Dethdlr
Last week, SOE released their new server status page. I took a look at this to see if there was anything there that I might be able to use myself. There was. I’ve put together three different versions of an EQ2 server status page, two of which can be embedded into your own website.
Feldon
From EverQuest2.com: Come Back to EverQuest II Free For This Weekend! This weekend, players who have quit the game between November 5, 2010 and August 2, 2011 can come back for free! It’s a great time to come back, too. It’s Bonus Experience Weekend and Back to School Bonanza for double Station Cash! If your friends haven’t heard about it yet, don’t forget to tell them! The free play time starts this evening and ends Monday evening. All players will need to do is patch their game client and log into the game!
From SmokeJumper on the EQ2X Forums: We’re aiming to put it on the Test server this weekend and then take it to Live in a week or two.
We have received several reports that EQ2Flames.com was hacked late this afternoon and had been serving malware. The account currently displays as Suspended. If the hackers were profiteering script kiddies, only able to inject malicious code but gaining no further access. then the damage may be minimal. However if the hackers gained access to eq2flames’ MySQL database then they would be able to browse everything, including hidden forums and Private Messages. vBulletin forum software does not store plaintext passwords so it is unlikely we will see identity theft. UPDATE: EQ2Flames is now back online. UPDATE #2: EQ2Flames seems to...
As we reported last week, we’re coming up on a Double XP weekend. Now the official announcement from EverQuest2.com: This coming weekend, from 12:01 AM PDT on Friday, September 2 and ending at 11:59 PM PDT on Sunday, September 5, EverQuest II will be running a Double XP promotion (+100% XP). Take advantage of these three days and watch those XP bars fill up! The bonus applies to AA, tradeskill, and adventure experience gained this weekend. Our French, German, Japanese, Test, and EQ2 Extended servers will also be enjoying the increase in XP gain. The localised times for this...
From the EQ2 Patcher: POPULATION / ZONE PROGRESSION Silent City: The Delving Dead Levels below 90 should actually have collections. TRADESKILLS Appearances on some tranquil threadbare crafted armor have been updated. The Scroll of Fire Seeds is now heirloom rather than no trade.
From EverQuest2.com: We’ve got some really great news! We now have an official SOE Server Status Page! The page includes server status information for the following games: EverQuest II Extended EverQuest II EverQuest Star Wars: Galaxies DC Universe Online Check it out here: http://www.soe.com/status. The information on this page will include up-to-date region, server name, status, and server load information. UPDATE: The Server Status page has been redone to add other games (Vanguard, EQ Mac, EQOA, FreeRealms, and PlanetSide). They’ve also added a time readout for the last time each server’s status was updated. This seems to have changed...
From EverQuest2.com: Hail and well met, fellow gamers! My name is Jennifer “Isulith” Bridges and I’m the newest addition to the SOE Community Team. I have to say, it’s truly an honor to be here.
After people started wondering where oh where has the Shady Swashbuckler gone, Gninja had this to say on the EQ2Forums: Shady is currently permakilled for an exploit he will be returning tomorrow after the update. Sorry for not letting you guys know.
This just in from Smokejumper on the EQ2 Forums: There are a number of things that we’re going to revisit on items: a) The green stats matter. Progression of green stats will be attended to in the new pass. b) There will be more variability between the value of stats on items. This was removed erroneously at the last minute. It will be returned. (Getting rid of the “all items have +29 STR on them in the same zone” effect.) There will be more “min/max-ability” on the items. c) The dev team will be playing a lot over the...
From the EQ2 Forums: GENERAL Fixed an issue with Guild Halls. Fixed an issue causing the streaming client to use old assets. Fixed an issue which could cause the streaming client to crash on startup. Fixed a disconnect bug where some characters would get dropped to character select upon login. Players will now be prompted for a one-time, free item unattuning: If you answer yes, all items will be immediately unattuned. Any equipped items will be popped into overflow. If you answer no, items will not be unattuned and you will not be asked again.
I could write 50,000 words about the disappointing Game Update 61, with referenced links to the nearly 100 forum discussions about its flaws, plus countless player and developer quotes. But what difference would it make? Despite a 2-day delay, and despite pushback from both Developers and Testers warning that the update still needed weeks, possibly a month of work to meet any reasonable measurement of build quality, Game Update 61 was released Thursday, August 25th. It was clear on Monday the 22nd that there was no way the Reitemization of EQ2 would be completed in time for Game Update...
Double XP Weekend Although it wasn’t included in the announcement of the Back to School Bonanza Double StationCash e-mail blast, visitors to the SOE.com website discovered that in addition to Double StationCash, EQ2 players can expect Double XP through the duration of the event. The EverQuest II Double XP weekend should last during these times: PDT: September 2 12:01am ~ September 5 11:59pm EDT: September 2 3:01am ~ September 6 2:59am BST: September 2 8:01am ~ September 6 7:59am CET: September 2 9:01am ~ September 6 8:59am
Due to the widespread changes to Itemization in Game Update 61 for level 20-90 items (including Sentinel’s Fate and Velious gear which were rushed for inclusion), a complementary Global Unattune was provided. This was supposed to include every item including Equipment, Appearance, Inventory (bags), and your Bank. However this did not quite work out that way, at least not permanently. Players have discovered that when they login for the first time, most or all of their items are Unattuned, but if they log out that character and log back in, all Bank items get Reattuned. Why? Rothgar explains: The...
After weeks of testers reporting getting stuck in their Guild Halls, or being unable to zone into their Guild Halls, especially Tier 2 halls in South Qeynos, this bug went live with Game Update 61, and was not corrected with today’s update. Your only recourse is to file a Petition with Customer Service with a status of “Stuck” and see if they will Reset your Guild Hall instance. Good luck!
From an e-mail I just received: Back to School Bonanza Double StationCash and Double XP!! September 2-5, 2011 Purchase StationCash in-game, via your Station Account, or redeem an SOE Pre-Paid Game Card at http://www.soe.com/gamecards/ (between 12:01am PDT Sept 2, 2011 and 11:59pm PDT September 5, 2011) to get Double StationCash. EverQuest II players also get Double XP during this weekend. Purchases made via SMS are excluded from the promotion.
The first Flying Squirrel mount, first premiered at Fan Faire, has been introduced to EverQuest II. It’s been added to the StationCash Marketplace for 1950SC ($19.50 or $6.50 if you stocked up during a triple SC weekend). Despite the name, the Flying Squirrel is a glider and thus available at level 60. We presume that there will be other color choices in the future, perhaps a darker brown, red, or even silver. According to Tom “ttobey” Tobey, this mount was modeled by Steve Merghart and animated by Chris Myers. After the jump, a bit less fanciful screenshot of the...
Here are your Update Notes for today, August 26, 2011. The US update will be at 7:00am PDT and last approximately 1 hour. That’s 10:00am EDT, 15:00 BST, 16:00 CET. The EU update will be at 5:00am PDT (13:00 BST or 14:00 CET) and last 2 hours. From the EQ2 Patcher Notes: GENERAL Due to an issue with GU61, all characters will have their items unattuned and adornments on equipped gear refunded once again. In addition, all AA trees should reset upon login. The LoN prestige house Residence of the Blades no longer gets confused if you own an...
Apparently, two additional days wasn’t adequate to fully test everything coming in with GU61. Who could have guessed? There are reports that gear is randomly re-attuning itself when you zone or log off. There is also some strangeness going on with AAs. Rothgar has posted this on the official forums: We will be hotifixing this bug tomorrow. The downside is that all of your items will become unattuned again and we will refund adornments applied to any equipped gear. After this runs tomorrow, the items should remain unattuned until you decide to attune them again. Tomorrow’s hotfix will also...
Note that the trailer mentions the Dungeon Finder which is not currently available. When the Dungeon Finder goes live, it will be specific to each server/realm at first, and won’t be cross-server, which may take months/years to implement.
From SmokeJumper on the EQ2X Forums: We’re going multi-pronged on this. 1) We’re spending money again on ads. You should start seeing banner ads. 2) We’re doing a winback campaign to reactivate interest with old players after Dungeon Finder rolls out, and pushing even harder when Freeport and the Age of Discovery launch later this year. 3) We added the video recording feature so that word spreads organically as you post any videos you think are interesting. There’s more than this planned, but these are a few of the things that should be most effective. To record a YouTube...
If you’ve ever wondered why EU patches and Game Updates always seem to take twice as long as US ones, you’re not alone. We’ve never been able to understand why the files aren’t sent earlier, or some steps taken ahead of time to make the update more quickly. Apparently there is some work being done. From SmokeJumper on the EQ2 Forums: The international team has developed a way to parallel process some of the update in the future, so we should hopefully see an update speed increase for non-US servers. Taylen of Splitpaw asked: Does that mean we would...
When one creates a character in EQ2, even for the sole purpose of tradeskilling, they must first select an Adventure class. There are a surprising number of characters out there which are max level Tradeskillers who have explored and completed every Tradeskill aspect EQ2 has to offer. Later on, they realize that they may have chosen their Adventure class hastily. These are not players who wish to respec their Adventure class and keep their AAs or quest discoveries (except Tradeskill-specific ones). Even though such a feature is intended for crafters, it would of course also be available to adventurers,...
After some issues with extended downtime (6 hours, but it took 3 hours for any explanation) on the EU servers, Game Update 61 has officially launched. From EverQuest2.com: 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 as a massive portal rips itself open within the fortress walls. The sounds of battle 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...
PC Gamer has landed a time-lapse video of SOE production artist Nate Temple conceptualizing the Raptor mount recently added to EQ2. He takes the raptor from a blank page to full color concept art which was then passed off to the 3D modeling and texturing team.