Server Upgrades must be getting sufficiently routine for the EQ2 and Network Operations teams such that posting a Status Report or two completely slipped their minds. Players, however, wanted to know: Was Unrest actually upgraded?

According to Rothgar, it was:

The upgrades were definitely made so you should be seeing improvements.

SmokeJumper elaborated:

Unrest is definitely upgraded already.

All servers except for Butcherblock and Storms have been upgraded now.

Butcherblock will be upgraded on the 16th of August.

There isn’t an ETA for Storms yet. I’ll post one when we get the date nailed down.

Rothgar had a comment regarding Bazaar and Vox as well:

The Bazaar is using a dynamic pool of servers that have been upgraded. This goes for Vox as well, so there should be some improvements for sure.

After a firestorm of player comment, a line item change in the Test Update Notes indicates that Subclass AAs (Alternate Advancements) will be available to low level characters once more. From the EQ2 Test Update Notes:

The Subclass Alternate Advancement Tree once again unlocks at level 10.

Game Update 61 is expected to go live in the last week of August.

TenTonHammer Interviews Dave Georgeson

TenTonHammer, like other Press sites covering SOE (EQ2Wire is a designated ‘Fan Site’ so airfare, hotel, etc. is up to us) made the trek to Fan Faire 2011 to cover EQ2 and other SOE games being showcased. Although TTH hasn’t featured EQ2 all that much in the past few years, they did score exclusive screenshots of Destiny of Velious plus a Dave Georgeson interview. The only other premier multi-MMO site still putting EverQuest II news on their front page these days seems to be Joystiq’s Massively.

When TenTonHammer announced their EQ2 Leapers and Gliders Giveaway, with an increased chance of winning for TTH members ($9.95/yr), I scrutinized their website to see how they’ve been covering EQ2. As it turns out, TenTonHammer did an extensive interview with Dave “SmokeJumper” Georgeson at Fan Faire, including a LOT more detail, explanations, and reasoning about the features announced for Game Update 61 and the Age of Discovery expansion than were given during the EQ2 Panels. This is an interview I haven’t seen linked anywhere (including EverQuest2.com or the EQ2 Forums) and it’s worth a read.

If you read the above headline and immediately checked your bank statement, well, that’s probably not a bad habit to get into, but we weren’t actually talking about Account Security. In today’s article, we talk about how plat farmers have gotten more sophisticated and are picking SOE’s pocket via new (StationCash Gifting) and old tricks (Legends of Norrath packs).

Fraud Happens

Every online business has its share of Credit Card Fraud. However digital currencies like StationCash have been especially prone to this problem, due to the immediacy of the conversion from real dollars to virtual ones. Scammers can create thousands of SOE accounts using automated scripts, activate them with stolen or faked credit card information, “fund” them with StationCash via more fraudulent transactions, and now with the new StationCash Gifting feature, “sell” items to players in-game using their ill-gotten StationCash. The scammer gets the platinum for the sale of the SC item, and then they can turn that platinum around to a plat-selling service. They get money for nothing via a bit of digital switcheroo.

There are still many unanswered questions about the AA revamp currently on Test, but Summoners, Druids, and Monks so far have gotten one response apiece about specific lines.

Xelgad posted to “Focused Minion (and other summoner changes)” on the EQ2 Forums:

We decided to scrap the pet Spell Multi-Attack (Doublecast) for several reasons. First, we wanted to move away from pet-specific AAs. As some of you know, scout pets did technically get some benefit from SDA because their attacks are classified as spells, but fighter pets did not really benefit at all. Additionally, in terms of AA versus AA balance (within the Summoner tree), Focused Minion was obviously much too powerful. At least to some degree, that was the result of the improvements to SDA in GU60.

From the EQ2 Forums:

POPULATION / ZONE PROGRESSION

Temple of Rallos Zek: Foundations of Stone [Challenge]

• Challenge Mode Statue of Rallos Zek no longer has a Knockback effect associated with his Titanic Swipe AOE.

If I had to summarize Fan Faire in one statement, one consolidated takeaway thought, it would be: We’re gamers too. If we can, let’s give the players what they want.

Giving players options and trying new things were the prominent themes throughout Fan Faire’s EQ2 panels. SmokeJumper in particular seemed eager to break away from tradition if it could lead to better gameplay. “Because we’ve always done it that way” must undoubtedly be one of his pet peeves in EQ2 meetings. Yet, it’s been barely three weeks since Fan Faire, and the glossy slides and upbeat pronouncements of flexibility have given way to many perplexing aspects of Game Update 61 which recently appeared on Test.

In between Double XP and Tinkerfest, the buzz this weekend was the upcoming Game Update 61.

So let’s take a look at the upcoming changes to how Alternate Advancement (AA) points can be spent. From the GU61 Update Notes currently on Test:

• The Subclass Alternate Advancement tab now unlocks at level 30.
• The Shadows Alternate Advancement tab now unlocks at level 50.
• The Sentinel’s Fate Alternate Advancements now unlock at level 80.
• The Heroic Alternate Advancement tab now unlocks at level 80.

Yesterday afternoon at approximately 1:04pm PDT, SOE games and services became inaccessible to a large number of people due to what some observers have described as a routing problem between the San Diego and Dallas, TX routers on the Level 3 backbone. The outage lasted about 10 minutes.

Today, at 10:27am PDT, SOE services were again briefly knocked offline, this time for approximately 15 minutes.

It’s unclear if this is part of a pattern or a couple of isolated incidents. More as we have it…

Not sure how we missed this, but from EverQuest2.com…

The Unrest, Guk and Everfrost servers will be offline on Tuesday, August 2, starting at 2:00 AM PDT for an estimated downtime of 6 hours. This maintenance is being completed for server hardware upgrades.

That’s…

• 2:00~8:00 AM PDT
• 5:00~11:00 AM EDT
• 10:00~16:00 BST
• 11:00~17:00 CET

Fr0m SmokeJumper in a thread titled Are you good enough (and crazy enough) to work here?:

We’ve had a lot of luck in the past with hiring from our player community, so we’re giving it a go again with two new positions.

• We have an opening on our environment team for an artist that’s great with Maya and Photoshop and has the desire to help build Norrath, one poly at a time. http://tbe.taleo.net/NA12/ats/caree…=1&rid=3605
• We’re also making a change in the Tradeskill area and we’re looking to hire outside the company and bring in some fresh ideas. Can you be passionate *and* logical about Tradesklling? If so, then http://tbe.taleo.net/NA12/ats/caree…=1&rid=3606

Please be sure to read any job requirements before applying and if you do apply…then thanks for your desire to help us build your world!

EQ2Wire wants to know…

• So how many AAs or Levels have you earned this weekend?

• Are you focusing on Tinkerfest?

• Are you checking out Game Update 61 on the Test servers?

Hot off the presses, er patcher, here are the Game Update 61: The War of Zek Update Notes from the Test Patcher. Game Update 61 is expected to reach the Live servers near the end of August.

Game Update 61: “The War of Zek”

PLANE OF WAR

The time is near for the great Fortress of Drunder to reveal its true purpose to all. The very bedrock of the Eastern Wastes shudders and rocks as a massive planar portal rips itself open within the fortress walls. The sounds of war echo through its halls as the God of War himself prepares his innumerable armies to march across the frozen face of Velious and seize control of the lands of Norrath for all eternity.

The Plane of War is a normal and challenge mode raid.

Elements of War is a normal and challenge mode heroic experience.

Bunji dropped the news that Game Update 61 is hitting Test today:

We plan to push the current GU61 content to Test tomorrow morning.

GU61 (or most of it) is scheduled to hit Test around 7-8am PST tomorrow morning, 7/28.

What’s in Game Update 61?

• Dynamic Dungeon: Silent City [60~90]
• Dynamic Dungeon: Djinn Master’s Prism [60~90]
• Plane of War: heroic dungeon (normal and challenge)
• Plane of War: x4 raid (normal and challenge)
• Reitemize Level 20-90 dropped, quested, and crafted Items
• Alternate Advancement (AA) Revamp, especially Subclass (Monk, Templar, Paladin, etc.) tree.
• Tradeskill AAs [25 pts]
• House Rating System
• Dungeon Finder — Dungeons of any level, same-server only
• Fae/Arasai Flying
• New content in Eastern Wastes
• Beastlord Prelude Event for Good or Evil (Exile may choose one)
• Velious Signature Quest continues

The disclaimer above makes it clear that not all of Game Update 61 will be on Test today, but we’re anxious nonetheless. Read more about Game Update 61 in the Fan Faire EQ2 Panel.

Note: The Freeport Revamp, Tradeskill Apprentices, Item Reforging, Mercenaries, Design Your Own Dungeon, Beastlord Class, etc. are all part of the EverQuest II: Age of Discovery expansion to be released this November.

Despite their having hardly left the drawing board, players have drawn some conclusions about the upcoming Design Your Own Dungeon feature, based on how similar features have been implemented, and how they’ve fared–mostly unsuccessfully–in other games. Speculation, as they say, has been rampant.

However Rothgar isn’t willing to yield the “DYOD will be abandoned just like Arenas” ground just yet. From the EQ2 Forums:

The arena argument doesn’t work, sorry. You can also play arenas using your normal characters and people don’t do that anymore either. There are several other reasons why arena’s didn’t work, but that’s a discussion for another thread. If it were simply because of the avatar system, people would still be playing them with their own characters, but they aren’t.

Here’s our sixth video from SOE Fan Faire 2011 “EverQuest II: Mechanics”.

If you’d like to view the transcript from this panel, check out our EQ2 Panel #5 – Mechanics writeup. We’ll upload an HD version of this video soon.

If you have been hoping for an empty lot to build a house from the ground up, that moment has finally arrived, with the Tenebrous Tangle Island Refuge! She’s not much of a looker unadorned, but with a soft item limit of 800, and a hard limit of 1,100 items with both expanders, it will be interesting to see what players come up with. Although there’s been nothing official, we suspect that the Felwithe Mansion will land in the next week or two.

From EverQuest2.com:

Ready to move on up? The Tenebrous Island Refuge lets you live on your own private island in the skies. A tiny island hovers above and provides a beautiful little waterfall into your own private pond. The grounds are lush and ready for you to build on! It’s rent-free, but remember that adventurers may only own one Tenebrous Island Refuge per character. Pick up your Deed of Ownership today for 1350 SC on the Marketplace.

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.

Niami Denmother has turned in another entertaining preview of this year’s Tinkerfest Event. More recipes, more quests, and more house items adorn this perennial favorite. Check out her writeup at EQ2Traders.

Tinkerfest 2011 runs July 29th through August 8th.

From the EQ2 Forums:

This week on the Jethal Silverwing Show.. Jethal and Elquin either have the show of their dreams, or get their accounts banned for life, as they are joined by Sony Online Entertainment President, John Smedley!  Do YOU have a question for The Smed? Leave your question Here and we’ll make sure to get the answer you’re lookin for!

Tuesdays at 10pm Eastern, 7pm Pacific
As Always, Join us IN GAME by typing /join antonia_bayle.ogr

As borne out in several different threads on the EQ2 Forums, starting with the original Dragon Ring and Wizard Spire Event Feedback Testing thread created on May 15th, all has not gone smoothly during the Spires and Dragon Ring Events. These events are still running on most servers, although the lucrative Spires event has been completed on many. So what were the biggest problems? Let’s spell them out and address them one by one.

Dragon Ring: Hiding A Serious Raid Mob?

Once our server (Butcherblock) reached 99% Spires completion, we got a 10 minute warning that something big was coming. For us, this coincided with the regular hourly Spires event, so we got to fight the regular “x4” event, and then the final “super x4” a few minutes later. This new epic x4 boss Ulbrow, nicknamed the Unibrow, appears, along with all of the previous bosses of the x2 and x4 epic stages of the Spires, all at once. There wasn’t anything too tough about this event other than server lag, players crashing to desktop, and knockbacks. Ultimately, we killed the encounter without too much difficulty.

What took many people by surprise is the final stage of the Dragon Ring…

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 spawned for the Skinning Knife subquest Unhappily Ever After.

The Fanged Sea

• The valkyrie event in The Fanged Sea can once again be completed.

LIVE EVENTS

Dragon Ring Rebuild Event

• Kreegar Krikneck should no longer require challenge mode debuffs to complete the encounter.
• Attacking NPCs should no longer despawn while in combat.

Wizard Spire Rebuild Event

• Attacking NPCs should no longer despawn while in combat.

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.

Here’s our third video from SOE Fan Faire 2011 “EverQuest II: Tradeskills and Housing”.

If you’d like to view the Slides from this panel in higher quality, check out the updated EQ2 Panel #3 – Tradeskills and Housing writeup. We’ll upload an HD version of this video soon.

If you’ve had it with mobs ‘warping’ around during fights due to the 5 meter melee range changes introduced with Destiny of Velious and recent attempts to fix it, there’s a thread for that. While I was initially happy to see the minimum melee range on mobs changed from 2 to 5 meters, allowing me to use all my ranged combat arts at melee range, the downside to this sweeping change quickly became apparent.

Mobs started dancing around, unable to attack me. Later fixes to try to eliminate the dancing effect made mobs more likely to warp around. With each ‘fix’, it has become harder and harder for tanks to control mobs, park them where they need to be, and keep them positioned correctly during fights. Since Velious was launched, tanking, especially large mobs like Dragons, Giants, etc. is downright unpleasant.

When this issue was raised at Fan Faire, it was initially dismissed as a case of Client or Server Lag. However we have watched this problem start with the change in melee range and grow progressively worse as attempts have been made to fix it. My recommendation is to roll back all of these changes and reduce the minimum range on all ranged combat arts to 2 meters. This would allow Tanks to position mobs without having to run around entire rooms, it would get rid of ‘dancing’ and ‘warping’ mobs, and it would bring Scouts what we’ve been wanting for a long time, not having to ‘kite’ to do DPS.

Submit your Comments on Mob ‘Warping’ on the EQ2 Forums

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?