2013

Sing, my Pretties, SING! #EverQuest

stargrace April 7, 2013 0Comment

Saturday night adventures found Oger, Elte, Nonpoint, and myself in the Demiplane of Blood, a raid from the Depths of Darkhollow expansion. I had never been to this particular raid before, but Elte was confident that we could clear a good portion of it without any issues, even though there were only three of us (and you can’t use mercenary). Oger is sitting at a comfortable level 77 and my enchanter, Kameeko, is still hovering around 90. The first tier was pretty easy and we didn’t have any difficulties. Then we came to The Performer, which is a really unique (and annoying) boss fight.

Basically, there are a handful of NPC in a room. During the ‘fight’ you’ll be helping them out by performing a song. Each NPC will randomly emote something to you in light blue text, and you’ll have to /say the corresponding phrase to whatever it is they’ve told you. In other words the entire raid is going to sing along their own unique phrases. There are 20-30 different phrases that you’ll have a choice of saying, so the easiest way to complete this raid is to hotkey each phrase, and associate it with the corresponding NPC. As an example, Aelfric the Flautist will say Please,  – and you’ll have a phrase to /say in response to that to continue the song. The raid can only get so many phrases wrong before you run out of chances, and while you’re watching your chat box for these phrases your raid (or group in my case) will be protecting the performers from waves of orcs, drachnids, and shadowmanes.

Thankfully Elte had social keys for each of these emotes that we needed to perform, and we could easily load them into our UI – the rest would be up to us (ie: hitting the right emote at the right time). You have to target the NPC and then /say each emote, and you also have to be careful because the performer can be attacked accidentally by yourself. No AOE in other words. I had to mem wipe a few times to fix this.

Once we got started things went pretty well. It’s a long fight, you basically sing along and fight waves for 20 minutes. During the waves a few bosses spawn. I didn’t grab any ‘blockers’ as they’re called, so I was a bit slower than everyone else running through the zone.

Upon zoning in, you will be hit with the AE effects Mire of Crimson Mists and Aura of Crimson Mists. These will hit you every five minutes. In order to negate these effects, you must loot an item from each of the Tier 1 bosses and turn them in to the appropriate quest NPC in the non-instanced Dreadspire Keep. Each turn-in negates the effect by 25%.

Eventually we made our way to Tris Wallow III – which is where we ran into issues and had to stop for the night (also, Roley and Adrianna DeFarge is a long fight, but we had no issues thankfully). I’m not sure of all the mechanics, but it involves healing her during one of her phases, and with only one cleric in the group there was no way we could heal (and cure her) in the time frame allotted. By the end half the group was charmed from not looking away from her gaze, Oger was dead (the joys of being his level), and things were going down hill quickly, so we called it a night.

Still, it was a lot of fun, and I learned a few new things. I’m looking forward to seeing what adventure we find ourselves in next. As always, happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!

Brewing and Housing and Levels – Oh My! #EverQuest

stargrace April 3, 2013 0Comment

Yesterday was an exciting day for me in EverQuest. First I made the decision that as much as I love my beastlord (and I do, she finally reached level 60) I really enjoy playing my enchanter (level 90). So Oger the shadowknight I’ve been playing with decided he would pick up the pace with his leveling, and I would join him with my enchanter. Level 60 can group with level 90 (it’s your level + 1/2 your level in order to gain experience). There are a few reasons for my preference in playing the enchanter, but I do have to admit that one of the main ones is because I have worked so hard to level her crafting over the years.

EverQuest crafting is a pain in the ass. You constantly fail combines, and the ‘cap’ on your skill is 300 and HAS been 300 for many years now. Of course expansions that release add to recipes below cap, but more often than not their final combines are WELL above cap, typically in the 400-500 skill range leaving you a high chance at failure OR purchasing one of the $10 2 hour craft potions that guarantees if you fail a combine you get your materials returned. You CAN put aa into salvage (and I highly suggest it) but you’ll never get 100% return, and you can also put aa into less failures (which I also suggest). Nothing beats those potions though especially if you’re doing a very rare and difficult combine (prayer shawl, anyone?).

So last night I also managed to FINALLY reach 300 brewing.  I stuck to the same method that I had written about 2 years ago. You can use more recent recipes but the components for those combines are far more expensive, especially since current players use those for their food / drink / etc. I do want to be able to make some of the more recent craft goods though, so once I had reached 300 brewing, I logged onto my 73 druid and took a trip out to East Wastes, Zeixshi-Kar’s Awakening to do some foraging. Foraging and crafting go hand in hand together, and I find that the default 50 skill is just simply not enough, hence why I have a druid. I ended the night collecting a handful of planar goo and planar planar energy shards. These are currently selling for 100p in the broker each, so hopefully I can collect a nice surplus.

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

Beastlord Enters Plane of Disease #EverQuest

stargrace April 1, 2013 0Comment

Things are going very well in EverQuest lately. My beastlord is now level 57, and has been exploring Plane of Disease which is a hot zone for level 50 and up. There are some quests given out by an NPC outside of the guild lobby, they reward some very nice gear for these levels (shoulders, a belt, and a cloak). I picked up the quest and got a haste belt that was a huge upgrade (though all of the pieces are pretty nice upgrades). I currently have my experience on 50/50 so that half of it goes towards aa. I have over 30 aa so far although there are not many useful things for me to purchase at this level yet. Once I hit 60 a lot more will open up.

I’ll be exploring some old events and zones before too long, and broadcasting them on twitch tv. In case you’re not familiar with my channel, you can find it here. I only have a few broadcasts there so far but it will come with time.

I’ve also been working on my alchemy. My skill is at 150 so far, and I’ve been leveling up the crafting trophy as I go along which reminds me. There is apparently a quest you can do if you’re a crafter, that will allow you to unlock multiple mercenary slots instead of purchasing them in the station cash store. Of course purchasing them in the store is much easier than getting to 300 in every craft and then doing a quest, but for the determined, it works well. PLUS you can repeat this quest 4x allowing you to have 4 mercenary slots. This lets you easily switch from healer to dps to tank mercenary without having to go purchase a completely new one. I’m not quite at 300 in every craft yet, but it’s a dream of mine to be there one day.

I still haven’t done any of the anniversary things yet, but that’s alright. There’s so much to do in EverQuest I don’t feel like I’m missing out this year by leveling up a new character. As always, happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!