EQ2 Housing is getting an upgrade! The biggest changes include the Faydwer acorns  which have received a nice window which looks out into Kelethin. And the Maj’dul apartments which have been lacking in charm have really opened up with skylights and the like.

Here at EQ2Wire, we’re anxiously awaiting Gu53 being pushed to Test (scheduled for today) so we can go grab screen shots of all the new housing options. There have been some unconfirmed reports that existing spaces were reduced to make room for the new areas. We’ll be checking this out

Preview at EQ2Players

Alan “Brenlo” has chimed in on the EQ2 Forums with the news that GU53 will be appearing on Test servers tomorrow. He’s also spilled the beans on Hot Zones and what this means for you.

Tomorrow morning, Shards of Destiny is going to the Test server!  Woo Hoo!  We hope you are as excited as we are to see the new content and try it out for yourselves.  I encourage you, if you have time in your busy schedules, to jump onto Test and try the new content out.  We would love to hear your feedback and the more people that take part, the more solid we can make sure this update releases.

One thing you will notice missing from the update notes are the Shader 3.0 changes.  Unfortunately the work is turning out to be a little more time intensive than our initial estimates.  We did not want to rush it out, as it is a far reaching change that can impact many players and systems, so we are going to let it bake a little longer.  Working with it and testing it internally on as many system configs as our compatibility lab can put together, and they can put together a TON, to make sure it causes as little disruption as possible.  We want everyone to enjoy the vibrant lighting and shader changes this brings to the game and we hope you can be patient as we continue to tweak it until the next game update, which is tentatively scheduled for early December.

One of the new systems we are really excited about is the Chronomagic, formerly Auto-Mentoring, system.  This allows you to level down your character and experience lower level content that you may have missed, want to play over, or experience with new friends.

Houses are getting room upgrades! How exciting is that?  Most housing will soon have at least one additional room added to their architecture.  Maj’Dul housing gains multiple new rooms, I may finally up and move there.  Along with the new rooms, there is a modest increase in the number of items a house can hold, so we hope that you decorators out there make good use of the added space.  If you are a decorator and have something to show off, we encourage you to show images on the forums or even send them to us as we love to see the imaginative things you create.

There are a good deal of additional features and content pieces coming too, so check out those Test update notes and let us know what you think.

You may have noticed a hotfix this morning with a couple of small code changes.  One of which was a small change to the Welcome Screen.  Nothing huge, just a single new field in the lower right corner.  The welcome screen now displays each days Daily Mission!  A welcome and useful change I hope!  Above that you will see a new field that simply says Hot Zone.  “What is that Brenlo?” Well I am glad you asked!  Our brilliant coders and designers have come up with a new feature that each day increases the fabled drop rates in one dungeon.  The welcome screen will display which dungeon currently has the increased drop rate.  “But Brenlo, right now it says None!  I want my Hot Zone!” Do not fret my friends, we will be turning it on soon.

In fact. . .  Because we were unable to provide our European and Japanese players with GU 52 at the same time as our North American servers, we will be turning the Hot Zones on for those servers this weekend!   Look for an announcement from Kiara on the specific time it turns on and then watch the welcome screen.  For our North American servers, you will get this new hotness, yes I just said new hotness, let the hate mail begin, the following weekend.  Just in time for Labor Day.

We have lots going on here in the EQII laboratory so we will continue to keep you updated and keep that feedback coming as we love to hear from you.  Well most of you, you know who you are . . . Kendricke.  =P

I hope to see you in Atlanta at Dragon Con.

Alan “Brenlo” Crosby
Senior Producer EverQuest II

We’re now less than 6 months from EverQuest II’s  Sentinel’s Fate expansion and Domino, EQ2 Tradeskill Developer, is starting to dig deep into Transmuting. If you’d like to see her preliminary ideas and give feedback on the EQ2 Forums, you should check out the EQ2 Tradeskill forums.

And here’s a completely unrelated Fan Faire photo:

Rothgar brings us an update on Game Update 53. The EQ2 Team wants to get Gu53 on the test server soon, to allow 1 full month of testing. However Shaders 3.0 won’t be ready within the next few days. As a result, Shaders 3.0 are slipping to Gu54 expected in November.

If you attended our last Fan Faire or have been following the forums you’ve probably heard about a major overhaul to the EverQuest II rendering engine where we are upgrading all of our existing shaders from version 1.x to version 3.0.

This upgrade will result in a performance gain for many of you with a Shader 3.0 compliant graphics card.  In addition, you’ll notice a visual improvement in just about everything from zone geometry to character armor.

This is an enormous undertaking that Ryan “Imago-Quem” Favale has been devoting nearly all of his time to for the past several months.  Ryan has shown an amazing level of commitment to this feature and has spent countless nights and weekends working his way through the shader system.  Not only does this upgrade involve the conversion of thousands and thousands of shader files, but we’ve had to modify existing art tools, create new tools and maintain backwards compatibility with the old system.  In addition, each shader must be individually tested by our QA department.

At Fan Faire we announced that this upgrade would go live with Game Update 53 which is just around the corner.  Unfortunately I’m here to let you know that we will be pushing this upgrade back to Game Update 54.  We always hate to push a feature back after we’ve announced it but we feel that this is the best thing for the game overall.  We are making a new commitment to quality and want this feature to be everything that we’ve promised.  Simply put, we need a little more time to complete the conversion and make sure that its as bug-free as possible.  The work is almost completed and we’re very excited about it.

On another note, Game Update 53 is still packed with lots of great content and features that I’m sure you’ll love.  We have a new raid zone coming, auto-mentoring, the new achievement system and so much more.

We’re also aware that some of you are still experiencing client crashes.  The latest version of the client will be delivered to the Test Server within a few days and we expect that some of these issues should be resolved.  Game Update 53 will be available on the Test Server almost a full month before it’s scheduled to go live.  We’ll be listening to your feedback very closely and making sure any new issues are looked into right away.

Again, I’m sorry to have to ask you to wait a little longer on the Shader 3.0 upgrade.  We feel strongly that something of this magnitude should get the time and attention it deserves to be perfect.

Thanks for your understanding and most of all thanks for continuing to play EQII!

Here are your EQ2 Patch Notes for August 26th:

ACHIEVEMENTS

Fury

Enhance: Hibernation should trigger properly when falling below 15%.

ITEMS

The focus effect on the Robe of Shifting Visions will increase the damage properly now.

MISC

The Welcome Screen now lists the current Daily Double.

Also, the Welcome Screen has been updated to include information about the current Daily Mission as well as support for upcoming Hot Zones.*

At the first of every month, the EQ2 forums accumulate questions for developers. Answers to the questions posted around the first of July have now been posted. There’s nothing earth-shattering this month, despite the large number of questions answered. You can read it yourself here:

Dev Q&A 2009.07.01 Answers @ EQ2 Forums

And care of EQ2Players, we’ve got our first screenshot on the Self-Mentoring NPC we’ll be seeing in Game Update 53 (Shards of Destiny). It looks like there will be a small gold (5g for any level) and status cost for using the NPC.

Check out Kiara’s entertaining parable about this new feature of Gu53 at EQ2Players.

Greetings Norrathians! There will be a bonus applied to AA experience this weekend, starting at 1:00 p.m. PDT on Friday, August 21st and ending at 10:00 a.m. PDT on Monday, August 24th.

Happy and safe adventuring!

~from EQ2Players~

It’s the 20th of the month, and that means it’s time for Moonlight Enchantments again!

Some incredible house items and a few unique mounts can be obtained in the Grottos of Norrath.

These mushroom rings will appear in five locations (click the Grotto name for a list of rewards):

• Enchanted Dryad Grotto: [Antonica – Archer’s Woods] (-696, -4, 621)
• Enchanted Brownie Grotto: [Darklight Woods – Werewolf area] (16, -32, -236)
• Enchanted Zygomyd Grotto: [Nektulos Forest – Barren Sky spires] (-368, 1, -680)
• Enchanted Naiad Grotto: [Enchanted Lands – Bonemire spires] (-282, 6, 13)
• Enchanted Fay Grotto: [Greater Faydark – Nursery] (-132, -44, -771)

Even though we do not have a specific release date for Gu53 (Shards of Destiny), “late September” has been posited as a timeframe we should be watching for. As we approach the duly appointed time, more information is coming out about what we can expect in this update.

Unless you follow the EQ2 Dev Tracker, you’ve probably missed some salient details.

Skill Up Catch Up

Not every EQ2 player has access to a Guild Hall, specifically the Training Dummy amenity. This is relevant because at the great speed most folks now level up into their 50’s or 60’s, many players find themselves deficient in certain skills such as priest skills (Ordination), mage skills (Subjugation), scout/fighter skills (Piercing, Slashing) and want to “catch up”. So far, the only easy means to do this was to grind kill mobs or fight a training dummy.

You get better at Ranged (126/400).

According to Aeralik, this issue has been identified and in Gu53, if there is a large gulf between your skill level and the maximum, you will skill up faster. From this Dev Tracker post:

If you are really low in skill it will be much easier to level it up and the skill gains will come along much faster.  Then once you get closer in skill to your level you will then slow down to a more gradual level.

AA XP Slider

One of the features I am the most excited about in Gu53 will be the AA XP Slider. On PvE (regular) servers, we will be able to channel up to 100% of our combat XP into AA XP.  PvP servers will allow up to 50% of combat XP to be converted into AA XP (until the AA cap is reached). I intend to roll an alt and see how feasible it is to level from 20-80 entirely by grouping all while earning sufficient AA points.

I am very hopeful that this AA XP slider will encourage folks to group in the level 20-60 range again. Flying through Stormhold, Nek Castle, Runnyeye, Deathfyst Citadel, and getting a solid amount of both Alternative Achievement (AA) and levels will be a great thing. A lot of folks out there are soloing to 80 and have no clue what their character brings to a group/raid.

Once again Aeralik chimes in on the EQ2 Forums with the facts:

The aa slider enables at level 10.  Pve players can put all adv xp into aa if they want but pvp players will be limited to 50% while below the current maximum level.

The AA cap only applies on pvp servers and works to keep players relatively close in strength.  We don’t have any plans to adjust this cap because its just a spending cap and you can still earn additional AA levels while capped.

Racial Traits

When racial traits were added after the launch of EQ2, players were surprised at just how good some of the effects were. Specifically, erudites are clearly superior spellcasters, while ogres are the obvious choice for tanks due to their health buffs.

With the upcoming Racial Respec tokens we will be able to purchase with StationCash,  and with certain racial traits being such obviously good choices, there is a concern that all wizards will change to Erudite, all predators to Dark Elves, all tanks to Ogre, etc. As a result, we can expect racial traits to be rebalanced and reshuffled in Game Update #53.

Here are Aeralik‘s comments on the EQ2 Forums:

The racial trait changes are staying largely in line with how they have always really been oriented.  Fighter races get some nice fighter bonuses,, caster races get caster bonuses, etc.  This really goes back to the base race design.  The original stats favored certain archetypes for play and usually their racial packages complemented these using effects of the time.  The previous racial update made things a bit more specific with current effect packages but we tried to make each race a bit more unique.

This next race update tries to mix them together so you have a wider variety of choices but the race’s abilities come from common pools.  So if you picked a mage oriented race and play a mage you get some nice choices but nothing really amazing.  If you went off the normal path and chose something like an ogre mage you still get a lot of benefits to yourself but overall dps differences from a mage race will be minimal at best and easily overcome.  In fact the ogre mage is probably a really good choice for a number of playstyles because the fighter package is really nice in some aspects and the priest package shares a lot with the mage one.

Leather & Lace

And I leave you with some leather screenshots to tide you over until the next posting. Toodles!

Tier’Dal Executioner Leather Assassin appearance gear

-available today on StationCash-

Ratwarlock has chimed in with an article covering the appeal and drawbacks of both Instance and Contested Dungeons. It’s worth a read over at his site RatWarlock.Wordpress.com.

Sentinel’s Fate (The 6th EQ2 Expansion expected in February 2010) will ship with one large progressive contested dungeon (reportedly twice the size of Sanctum of Scaleborn, with a progression of shareable quests available as you traverse the depths).

Our Stand

EQ2Wire believes that both types of dungeon have their place. Folks have gotten a bit burned out on having to “stick to the script” each time they group up in the ~20 TSO instance dungeons and repetition over the life of the expansion can be an issue. While the guarantee of named mobs being up every time you run through the zones is a draw, variety is, as they say, the spice of life. Sometimes folks want to experience something unique each time they run a dungeon. That is where contested dungeons come in.

However, some contested dungeons are so target-rich (lots of mobs!) with such a short respawn (as little as 4 minutes) that they are rarely visited at the appropriate adventure level or only for quest updates essential to Epic Weapon and other questlines. The examples that come to mind are Kaladim and Mistmoore Castle.

These zones were designed as “end game” content, expecting multiple well-geared groups to be constantly clearing trash mobs. Now that these zones are not “current tier” content, groups often find themselves without other groups “clearing the way”. Average groups with average gear don’t have a chance at the appropriate level.

Perhaps we might see going forward smart contested dungeons that detect the presence of other groups and scale the zone up and down automatically by spawning additional mobs based on the number of players in a specific area.

Shard of Love Target Audience

Speaking of instances, it was not clear until last week that the Shard of Love would be a scaling instance dungeon for one group of players ranging from level 50~80. Kander provided us with the details.  Let’s hope the XP, AA XP, gear, and rewards from this zone make it desirable for the entire level range. So far, allowing folks under level 75 to do these zones hasn’t really paid the dividends of providing rewarding gameplay for level 50-70 players.

As announced at EQ2Players…

EQII’s next Game Update #53, Shards of Destiny, is slated to go live in late September. We will be bringing some exciting new content to the world of Norrath with Shards of Destiny.

Erollisi Marr’s influence is felt once more in Norrath. Our players will be able to explore the Shard of Love and learn more of the popular goddess’ story. The Shard of Love is a single group zone.

There will also be a new x4 dungeon to test your skills. Miragul’s Planar Shard will continue the story of the powerful mage.

There are several other exciting additions coming with Shards of Destiny!

Auto-mentoring: Revisit content you may have missed!

Housing renovations: Enjoy more space to exercise your decorating creativity, or just more room to store your booty! Several housing types are receiving an additional room.

Achievement System: Killed 100,000 undead? Now you’ll be able to track your accomplishments and earn nifty rewards.

Shader revamp: The changes to the shader system are ready! Enhanced graphics and more realistic-looking shadows await.

---

We do not yet have an exact date for Shards of Destiny (Gu53) to appear on Test (ETA?) or be pushed to Live. But when we do, you’ll be sure to find that information ASAP. 🙂

If you’ve ever wanted to look at the artwork that goes into conceptualizing or marketing EQ2 or other SoE games, now’s your chance at the new SoE Art Portal.

If this is part of the Fan Faire-announced  plans to provide mail-order high quality posters and prints of this artwork, then I’m rather excited and intend to do some shopping when this next phase becomes available.

GENERAL

• x4 raid mobs who heal themselves by 2% when they kill players now only heal this way to 45% of their max health.  They will no longer heal at all if they kill players and the mob’s health is above 45% already.*

MUNZOK’S MATERIAL BASTION

• During the final Munzok fight, Elemental Augers will no longer cast Icy Storm (instead they cast two weaker spells).
• Munzok’s AOE spell Void Inferno no longer clears players’ targets, and Ripping Voidforce does slightly less damage to players who are close to Munzok himself.

PALACE OF THE ANCIENT ONE

• Void Rippers on the first island and Void Renders on the fourth island have less health than before.

STATION MARKETPLACE

• You can now purchase Station Cash in increments of $25 dollars.

YKESHA’S INNER STRONGHOLD

• Ykeshan researchers are no longer immune to stun, stifle and mesmerize effects.

* As written, it seems this would affect all raid fights, including any Kunark raid mobs with this mechanic. This is a pretty substantial change, which may allow  raid forces to have a particularly disastrous run, have a healer pull off a raidwide resurrect, everyone get rebuffed, and continue on their merry way, with the mob parked at 45% health. We’ll see how it plays out over the next months.

Woodworkers, Domino is looking for your feedback on your tradeskill class going forward into the next expansion. Check it out!

ITEMS

• The Meathook from Sinking Sands is now a piercing weapon.
• Illusionists: The Shifting Visions 6-piece set bonus properly adds damage to Dynamism again.
• The Stick of the Sootfoot Boomer now triggers correctly off of offensive spells.
• The Great Horn of Drelakor can no longer be wielded by priests.
• The Purple-Saddled Mistrunner Horse can now be turned into a house plushie.

KURN’S TOWER

• Kurns Tower (x2) has been tuned a bit and the bosses are not so stingy.*
• Ilenee’s Despair and Betrayal now teleport less frequently.
• Kurn now has an additional spell to help make transitions between controllers smoother.

* Check out my previous blog post for more information on how Kurn’s Tower x2 rewards have been tweaked.

Some of us who have made significant progress in Ward of Elements and have wanted to sink our teeth into some new x2 content have ventured into Kurn’s Tower x2 raid zone and found the challenges to be formidable, but the rewards not so much. Perhaps the biggest concern about the zone was that no set patterns dropped.

Timetravelling has chimed in with some big news. He has made substantial changes to the loot table including:

• The common items from the first 3 bosses have been removed and moved to a basepop (trash) table
• Ione can now drop up to 3 items, including rares from a brand new table
• The first 3 bosses now drop a raid set item (the WoE set) in addition to their normal loot

I know this will go a long way to making folks more interested in this zone.

I’ve only dipped my toe in the water on this one, but found even the trash had some interesting scripts to them (the single trash mobs have an AoE on a timer, the paired trash mobs summon a burynai helper at ~30 seconds).

It’s also worth reading the thread if you have had some difficulty with the 3rd named as there are some ideas posited by devs and players alike.

Kiara has informed us of a new in-game Survey in EQ2. It asks questions about how much solo, group, and raid play you participate in, as well as having a VERY important question for anyone who is excited about the upcoming Race Respec item which will become available in the Marketplace.

The survey has some good questions about what you like or dislike about solo play. I expressed my feeling that solo play ill-prepares players for grouping later on and gave some suggestions. There’s also several questions about how you feel about Game Updates and specifically their frequency (monthly vs. quarterly). Here’s an opportunity to express yourself on the subject if you feel you have not been heard on the forums.

Don’t miss this survey!  Type /survey in-game to give your input on the future of EQ2.

EQ2 Devs are quick on the draw and have already remedied some issues that were present in the July 28th Fan Faire Feedback update and made some other cool changes as well. Each of the items in these two updates may appear small, but they are almost all from player feedback and make the game better. It’s great to see.

General

• Choosing a bad name when using the CTS token should now give an appropriate error.
• The Scroll of Smoldering Tactics and Scroll of Smoldering Blessing now properly display their bonuses in the Persona window.
• The Abyssal Carpet mount can now be summoned without equipping it.  It is now slightly faster and adds an additional bonus.
• Smoldering shards should be slightly easier to acquire in both Chardok and Sebilis.
• The Carpet of El’Khazi can now be converted to a house item.
• The plushies of the Parade Halasian Draft Horse are now correctly dark coloured.

With apologies to Dylan Thomas, it appears that the instant no-carry cast-anywhere torch which we have all been granted (press Alt-L) does not always respect the wishes of its owner. It seems that its flame will not remain quelled for long, and folks have reported spontaneous re-ignition of their torches at the least opportune times.

I’ve heard this makes PvP quite a bit more interesting.

A hotfix is expected soon.

If you have not already read Niami Denmother’s writeup of Tinkerfest over at EQ2 Traders, you should check it out. It spells out exactly which Tinkerfest items you will only be able to acquire during this week+ long event (vendor only), and which ones are also craftable by Tinkerers with a skill of at least 25/400 (approximately 1 hour’s crafting).

Note that even the crafted recipes each require one Shiny Tinkerfest Cog which can be harvested in Steamfont up at Gnomeland Security, as well as the celebration hubs in each of the 5 major cities. I should hope there is plenty enough time between now and the end of the event for folks to harvest enough of these cogs to decorate even the largest guild hall.

Fan Faire Feedback Update

At the most recent Fan Faire, many of you presented us with a ton of useful feedback.  We’ve tried to address many of your great ideas and suggestions in the below changes.  Thanks to everyone who attended and provided feedback and to those of you who provide feedback through all the other channels!

GENERAL

• There is now a flight post from the Bellywhumper camp out to the Dragon’s Rest Shallows for easier access to the Order of Rime camp.
• Those who have achieved some faction with the Order of Rime can now use the Order’s warbirds to travel back and forth from Fens of Nathsar to Jarsath Wastes.
• A Call of Rime bauble is now available from Melimy Yolta, in the Fens of Nathsar Rime camp!
• Non-charged mounts can now be stabled in your home!  Just examine your whistle, drum, or carpet to place the item in your home.  Examine the stabled mount again when you want to ride your mount once more!
• Guild hall harvesting minions now also harvest imbue materials.
• Boomba now offers a much wider selection of pickles.
• Player-written books will now be editable when transferring to another server.
• Players now have a personal torch that does not clutter their hands.  Use ALT+L to light your way.
• Guild mail can now be sent to specific ranks.  Click the to button on the send window and select which ranks you wish to spam . .. Err mail.
• Added an indicator (white star) on the target window. This should only show up if the NPC gives AA experience and not show up if you’ve collected it.

ITEMS

• The Firiona Vie Statue now has 100 status reduction.
• Collection items from The Shadow Odyssey dungeons have now been added to the Collection Burynai.

LAVASTORM

• Najena’s elevator in Lavastorm can no longer change directions while traveling to a new floor.

MOORS OF YKESHA

• A mysterious new stranger has appeared in the Moors of Ykesha. Rogues and predators may visit him to exchange their hybrid shard armor for class shard armor.

MUNZOK’S MATERIAL BASTION

• During the final Munzok fight, Munzok’s various adds should no longer cast any spells players can cure.  Cures can be focused on spells and effects cast by Munzok himself.

NEKTROPOS CASTLE

• The Swine Lord should spawn a bit more frequently in Nektropos Castle.

VOICE

• The voice system has been upgraded to correct a number of disconnection issues.

QUESTS

• Hallmark quests can now be deleted from your quest journal. Note: Hallmark quests have never counted towards your quest limit, so deleting them will not make room for additional quests.
• If you have the right Rime faction to get a quest from Rantiri Skelbre, Kraytoc Killingfrost, Kellaen Mednevn or Kyena the Eastern Lord, but you do not have the Rime illusion on, they will now tell you that they must recognize you in order to proceed.
• If you meet the requirements for Rime quests in other zones Bragek Joll, Thress Kivatei, and Pylemea Stoerki will now tell you to travel to another zone to get a quest from specific NPCs.
• The quests “Kill ’em All” in Fallen Gate can now be obtained by players above level 25.
• The quest “The Summoning” in Nektulos Forest can now be obtained by players above level 37.
• The quest “Trinkets of the Dead” in Nektropos Castle can now be completed.
• Billy in Nektropos Castle should be a bit easier to find for the heritage quest “A Missing Mask”. He can now be hailed by clicking on him instead of having to use the ‘H’ key
• The quest “Bag of Parts” in Baubleshire can now be completed at any level.
• The Shady Swashbuckler in Nektulos Forest can now obtain Berik, Sword of Thunder for those who have already completed the quest.

Tinkerfest is here!! The gnomes of Norrath have resurrected their holiday from more than 500 years ago. This celebration of all things gnomish will bring you new gnomish house items, new shinies to collect, and lots of fun! Look for signs of celebration in gnomish hangouts – Gnomeland Security in Steamfont Mountains, Temple Street in Freeport, Baubleshire in Qeynos! The festivities will run from 12:01am July 24th until 11:59pm August 3rd PDT. See you in Norrath!!

Read More

Tinkerfest at EQ2Traders

Miragul himself has returned to Norrath and can be found residing in Miragul’s Planar Shard, a new x4 raid zone connected to Everfrost. The zone features a variety of encounters, some of which can be completed in normal mode, or for those seeking additional challenge and rewards, hard mode.

This zone shares the artwork of the Crucible.

The Thursday July 16th Hotfix corrects two issues I discussed yesterday.

First, being unable to use the Automated Character Transfer Service (available by purchasing a Character Transfer Token through StationCash) due to ‘ghost mails’ stuck in their mailbox.

Second, the Research Assistants not granting the spell if you are logged out of the game or not in the same zone as a Research Assistant when the research completes.

Here are the July 16th Hotfix Notes:

GENERAL

• The “/clear_mailbox” command will now allow players to delete all mail, including ghosted mail from their character. NOTE:  After using the command the mail icon in the Spell Effects window will remain until the player logs out and then back in.
• An issue that was causing researched spells from research assistants to not be granted upon completion has been fixed.