Feldon
First I’d like to wish a Happy New Year to all of you. No doubt many took advantage of the Double XP weekend and squeezed in the last bit of Frostfell magic. In the coming weeks, we should be hearing more from EQ2 developers and their work on the upcoming Game Update 63 coming in February. This update is expected to include new Destiny of Velious content, including dungeons, raids, and more. Here are some issues we’re tracking this week, some of which got a nod from a developer or community: Character Lighting EQ2Players Invisible Mercenary Healers Timorous Deep...
DGC Wants Feedback
Test Update Notes from the EQ2 Forums: DUNGEON MAKER Mystic Guardian avatar for Dungeon Maker has had the zombie scare attack changed. Fixed an issue with avatar power consumption rates. (also on Live as of Dec 22nd) MERCENARIES Ten new mercenaries can be found within the major cities of Norrath. This includes Freeport, Qeynos, Neriak, Gorowyn, New Halas, and Kelethin! Gaeri Tallspire [Warlock] and Firus Scorchtouch [Wizard] have returned to their normal hangout and can once again be hired! They have been rebalanced a bit to do less spike damage but in some cases might do more DPS on...
On last night’s EQ2Talk Podcast, Dave “SmokeJumper” Georgeson shared his thoughts about the importance of player feedback. We provide a transcription of the segment from 7:55~12:15. In the past, we’ve been a little heavy handed on a few things. I admit that. We’re trying to be really serious this year about getting you guys [all the players] involved in a lot of stuff. Traditionally, the game has been… you know we try to communicate on the forums, but you know what the forums are like. It’s a challenge. The trolls enjoy their game. And it’s tough to fight them...
One tantalising bit of information from tonight’s AoD/F2P Webcast was that the Age of Discovery Beta may start allowing Fan Faire attendees in tonight. It’s unknown how quickly others will be brought into the beta. Also, we were told that while Beastlords, the Freeport Revamp (a GU62 feature), Mercenaries, Tradeskill Apprentices, and Reforging would be in the Beta now (or soon), Design Your Own Dungeon won’t hit Beta until next week, to focus testing attention on the previously mentioned features. UPDATE: We have it on good authority that Fan Faire attendees are now receiving invites to the Age of...
Enemies in EQ2 have always tended to exhibit some odd behavior such as running long distances or zig-zagging around a room in an attempt to reach the player. Destiny of Velious greatly exacerbated this problem, causing enemies to “orbit” the player, or worse, warp or teleport around. Because raid mobs are often able to ignore certain movement speed limitations, this has been a major problem in certain raid zones that require the tank to slowly keep the mob moving in a circle around a room. The mobs will teleport on top of the tank, or start to orbit clockwise...
No sooner than we’ve posted a long-simmering article about Velious’ steep heroic progression than changes have hit Test which could turn EQ2’s heroic progression on its ear. Brace yourself. Everything you know about Velious shard armor is about to change.
From Rothgar on the EQ2 Forums: What are your current concerns with the state of PvP in EQ2? Separation of PvP/PvE stats? PvP Mechanics? Warfronts? Battlegrounds? Flying Mounts? Population? Something else? Feel free to prioritize them in a list such as the one above. Rothgar‘s thread has also served as a great literacy test. Most players have responded with novel-length feedback.
After a growing silence about key parts of Game Update 61, specifically unexpected mechanics and itemization changes in high level gear, Salim “Silius” Grant, EQ2 Mechanics Lead, has stepped up and provided a detailed response to the issues as laid out so well by a determined player, Nevao in a thread entitled May we have a “State of the GU” post? Responses from Silius are in red: Itemization Changes Tier 3 to T8 revamp? Last time I checked there were still reports of items with insanely out of whack stats given the tier (mid-tier items with 40+ weapon skills...
Moments ago, we spoke with Gninja on Test, who has been working hard on spot-checking and fixing any gaps in the Reitemization of level 20-80 items. He’s also been talking to players, examining linked items, and checking bug reports. He also linked some of the loot from Dynamic Dungeons and some higher level items which have gotten new effects. From the EQ2 Forums: If you have specific examples [of itemization issues] please PM them to us. We can take alook at them on a case by case basis. I should also be available on the test server looking for...
It was easy to interpret SmokeJumper‘s suggestion that StationCash purchases could count as “time” towards Veteran Rewards and, taken to its logical conclusion, allow players on EQ2X or even Live to “buy” Veteran time. However this is not what he meant! Here’s a clarification: Veteran subscribers that have been here forever have already received their rewards. That would be a “no” for [taking previous time into account]. We’d only give them “backlog” credits from the last vet reward time to now. But for EQ2X’ers, you’ve never received credit, so you’d get credits as far back as August last year...
SmokeJumper mentioned changes to the Veteran Rewards system at Fan Faire and touched on them further today on the EQ2 Forums: I can’t get you a solid ETA yet, but yes, we’ll have a revamp coming. The design is outlined and we’re committed to the concept. Basically, we’ll make a system by which you get a token or credit (or something) every day that you play (for subscribers, including Gold & Plat) and other metrics (for Silver & Bronze folks). Then we’ll create a category of things which are “veteran rewards” that all have costs associated with them. You...
As we reach August’s midway point, we are potentially in the “home stretch” on Game Update 61. If internal schedules hold true, we could see the next update pushed to live servers in 2 weeks. This is usually the point where player anxiety levels are highest, as what’s on Test seems incomplete and not ready for prime time. Although it’s a well-worn cycle, the question is always “Will it be ready?” Will 2 weeks of dev crunch time result in a solid Game Update 61? Level 20-80 Reitemization We’d caught hints, but Fan Faire brought confirmation that level 20-80...
Bunji posted this on August 11th at 5:54pm PDT on the EQ2 Forums: [Everyone having monk AAs] will be fixed tomorrow morning. We couldn’t get the fix in tonight for [because?] the next build includes the house rating system which requires us to update the server databases (needed more time to do the update than normal basically).
image courtesy fangshendo.com Does your Bard bear a secret admiration for the martial arts? Does your barbarian Shadowknight aspire to move with the deftness of a butterfly? Maybe you’ve just been feeling a little punchy? Silliness aside, the latest patch to the Test servers seems to have had an unintended consequence: Every class has now inherited the Class and Subclass trees of a Monk. While this could normally be chalked up to “expect the unexpected on Test”, what makes it interesting is that everyone’s Class and Subclass tabs have been relabeled Animalist and Beastlord. This led to early morning...
From Rothgar on the EQ2 Forums: Hey guys, we understand that many of you feel strongly against this change. This is why we put things on test, right? We still have a couple of weeks before GU61 hits live. We’re busy finishing up GU61 and fixing bugs, so don’t expect daily responses from us on these issues, but that doesn’t mean we aren’t discussing them internally. UPDATE: We have added an additional quote from Rothgar.
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...
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...
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...
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...
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...
Every year at Fan Faire, we get to watch EverQuest II Designers and Developers answer some really fantastic on-topic, valid questions from the Question & Answer panels. These questions help shape the future of the game and get problems addressed that the devs may not be entirely aware of. However, every year, we also see some of the strangest, uninformed, facepalming (is that a verb?) questions that completely puzzle us (and the developers). Hey, they paid their Fan Faire admission price too, right? Over the years, fastidious players have wised up and managed to intercept EQ2 devs in the...
If you have been wanting to pledge your allegiance (and likely your immortal soul) to Anashti Sul, former prime healer of Norrath, you’ve no doubt been perplexed by her top disciple’s insistence that you be of a good alignment before taking the blood oath. Fortunately, Prathun is on the case and has a fix in the works: This has been fixed. Plumator Dul’Sadma should rebuff you if you’re aligned with a good city, but allow you to continue her dialogues otherwise. I’m sorry for the inconvenience. Standard disclaimer: This fix will have to go through the standard testing, approval,...
tfetterman noticed a change in the June 13 Test Update Notes affecting the description and behavior of the Bard ability Rhythmic Overture. Bard Rhythmic Overture now applies as a buff to the bard. All damage inflicted by the bard will apply toward Victorious Concerto. Lemilla of Permafrost described the change: As it’s a buff on yourself instead of a debuff on the mob, it would mean that it will track damage inflicted upon multiple enemies instead of just one. This change makes it possible to charge a proper VC on fights where the mobs die within 10 seconds. Same...
From Silius on the EQ2 Forums: Hey everyone, I just wanted to let all of you know that in the next few weeks I will be pushing tradeskilled items to test with updated stats. This push should make all the current crafted items relevant. Their new growth is derived from the growth established in Velious. This means they will all be modified to give appropriate stats based on the new mechanics of attributes and other stats. I will need some help from all of you when we push this to test so I can make sure that I have...
From Kaitheel on the EQ2 Forums: Tinkerfest has been activated on both Test and Test Copy. Like clockwork, Tinkerfest has returned! Take up your favorite wrench and celebrate all things gnomish, be they metal, combustive, mathematical, experimental, or a combination thereof! Adventures, rewards, buyables and crafted items await you, both new and familiar. You won’t want to miss all of the fun at Gnomeland Security, your headquarters for all things Tinkerfest, in Steamfont Mountains.