Steam will be selling Sentinel’s Fate in approximately 20 minutes. Good news since DLGamer didn’t ask for  enough keys. O.o

From Kiara:

US servers are Good to Go and should be coming up very shortly.

EQ2 ZAM has coverage of Game Update 55 including the Golden Path questline, revamp to Butcherblock, etc.

And here are your massive Game Update 55 Notes from EQ2 Forums. After the jump…

DLGamer seems to have run out of Sentinel’s Fate product keys and Steam has not yet listed Sentinel’s Fate. Kiara is aware of both issues.

More news as we have it.

In addition to the ~175 of us in the #EQ2 Chatroom I linked here, the UStream Sentinel’s Fate Launch Event is going on as well. There are nearly 400 visitors in that chat and live video event.

You can find EQ2Wire in either chatroom as Feldon30. 🙂

The EQ2 Servers will be coming down shortly for the Sentinel’s Fate expansion and Game Update 55 patches. Servers are expected to come back up at 9am PDT.

Also some of the people who purchased Sentinel’s Fate digitally from international websites will be getting their keys by e-mail at this time. Some people have reported that DLGamer.co.uk is now accepting orders from Australia.

While the servers are down, you can chat with us online! We will be in the EQ2 ZAM chatroom. Kiara will be joining us as well and giving status updates.

	For instructions on how to connect to the chat using mIRC, Trillian, or other chat client, check out the fantastic instructions at EQ2 ZAM.
	If you are not able to run chat software at work, or you just want to jump into the chat through your web browser, you can chat here.

See you in the chatroom!

Ryan O’Sullivan at AdventuresofTaas.com was able to obtain the Sentinel’s Fate Collector’s Edition and thought some might be interested in seeing the contents. His Sentinel’s Fate Collector’s Edition Unboxing.

From Kiara:

On February 16th, EverQuest II’s sixth expansion: Sentinel’s Fate will launch the retail headstart! We’re all very excited, and hope that you share our enthusiasm. We want to give a brief overview of what to expect on the 16th.

We’ll be bringing the servers down at midnight on February 15th to begin patching to the live servers. Fan Faire attendees will be flagged at this time.

Starting at 6am PST and running until 8am PST, Zatozia will be running a Ustream event.

Kiara will be on the Official Forums and in Zam’s IRC chat to provide updates until the servers come up.

We plan to have the servers back up and ready to go by 9am PST.

EQ2Wire will also be present in the EQ2 ZAM chatroom if you’d like to tug our ear on any issues or offer suggestions.

Alan “Brenlo” Crosby, Senior Producer of EverQuest II has posted this Producer’s Letter:

Happy Valentine’s Day All!

Here we are, perched on the precipice of another big launch for our beloved game, EQII. Next week is a big week for us and for you, the players of this grand game. You will finally be able to log into the new areas of Odus and explore, level and play in the new area that the team has spent nearly a year putting together. Characters can now advance to level 90 as adventurers and tradeskillers. More items, more spells, more AA’s and we hope lots more fun.

As many have noticed, Halas is not going out with the expansion, many have asked why and the reasoning is twofold. We have three pretty decent starting areas already. Darklight, Greater Faydark and Timorous Deep. We know they are not perfect and so the team has done considerable work in reworking those areas, streamlining the progress path to make for a better experience. We believe that you will find the experience in those zones to be far better than it had been. So, we went to work on higher level content for this launch, which we have with the expansion content and the new Battlegrounds.

Additionally we really want new Halas to be something special. We want more time to polish the area and make sure the progression path is fun and smooth. We also hope to get kilts in there. Currently we are looking to have Halas out with the Halas Reborn update later in the year.

With this release, we are proud to open up the Pre-Season of EQII Battlegrounds. Three zones will be available, each with a different playstyle. They will have progression and items and we hope add a whole new element of fun to the game. Unfortunately we didn’t quite get as many players as we had hoped on the server to give it a proper test, so we are going to use this pre-season phase to iron out any kinks and tweak the balance a bit more beyond the testing phase. When we are ready, we will begin Season 1 and the mayhem will begin in earnest. You will be able to work towards the new Chaos Armor during the pre-season, which might be the best looking armor we have added to the game.

With a game like EQII, it is evergrowing and everchanging, on occasion we find the need to adjust items, spells etc. . . and some mythicals had their power reduced with the release of the expansion. With each launch, we have to look at the items released previously and decide if they are perhaps too high to encourage players to look for upgrades. EQII is, at its core, a game driven by itemization. The constant desire to get the next biggest, baddest piece of gear. So on occasion we have to make some difficult decisions. This was one of them. For those who feel their mythical was devalued, I offer my apologies.

Next Tuesday is the retail head start, so to get you all ready, we are turning on Bonus XP from now until the servers come down for the update Tuesday morning. I hope you all login and enjoy. We look forward to seeing you on the Battlegrounds and running around Odus. Mostly, we thank you for playing EQII.

Alan “Brenlo” Crosby

Senior Producer EQII

Looks like SOE Marketing forgot that there are more countries in the world than the United States, Canada, the European Union, and Japan.

Australia, New Zealand, Norway, and other countries are all reporting that they are unable to order the Digital Download from DLGamer and Direct2Drive.

We have heard that on February 16th, Steam customers in these other countries will be able to order the Digital Download in these countries.

At this point, we’re not taking anyone’s word for it.

SOE Marketing Dept Strikes Again

We here at EQ2Wire consider it a classy move for the SOE Marketing Dept to make it so incredibly difficult for loyal customers to purchase their product. I wonder if they got pay raises this year with exceptional skills like that.

Kiara has officially announced the Digital Download partners for International customers.

Greetings!

We’re pleased to announce the International Digital Download Distributors for Sentinel’s Fate.  Our international customers will be able to digitally download the expansion and begin playing on February 16th!  We appreciate your patience as we’ve worked out all the details.

Accepting Orders Today

DLGamer – £29.95 (34,95 €) ($46.88)
English | French | German

Direct2Drive – £29.95 (34,95 €) ($46.88)
English | French | German

Accepting orders February 16th

Steam
visit Steam

International customers will be able to DD the expansion on February 16th and take advantage of the headstart offer.

They will receive the DD version of the game and the things included in that package:

• These include:
  • 500 Station Cash
  • LoN Fall of Erudin scenario
  • 30 days free play time for new accounts
  • In-game armor piece – Guarding of the Learned

Continuing Coverage

EQ2Wire is continuing to follow this story. If you are unable to purchase the Digital Download through these sites outside of the United States and Canada, we’d like to know about it! If you find any tips or tricks on how to order the product through these websites, please let us know either by Comment or by sending us e-mail.

Sentinel’s Fate Digital Download

We are getting reports that the Sentinel’s Fate expansion has appeared on Digital Download websites for customers outside the United States and Canada. If you hear of other sites, please let us know! We are still expecting a formal announcement at 9:30am PST today of the Digital Download partners.

If you are outside the United States and Canada, you should now be able to purchase Sentinel’s Fate from these websites (of course we would be curious to know if any of you have trouble with these sites):

DLGamer – £29.95 (34,95 €) ($46.88)

Direct2Drive – £29.95 (34,95 €) ($46.88)

Bad News for Amazon.com Pre-Orders

We’ve gotten a report that Amazon is telling its Sentinel’s Fate pre-order customers the following:

Severe Weather Alert: Due to winter storms on the East Coast of the United States, many packages will be delayed.

Bonus XP Weekend!

Kiara brings us news that this will be a Bonus XP Weekend!!

All forms of experience (Achievement, Adventure, and Tradeskill) will receive a 30% bonus from Friday Feb 12th @ 3pm PST (6pm EST) until Monday Feb 15th @ 11:59pm PST (Feb 16 @ 2:59am EST) when the servers will be brought down to patch the Sentinel’s Fate expansion as well as Game Update 55.

Retail Boxes

Some players have reported seeing Sentinel’s Fate regular and Collector’s Edition boxes in retail stores. We’re glad to see this as it will make it easier for some players to buy the game early if they are not able to get to a retail store on the 16thl. Frankly, the release date doesn’t really matter on an MMORPG. Until the servers themselves are patched, you cannot play the new content.

Kiara has encouraged players to NOT enter Sentinel’s Fate product keys into the system (Station.com) until February 16th. The system may get confused by a prematurely entered key. O.o

With hardly a moment to spare, we will soon find out where the EverQuest II: Sentinel’s Fate expansion will be available for purchase as a Digital Download.

We will be releasing the distributors and the links to their sites tomorrow morning after 9am PST. It will be up in this thread about 9:30am PST as soon as I walk in the office. The list will be updated as more information comes in, but will be good to get everyone started. — Kiara

Current wisdom indicates that if your IP address is recognized as being outside of the United States and Canada, you will be able to play the DD on February 16th. If not, you will be waiting until February 23rd.

Commentary

I’d like to know…Are there any positions open in the SOE Marketing Dept? I’d love to be able to completely fumble the international launch of a top 10 MMORPG expansion, take late lunches, and not lose a wink of sleep at night, all while its Developers and Community team are working 14 hour days including weekends to develop and release a game that a lot of people won’t be able to play. Must be nice.

Didn’t I promise the Battlegrounds news would slow down? Oh well…

In response to concerns that 6 vs. 6 is too few players to set up an adequate defense in the Battlefield of Ganak: Capture the Flag Battlegrounds scenario, the number of players is being changed to 12 vs. 12.

This should also hopefully address the issues of spawn camping (AoE root/nuke players as soon as they revive). as a defense perimeter can be setup to protect your allies.

When I launched EQ2Wire at the August 2008 Fan Faire, I had no idea that we would become a popular destination for (nearly daily) EQ2 News and Commentary. And so it is an interesting coincidence that the release of Sentinel’s Fate will mark the 18 month anniversary of EQ2Wire. What better way to celebrate than to give away Sentinel’s Fate Retail keys to our readers?

Contest Concludes

The EQ2Wire Sentinel’s Fate Contest concluded on February 16th. We awarded 10 Retail and 2 Collector’s Edition product keys!

Terms and Conditions

There were 10 first prizes and 2 grand prizes. The first prizes are Sentinel’s Fate retail edition product keys. The grand prizes are Sentinel’s Fate collector’s edition product keys. Digital purchase only. No physical box will be shipped. Winners are entitled to the product key assets only. Prize has no cash value.

One entry was accepted per day.

This contest was valid for any country except where prohibited by law (I think that’s just North Korea, sorry Kim Jong-il). Supported languages: English, French, German.

We are not responsible for winning e-mails being rejected, returned, or lost in transit. If a winning e-mail is bounced, we reserve the right to award the product key to an alternate. We reserve the right to verify e-mail addresses by contacting contestants as well as Sony Online Entertainment with your submitted information.

Contestants may only win once during the contest period.

If there is a conflict or indication of anything hinky with the entries, we may make substitutions. All decisions regarding this contest are final.

Download the EQ2 Battlegrounds Promo Video

Download Battlegrounds Video

Justin did a fantastic job on this Battlegrounds video and it’s one of the better EQ2 promos I’ve seen. You may remember he also did the stunning GU54: Will of a Tyrant video (Download in HD)  which got a lot of positive comments on different forums. It’s nice to see promotional materials that do a great job selling the game. Hopefully we’ll see more like this!

EQ2BattlegroundsWire?

Ok I promise we are not renaming this site to EQ2BattlegroundsWire. 😉 We’ve had a lot of news about them lately, but we will be getting back into the PvE side of things with Grouping and Raiding very soon!

There has been some talk on the EQ2 Forums both in PvP circles and elsewhere, in the Beta forums, not to mention EQ2 Flames, with a lot of concerns about how fairness is going to play out in the Battlegrounds. There have been suggestions that people will exploit and game the system as a stepping stone to progress further in raiding. I am not taking sides in this, but so far I am reasonably happy that these issues are being watched like a hawk.

Parts 1 and 2 of what should probably be a 2 part post. 😉

We have discovered some ancient writings which may yet hold the answer to a puzzle.

There has certainly been a lot of gnashing of teeth on EQ2Flames and the EQ2 Forums that Battlegrounds, Battlegrounds Armor, and the PvP ruleset is going to “ruin” raiding in EQ2.

And there have been plenty of naysayers saying PvP wasn’t strong enough to sustain multiple PvP servers, or that Arenas never really caught on, as proof that there is no need for Battlegrounds.

As for me, the prospect of being robbed on the way to the bank, or being unable to turn in a quest due to roaming murder squads, just isn’t why I play this game. I know it is a play style that many people love, and I respect that.

I’m no stranger to PvP in other games. I had a blast playing Rainbow Six, and Quake. Not to mention some early networked PvP games like MazeWars and NetTrek. The PvP was a controlled environment, and something I could switch on and off. It was a lot of fun!

I’ve been optimistic about Battlegrounds because I see the potential. People have downtime when forming groups or raids. Some people like the idea of PvP in EQ2, but not the implementation. Sometimes there just aren’t a lot of players online. And no doubt, some guilds will want to test their mettle against other guilds on other servers!

Tonight, I tried out the group Battlegrounds zones, and so far, I had a lot of fun!

What are Battlegrounds?

Battlegrounds is a new feature launched on February 25, 2010. Battlegrounds are a Player vs. Player (PvP) environment which take place on a completely separate server from the regular PvE and PvP servers. It roughly coincided with the release of Sentinel’s Fate (Feb 16) and Game Update 55.

Tokens

Each of the 3 Battlegrounds have their own unique Token. These tokens can be spent at the Battlegrounds Merchant in Qeynos Harbor or North Freeport. Multiple tokens from different zones are required to buy items.

Just by participating in a Battleground, you will earn at least 1 token. If you are the winning team, you will earn 3 tokens.

In addition, there are 2 Battlegrounds quests available for each of the 3 Battlegrounds zones. Don’t forget to pick these up before joining up!

How Do I Join a Battleground?

To join a Battleground, press Alt-Z to bring up the Zones window. Select the Battlegrounds tab. Click to view the Battlegrounds Window. You can choose one of the 3 zones presented in the list:

• Battlefield of Ganak (Capture the Flag: 12 vs 12)
• Gears of Klak’anon (Protect the Relic: 6 vs 6)
• Smuggler’s Den (Hold the Fort: 24 vs 24)

or you may choose First Available.

If you are already in a group or raid, you can click Queue Group or Queue Raid to bring your pre-made group or raid over to the Battleground. Otherwise, you can click Queue Self and jump into a pickup group.

When the zone becomes available, you will be prompted to join the Battleground.

What Happens Next?

As soon as you accept the prompt, you are immediately logged out of your main game server and whisked away to the Battlegrounds server. Your group (or raid) is assembled on either the Red team or Blue team and off you go!

Rules

You are now operating under a PvP ruleset. This can substantially change how your gear works on Battlegrounds vs. your regular server. You can look at how your gear will behave in PvP by clicking the [X] PvP checkbox on the examine window. The duration of your stun/stifle/mez/root spells is substantially reduced. And you may not use any sort of Evac/Escape ability.

You may not speak to the opposing party or any other public chat such as Out-of-Character, Shout, or level chat.

Capture the Flag (Battlefield of Ganak)

In Capture the Flag, you are naturally trying to bring the opposing team’s flag to your home base. To do this, you simply run up to the flag of the opposing side and your character will grab it and carry it around.

You cannot score unless your team’s own flag is safe and secure in your home base. With the change to 12 vs 12, if you coordinate your strategy, you can set up a defense perimeter of 2-3 players to guard the flag, 1-2 players trying to get the flag, and then the other 7 players involved in skirmishes in the center of the playing field.

The first team to successfully capture and return three flags wins.

Protect the Relic (Gears of Klak’anon)

Acquire and hold the relic to accrue points faster than the opposition. The team with the higher number of points at the end of the time limit wins.

Hold the Fort

Gain control of the five spires which jut out over the raging ocean and hold your position longer than the opposition!

At the End of a Battle

When a Battlegrounds encounter concludes (either the prerequisite number of points have been reached, or the timer runs out), all characters are teleported to their home bsae and rooted in position. A scoreboard appears show how both teams did.

After approximately 30 seconds, the Battleground closes and you are returned to your place of origin.

Battlegrounds Rewards

We are currently working on a complete guide to the Battlegrounds armor and weapons.

>> View Battlegrounds Armor

At launch, Battlegrounds is restricted to level 80-90 with Battlegrounds armor at a minimum level of 90. It is intended for Battlegrounds to have rewards added so that Battlegrounds are open to players from level 10-90.

From EQ2 Forums:

Greetings Norrathians.

Starting at 4:45am PST  Antonia Bayle, The Bazaar, and Sebilis will come  down for an estimated 5 hour downtime.  During this time, the database  software will be upgraded to address lag issues.

We will update this thread as needed should any issues arise.

Thank you for your patience!

We’ve seen some screen shots on the web of the Battlegrounds armor, but it’s been pretty low quality images. We took some images with the maximum graphic settings. This is the most detailed armor EQ2 has seen yet!

One surprising aspect of the Battlegrounds is that each of the 3 Battlegrounds zones give different tokens. The Battlegrounds merchants (now parked in Qeynos Harbor and North Freeport) require 30-40 tokens from at least TWO different zones to buy each item.

More after the jump…

As of 3:15pm PST (6:15pm EST), the Test Copy server is being rebooted for testing Battlegrounds. From the EQ2 Forums:

Battlegrounds are up on Test and Test-Copy!! Teams who win their matches between 5 and 8pm PST every day that the BG’s are up for testing will get an awesome battlegrounds cloak for their characters!

As a special Battlegrounds event, several members of the SOE staff will be available for match-ups on Thursday, February 11th from 4 until 6pm PST.

Our SOE teams will play anyone who wants to challenge us and (if you beat us!) the winners will receive a special in-game title after the event!

So make sure you head on over to Test and Test-Copy to practice and we’ll see you Thursday!!

and this:

Battlegrounds have been activated on the Test Copy server and we’d like to see people starting to join as soon as possible.

We will be re-enabling the /testcopy command today, so if you aren’t on this server, go ahead and queue yourself up.

We expect a lot of people requesting a copy, so it might take a little time to get everyone moved over.

Expect bugs and expect crashes so if you notice something out-of-place please report it to us using the /bug or /feedback command.

To access battlegrounds, press Alt-Z (the old Zone Reuse window). The first tab should allow you to select a match and queue yourself or your group.

Battlegrounds Discussion on EQ2 Forums!

NOTE: Some players are reporting crashes with EQ2Maps and Battlegrounds. For the time being you may need to uninstall EQ2Maps and use the default UI.

So far, we’ve spotted a dozen individuals who seem particularly interested in player’s triumphs and exploits in the Battlegrounds.

• The Tinmizer’s Tinkerers want you to straighten things out in the Gears of Klak’anon
• The Pirates of Gunthak want to hear of your conquests in  Smuggler’s Den
• The Iksar want to know when you will next face the challenges of the Battlefield of Ganak

Each camp offers 2 different quests for their Battlegrounds zone — defeat other players, or complete the scenario.

Qeynos Harbor seems to be the quest hub for good characters wishing to participate in Battlegrounds. Those of the evil persuasion can find these tasks in North Freeport.