Livestreaming EverQuest DDD (6pm EST) #EverQuest

Watch live streaming video from mmoquests at livestream.com

Yesterday after some discussion on twitter I decided that I would attempt to Livestream some of my game playing – in specific my exploration in EverQuest. Above you can find a link to one of the broadcasts I did where I camped for my enchanter 1.0 piece in City of Mist and then headed to Plane of Fear. It was a pretty boring camp but thanks to some good friends keeping me company in the Livestream channel I seemed to come up with plenty to talk about.

Today I’ve decided to share one of the anniversary tasks with viewers, Dragons, Dragons, Dragons. This task sends players back in time to defeat the dragons of Norrath, starting with Vox and Nagafen and working your way up. If you’re interested in RSVP’ing so you get a reminder you can check out my livestream channel – there are also two other quick broadcasts I did to test out the equipment. Last night I had intentions of broadcasting some Vanguard, but then I got carried away with crafting in EverQuest so that sort of fell through. I do plan on broadcasting more games that I’m playing although I can’t guarantee that I’ll actually speak during all of them there will at least be some wonderful in-game music to listen to.

I hope this along with my youtube videos gives a little indication of why I love the games I play. They’re simply fun.

Happy gaming no matter where you find yourself! I’ll see you in Norrath (and Telon, and anywhere else I wander).

Thoughts on House of Thule #EQ

If you believe everything you hear on channels, House of Thule has been met with mixed reviews. Personally I really love this expansion but it’s because of a few key components that not everyone appreciates. Number one after having taken a long  break from the game I found it very easy to get relatively caught up as long as I was level 80+ due to the mote gear vendor. While not everyone returning will know this – there is a vendor in the Feerrott who sells ‘mote gear’ and basically using a new currency (dream motes) will allow you to purchase gear in tiers. Earning reputation will unlock higher levels of mote gear, and this currency (like all currency) can be purchased from players selling in the bazaar. Or you can earn it from doing tasks and missions. Because it’s the current currency, there’s a lot of it for sale and it’s much cheaper to use mote gear for the first little while then it is to purchase gear from the bazaar. Mote gear was a HUGE upgrade over my fabled planar gear and the gossamer stuff I was wearing so I was only too happy to find this vendor.

Spells in HoT level 86+ rank II are actually obtained by means of a quest much like they were in Gates of Discord with rune turn ins. The system has also been improved slightly. Number one you can pick and choose which spells you want to obtain instead of having to get them in order and number two the items used to obtain these spells are all tradeable between players and you can sell them / buy them in the bazaar (while the spells themselves are no trade). Another method of allowing returning players an easier time of catching up. While I am sad to see that spells are not dropping from mobs in this expansion it IS nice to know that I’m not missing any of them (unless I chose to raid and obtain Rk III spells).

The basics of the expansion are quite simple. There are a number of tasks you must do for progression (T1-T4) and in order to request these tasks you’ll have a number of quests to do for a number of NPC. The quests are quite lengthy but incredibly worth it. You earn not only experience and the ability to request the tasks on your own, but there are also trophies that are rewards (as well as achievements) that can be placed in your home and grant extra buffs to players (if you’ve got your trophies running, they use the tribute system). Last night I finished off the series in House of Thule itself, and gained a trophy that allows me to raise my max str. as well as my actual str. While not incredibly useful to my enchanter it’s just one of many trophies and I look forward to obtaining the rest of them. Plus these trophies are house items – and hey who doesn’t love a good house item.

If it were not for the fact that I am a returning player I am not sure if I’d enjoy the expansion as much as I am. Of course the housing would have me transfixed (how could it not) but the progression may be too ‘easy’ if I were on par with everyone else. As it is I have less then 300 aa (lots of players have over 5,000 now) and since I’ve returned I’ve leveled not only my necromancer to 90, but the enchanter to 87, and a boxed bard to 76. On that same note if everything were incredibly difficult I wouldn’t necessarily have stuck around either, so perhaps this is a good compromise. That’s also not saying that everything is easy, it’s certainly not. Tier 4 is incredibly difficult, and a lot of the missions you request have little quirks that make them even harder. Thankfully I’ve been playing with a few friends who make all of this much easier and a LOT more fun.

Happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself! I’ll see you in Norrath.

EQ2 Celebrates 12 Years of EQ1 #EQ2 #EQ

Ah, my old nemesis from EQ1 and I can’t even call it my nemesis because I actually never managed to see Quillmane in game in all the times I attempted to. Famous for their pegasus feathered cloak which is used in the magician epic SOE has continued with the humor by spawning angry mages at the end of the EQ2 event. Yesterday I spent some time in EQ2 doing the EQ (confusing eh?) 12th anniversary quests. Mostly because I wanted the awesome house items that go along with it. I really wish EQ had put some house items in game with their anniversary tasks, but alas I’ll just have to be satisfied with augments.

The only instance I really had troubles with was Lavastorm, but I toughed it out playing a shadowknight and coercer together so that I could get the title at the end of the event. Now that I’ve gotten it, it’s simply a matter of farming the pieces I want (Guk for the level 90 gear, and Enchanted lands for the pegasus cloak which just has an incredible graphic). Each instance drops a fabled adornment, a common piece of jewelery, and the chance at the rare drop from that EQ1 encounter. You also get two tokens which can be spent at a special vendor in Antonica. Doing all of the instances once gave me enough tokens for every item that was not a plushie – plus two plushies. I’ve added them to my museum on Antonia Bayle, and I’ve started collecting items for the coercer on Oasis since at this moment I’m still split between both servers.

I also participated in my first public quest yesterday – and it reminded me of public quests  in Rift and Warhammer except for one really important factor. EQ2 is not made for these sort of quests. What I mean is that there are very few spells that land on anyone outside of your group / raid and you won’t always be invited to one despite advertising. This was the case with my warden who landed (literally) on top of the PQ (public quest) in progress. I was not invited to the raid, and I couldn’t heal anyone or do anything but throw a few little nukes at the encounters. My buffs are useless for anyone not in my group and over all the experience was incredibly poor. Thus since my participation was deemed poor, my rewards were poor.

The second time around went much better. My first PQ was the Ring War (I believe that’s what it’s called on Oasis at least) and the second one was SG (not sure what that stands for). SG is the least popular of the two public quests, and I was invited to a raid without issue. Basically you battle hordes of mobs that swarm the raid and there’s an actual strategy to the encounters. We did wipe once, but revive places you right where you need to be, so it was nothing to get back into the fray. I healed for all I was worth, and managed to score a piece of legendary gear. Not that bad I suppose considering we only had one raid worth of people around.

The quests were fun but without the ability to cast heals outside of group I feel that healers really get the short end of the stick on these. I’d like to see a special flag applied while inside the blue marked map that turns your heals into AoE heals – the problem with this is that classes like shaman may see far higher returns in participation because of how their heals work. They are wards, and prevent damage from coming in. In other words a ward gets used up first before a regular heal will land. Based on the damage being done to players I doubt this would be much of an issue in a raid situation, but you never know. Hopefully we see some sort of “join public group” option in the future to make participation easier on players.

Happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself! Woohoo for Friday!

Decisions Decisions Decisions #EQ

Alts always seem to cause me the most joy and the most grief in every game I play. I enjoy working on them, but every second I play an alt is a second I’m not playing my main – whoever that is at the time. My main rises and falls as often as the sun or moon and it took me a long time to come to grips with the fact that it’s simply how I have decided to game. I used to get upset with myself for being ‘behind’ the curve and the conversation of “if I had only focused on one character” comes up more often then I’d like to admit.

The dilemma: I love my necromancer, but she’s a fairly new character in creation. I moved from Luclin to Drinal to play with friends and had no characters there so she was created. While I love the character because she is more ‘uber’ then my others I also the shortest history with her. She is well geared, has her epic 2.0, over 300 aa (finally), 300 tailor, etc. My old main used to be my enchanter who I have huge history with. However she’s well behind the times in almost every aspect. I did spend a bunch of time yesterday updating her gear and she no longer sucks quite as much as before, but she was mid-way through her 1.0 and while she does have 300 in jewel crafting, she has only reached 200 in the rest of the crafts. The other problem is that enchanters sort of suck, game wise. In fact they are so rare and perhaps so un-needed that their levle 76 aura is actually an xp bonus (I kid you not) for anyone who groups with them. 5% for rank 1, 7% for rank II and 9% for rank III.

What’s a girl to do? Stick with the better geared-well-created character or attempt to make up for years of neglect on the character with history. Something tells me I may be giving this scenario too much thought.

The dilemma: I have two active EQ accounts and I’d REALLY like to box more consistently, but during my last phase of playing I moved all of the characters from account B over to account A thinking I either 1. wouldn’t be playing any more or 2. wouldn’t be boxing any more. I regret the decision now but what’s done is done and I don’t want to pay $25 to move the characters back. So my only option is to start over on my 2nd account with fresh characters. What to create is always an issue for me. I THINK I have settled on a druid – the same druid that I moved off of the account initially. Providing nice backup heals, transportation, and group buffs I think that the druid would be a great match no matter who I am playing off of my main account. However. I also have a 50 bard that I wouldn’t mind playing, a little more difficult to box with the selection of casters from my main account but not impossible. Offering fantastic methods to pull and great group buffs. Argh the choices!

The dilemma: Housing! How could I have a complex choice to make in housing? Well this one is quite simple. I just am not sure what sort of house I want to design. Do I want to build from scratch like some of the other creations out there I have seen or should I stick with the simple “this is a house, this is a yard” feature that any player can create by default. From the start I wanted to re-create my EQ2 Norrathian Museum – however, a LOT of items within EQ are simply not able to be placed even though they may be ancient relics of days gone by. The point to my museum is of course to show off objects that perhaps not everyone has seen or collects. In EQ this includes every single weapon in game, but not a lot of other bits. I don’t really want a museum filled with weapons.

There you have it, my decisions of this morning. Have any suggestions? Feel free to let me know!

Be sure to check out Scarybooster’s blog this week (well, all the time actually, it’s a great read) for DAW: Developer Appreciation Week. Or, why not do one better and participate in the event and show your love for game developers. With so much negativity floating around the gaming community it’s always a refreshing break to show a little love.

Happy gaming no matter where you find yourself, I’ll see you in Norrath!

Dragons, Dragons, Dragons #EQ

Two years ago for the 10th anniversary Sony came out with the mission “Dragons, Dragons, Dragons” which sent you through instanced versions of Norrath zones to defeat the dragon population one at a time. Each one of these dragons is a raid encounter, and there are 20 of them in total to defeat. Each year of the anniversary Sony brings back these quests for players to attempt – and this year was my first year being able to participate. The rewards are two different augments. One is based on the age of your account, and the second one is based on the number of dragons you defeat. Both of them were upgrades to me not to mention the fact that I had a blast working my way through the old world encounters.

First up was Lord Nagafen, with 32k hp he barely stood a chance, along with Lady Vox who came next. I defeated these on live server not all that long ago when Nostalgia the Guild was making the rounds, so I wasn’t really having any squeals of delight at the time. After that came a dracoliche, which was in the actual version of Fear along with all of the mobs that swarmed us. Not a difficult fight, but annoying to find our way out of. Gorenaire, Trakanon, and Phara Dar all fell with ease. Then we started meeting dragons I had never seen before on live servers Like Lord Yelinak and Vulak’Aerr. My ‘wow’ moment came while defeating The Four warders of Sleeper’s Tomb (although not the sleeper himself) because I had never been in the zone before. Finally we came to Quarm who was by far the most impressive looking dragon creature I had seen all night. Each little bit you DPS him down causes one of his heads to explode until he’s left with just one. There are adds, and of course in true Sony manor the dragon fights are belly fights (as I quickly remembered when not a single one of my spells would land from range).

The 11th dragon is Kessdona the Enlightened and this was where we met our wall. See, this dragon replenishes its health via 4 stone statues that stand all around it during the fight. Your job is to defeat the proper statue that the dragon is using to siphon the health. The only way to figure out which one of the four statues it is, is to bring someone who can track. The one that shows up on track is the proper statue. Not incredibly difficult unless you’re a monk and a necromancer with a cleric and warrior mercenary attempting these raid encounters. If that happens to be the case, well. We spent a lot of time trying to guess which statue it was and some times we were correct but all it takes is one incorrect guess and the dragon would move from 50% health to 99% health. Ugh.

Still, I’m pleased with all of our progress. It was a lot of fun and the rewards were still nice for the amount we accomplished. We have gotten a few guild invites to defeat the rest of the dragons, so we may just go along with that and see how far we can get.

Happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself! I’ll see you in Norrath.