Tag: EQ2

Fun in Instances

One thing I enjoy about the TSO instances that a lot of people on Kithicor don’t take advantage of is the fact that you can start doing a lot of them mentored down to level 50. I realize a lot of people mentor down to grey out a zone in order to complete the shard quests, but yesterday Wpus, Ultann, myself and Hamal (newly betrayed to assassin) headed to The Necrotic Asylum in Commonlands mentored down to level 55 and did the zone as it was meant to be done.

There a few benifits in doing the zone this way – if you’ve never been to the zone before as a level 80 you can learn how to defeat the encounters. I’d never been here on any of my characters before aside from doing shard quests that don’t require you to complete the zone. It was a lot of fun, and the encounters are still quite difficult at level 55.

The sign that not many people take advantage of this aspect of the instances came from the fact that we made four discoveries while in the zone – a zone that has been out since November of last year. It’s not necessarily a bad thing but I’m sure on servers that have a greater number of players below 80 they would have already discovered those items.

It rewarded a shard and some nice gear for Hamal, as well as aa and my dirge managed to inch her way to 75. I’ve stopped grinding her experience for the last little while, being a little burnt out from it and trying (and failing) to focus on the enchanter and mystic combo.

We all had great fun none the less. Before heading off to Necrotic we went to Solusek Eye and wandered around the zone taking down named. One was an epic x2 that rewarded a nice master and a piece of gear. Aside from that the day was fairly quiet, spending some time to decorate the guild and wondering what I should work on next. I’m far behind in achievements on both of my characters, while Wpus and Ultann are almost finished with theirs. Even though GU52 is a few weeks off (not even on test yet) I am looking forward to the changes that will be coming, as well as the new instances.

I hope everyone is having a fantastic Sunday, if you live in Canada chances are you have a holiday tomorrow – take advantage of it! I’ll see you in Norrath.

We didn’t win – but we also didn’t care

First of all, congratulations to Wpus and Ultann for finally getting their guild to level 30! Yesterday when I logged in we were 10% from the level, and I grinded out enough writs to push us over the edge. I realize that level 30 may not seem like a big deal, but this is a guild made up of three people (myself included) with the occasional Kasul popping in on his ranger. For three people, this is a big deal just like it was a big deal when Nostalgia hit 30 and was able to purchase a guild hall. Which is exactly what Wpus did. Now proud owners of a guild hall in Qeynos, we spent some time yesterday fixing it up. Of course there’s a long way to go, but it’s beginning to fill out. Our amenities include a broker, banker, druid ports, recall to guild hall, and the NPC merchant that you can sell status items to. Not many, but it’s better then none.

Once the excitement of purchasing a hall had died down, we decided to do something ‘new’ – new for us in any case. I suggested we give Veksar: The Invasion and Sunken Theater a shot.

We actually did fairly well in the Invasion and would have done even better had the zone not been bugged and refused to drop the two keys you need to unlock the third door. No one had received them at all, and that is the portion of the zone where you unlock the chest and move the stick Indiana Jones style. I did get Ellithia a nice earring upgrade but was sad that we couldn’t attempt to go further.

We didn’t do so hot in Sunken Theater, although like the previous zone we did manage to take down the first two named. Once we got to the named that spawns those globes that like to heal him, well. That was as far as we could get. Still, for having three people in group and two of us boxing, we did surprisingly well.

More and more as I play I realize it’s NOT about winning, or at least it doesn’t have to be. There are plenty of things we can take down with our group including Maidens which we ran first. Sure we’re not going to be one grouping PR but as long as we’re having fun attempting what we do that’s all that matters. I keep reminding myself that my illusionist only has her T1 TSO set as does the boxed inquisitor, and I also don’t have my epic. Eventually I’ll work on that. Maybe.

After our Veksar attempts we headed to Korsha simply because none of us had been there before. It’s an absolutely beautiful looking zone and the danger levels are just as high. We managed to spawn the first named who is an enormous golem that reflects spells. Great!

Aside from the reflect he has a dot that instantly drains all of your power if not cured, and a stun, and a few little knockbacks. He’s actually not that difficult an encounter – except our group was completely made up of casters, even the shadowknight tank spends more time casting spells then CA’s. That meant we could do very little damage to him and could only stand and watch (and frantically heal) as things went wrong.

We quickly learned our limits on the zone and headed back to the guild hall broken and battered but with huge smiles still since we had such an awesome time. In the end that’s all that matters. Kasul has started playing his ranger again (though I believe he may switch over to an assassin) and it would be nice to fill the final spot in group with some DPS. We’ll see how that goes.

All in all it was a pretty full evening. I went to bed very early (still recuperating) and was awoken by fireworks at 4am. I realize it’s Victoria Day weekend, but still, 4am?! Gah.

Hope everyone else has an amazing weekend, see you in Norrath!

Kurn’s Tower to hit EQ2 (FINALLY)

You can read about it yourself over on this teaser article via the EQ2player forums but it is indeed true! Kurn’s Tower (as well as a few other instances) are making their way back to EQ2! I know players have been waiting a LONG time for this update, and it should be met with much happiness.

Not only is Kurn’s coming back in GU52 (also being called Monument and Might), but there are going to be over 80 new quests added to RoK zones, a new x2 dungeon, a new zone in Jarsath Wastes, the player written books, and even more goodies.

This looks like it’s going to be an amazing update!

CoA (again)

I’ll admit, lately in EQ2 there hasn’t really been anything new going on. Not the fault of the game since there has obviously been some updates (Lavastorm revamp, new raid zones, etc) but I haven’t actually gotten involved in any of it which is odd for me. I did the level 40-50 solo quests in Lavastorm so that I could purchase the armor molds (they look amazing) on my bard, but have not done any of the higher end Lavastorm quests. I have never set foot in the x2 Ward of Elements, and I have not completed the TSO quest chains in Moors because, well. Just because.

I did head back down to Crypt of Agony with Wpus and Ultann last night to see if the ranged item would finally drop (which it did not) though the drops were not completely horrible as we saw a fair number of legendary. No Cardiocutter either though I wasn’t surprised at that.

Eventually I should work on obtaining my epic weapon for the illusionist, but the thought of killing 100 yah-li and purchasing a bunch of T8 crafted furniture really doesn’t appeal to my gamer self compared to the coercer epic that I completed in a day. I wish there was not such a huge variance in between the difficulty levels of epics.

Now, one bit of interesting news that did come up is that Thom Terrazas is taking over as the new Producer for EverQuest. If you subscribe to Beckett MOG you may recognize his name this month from an interview I did with the Vanguard team back in February (the article will be in the next issue of Beckett MOG due to release at the end of May). I absolutely loved his passion for Vanguard (at the time of the interview) and I have no doubt that he will carry this passion over to EverQuest. In fact I enjoyed interviewing the entire Vanguard team an incredible amount, they were very open and easy to talk to. I was a little surprised (ok, maybe not) that he didn’t mention Vanguard at all in his opening talk about joining on with EverQuest, I suppose Vanguard is a dirty word that shouldn’t be said too much (even though I really do love that game).

I need to get back into some crafting, and doing some decorating some time. That usually refreshes my mood about things. The guild is creeping closer to level 30, and a new guild hall should be on the way shortly after that (which I know Wpus and Ultann are really looking forward to). It will be nice to port from our own hall instead of smuggling ourselves into the T3 ones in Antonica and Commonlands to locate a guild who has their ports open to the public.

See you in Norrath!

Taking in the View

Ever have one of those days where you log into game with visions of grandeur about all the things you’d love to finish off and accomplish, and then actually get none of them done? Well, that was me yesterday. I was hoping to finish off some writs but I only managed to get a few done before I was side tracked into something else.

The trio headed off to Crypt of Agony in the hopes that perhaps Ultann’s fabled range item would drop (or the Cardiocutter!) but alas neither of them made an appearance. The instance was still great fun though, and the illusionist managed to finally (remember she’s power leveled and quite far behind) get enough aa to pick up time compression, which made a huge difference in the groups over all DPS. We blew through the instance quite fast.

Pictured above is the Oracle Tower in Antonica, one of my favorite locations. It’s huge once you get up close, and I just absolutely love the way it was designed. Of course at the top is the zone in to the isle of refuge and Darathar. There’s a few quests that involve the Oracles down below as well though I’m not certain that I’ve ever completed them.

I want to get back into the swing of doing some of the older quests that you can find in the shattered lands, it’s been a while and while they may not be as fancy as the quests that are out in TSO (Moors) or RoK, they do give you that Nostalgic feeling that’s always important, especially lately it seems.