I’m excited about the next EverQuest2 expansion ‘Chains of Eternity’. No big surprise there, I get excited about any expansion for any game (did you know LotRO is releasing Rohan today? Urge to play, rising). The story reminds me a bit of the void creatures who invaded Norrath not that long ago:
“Death is rampant across Norrath. Citizens are suddenly falling dead as their spirits are torn from their bodies. No one on Norrath seems to understand why the souls are being pulled from the mortal plane, but all signs point to a massive disturbance within Ethernere, the realm of the dead. The heroes of the world must travel to Ethernere to find the cause of the unbalance in the Grey Wastes, and discover what has become of its caretaker – the mysterious being known as Drinal. If the heroes can return balance to Ethernere, the siphoning of souls may be halted. Should they fail, both the living and the dead will suffer a dismal fate.” – zam.com
I did my first pre-quest to the expansion yesterday and I don’t want to spoil the story but I did get a very nice level 92 necklace out of it. I completed it on my swashbuckler, Jacquotte, who is the only level 92 character I have at the moment. The rest of my characters are still sitting at a dismal level 90, most of them not having the required 280+ aa in order to progress further. A handful of them are close, hovering between 230-250aa and that is what I spent most of my game time this weekend working on. Inching them further and further.
Except the bard, who I betrayed from Troubador to Dirge. Again. This is probably the .. 20th? Time I’ve betrayed that specific character back and forth. I’ve written about it a lot, too. I’m thinking of betraying my shadowknight to a paladin as well for the simple fact that there are a billion SK out there. I know, not exactly a good reason. I do enjoy the ‘fresh’ feeling my characters get when I betray them though.
Chains of Eternity will change the current cap of 92 to 95, adding three new levels. Of course there are other features being added too:
- Prestige Abilities – Each subclass will get access to new Prestige Abilities!
- Prestige Tradeskills – Your crafting will shine like never before with Prestige Tradeskills.
- Organic Adornments – New adornments that gain experience with you and grow in power.
- Guild Level Cap Raised to 95.
- Adventure to Level 95.
- Tradeskill to Level 95.
As always, happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!
” I was hoping for more than two, but that seems to be the norm with expansions lately. ”
Hmm about that, I got a few answers when I talked with qixter(Smokejumper’s twitter name) several months ago. He answered like,
“the new terrain generation system/toolsets is almost complete. faster speed in creating any landmass or mountain vistas, better blending among terrain types, looks cooler, perform better, etc. I’m so excited about what our team will come up with this brand-new toolset”
Maybe he didn’t mention the ‘new art/contents creation pipeline’, but well I’m also excited =) So I think I’d be nice to have fewer, but a lot larger zones from now on.
RIFT expansion is where it is at for me. Although I want to do Riders of Rohan I have time for one game and RIFT will have to be it.
Betraying my Dirge over to Troub to see the new(ish) Freeport content remains near, but never at, the top of my to do list. Someday I suppose?
It sounds pretty tedious to me. If there’s one thing I really, really don’t want more of in any MMO it’s undead. Ghosts and spirits are a marginal improvement over zombies, which I would happily never, ever see again anywhere, but that’s about the most positive thing I can say.
The whole “two overland zones and a bunch of dungeons” ran out of steam years ago and much though I love a level-cap rise, the new way of doing it in dribbles of two or three levels that each take as long to do as several old levels just seems silly.
The rest of the expansion…well, there isn’t any more, is there? That’s your lot.
I thought Age of Discovery was a superb expansion, the best EQ2 has ever had. I got incredible use out of it and it led me to play EQ2 solidly for almost a year longer than I expected. I was so pleased to think that would be the kind of expansion we’d be getting from now on and it’s so disappointing to see them row back to the old, tired model.
Doesn’t matter much to me though because I won’t be buying it anyway, or not for a good while. I’ll be in GW2 and Rift come November.