires taking out a “Lead Orc” who is responsible for rallying all the Goblins on the Island. This specific quest requires teaming up with other players on the island, and aims to get you used to partying with other players.

Rest assured, you have collected the necessary equipment to continue leveling on the Isle of Refuge until Level 6, Level 7. Continue exploring the Island and speak to all the various NPCs in town and North of the Goblin encampments. Many of them will provide you with other simple tasks which can result in gobs of free equipment…..jewelry, new weapons and more!

Article found on everquest gold (dot) net

This quest writeup is a historical document of the Isle of Refuge. This zone was repurposed/revamped in Game Update 19.

Cellar Cleanup

The Cellar Cleanup quest is the artisan quest on the island. To start the quest go to Malvonicus’ Tower and speak with Assistant Dreak. You will know who he is, cause he will be bitching about the cellar being a mess. After agreeing to clean up the cellar turn to your left and you will see the door that leads to the instanced cleanup quest. You must do the following to complete the first part of the quest.

Move the table, chair, mirror, and bed.
Harvest the crushed rock, and fallen log.
Get rid of the burned barrel.

Once you do this go back to Assistant Dreak. He will thank your for cleaning the cellar and ask you to craft a tin spike to be used in his lock. If you accept he’ll give you a bag full of the materials you’ll need to craft the spike.

Once you get the bag with all the materials go back into the cellar, which now has all the different crafting devices. Go up to the forge and select Tin Bar. From here just hit create and let the crafting run its course. Once you have the Tin Bar, go back to the forge and select Tin Spike and again let the crafting sequence happen. Once you have your Tin Spike in hand, go back to Assistant Dreak. He will give you the following:

Dreak’s finely crafted bracelet
Note from Dreak

The bracelet must be attuned then equipped. The note just tells you where to go to find out more about crafting. That is all for the Cellar Cleanup.

Article found on everquest gold (dot) net

This quest writeup is a historical document of the Isle of Refuge. This zone was repurposed/revamped in Game Update 19.

EQ2 Allakhazam Writeup for the Isle of Refuge boat sequence:

Step 1: Captain Varlos
You’ll appear on the ship next to Captain Varlos, double click on the Caption to initiate a conversation. Navigate through the initial conversation, and the Captain will gradually explain where you are, how you got there, and where you’re headed.

At the end of the conversation, Captain Varlos will ask you to go speak to his First Mate Waulon, who is located just to the NE of the captain at the back of the ship.

Step 2: First Mate Waulon
Waulon mentions to you he’s lost his hat, and you agree to find it. This task will teach you some of the simpler tasks in the game. Run S down the steps of the ship and head to the boxes on the wall at the other end of the ship. Search all three boxes by double clicking them, until a “loot dialogoue” pops up on your screen. You’ll see a hat. Click “Loot all”, and return to waulon with his hat. A dialogue box will pop up stating Waulon as rewarded you the “Mariner’s Charm”, click the accept button and the charm will now be in your inventory. Click “i” at anytime to view your inventory.

After returning Waulon’s hat he requests you speak to Ingrid….she is located just down the steps to the SW.

Step 3: Ingrid
Ingrid details an issue she’s having with the merchant Vim on the ship. She states she desires an artifact (a piece of the “moon) from Vim, and asks you to buy it for her. Problem is you have no money. No problem time to cash in that Mariner’s charm Waulon gave you back in step 2. Head to the S up the stairs to Vim.

Step 4: Vim
Double click Vim, and the standard EQ2 merchant dialogue will appear. At this point, click the sell tab, and double click your “mariner’s charm” to sell. You’ll receive 42 copper for the charm.

Now, click the buy tab. The Shard of Luclin is what Ingrid so desired, so buy it for her! At this point you’ll have 42 copper in your coffers, and the shard of luclin will set you back 36. So just double click, and it’s yours! At this point head back to Ingrid and present her with her gift.

Captain Varlos calls you back up to the deck.

Step 5: Back to Varlos

Once you run back up to Varlos, the Captain will ask you to clear the ship of the rat infestation which has set upon them. This is a chance to get a little combat practice.

Accept the task, and be sure to “accept” the splintered club the caption offers you in the dialogue box. Once you click accept hit the “i” button to open your inventory. Near the bottom of the inventory screen, double click the splintered club. This will equip the club as your main melee weapon.

Now head down to the lower portion of the ship and target some rats for battle! To target a rat, simply click on it or click the TAB button and cycle around the different rats on the ship. Once you have one targeted, it’s time to attack! You’ll notice the action bar on the lower portion of your screen. It consists of 13 buttons, and depending on the race you chose 5-8 of them will be filled with options.

However, for all races slot 2 will be equipped with the “melee attack” function. Once the rat is targeted, you can click this button with your mouse cursor, or simply click the number 2 on your keyboard. All buttons are bound to numbers 1-0, and the – and = keys on your keyboard. So now, target that rat and hit the number 2 on your keyboard.

After you’ve dropped the first rat, double click the carcass to harvest it. After double clicking, “loot” the rodent meat from the putrid animal and head off down the ship to take out the next rat! After killing and harvesting the second rat, head back up to Captain Varlos.

Step 6: Kill the Goblin

After completing the rodent quest, a dragon type creature will attack the ship and free the goblin that was caged next to merchant Vim. Head down and kill that goblin!

After dispatching the green menace, head back up to the Captain, he’ll congratulate you and send your on your way to the Island of Refuge!

It seems we’ll be parting with two islands by May’s end. And while we’ll still be able to catch  John Locke, Jack, Hurley, Sawyer, and Kate in syndication, the Qeynos and Freeport starting islands seem destined for a more permanent fate. We are providing continuing (hopefully not excessive) coverage of the impending removal of the EQ2 starting islands.

Links to Isle of Refuge

I have done some Internet Archive and Google searches to try to find Writeups and history of the original Isle of Refuge quests. Here’s what I found:

• LISTEN to the Isle of Refuge/Queen’s Colony/Outpost of the Overlord theme music
• Read an old EQ2 Zam writeup about Isle of Refuge (on the Boat)
• Read an old writeup about Crafting on the Isle of Refuge
• Read an old writeup about Garven Tralk and the Isle of Refuge (Fighters)
• Read an old writeup about Collection Quests on the Isle of Refuge
• Read an old writeup about Other Quests on the Isle of Refuge

EQ2Players.com French Community Rep, Soffrina had a chance to interview Domino and ask a few questions.  Here are a few excerpts from the article:

How do you come up with a decision to add a new thing to the game? Do you listen to the community’s needs, is it a development decision depending on its importance or is it a combination of both? In other words, how do you initiate a project?

It is certainly a combination of things.  When I play, I’m always watching for things that might be needed or that would improve tradeskills (or indeed the game in general) and I have a list of things I want to do when time permits.  The community is also very proactive about suggesting things that they would like, and often these agree with the things I already want to do, or are appropriate to add to the list.  And sometimes there are changes “behind the scenes” that make it appropriate to include tradeskill content of a particular type.  For an example of the latter, when the Lavastorm zone was revised, it made sense to take advantage of the changes and put in a tradeskill quest line in Lavastorm at the same time.  Once I know what I want to do next, I just figure out about how long it will take and run it past the team leads to ensure they agree, then off to work I go.  It’s not a very formal process.

Will there be musical instruments coming soon to EQ2 for players housing?

There are already a reasonable number of carpenter-made musical instruments that can be placed in houses.  There aren’t any current plans to add more.

Will it be possible one day to have outdoor areas in houses so fans of decoration will finally be able to create a real garden?

It’s something that would be decided by our art team, in particular Haohmaru.  We know it’s something that many people would like, but I don’t know if there are any specific plans currently.

Are there any plans of creating brand new quests, like the epic crafting quest?

I am always hoping to add more tradeskill quests.  There are no current plans for another epic quest, but I’m sure there will be more quests of other types.

Check out EQ2Players.com for the full interview.

There seems to be some confusion in the In Testing Feedback thread regarding the removal of Qeynos and Freeport as starting choices. I stand by the original article I posted, but some clarification is worth mentioning.

Qeynos and Freeport Going Away?

Qeynos and Freeport are not being removed as cities. Furthermore to my knowledge, none of the level 6-20 quests in these city zones and surrounding suburbs are going away. Although further testing on the Test Server will be needed to confirm this.

Players wishing to experience the Qeynos and Freeport level 6-20 content would need to create a character in Kelethin or Halas, Neriak or Gorowyn and arrange travel to Qeynos or Freeport to do those quest lines.

It is also worth pointing out that changing Citizenship between Qeynos, Kelethin, and New Halas, or between Freeport, Neriak, and Gorowyn, is approximately a 15-30 minute process. It’s a single quest or short series of quests. It is nothing like Betrayal. Nor is changing your Citizenship required to play this content.

EQ2Wire would prefer if the islands are not removed, but de-emphasized from the Character Creation screen, with more options added on the Departure Boat to port the player to level 6-20 content in all 6 starting cities.

We stand by our belief that removing content is not necessary to improve the experience for new players.

The Promise of Battlegrounds

The promise of Battlegrounds has been the opportunity to meet players from other servers and challenge them in meaningful PvP combat. It has been a great time-killer while attempting to form up groups. It has been a fun exercise for guilds from different servers wanting to face off in battle. And it has been an opportunity (perhaps too good of one) to gear up. However this promise has largely gone undelivered to the European community.

Aside from localization issues (language, number and date formats), European servers almost always undergo software upgrades at a different time (and sometimes different date) than Stateside updates. If the software does not exactly match between two copies of EQ2, then these two players facing off in Battlegrounds could lead to character corruption or exploits. As a result of these concerns, Battlegrounds are isolated by language and country. Thus, the French, German, Russian, UK, and US Battlegrounds clusters cannot talk to each other.

The issues caused, and solutions posited on this subject can all be found in this prominent thread on the EQ2 Forums: Battlegrounds and EU Servers

In February, former EQ2 Senior Producer Alan “Brenlo” Crosby created a thread “What is the Golden Path?” It included this provocative passage:

The golden path is the first step in a larger revamp of our new player experience.   We took a look at the starting areas, other than Qeynos and Freeport as we plan to move away from those, and reworked content so that it had a better flow.  We wanted the quests in Darklight, Timorous and Greater Fay, to give you a better progression path.

When asked in the EQ2 ZAM Dev Chat to clarify this position, Brenlo responded further:

We plan to only allow new characters to start in the newer player areas. Timorous, Greater Fay, Darklight and soon Halas. The new player experience in Qeynos and Freeport are just not up to snuff anymore and do not provide as solid an experience when you enter the game for the first time.

Any hopes that this change would be canceled with the introduction of new EQ2 Senior Producer Dave “SmokeJumper” Georgeson, were dashed with his indication that he would “not be changing anything that was short-term” (short-term plans). So it seems this change was destined to go in one way or the other. Here are today’s Test Update notes which will not apply to Live Servers until Game Update 56 in mid- to late-May:

Test Update April / 27 / 2010
GENERAL

Qeynos and Freeport have been disabled as starting cities.

Today’s hotfix:

ALTERNATE ADVANCEMENTS

• Fiery Blast and Rhythmic Overture should no longer apply extra damage if cast by multiple people at the same time.

ITEMS

• Many items that had nude appearances have been corrected.

PERAH’CELSIS’ ABOMINABLE LABORATORY

• Arkatanthis’ benthic warlord adds will try and pick a more balanced group of 3 players when they spawn during the challenge mode encounter.

The nude appearance items were caused by a bug that slipped in last week which caused female characters to appear to wear nothing but pasties in the chest area.  (May want to exercise discretion when viewing that thread since it includes screen shots.)

It all started with a simple post:

“If you’ve ever fancied yourself a writer for EQ2Wire, whether it’s just updates on the happenings around Norrath, including updates on Live Events, shoot us an e-mail thru Contact Us.”

Since then, I’ve gone from e-mailing articles to Feldon to full Author, Contributor, and Editor at EQ2Wire.
You may have noticed a few of my articles over the past few weeks.  Some of you are probably wondering, who is this Dethdlr person?  Allow me to introduce myself.
I started playing EQ2 on May 15th, 2005 but it wasn’t until August of 2006 that I convinced my wife to start playing as well.  That’s when EQ2 became a part of my daily routine.  Since then, I’ve done everything from casual player to just under hard core raider (was the OT for Society of Depravity/SoD for a while during EoF and RoK).  I’ve been in every beta since EoF and currently have a 90 Assassin(Decimatr), 89 Templar(Elinore), 86 Warlock(Ryncewynd), and an 86 Berserker(Dethdlr), as well as a few other lower level characters, all on Kithicor.
A few years ago, my guild needed a weaponsmith so I leveled Dethdlr up to a level 70 Weaponsmith.  When RoK came out, he became the 26th worldwide and 1st level 80 weaponsmith on Kithicor.  Since I was one of the only weaponsmiths in my guild, guildmates would ask me which weapons they should use for their characters.  To make things easier, I created www.eq2411.com which lists the mastercrafted weapons up through level 80 broken out by class and tier.  Dethdlr is still sitting at level 80 weaponsmith today but my alchemist is level 90.
I’ve done a little bit of UI development and created the first plug-in for the Fetish Nightfall UI.  I also added the AFK button to the player window and added the click to cure with potions to the player window in the same UI.
For years now, I’ve been checking the EQ2 websites several times a day to see what the latest news was that’s going on around Norrath.  When I would find something interesting, I would tell my guild about the new news.  Now I get to post it on EQ2Wire.
Feldon does a great job of searching through the sea of information that is created about EQ2 on a daily basis and posting it here so that everyone else doesn’t have to.  I have no delusions of being able to do as good a job as Feldon does at this but I’ll do my best.
I look forward to bringing you the latest information on the happenings around Norrath.

Leading up to the launch of Game Update 56, there will be a prelude quest “A Vision of Valor” with a storyline leading to the rediscovery of New Halas. When this quest goes live mid-May, before the launch of Game Update 56, you’ll be able to pick it up in one of the home cities.

From Domino on the EQ2 Forums:

You will find NPCs in North Qeynos (at the temple), West Freeport (near the inn), Neriak (by the entrance), Kelethin (near Bayden Cauldthorn), and Gorowyn (at the dock) have a prelude quest to offer.

As this content is currently on Test, if you are interested, you may test this content out, as well as New Halas, on the Test Server.

Game Update 56, or least major chunks of it have been pushed to the Test Server. Already, I and other players have noted that certain textures are missing (especially with Shaders 3.0 enabled), and all housing is currently unavailable (making it impossible to take a peek inside the 2, 4, and 6 bedroom New Halas housing.

But what may be more interesting is not what files are missing, but what files are unexpected. Because the Live and Test Servers are just another development branch of EQ2, inevitably, some Expansion and future Game Update/Live Event files get tagged and download to our computers.

Close examination of these files have revealed some tantalizing peaks into the next expansion, as well as a preamble event.

* MAJOR SPOILER ALERT * MAJOR SPOILER ALERT *

If you don’t like spoilers about the next Expansion, then don’t read further.

Lessing (known on EQ2Flames as mafoe) has taken screen snapshots of the FABLED loot offered by the new Vendor being added in Game Update 56.

Here are links to these screen snapshots:

http://lh3.ggpht.com/_XvWh6xG4qE0/S9LAenf-rcI/AAAAAAAAAKQ/2KuKWlshkgY/EQ2_000868.jpg

http://lh6.ggpht.com/_XvWh6xG4qE0/S9LAe1IsMHI/AAAAAAAAAKU/Ttdtjvu6500/EQ2_000869.jpg

http://lh3.ggpht.com/_XvWh6xG4qE0/S9LAfTEriRI/AAAAAAAAAKY/MaEJl-oV8RM/EQ2_000870.jpg

http://lh3.ggpht.com/_XvWh6xG4qE0/S9LAfsymb7I/AAAAAAAAAKc/HmsbcyoJvm0/EQ2_000871.jpg

http://lh4.ggpht.com/_XvWh6xG4qE0/S9LAgXpQbpI/AAAAAAAAAKg/0g0DOHH5GSk/EQ2_000872.jpg

Game Update 56 is looking to be a huge update, with many tweaks and adjustments throughout Norrath. In brief…

• a substantial Travel Revamp
• more quests in Stonebrunt Highlands to hopefully fill that level 87-90 solo questing gap
• a new Storyline feature
• a new Icy Keep x4 Raid
• Shaders 3.0 Graphical Revamp
• Research Assistants can help all your characters
• Blue PvP Adornments
• Yellow Adornments on T9 Mastercrafted gear
• Level 90 Character Traits
• PvP Warfields
• new Training Dummy options in your guild hall (solo, group, raid, and AE group)
• and of course New Halas

Also of note, is that a vendor has been added to Moonfield Hamlet selling some of the rare Heroic drops from Sentinel’s Fate zones. It will be interesting to see if this is like the vendor added late in the release of The Shadow Odyssey, where only the lesser Fabled items were available, and for a whopping 150 shards/marks each.

With the Test Server being updated nearly a month before we are estimating Game Update 56 will hit live servers, hopefully there will be plenty of time to test out all the changes.

Domino has posted some background and lore regarding the new tradeskill society, the Ravens of the North, in New Halas. From the EQ2 Forums:

The focus this week has been on new EQ2 Senior Producer Dave Georgeson, and EQ2 Server Performance, which has been a persistent black cloud over EQ2 for the last 2 months.

Test Copy

Test Copy is getting some major use as it is where PvP and Battlegrounds changes are tested.

Gninja advised us:

We will be working out a schedule as to when the test_copy server will be pvp vrs pve. We are working it out now and will get back to you guys shortly.

Stuck at Character Select

An issue with being stuck at Character Select on Thursday was caused by a Configuration issue which has been corrected. EQ2 Forums

Adventure/AA/Tradeskill XP Weekend

The e-mail and EQ2Players announcements for this weekend’s Bonus XP event neglected to mention that Tradeskills will also see a bonus. We have not yet been informed what % the bonus will be, but 30% is a good guess.

Game Update 56 Goes to Test Soon

We don’t have an exact date, but Game Update 56 will be moving to Test and Test Copy soon. When we know exactly what content will appear on Test and Test Copy, we’ll let you know. It would not be surprising if New Halas is not in the first build. EQ2 Forums

Thundering Steppes Revamp Mothballed

Gninja has confirmed the news we speculated about earlier this year.

Unfortunately we will not be making drastic changes to Thundering Steppes this time around. That doesn’t mean there will be no changes but we are not considering it being revamped. GU56 will be full of cool stuff though (Including but not limited to New Halas and some new raids) you should see it hitting test servers in the not too distant future.

A revamp of Thundering Steppes seems to be completely off the development radar at this point, with Butcherblock Mountains stepping in as the “place to be” for level 20-35 content.

Although subject to change, our understanding is that, just like Timorous Deep, level 20 players will be offered a quest guiding them from New Halas to the Butcherblock docks to begin level 20-35 content.

Level 82 Mastercrafted Armor

It seems the strength of level 80 Tier 1 and Tier 2 Shard armor from The Shadow Odyssey was always destined to overshadow Level 82 Mastercrafted armor. But that doesn’t mean the EQ2 team haven’t given up on it yet! Domino has managed to land some additional upgrades to the Level 82 set:

Look for some changes coming to level 82 mastercrafted armor with GU56 (for a start, it should all be level 82 now …) including the addition of yellow adornment slots and some resists. We are also in the process of discussing the possibilities of some stat tweaks.

It now seems even less likely that any of the Tier 1 Marks of Manaar gear will be an upgrade to any player. Note that Tier 2 Marks of Manaar gear (which has Critical Mitigation and better stats) must be sought out in Moonfield Hamlet in Stonebrunt Highlands.

From Rothgar on the EQ2 forums:

We’ve located the issue that was causing the slow performance last Tuesday. This problem had ZERO to do with battlegrounds but they were taken down as a precaution anyway. I know that battlegrounds tends to get the bad rap because it’s new, but they are not always the cause of problems. In fact, we’ve got the character loading issues under control now so that there are no performance spikes as a result of characters going to and from the BG world.

We’ve been making some general performance improvements that will help lower the game server lag (exhibited as spell lag) which will be going into testing soon. When we are confident that these changes are working correctly, we will get them out to live servers.

We have several engineers working on performance issues and this is currently our top priority.

After the widespread outages of the EQ2 servers the night prior, a thread was created on the EQ2 Forums to solicit an explanation from the EQ2 Developers, and/or new EQ2 Senior Producer Dave Georgeson, on the cause, and to seek reassurances that the issues are being identified and on track to be resolved.

As they tend to do, the thread branched into speculation on the origins of Dave Georgeson’s forum handle — SmokeJumper. Skywarrior posted his theory:

Hmmmm.  Smokejumpers are extremely brave (or crazy) and well-trained individuals who jump out of airplanes in order to reach remote areas involved in forest or brush fires, with the express purpose of helping extinguish the flames.  It seems to me that Dave’s handle is quite appropriate to the situation he finds himself in.

Dave “SmokeJumper” Georgeson, the new EQ2 Senior Producer responded with:

Ding, ding, ding. You have it in one, sir.

And yes, I still answer to “Qix” or “Qixter” also. (I’ll bore you with the story of where those names came from some other time.)

Regarding the performance issues: Yes, we’re completely aware of it, and yes, it’s our highest (and only) focus for the programming team currently.

It’s a two-pronged issue that affects multiple aspects of our architecture, and neither of the issues is a “quick fix”.

In other words, we have to gather more information and study that data to find out exactly where the problems are before we can create solutions.

That’s in progress now and we’ll get solutions made ASAP. But currently, I don’t know an exact date when “ASAP” will be completed…mostly because we don’t have the solutions figured out yet.

But as I said in the other thread…we *will* kill them.

From the EQ2 Forums:

Greetings all.

An update on Battlegrounds and server issues.

Battlegrounds will be down until at least tomorrow.  While the BGs are down, we’ll be collecting data on the current server issues as an aid to tracking down what is causing the the lag and slow zoning times.

We’ll be tracking the data with the BGs both off and on.  If they appear to significantly affect the issues we’re seeing on the live servers, we’ll have them off over the weekend.

We’ll let you know any further information we can share when we have it.

We apologize for the inconvenience and greatly appreciate your patience as we try to track down the problems and iron out the bugs.

– EQII Team

With the powerful buffs and bonuses of our Mythical/Fabled Epic Weapons safely squirreled away to a separate permanent spell (thanks to the Epic Repercussions quest), we’ve been able to divert our attention towards finding other, better weapons.

While the choices are not plentiful (even with their buffs stripped, our Mythical weapons still have some formidable stats), the Sentinel’s Fate expansion is nonetheless supposed to offer us a variety of replacements for our now Enervated Weapons.

Thus far, there have been a scant few upgrade choices for healers. Fortunately Kander has responded to these concerns:

There will be some new 1 handed and 2 handed healer weapons with GU 56. In both heroic and epic content.

Battlegrounds For Levels 30-79

We’ve gotten some more details on the format that Battlegrounds from levels 30-79 will take from timetravelling:

After Game Update 56 the Battlegrounds tiers will be:

30-39, 40-49, 50-59, 60-69, 70-79, 80-89, and 90

Players in each tier will be auto-mentored down to the lowest common level (30, 40, 50, etc.).

Players in each tier will also have armor sets and accessories available for purchase from the existing PvP Merchants in the major cities.

The BG ‘starter’ sets will be the already-existing Mastercrafted armor sets (from levels 30 -> 70). Each has had a small amount of toughness added to its existing stats.

In other words, if you don’t already have Mastercrafted armor from levels 30-79, and want to do Battlegrounds, it’s recommended that you commission or pick up a set.

The Warfields of Antonica and Commonlands

Meanwhile we have gotten some clarification from Olihin on Antonica and Commonlands becoming PvP zones on Open PvP servers (currently Nagafen).

Warfields are restricted to PvP servers.

The writs are being changed to 6 kills for 5 tokens across all levels. A single currency regardless of the level will be used.

The new coin will be the Discord Token and I have set up a merchant to exchange the tokens for you in increments of 5 or 100. I know some will be able to gear up more of their characters quickly, but that is the point. I want you to be able to play on your account at whatever level you want and either save or spend your token when you want.

and from timetravelling:

[Warfields] is a new event that will be on PvP servers only that will give players the opportunity to fight for control of Antonica or the Commonlands.

This is clearly an effort to try to move at least some of the PvP community away from the “Token Vending Machine” that is currently the Kunark quest hub of Teren’s Grasp. Most players bent on earning Tokens live there 24/7.

We’ve received word that brand spanking new EQ2 Senior Producer Dave Georgeson also gave an interview to Massively. It’s an interesting contrast to the EQ2 ZAM interview and worth a read.

It may turn out that the only EQ2 fan site that didn’t get an interview with Dave Georgeson is EQ2Wire…

The Tattered Notebook: A moment with Dave Georgeson @ Massively

The Return of SmokeJumper

Dave Georgeson has already taken the time to post on the EQ2 Forums and respond to some player concerns. He’s brought back his nickname “SmokeJumper” from when he was a developer on Planetside. You can read his comments in the ZAM Interviews Dave Georgeson thread on EQ2 Forums.

If you have been poking and prodding the EQ2 forums hoping for even a brief Producer’s Letter from Dave Georgeson, you’ll be surprised to read the in-depth exclusive interview at EQ2 ZAM with new EQ2 Senior Producer Dave Georgeson who replaced Alan “Brenlo” Crosby last week.

EQ2 ZAM Interviews Dave Georgeson