Stargrace

EQ Patch Notes – March 19th

3/19/2009

*** Highlights ***

– Pet hold can now be used with charmed pets again (as long as the owner has the AA).
– Put separators back into raid window. Separators will now appear between sorting groups for all sorting criteria except for “by name.”
*** Quests & Events ***

– Added a check to make sure there are miscreants in Shadow Haven when they are supposed to be there.
– Bristlebane’s party will now show up in, er, minitab as expected.
– Added a default “Hail” dialog to each kill target in the Justice of the Tribunal 10th Anniversary task that will let you re-engage if you already hailed that NPC but failed to kill him.
*** NPC ***

– Modified the spawn rates of several NPCs in Fabled PoP that drop the “Swarm Pet” Weapons to normalize the rate that they appear. Most spawn rates were increased but some were reduced that were appearing too frequently.
*** Tradeskills ***

– Fixed the broken coffin poison bottle. Now it can make any NORMAL poison combine as well as the original coffin bottle combines.
– The following spell research recipes now create a duplicate (tradable) scroll instead of the original (no-drop) scroll. For real this time! Skill: Champion’s Aura, Skill: Poison Spikes Trap, Skill: Master’s Aura, Skill: Bloodlust Aura, Spell: Blessed Aura, Spell: Decrepit Skin, Spell: Aura of the Muse, Spell: Elddar’s Grasp, Spell: Puratus, Spell: Moonshadow, Spell: Ghost of Renewal, Spell: Mind Shatter, Spell: Chaos Flame, Spell: Iceflame Guard, Spell: Mind Flay, and Spell: Spirit of Oroshar.
*** Pets ***

– Pet hold can now be used with charmed pets again (as long as the owner has the AA).
– Now only PC pets will display their owner’s name under them.
– Telling your pet to attack another target when focus is turned on will now cause it to switch targets and focus exclusively on the new target.
– Fixed a bug where telling your pet to attack a new target when focus is turned on would fail if the pet hated the new target the most already (even if the new target was not already its target).
– Casting swarm pets or familiars should no longer disrupt the state of the buttons on your pet window when you already have a normal pet up.
– Pet target hit points are now updated even if you are not targeting the pet’s target.
– Fixed several other bugs that were causing the buttons in the pet window to become out of sync with the server or to reset upon zoning.
– Qattack will now only change the pet’s target if the pet did not already have a target. This is contrasted with the regular attack command which will force the pet to change targets (if focused or not). Qattack now simply adds the target NPC to the pet’s hate list, so that it will attack that target at a later time when its other targets are dead.
*** UI ***

– Put separators back into raid window. Separators will now appear between sorting groups for all sorting criteria except for “by name.”
– When sorting by group, empty slots should always be shown after filled slots for each group. Also group leaders should always be at the top of each group.
– When sorting by anything but group, all the empty slots are removed and not displayed.
*** Previously Updated ***

– Fixed a problem with Atler Flamejabber. He should now reappear in his correct location after someone has completed his quest.
– Nettle Higglesbury should now correctly gather some rabble rousers around him once he’s finished his pie.
– Fixed an issue with Bristlebane’s parties not showing up as expected after 20 hours.

Fabled Loot, Leveling, and Epics

I haven’t actively gone after any fabled in game. The really good amazing stuff is either camped – or it’s held hostage by encounters that there’s no way I could kill, even with friends. Later last night it was suggested I begin working on the druid 1.5 pre-quest (difficult to work on 1.0’s when the named you need are fabled up) and so I was heading to Plane of Growth for some foraging when a fabled encounter walked into view. I had no idea who they were – but as coincidence would have it, they did drop a nice clicky for me! My first fabled drop and it’s not so bad.

As I mentioned, yes. I decided to begin working on the druid 1.5. Ideally I’ll do the 1.0 as well but with fabled up for the next month it makes it a little difficult, and I’d rather own my 1.5 anyhow. My first task was to head to Jaggedpine forest, a zone I have not been to in many moons. It looked almost exactly as I remember it way back when. After speaking to my npc there I headed to Plane of Growth (no fabled Tunare up) to forage a nut, which took most of my evening. Thankfully Tipa’s tweets on belly button line kept me entertained and slightly disgusted, either way.

Before heading off with a guild mate to work on my druid epic, we hung around Stoneroot and managed to ding the little druid level 70. It surprised me because when I started playing her again she was level 63 – only a few days to get to 70 without even trying. Of course it shouldn’t surprise me after the speed in which the necromancer leveled (from scratch) but it still makes me giggle.

By the time I managed to forage the one item I needed, it was getting late and I was getting tired, so I called it a night and headed to bed. Today I’ll pick up on it again as I’m sure there are plenty more things that need to be foraged, and it’s easy to get it done while I do other things. Inching the druid up a few more levels will be nice, though not on the top of my list of priorities. I still haven’t completed the new deity quests that are in place and for some reason servers came down last night at 2am and should not be back up until 8am – I have no idea why. The MoTD claimed it was for a hot fix, though I’m not quite sure what hot fix takes 6 hours to implement. Guess we’ll see!

The new LoN items today are great! For EQ2 it’s a parrot for your shoulder, in EQ it’s a special frost particle effect. Be sure to check out the LoN free loot items for EQ’s 10th anniversary. Even if you don’t play the game there’s no beating free items.

I should have some role play posts to add here soon, it’s been a little while and I’ve missed it. We’ll see how that goes! In the mean time, happy adventuring no matter where you find yourself.

Wandering around in EVE Online

I like gaming, obviously. I tend to stick to my ‘usual’ games (EQ/EQ2/VG) but every so often I like to play something new. Well, actually I enjoy playing new games a lot of the time. They don’t typically have something that keeps me in the game, but it’s still fun. I enjoy the ‘first time’ experience, and I love comparing it to adventures I’ve already had. In some small way, it widens my views of games in general (I personally feel) plus, well, it’s just fun. Playing video games is still relatively ‘new’ to me as I’ve mentioned a few times.

So as a complete change of pace (and I do mean complete) I decided to try out a 21-day trial of EVE Online. This game is not new, but I’ve never played it before – and it is 100% out of my ‘typical’ realm as far as games go. So why bother trying it at all? Well, honestly. Why not?

I make no secret to the fact that I am not a fan of sci-fi (or Syfy, heh) and I never have been. That doesn’t mean that I’m not open to the idea that perhaps one day my interests will veer down that path, but as of yet it hasn’t happened. I haven’t watched any Star Wars and I can’t name space ships they tend to put me to sleep – and yet I still decided to try EVE and despite all of that I don’t think I started playing with a negative attitude at all, in fact quite the opposite.

Keep in mind that these are very much my first impressions with EVE, and they’re pretty cryptic. You may think I’m a ‘happy fluffy bunny’ type of female gamer and there for I may already hate the game before I’ve even started – but you’d be wrong. I’ve been known to enjoy a great amount of PvP which a lot of people find surprising, and while it’s true I spend more time in my games of choice decorating and talking with a wonderful community, there are lots of things that keep me playing.

I patched (and it went smoothly) and logged in, met with a bunch of choices as far as ‘character’ creation goes. I’ve seen a plethora of guides on everything EVE related over the last little while – especially with the relaunch taking place, but I haven’t delved into them too much. I enjoy picking up a game and being able to “go from there” when playing. Once I’ve found a niche, or settled into a game, I may look into guides further to decide what I should play and to figure out if my character is in fact a horrible creation that I should immediately start over.

Once you’ve created your character (and what a calm soothing voice to go along with character creation I must add) you’re plunked down in the beginner tutorial.

The tutorial was fairly easy to understand. You go through inventory (cargo) and maneuvering the ship around. It was absolutely beautiful if not only slightly confusing to me because I’ve never given much thought to the inner workings of a space ship. There was a lot of people talking in some channels that I mostly ignored because I had no idea what they were talking about. I got all excited when it came time to learning how to orbit other ships, and then how to attack them. Granted, this was all done in the safety of the tutorial, and I didn’t have too much to worry about because the practise ship wasn’t really hurting me. I spent far more time ogling the skies around me then anything else. You learn how to move things onto your ships, and then before you know it you’re off to a station to pick up your first mission and unload some skills.

You learn how to cue skills (training and what not), and to arrange the order of them. Having skills work up while you’re out of game is great, and something I’m not used to. I was still trying to let the mass amount of buttons and ‘things’ sink in while following the tutorial. The very first mission I was given had me fly out some place and pick up a package, and then bring it back to the agent who gave me the task to begin with. It got me settled with the beginner commands, docking and warping – which I promptly forgot once I spent a couple of days away from the game. My own fault though, I know how I pick up on things (or don’t).

Once I’d completed the mission I became a little lost on what to do next. I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to head any where, and none of the agents seemed to want to talk to me. That was apparently the end of the tutorial and I thought perhaps I had missed something or skipped over something or was just not looking at something obvious.

My first exploration into the game wasn’t too bad, and I didn’t hate every second of it like some may have thought I would. Do I think it will grab me enough to want to keep playing? It’s honestly too soon to tell yet. I do plan on trying out the rest of the 21-day trial, and I’ve also decided to pick up Age of Conan from Steam ‘just because’. Another game I’ve never tried before.

The only down side to having such a HUGE option of games out there, is of course the limited time in which to play (and write) about them all. Just because you may not hear about it here on my web site doesn’t mean I feel negatively about a game either. I simply only have so much time and I still (always) use this blog for my personal adventures. Anyhow, looking forward to more exploration!

The Fabled Sword of Truth, and Leveling.

Sword graphic on the right hand side is the Fabled Sword of truth – a pretty impressive piece of gear that comes with a very unique graphic that everyone adores. The sword comes from The Fabled Lord Inquisitor Seru in Sanctus Seru. One of the many fabled that are highly sought after during the month of fabled drops.

Yesterday was fairly quiet. My 63 druid is now part way into level 69, having spent some time in both Stoneroot and Valdeholm yesterday. Lesson of the devoted is a great veteran reward and everyone in the group happily burned theirs. I also used an experience potion (or two) to help climb through the levels. I expect things will slow down again around level 70+ but I really love playing the druid in any case. I boxed the enchanter along with her for some experience yesterday, who is creeping up on level 79. I should get started on the druids epic some time, I haven’t looked into it but I know it’s on the long list of things I’d like to do ‘some day.’

I’d also like to work on the Bristlebane firework quest – which is going to be a 20+ hour quest no matter how you look at it. The party machine that shoots fireworks off is in one zone at a time, for one real life hour. There are 20 zones, so even if you were to follow it, it would take 20 hours to get the updates to each location. I’m thinking if I cut it down to 5 locations a day that may be easier. We’ll just have to see how it goes though. As of yet I’ve only just managed to pick up the quest. Then there’s also the 10th anniversary deity quests that I’d like to complete, the aa from them is apparently very nice. We’ll just have to see!

Sorry for the short post today but real life has me doing other stuffs so for now this is it! See you in Norrath, and I hope everyone has a fantastic Wednesday.

Celebration Continues

The celebration continued in EQ yesterday, and it was great. Not only are there fabled back in game (which everyone was camping) but there are 16+ other quests going on. I stumbled into PoK and was practically blinded by the fireworks going off. From almost every rooftop and outside every building is a wonderful banner, and from these banners amazing shows of fireworks shoot off. They’ve out done themselves with the display in fact. As I began to work on the Bristlebane quest that sends you all over Norrath via riddles, I noticed a new npc on the landing of one of the buildings – right close to the Shar Vahl stone.

It was a huge Crystalline orb, and it spoke to me. Talking about Veeshan and asking if I was ready to be tested on the last 10 years of Norrath.

Wow, they were not kidding. They ask a series of questions and some of them so incredibly obscure (like, what is the full name of the guard who stands in the lobby of the bank in Felwithe) and you have a total of three minutes to answer them all. There are five questions I believe. The rewards are nice, you get a little cloth item that summons minions of Veeshan to attack your target (once every 10 minutes) and some fire works, coin, and other goodies. It took me a few (ok, more like 50) attempts to answer all of the questions correctly, they randomize every time you re-start the quest. The adventure for Bristlebane’s fireworks is a lot more involved then I had thought too, there’s only ONE firework machine up at any one time, and there are 20-40 zones (I didn’t count exactly) that it could be up in at any one given time. A few of the people in Drinal were kind enough to announce when they saw this party machine, and are helping one another in locating it. It’s that sort of friendship I love to see.

Aside from those two amazing quests – each one of the Gods in EQ have a special quest going on right now. They have returned to celebrate Norrath, and I haven’t looked into these at all yet. We did stumble into one of them in Qeynos, and there are quite a few of them so I imagine that may be the plan for later today, we’ll just have to see!

Another great thing that happened last night was a GM came to the guild lobby as I happened to be sitting in it – and buffed the entire area. There were 80+ people at the time and the GM’s buffs landed on everyone, no matter their level. The great thing is they cast every single end game buff, at Rank3 (RK3) which is raid standard. Because they were landing on those level 1 or higher, it made for a LOT of very happy players. They also gave out cake, and a good time was simply had by all.

That’s n0t all though, of course not. There is also the great LoN fun going on right now – you get one free LoN loot card every single day this week be it in EQ or EQ2. For EQ yesterday was a burning prince loot card much like the sparkling / shimmering fist items you can get in EQ2. Today it was a kobold king illusion. EQ2 is different, yesterday was a potion that will heal you to 100% health once a day, today is a cloak (I didn’t check out the details to see what it did) so make sure you log in each day to claim your items! There are also special deals going on as far as booster packs go, and special anniversary scenario.

While a lot of celebrating was going on the guild did manage to get some SoD progression done too. We finished off the Oceangreen Hills progression line which unlocked the Journeyman RK2 mercenary. With some help in Stoneroot (ie: mass pulls) my druid also dinged level 65. Now, it is quite common for me to have alts in every game and it comes as no surprise that I follow that tradition in EQ. I’m always worried about what others will think when they see my army approaching. I’ve always envied those who manage to stick with one character or two, and I’ve just never been able to. The druid is of course a halfling, and a tailor at that (and one wonderful baker). We’ll see how / where things go with her level wise.

I hope everyone has an amazing Tuesday, and don’t forget it’s also St. Patrick’s Day! Changed my web site colours in celebration. See you in Norrath!