A surprising post from SmokeJumper yesterday caught our attention regarding New Hardware:

The server hardware is coming in in chunks as we ship it to the various data centers around the world.

But the good news is…Permafrost and Oasis are now upgraded, as of this morning.

More are coming soon!

We’ve already received indication that the rest of the hardware is already on order. Russian servers will not be upgraded as the hardware is relatively new (2007) while the current EQ2 servers were on 2004 hardware. Note these are the game servers and zone servers. The database servers were already upgraded late last summer to new 64-bit hardware.

In a blink-and-you-missed-it update today, several crashing issues were fixed, but there are still many bugs to squash and issues to address in Game Update 60.

All U.S. servers came down at 7am PDT today for an estimated one hour update. The U.K. worlds will come down on June 2nd at 5am London Time for an estimated two hour update. Here are the patch notes from Station Launcher:

GENERAL

• Fixed a zone crash related to using certain spells without a target.
• Fixed a crash issue related to Battlegrounds.
• Fixed a zone crash which could occur on The Bazaar and Vox.

BATTLEGROUNDS

• You should no longer see your own chat in third person.
• Fixed an issue where matches would display large wait times.

From SOE’s Facebook page:

This Thursday at 4PM PDT the SOE webcast is going to host members of the EverQuest II development team as they talk about Game Update 60: The Children of War. Find out about the Crystal Cavern, Fortress of Drunder, PvP changes and more! Also, members of the EverQuest Team will be in attendance to talk about Hardcore Heritage and why you’ll want to revisit some of your favorite places!

From EverQuest2.com:

Available today, May 31, 2011, The Children of War is the 60th game update for EverQuest II. This update will automatically install the next time you run the Launcher before logging in. Several updates were made to the game; here’s a quick look at some of the highlights!

Game Update 60: The Children of War

The Crystal Caverns

The Fortress of Drunder

Read more at EverQuest2.com.

From EverQuest2.com:

The Children of War update brings changes to the Player versus Player gameplay style available on our PVP servers, a new battlegrounds lobby, as well as a new battleground scenario.

Read more at EverQuest2.com.

From EverQuest2.com:

The Children of War continues the storyline introduced to players in the recently released EQII: Destiny of Velious expansion pack as part of the Age’s End Prophecy saga.

Destiny of Velious provides many options for solo and duo players wishing to gear up without stepping into a heroic dungeon.

• For starters, the Othmir and Snowfang quest lines reward gear that was unheard of except for raiders in Sentinel’s Fate.

• Public Quests offer sets of gear, weapons, and more, with or without joining a group or raid provided enough players are present and successful.

• A largely unknown solo/duo dungeon Crystalline Breaks provides additional gear up options.

• And finally today sees the introduction of a Velious Solo Shard Quest to fill out player options for gearing up without a full group.

Drunder and Critical Mitigation

The Shadow Odyssey introduced Critical Mitigation, a stat needed by players to survive the heavy hits of raid bosses and enemies. Sentinel’s Fate upped the numbers, but it was Destiny of Velious which rolled out Critical Mitigation to all group zones and even overland solo content.

The three new Drunder dungeons, new Citadel of V’uul x2 raid, and three new Drunder x4 raid zones are no exception and set alarming new standards for the amount of Critical Mitigation needed even to do heroic content.

Adding to the concern is that while mobs can be examined to see their Crit Bonus buff, this number has been traditionally 30-50% lower than the amount of Critical Mitigation actually needed to survive their attacks.

The high Critical Mitigation needs of Drunder are hardly a surprise as there was a lengthy thread on the Testing forums. Now that the Drunder zones are live, the discussion is playing out in two threads on the EQ2 forums.

After the jump, Kander and Gninja respond to player concerns and indicate that the number displayed when inspecting mobs will be adjusted to show the real Crit Bonus amount that players will need to gear up for.

Multi-attack Not Working on Offhand Weapons

In a two different forum threads, players reported that Offhand Weapons are not multiattacking unless their timing is staggered (use a combat art to interrupt one, or use weapons with two different delays). Zoltaroth‘s response:

We found what is causing this and are working on a fix. Most likely the fix will be in the next hotfix after tomorrows (ie: not tomorrow).

Battlegrounds Tokens for 2 Gold

For testing purposes, Battlegrounds Tokens were placed on the PvP Vendor for 2 gold a piece on Test Copy. Unfortunately, these cheap tokens made their way through to live and as a result, some players on Nagafen have stockpiled thousands of tokens. Some players have even transferred from other servers to Nagafen just to buy them. Olihin says this will be addressed:

This was not intended as stated and we are taking steps to resolve the issue. We appreciate the report and patience while this is resolved.

We thank those that had the restraint to NOT buy the tokens, since it was a bug that the token was there to begin with.

After the jump, your full Game Update 60 Notes for today, May 31st, 2011…

Today, arguably the largest Game Update we’ve seen in years hits the live servers. Game Update 60 adds 4 new dungeons, 4 new raid zones, more crafting, more quests from a solo shard quest to a Heritage Quest, major changes to PvP from gear to itemization to mechanics, not only a new Battlegrounds lobby, but a 4th Battleground 18 vs. 18.

We are still waiting for the full list of Game Update Notes, but in the meantime, here’s just a quick bullet point list of what we can expect:

New Level 90 Dungeons and Raid Zones

The Crystal Caverns will naturally be familiar to those who adventured through Velious in EQ1.

The Fortress of Drunder consists of 3 new group dungeons, 3 new x4 raid zones with both regular and challenge modes, a new x2 raid zone, as well as a crafting zone. Drunder zones are only accessible via flying mount.

• Drunder: Spire of Rage (group)
• Drunder: Strategist’s Stronghold (group)
• Drunder: Tower of Tactics (group)

• Drunder: Citadel of V’uul (x2 raid)
• Drunder: Sullon’s Spire (x4 raid)
• Drunder: Tallon’s Stronghold (x4 raid)

• Drunder: Vallon’s Tower (x4 raid)

From EverQuest2.com:

The Children of War, or Game Update 60, will go live on Tuesday, May 31, 2011. The US servers will be offline at the usual Tuesday update time of 7:00 am PDT and are expected to be back online around 10:00 am PDT.

The update notes will be available in the Update Notes forum, and a feedback thread will be unlocked once the update has been completed on the US servers.

We’ll post any downtime updates in the Official News and Announcements “Server Downtime for the Children of War” thread.

If you firmly believe that all races and classes should be playable in all cities, today we are one step closer. Starting with Game Update 60 on May 31st, Ratonga will be tolerated welcomed in Qeynos and Kelethin.

From EverQuest2.com:

Celebrate With the Ratonga: May 31 – June 6, 2011

Word is spreading fast among the citizens of Qeynos and its allies: ratonga have begun to openly enter the cities, and the guards are no longer turning them away at the gate. With Game Update 60: The Children of War, ratonga will now be considered a neutral race and may start life in any city of Norrath.

If you just can’t get enough of Thurgadin, City of the Coldain Dwarves in Velious, and wish you could take some of it home with you, take heart. The Thurgadin Grand Hall joins the Kromzek House as one of two new houses now on the Test and Test Copy servers.

The voluminous Thurgadin Grand Hall will make you wish indoor flying were possible, as the new house contains both the Remembrance Park and an enlarged version of the Mercantile area of the city of Thurgadin.

A seventh Prestige Housing portal has appeared on Test and EQ2Wire went to check it out.

The new Enchanted Kromzek manor joins the largest Prestige Houses including the sprawling Mistmoore Estate.

It’s hard to believe that it’s been a week and a half since EverQuest II service was restored, and harder still that EQ2 was offline for 12 days, an exceptional operational gap for a game modeled on “sticky” customers who login daily to check in on and advance their characters.

During the downtime, EQ2Wire wanted to give the EQ2 team an opportunity to come out from behind the bushes and share a bit of what they’ve been working on and maybe break some of the tension. After all, the EQ2 team had only just taken the wraps off 3 months of hard work by unveiling Game Update 60 on the Test servers. The Shutdown arrested feedback just a scant 72 hours after testing had begun.

The Sony/SOE security breach precipitated a communications blackout that fell over the company like a cone of silence, almost completely cutting off SOE from its customers. We submitted some questions a few days after the outage and are now able to share the responses with you. Due to the timing (and lawyers), there will be few revelations, but it’s still worth a read.

Check out SmokeJumper‘s responses to our questions after the jump…

We’re still 1 week away from Game Update 60 and Today’s update fixes a few outstanding bugs, specifically a Public Quest Participation loot bug, as well as handing out those five 7-day Research Potions to make up for the Research Assistants going on holiday while the servers were inaccessible.

The full Update Notes after the jump…

From EverQuest2.com:

Hello, Norrathians!

We’re incredibly glad to have our worlds back online again and we really appreciate you all being so patient with us while we strengthened the castle walls.

It’s been quite odd working on the game without it running. We’re glad you’re back!

So, you’re probably wondering, “What has your Dev Team been doing for the last couple of weeks?”

Here’s a small list of things that happened during that time:

• Figured out the Fan Faire panel details. The “New Stuff” panel is going to be a heck of a show this year, I think.
• Continued brainstorming on a major new feature set (which we intend to unveil at Fan Faire.)
• Detailed out the mechanics change plan for the coming year (we’ll be sharing these plans with you soon and think you will really like what we have in store.)
• Worked out a very cool set of tradeskilling quest changes to make those more interesting.
• Made a quick UI change to the AA trees so that unavailable abilities are greyed out. (Kind of a “no duh” change, but it’s nice.)
• Freeport artwork concepting has been going well and the first architecture changes have started.
• And of course, there’s a lot more, but details will roll out as we get closer to their release.

From EverQuest2.com:

Beginning at 7 AM PDT (15:00 BST, 16:00 CET) on Thursday May 19, 2011, the Login Server, SOE Account and Commerce flow and the Station Store will be unavailable due to maintenance. We expect this maintenance to take approximately 2 hours. This may also cause some forum accounts to temporarily lose permissions, due to the inability to verify account status while the maintenance is taking place. This is only temporary and normal permissions will return automatically once the maintenance is complete.

We apologize for this interruption and will resume all affected services as soon as the maintenance is completed.

An issue brought to my attention by Cyliena of EQ2 ZAM and Tuatha of CheesePirate.com involves Player-written books which have lost their Edit rights since the Server Merges last December. This is not an issue that has gotten much attention, but after 6 months, maybe it’s time to shine a bit brighter spotlight. Because the books are no longer editable, it’s not only impossible to edit them, but copying them is difficult as the text cannot be selected — it must be retyped word-for-word. This problem is being discussed on a thread on the EQ2 Forums.

From Cyliena:

My main character, Cyliena, has written four books. Of these, three of them she cannot edit or copy anymore. The only difference with the book I can still edit is that it’s one of the Frostfell greeting cards. The other three are using Strengthened Leather Notebook, Bristled Leather Notebook and Etched Leather Notebook. Other players on my server are having the same issue, will prod them to post their experiences as well.

edit: Figured I’d mention that I did not lose my name in the merge, nor was I ever in danger of losing it during the original EF name script error as EQ2Players shows that I’m the only Cyliena in existance.

From Tuatha:

I have 16 finished and half finished titles on 3 different characters that can not be copied or edited anymore after the Blackburrow-Everfrost merge. The 4th character has 3 titles that can still be edited and copied.

None of these characters lost their names in the merge.

While SOE and by extension EQ2 were offline during the 12 day downtime, what were the devs doing? Scrapbooking? Needlepoint? Actually, they continued work on Game Update 60 (now slated for a May 31st debut according to SmokeJumper) as well as looking ahead to Game Update 61 and beyond.

While players were not able to test Game Update 60, the developers have continued to polish it up and add new things while the servers were down, as well as addressing the feedback from players during the short testing period.

We’ve been hearing about a new Adornments System in Game Update 60. System is perhaps too strong a word for what we’ve seen on Test. But the changes indeed help to visually distinguish adornments from other items which makes finding them in bags a lot easier.

Item Examine windows have seen a change, as adornment text has been replaced by subtle Adornment “badges” for each color the item supports. Adornments themselves have been given bold new icons which are unique, color-coded, and stand out from other items in both recipe books and inventory bags.

Your Feedback

Does this go far enough to make adornments easier to find and stand out among other items? Would you still like to see an Adornment Helper in-game that shows all the adornments and where they are available from?

So it turns out that some Research Assistants took a little vacation while the servers were inaccessible and did not continue dutifully researching upgrades for all players. After thoroughly investigating the issue, SmokeJumper has posted the planned solution:

Hi, folks,

When we came back online, we intended that Research would have continued to tick along while the outage occurred, so that you all would come back with a fully researched spell. However, that didn’t happen. And there’s no real way to make it automatically happen.

So…in next Tuesday’s hotfix (2011.05.24) we will grant you five (5) potions, each of which will reduce the amount of time you need to research a spell by seven days. (35 days of reduction, total.)

You can apply those potions any way that you desire.

Soon!

Here’s a screenshot of what these potions will look like:

Here are your update notes for May 9th (17th?), 2011:

USER INTERFACE

• Fixed a bug with dragging currency to the currency list in the Character window.
• Fixed a bug with the Character window’s location not saving correctly between session.

HOUSING

• Fixed a bug that would sometimes cause stubborn portals to come back after being picked up.
• Fixed a potential bug with buying a house in a zone that instances.
• House portals should no longer port you while they are being moved around.
• Fixed an issue with item placement in the Maj’dul Vacation Suite.

QUESTS

Hold of Rime: The Ascent

The collection “Trinkets of the Ascent” can now be found within the Ascent

At the time of this writing, the linked notes said “Update Notes: Monday, May 9, 2011”.  My guess is that either the *hope* was for these to go out on May 9th or someone looked at the calendar wrong.

Update: As pointed out in the comments, these may be the notes from an update that occurred on Monday, May 9th and they are just now being posted.

Now that EQ2 has been resurrected, some players have had issues with the mandatory password resets. Others who have gotten into the game noticed issues with Research Assistants. Some EQ2X players at the Bronze and Silver levels feel there should be compensation. EQ2X players at Gold and Platinum already have a compensation package. Finally, players are curious about when Game Update 60 will hit, since we are just 3 days away from the original announced launch date, and there had only been a couple days of testing.

Details after the jump…