February 2009

Time to PLAY!

stargrace February 11, 2009 2Comments

Now that all of my articles are finally written, I have decided to take the rest of this week to do absolutely nothing (aside from get better from this cold that I’m still trying to battle) aside from game. Maybe clean the house a bit. Anyhow, my schedule for this week is empty and I’m loving it. No doubt I’ll get some time to dive into LoTRO for a little bit, as well as playing EQ2 with friends, and whatever else happens to catch my interest. As long as this flu bug doesn’t beat me into submission at least. 

Yesterday was a great day gaming wise. I got a lot done, which is always fun. I started in on the Valentine’s goodies, but was quickly side tracked by guild mates. When we can, we mentor down to level 50 and do the void shard goodness with my bard who’s sitting at level 54. My mystic has her full set of T1 gear, and two pieces now of T2 gear. The coercer is still four levels away from using void shard gear, but she has 9 shards just waiting to be made into something. I should be able to get quite a few more before she’s level 80 and able to wear any of the gear. She’s still wearing level 30 gear in the mean time. At least she has all of her adept3’s!

The shadowknight and conjuror I hang out with headed to Vaults after our shard run and trio’d that, then headed to Chelsith to do that together. By then it was around 9:30pm though and I was not feeling very well at all so I took some night time medicine and crashed for the next 10 hours. I’m not sure what they gave me in San Diego when I was down but dang I just can’t seem to shake it (and to be perfectly fair, it’s not ALL from the people at SOE, I’m sure a lot is due to the 6 airplanes I was on, the lack of sleep, stress, and my already weakened immune system). We did manage to get a shadowknight master to drop, it’s usually always just conjuror spells that we get. 

Hope everyone else is having a lot of fun in their game of choice, see you in Norrath!

Patch Note Catch Up

stargrace February 10, 2009 2Comments

I haven’t read the patch notes in a little while since I’ve been so busy doing articles that I had to write up, so here they are! I now get to play for the rest of the week and get over this horrible cold I have. Looks like some fantastic changes in place, and I’m really looking forward to playing with the Valentines stuff. 

Hotfix February / 10 / 2009
EROLLISI DAY

(2/10/09-2/16/09) Erollisi Day is being celebrated across Norrath! Those willing to participate in the celebration are encouraged to make their way to Antonica or The Commonlands where the Swornlove siblings’ task of matchmaking can lead to a deeper mystery surrounding three Sisters that have traveled to Antonica seeking answers. Meanwhile, love notes and message candies hold new worth with holiday merchants in Qeynos Harbor or East Freeport and tradeskillers, alike.

RECRUIT-A-FRIEND

The EverQuest II Recruit-A-Friend program is a unique promotion that rewards you with free gameplay time (to be added to the end of your then-current subscription) and exclusive in-game items for each new player you bring into the game who becomes an active subscriber of EQII.   For information about how you can participate visit the website at http://everquest2.station.sony.com/recruit-a-friend.vm.

Hotfix February / 5 / 2009
HIGHLIGHTS
A new type of item has been added: HEIRLOOM items are the same as NO-TRADE except that they can be placed into your shared bank.  Characters on the same account and server can then pick them up out of the shared bank.  Normal shared bank rules apply on PVP servers.

GENERAL
The spider ability ‘Sticky Webbing’ has changed from a 30 second root to a 3 second daze.
Merchants in the Village of Shin will now buy as well as sell items.
It should now be slightly easier to avoid the blood gorgers in the entry passage to Grobb, if you are careful.
Spotting a business opportunity, a new fuel merchant has recently set up shop in Firmroot Moot near the mender.
Large attribute values over the base cap will no longer cause your max hitpoints or power to decrease.
Adornments which add additional damage to a weapon will now correctly report critical attacks.

ACHIEVEMENTS
General
Bountiful Harvest should no longer display a combined harvest on root and foresting nodes.  Instead you should see two messages similar to other nodes.

Assassin
Frontload will no longer cause poisons to cancel when it is toggled off or expires.

Berserker
Perseverance is now a buff and works in a similar fashion to Reversal with a hidden spell that can only trigger once every 15 seconds.

Shaman
Kindred Restoration will now cast properly if the shaman is casting another spell.

DUNGEONS/ENCOUNTERS
Anchor of Bazzul
Imprisoner Y’nosii’s death now results in his weakened soul spawning. Killing the weakened soul gives a key that will open Ynosii’s treasure chest.

Cavern of the Afflicted
A group of zombies near the first Maledictive Terror should no longer continue to respawn.

Evernight Abbey
Players on the quest A Brother’s Revenge should no longer be able to get a quest update and be asked to turn in Gabardine Obisgnul’s head when they do not have the item.

Halls of the Forsaken
The mission End of the Forsaken should no longer occasionally have too few forsaken soldiers and conscripts present in the zone.

Nektulos
The Avatar of Hate should cast crushing hatred more reliably on attackers now.

Palace of the Ancient One
The Switchmaster should critically hit players somewhat less often now.
Tythus can no longer have his Voidslide AOE interrupted.
The duration of Nether Bolt, the reactive associated with Pentaclypse and Ultaclypse, has been reduced to 1.5 seconds.

Ravenscale Repository
The two parts of Mission of the Macabre can now be completed in any order, so that Noyle is no longer occasionally already dead once players reach that step. 

ITEMS
Atrebite Mantle of Destruction may now be worn by all plate tanks.
Drum of the Ethernaut Chronicler’s proc now functions on both spells and melee attacks.
Cloak of the Overlord and Cloak of Antonia Bayle now have additional ranged bonuses.
The proc text on Ripper’s Stiletto now more clearly states that it triggers only from attacks made with that weapon.
A number of the Frostfell reward armors have been changed to create a more balanced stat progression.
Paladin’s Zealous Voidbeam 4-piece bonus now adds mitigation instead of Spell and Combat Art damage.
Silk Robe of Summoning, Aramid Robe of Voidcaller, and Staff of Elemental Mastery no longer function on swarm pets, but should stack with other pet effects better than they did previously.
The 5-piece bonus on the Conjuror and Necromancer raid sets has been improved slightly.
Razhish’s Cloak of Flowing Power has a new proc.
The effect on Ferhustr’s Furious Rolling-Pin should now add 20% to heals and runes.
Overloaded heal procs will now trigger properly from reactives and wards
Unholy Rift 4 piece bonus to Tenacity should now have a 35m range.
The Neutral Avatar 2 piece charm bonus will now work correctly.
Protective Platemail Helm of the Rising Sun is now properly classified as plate.
Void-Etched Blade and Void Cutlass of the Lethe now have delays more suitable for offhand weapons.
Extract Mana on the Illusionist robe from VP now functions properly.
The collection reward Cape of Infatuation now has an appearance.
Many of the fabled items within Palace of the Ancient One, Ykesha’s Inner Stronghold and Tomb of the Mad Crusader, have been upgraded and or had effects added.
Gynok Moltor will no longer drop Stained Mummy Bandages or the Eye Mounted Ring. His drops have been upgraded and new items have been added in place of the ones that were shared.
The Savage Wall was dropping from both Captain Ikalus and Xebnok the Wretched. Xebnok will no longer drop the Savage Wall and has had a new item added to his table to replace it.
A few pet caster effects have been added to select mage items.
The Silvered Link Chain is now usable by rogues.
Zarrakon will now drop new items.  In addition some of his existing drops have been upgraded or had effects added to them.

QUESTS
Moors of Ykesha
Captain Lip Marrsquire’s “Evidence?” quests are no longer impeded if completed after finishing the quest, “Who Dun It?”  Return to Captain Lip Marrsquire to complete these quests.

SPELLS
General
Examination Data will now show the critical damage multiplier if it differs from the base amount.
Spells that are affected by achievements will no longer drop after being charmed.

Defiler
Spiritual Circle will now apply properly to members of the raid.

Inquisitor
Repenting Strike will now trigger if the inquisitor is stunned or stifled.

Necromancer
Siphoning of Souls adept 3 will now trigger Soothing Soul properly.

TRADESKILLS
A number of trade skill faction rewards are now considered heirlooms.  The components required for “Proof of the Pudding” are also considered heirlooms.
“Tools of the Trade” set bonuses are now slightly different for each set.

UI
Critical Mitigation display in the persona window will now show the attribute gains as well.

Questing Along

stargrace February 10, 2009 8Comments

For some reason, the screen shot pictured above is what my graphic card keeps doing (randomly) in game. In EQ2 this happens once every few hours, I can drop to desktop (just alt tabbing out) and go back into game and it will fix itself. However, it’s not limited to EQ2. When I was playing DDO to do a review for MMORPG.com, it was happening every 20 seconds or so. I’ve not had it happen in LoTRO (yet), or VG, or even EQ1, but it sure doesn’t like EQ2 or DDO. I haven’t figured out the issue yet, and I’m reluctant to get a new video card already because the 8800 I’m using now is still fairly new to me. The 7600 seemed to do a better job though.

Last night I wandered around Kunzar Jungle with the coercer, doing a few quests for some upgrades. Now that she’s hit 75 she can tag along on void shard quests with the biguns and save up for her gear. I had intended on working some of those last night but things didn’t quite work out that way. I did get a nice pair of gloves from questing in the jungle that I had been eyeballing though. I still find it amusing that I have an 80 coercer already as well as an 80 illusionist, so this is my 2nd coercer. If I ever manage to get all of my characters on the same server again that will be funny. I haven’t decided if I’ll keep both coercers forever or not. I more then likely will, who wants to delete a level 80 character. 

The guild that I’m in (smaller one with close friends) also hit level 22. We’re saving up (well, I am at least) status and coin to one day get a hall. Will it happen? Not exactly sure, but it’s fun to think about. In the mean time there’s a few halls who have set their druid rings and portals to public so that everyone can use them – a great idea I personally think. I also peeked in on Najena and was happy to see folks there having a good time. 

I have one more article to complete today, and then the rest of the week I’ll be able to just devote to gaming and relaxing and getting over this horrible cold that I’ve had since I got back from San Diego. Today the frog voice has sunk to a new low and I’ve got a horrible cough that makes me feel like a smoker of 10+ years even though I’ve never touched those things in my life. It’s got to get better soon though, right? 

See you in Norrath!

Guide Bledlynn and Guide Altheah

stargrace February 9, 2009 3Comments

Ellithia and Arysh found themselves homeless (guild drama always sucks) sitting outside the steps where their home once used to be. While they were contemplating what to do next and what course of action to take (if any) two kind guides came along. On the roleplay front I don’t think these two knew that I was playing both characters, but it was still a lot of fun. They mentioned to me that they were wandering around proving to Lucan D’Lere that he would not be able to stop people from marrying one another, no matter who they were. 

So the two kind guides asked if I would mind marrying my two characters to one another. At first I declined, after all who wants to deal with the hair balls of a Kerran or the flimsy features of a wood elf. They were quite persistent and in the end who doesn’t simply want to be loved. So it was that these two married my mystic and my coercer. Here’s the exact text.

• Altheah: Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today to join Arysh and Ellithis in marriage.
• Ellithia: I think not!
• Altheah: Ellithia, won’t you take Arysh as your lawful, er kerra…to have and to hold…in sickness and in health, Til death do you part?
• Ellithia: No! Not even if you paid me a million plat. I have an aversion to hairballs..
• Altheah: And you, Arysh, won’t you take this lovely, er wood elf…to have and to hold in sick ness and in health?
• Arysh: YES! Yes I will. I will marry her, I love her!
• Altheah: For you, from your friendly neighborhood dark elf, Guide Altheah.

Of course then Bledlynn had to break out in song as Altheah married Exodium who is a friend of mine. I could do nothing but sit there and smile and try to hold onto my lunch as the troll belted out their lyrics. 

OHHHHH…. Give me a home where the hob-gob-lins roam, and the treants and spiders all play. And scream-ing is heard…. from dis-cour-a-ging birds… And the skies are purple clouded all day.  HOME! HOME ON THE PLANES! Where the treants and spiders all play! And scream-ing is heard… from dis-cour-a-ging birds. And the skies are purple clouded all daaaaay’.

Ah. It is  fantastic to be back in Norrath.