January 2012

Beastlord Adventures #EQ2 #EverQuestII

stargrace January 10, 2012 6Comments

My beastlord is almost level 81 now, and yesterday she completed the ‘Goddess Rising’ world event. Sadly, none of the rewards were something that beastlords can use (a shield, and a bow) and the house item has the exact same graphic as the regular covered bow you get from The Shard of Love – but I did have a fantastic time with the story, and the zone was beautiful. I just wish there had of been more to do there. You enter the zone and collect 8 rocks (clickable boulders scattered throughout the zone) and then you kill 4 golems at the entrance until a piece you need drops. It’s a really beautiful zone that deserves a little more attention (imo). Ibeogur and I also ran through the regular shard of love instance and I was incredibly surprised. First of all, gear dropped. Actual PvE legendary gear. The zone has never dropped anything for me before aside from appearance stuff. I had to assume it was a bug. The fabled shield also dropped which I have never seen drop for me before, and I’ve ran this zone a LOT. At the end, the fabled wings dropped. It was a REALLY good run.

The last push from 80-90 is always a difficult one for me. First of all, beastlords don’t get to start their epics until level 90, so I can’t work on that which is something I would normally do early. I’m a bit too small for DoV, it’s best to head to the Great Divide at around 85-86. I haven’t done any of the TSO instances that scale with levels, so that’s probably where I’ll spend the majority of my time, completing the quests for those zones and dragging my mercenary along with me.

Speaking of, I claimed the warboar warder from the Age of Discovery collectors edition yesterday. He is GIGANTIC compared to my little ratonga (I shrunk him down in the screen shot) and plays the role of a tank. Although to be honest, I’m not sure how great a tank he is. I probably need some loyalty points and to actually spend his aa points. He couldn’t keep agro off of my beastlord yesterday, even though she’s wearing level 60 gear and has nothing but journeymen skills. I’m hoping to reach level 85 today, but it’s MUCH slower than it was getting 1-80 (which took less than 10 hours of game play) so we’ll see how it goes. In the mean time, I’m having fun completing the crafting apprentice quests each day, maybe I’ll get one of those reactants as a reward, they’re selling for 900-1400 plat at the moment, and the money sure would be nice.

As always, happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!

Beastlord Leveling #EQ2 #EverQuestII

stargrace January 6, 2012 5Comments

With help once more from Ibeogur (guild mate) my little level 10 beastlord set out into the wide world of Norrath, and when the dust cleared, she was level 63. Beastlords are interesting, they have two key aspects besides their warders that make them a bit more involved to play. Number one, at level 18 you’ll earn yourself an extra hotbar that you’ve probably never seen before. On it will go (automatically) skills that you can’t use unless you proc a beastlord specific spell. You’ll never forget when this proc goes off because a giant blue and yellow beastlord paw print will mark your screen and sounds will go off. A little annoying if you proc often. Later on as you level you’ll also gain a savagery bar (level 20). As you use the skills that can only be used when you proc, you’ll gain savagery, and then you’ll be able to use other skills that only work if you have a certain level of savagery. It’s less confusing than it sounds. It’s hard to proc savagery when you kill fast though, so I’d consider these to be more ‘grouping’ tools.

Warders are neat. They come in different categories, and you can ‘keep’ one warder of each category. So far I’ve collected Feline, Aquatic, and Avian warders. They each get their own aa tree that you can spend points in, and you’ll have to earn loyalty with each warder. Pictured above is ‘Crabby’. I know, I’m incredibly creative when it comes to naming my warders.

Once I was done with the Beastlord for the day and put all of my items up for sale, I decided it would be a good idea to log in all 9 of my crafters one at a time in order to do their apprentice dailies. I didn’t get anything amazing, but I am researching some nice items. They’ll help for the ranger I’ve got level locked at 35, and any alts I make (although I already have 13, how many more do I possibly need).

I have three enchanters, and I’ve been looking at how to deal with that. All are on the same server, two are coercers. I’m thinking of deleting one of my coercers, but I need to level up another sage, first. One coercer is a 90 sage, the other a 90 carpenter (who has a lot of extra recipes that I don’t want to simply lose). I’m thinking that the warlock would make a great sage, and then I can delete that third enchanter that I really don’t need (all of the enchanters are level 90. I really like the class what can I say).

I’m enjoying myself in EQ2 this round which is nice. It’s a much more casual pace than last time I played, and Antonia Bayle is filled with players. I hope that the Free to Play model is kind to the game, although me and EQ2 have had our rough moments, and I’ve fallen out of ‘love’ with it a few times, it still seems to be the only game out there that can offer me EVERYTHING I want from an MMO. Robust crafting system, sandbox features (housing, achievements, shiny hunting, etc), solo and group content, a UI players can adjust (both in default and if you get a UI mod), a booming community, regular updates (even if the updates are not to my personal liking, at least they happen), guild features, and a few other little tidbits that we take for granted this day in age. While I still have some major issues with a few paths of the game (the reduction of stats down to players only requiring two, for example) doesn’t every game out there have issues?

Happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!