March 2007

The Forgotten Zones – Nektulos Forest – Part I

stargrace March 15, 2007 1Comment

Silverstep hunting down Asilian Vandal’s in Nek Forest

There was one other person in Nektulos Forest today while I adventured around, so I consider this to be one of the forgotten zones. It could also just be my servers population, either way. Nektulos Forest is home to 130 individual quests. 26 of those drop from mobs, so if you happen to out level the zone, and are one of those who love to complete all quests, be sure to find someone to mentor. 13 of those quests are book quests, found in various locations on both the Qeynos and Freeport side.

The forest has been revamped in the past year, mobs have moved around and if you haven’t been there in quite some time, I suggest you take a new look. The owlbears have moved locations, as have the various treants. When I was first leveling up the most popular quests were the Maid of the Mist access to Enchanted Lands, as well as the access quest to Cauldron’s Hollow. Unfortunately the  requirement for access was removed quite some time ago, though the quest itself still remains for those who enjoy that sort of thing.

On my venture for level 20-27 items I picked up each one of the Far Seas Requisitions from the docks, they each reward a nice item that I can transmute. Quest is from a table. They’re pretty annoying now that I have no idea where half of the mobs are located, I’m seriously wishing my fury had track. I also picked up the quest from the Augur along the docks, and I went and visited Bandit Kleron Asana who had a series of quests for some level 20 gear (if you’re looking for gear that doesn’t cover the armor quest slots, be sure to visit him, he has earring and hat quests). Do people even wear quested gear any more? I’m not sure how good they are with all of the player crafted out there, but it’s transmutable none the less.

I made sure to complete the griffin egg quest, being able to fly across the zone is a nice luxury that wasn’t around when I first started. The grinnins seem to have moved their way from the falls and I could only find a few spread throughout. Nektulos Forest is home to quite a few instances. There is Nektulos Castle, then the castle 2.0 and the castle 3.0. There’s also the Bloodline Chronicles adventure pack zone behind the main waterfall, home of vampires and other evils. The wizard spires will take you to the Barren Sky, and you can also reach the Island of Marr from the docks. The docks also lead to the Enchanted Lands (what was once misty thicket if you’re familiar with EQLive), Lavastorm, and Thundering Steppes. You can also hang out by the harbor master and wait for the boat to take you to Butcherblock Mountain. The Commonlands grace the other end of the zone. I’ll have more quests and screen shots to post tomorrow for part II.

The comforts of two-boxing

stargrace March 14, 2007 2Comments

Silverstep and Stargrace hang out in Qeynos Harbor together now

Incase I have not mentioned it yet, I really am enjoying two boxing in EQII. With the shadowknight tank class around that my boyfriend plays, a fury and an illusionist (both who buff int, and haste / dps as well as spell procs and the like, can’t forget that power regen) the mobs die fast and there’s little to no down time. It was a good decision on my part I feel, especially with the amount of time that I play. So what have I been up to?

I need some transmuted parts for a heritage quest. They’re going for about 1-2p each piece, and I need 12 pieces per character. Needless to say I refuse to actually pay that. I decided that in the time it would take me to even come close to affording that, I could probably work my own transmuting to the skill required, then it’s just a matter of farming adepts and legendary T7 items to provide the powders I’m looking for. My skill in transmuting just reached 100, which is where the fun begins as I can no longer get skill ups from physically transmuting items, but now I have to make the combines in order to achieve them. Not looking forward to the slow grind, but it doesn’t bother me quite that much. I am farming the supplies myself with my lower level characters, Misako specifically who is level 27 and around the range I need for materials. This is the way I figure it:

There are pleanty of quests with item rewards (and coin) that I have not yet done. The ones from Antonica, Commonlands, Nektulos Forest, and Thundering Steppes off of the top of my head. If I mentor for turn ins but complete the quests while I’m level 70, it will help me in numerous ways. Giving me gear for transmuting, money for purchases, and on completion aa, which is always a huge deal. I need 19 more on the fury, and 10 more on the illusionist to hit my 100 for each character. Once I’ve finished all of the quests in each of those zones, I should (hopefully) be on the next tier of transmuting, where I’d do the corresponding quests and get more items / money / quest counts along the way. That’s my plan at least. We’ll have to see how it really goes. It’ll give me a lot of time to prepare my “forgotten zones” posts that I’d like to make as well. So much still to do, I love it. There’s lore and legends, the quest count, and signature quests that I’ve been trying to finish off. A few things there’s no sign I’ll ever be able to complete them (like the world event quest for marr’s chosen, which requires a level 50 raid zone, and those who are level 70 must mentor down or else they can’t zone in… which really sucks might I add). I’m certainly happy with my home in EQII.

Old Friends Remebered

stargrace March 13, 2007 2Comments

The former Torrent Knights, about to kill Chel’Drak

One unfortunate side to MMO gaming is the fact that eventually, everyone moves on. Whether you are a life-time MMO player or not, it’s very rare you’ll see people play the same game for more then a few years. The games evolve, the people change, and we all wander that path and head different places. Over my years of gaming (5 now) I’ve met some fantastic people. Those who have become my closest friends and who I talk to on the phone as well as in game. People who I send Christmas cards to and who I would have never met were it not for the online community that I’d found. The above screen shot is my former guild, Torrent Knights. Towards the end, I felt that the guild was headed towards self destruction, they’d been asking folks to leave who simply could not attend a certain amount of raids due to real life issues. I don’t typically last long in guilds, and especially not raiding guilds, but TK was different. They were a close bunch of people who I felt very comfortable around. It was not just raiding (though it eventually turned to that) but felt like home.

With the onset of Vanguard the core of the guild left. What was once a some what hard core raiding guild degraded into something far more casual where now perhaps 4-5 people hang out while crafting or working on forgotten quests (myself included). I won’t forget those I’ve met though, or the stories we shared. Is it silly to think of this virtual world in such a sentimental manor? Of course not. Online or not, the emotions and feelings you can discover are not any less valid then a real life friendship (at least in my eyes – granted I’m exceptionally emotional, so I can be completely wrong here).

So where do I go from here? Do I attempt to find yet another new home or do I wander around Norrath on my own and form new friendships and do those dreaded pick up groups (yes yes, I know not ALL pick up groups are bad). It took me almost a year to find TK and settle in there. I’m not looking forward to searching for another home. I’ve got my small level 9 crafting guild with my alts, but the level 70’s still sport the TK tag for now. I do miss raiding on occasion, and there are still a few raiding guilds on LDL. Just not sure if any interest me, or if any are recruiting the classes that I play. I think it’s a shame that a new MMO came out (beta in a box at that) and my entire guild fell apart. The leadership and officers also went about it in a pretty crappy way. One day TK was raiding fine, and two weeks later they were completely done. Such is the way of MMO’s I suppose.

On a side note – there are plenty of guilds who are thriving and doing just fine since Vanguard has released, and in the 20-29 channel it’s been teaming with people who have moved to EQII due to the issues they’ve had with Vanguard. I think half of my sentimental feelings about the loss of TK is simply because I’m watching the other raid guilds move on and do content that we’d never finished off.

An eventful weekend

stargrace March 12, 2007 1Comment

Stargrace on her pretty new horse

This weekend I actually got a bit done (for once). Well, I didn’t actually get a lot done, but I did finish off ‘Trading Information’ which is one of THE most annoying quests in the entire claymore line. If you hang out in SoS long enough and in the 60-69 channel, you’ll eventually learn of this dreaded quest. Part of the claymore chain and by the time people are through with it they don’t want to go back to SoS any more. I can’t say I blame them. Having already completed the claymore on my fury, I was not exactly that keen to jump right back in and try to complete it on both my illusionist and my templar. Since the templar has yet to even start the dreaded quest, but the illusionist was almost done the SoS portions, I figured I’d try to get some of it done. With Shadowgeist (70 Shadowknight), and a 70 wizard from guild, along with my fury and illusionist (boxed) we spent a few hours in there, clearing what we felt like clearing and training everything else. A master or two dropped and lots of vendor trash which is never a bad thing for me. Under the ‘quick link’ section on the left hand side I have the entire claymore quest posted. I’ve got one more quest to complete in SoS (which is not *horribly* bad, but bad none the less) and then I can move on (finally).

Made a little coin on the broker, but have been spending it as well, gearing up alts and purchasing masters for those of my gals who need them. My fury needs one more master and then she’ll have all of hers. The illusionist and templar both need a few more. I’ve been pondering playing my assassin for a bit, she’s been stuck at level 46 for quite some time now. Would be nice to at least get her to 50.

I still have lots of language quests and L&L quests to go through that I haven’t even attempted yet. Perhaps that’ll be a goal for today, to work on some of those. Couldn’t hurt at least. They do have to get done some time. I boxed the conj and the templar together and finished off the clockwork L&L in Klak’Anon, the kills were a little slow using the conj’s tank pet (not to mention every spell I have is app1 for now until I upgrade – except my pets which are all adept3) so I switched it out for a scout pet. Adds were a small issue but the mobs were mostly green / blue and I had fun working on the quest. The body drops were far too rare, my only issue. Of course there’s gotta be some challenge to the quest other wise why bother.

Unrest

stargrace March 11, 2007 0Comment

Dasie, who some how got dropped from group – hey wait. I’M Dasie…

I did my first Unrest group yesterday, having very fond memories of this EQLive zone it was certainly a walk down memory lane. Exceptional care was taken with this zone. The script was fun, even if the zone itself is quite long to complete. About 3 hours total with a few breaks. We wiped twice, both times from shiny traps. Those shinnies are killers. Literally. The first time spawned a whole lot of billy dolls onto us, and the second time just spawned.. stuff. Lots of stuff. The on our way back after the first wipe the Bugaboo (level 80 epicx2 who HAS been killed – just not on my server) decided he’d like to chew a few group members.

There were a few favorite parts for me, of course my least favorite part would have to be when you’re in the kitchen area at the lockers and when the zombie pop in front of your screen much like the halloween crow reward did – scare the living daylights out of you especially if you’re not expecting it and no one warned you. It also actually scared me when the picture below happened to my screen, as though it were possessed. VERY awesome effect.

… just plain scarey

Couldn’t even see my group members, only the skull and the eerie static, mixed between the sounds of the house which I eventually turned down. So what I’m a big baby! The loot was not too bad. The vendor trash loot sold for fairly well, 15-17g each piece. Stuff that was of no use for anyone to actually wear, but again, plenty dropped as vendor trash. It was also a lucky run my first time through. The group consisted of myself playing Dasie (my templar) a 70 Shadowknight, Wizard, Necromancer, Fury, and a 68 Paladin. The templar legendary class hat dropped, so Dasie won that. She also got a legendary dagger with a disease proc on it that will come in handy on the fae dirge I’ve decided to level up (eventually). The end boss typically drops one of the legendary set chest pieces – and I didn’t care which one dropped so long as someone from the group could make use of it. Typically they just end up rotting. Thankfully earlier on in the zone I was going to box my illusionist / fury along – but then a second fury joined the group so I switched both out and just brought my templar (the templar and illusionist are on the same account so I could not bring both). I had camped the illusionist out in the zone, and it was probably a good thing I did, as the illusionist/coercer robe dropped at the end. It’s a very pretty dress, dark purple with lighter purple markings.

Another wonderful house trophy

As the final boss went down, I got some mail which I was expecting, and joyfully placed the skull in Dasie’ inn room in the Baubleshire. She’s not typically one for keeping such gruesome trinkets, but hey there’s a first time for everything. My advise for this zone – be sure you go in with someone who knows the script. It’s complicated and you could be there a long time if you’re not sure what to do. Get all of the outdoor sections done first, and assign one person to collect the pieces needed to unlock the various doors. We also assigned one person to collect the shinnies, and then we randomed on them so that not just one person hounded them all (though it didn’t exactly work out well) it seems like the more instance runs I do that have shinnies like Nek3.0 and Unrest the greedier people become for them. Two healers meant we could get by without a mezzer, but we probably could have survived with one (good) healer if we’d brought an enchanter along. The zone was not overly difficult, the hag fight, was lots of fun. Freeing people from the jail cells (AFTER the mobs inside were dead, people having learnt that lesson before) was great. All in all, very pleased with this zone and looking forward to completing it on the other characters I have, hopefully a few times. The class hat and chest piece drops make it a very attractive zone to do. As well as some nice legendary jewelry pieces, a wand, a cape, and a few other pretties. If you haven’t been yet, be sure to check it out.