Crescent Reach was starting to look a little small, most of the encounters were blue or easier, so the decision was made to head to Blightfire Moors, which is also a hot zone. This zone is packed full of snakes, shrubs, and prowling cats. We set up a camp near the entrance to begin with, and picked off bog rats and rats until we completed two simple quests that were on a sign just outside Crescent Reach. Turning them in didn’t net very much experience, but it was still better than nothing.
Eventually we moved on to a small camp of gnolls. These came in packs of three and we were almost defeated numerous times but some how managed to pull through by the skin of our teeth. Leveling was going really well, and before I knew it my Barbarian Beastlord was 20, along with the shadowknight.
Once we had our fill of gnolls, we moved on to some wild cats. These were far too tough for us. They are social and before we knew it we had about 10 cats chasing us around. Poor Oger fell to their vicious bites twice, while I ran away like a chicken to the nearest zone line. Always saving myself. Thankfully I also had the healer mercenary, so I came back and gave him a rez. After two wipes at this camp we decided to move on to killer shrubs.
The shrubs were also social but easier to handle even when they conned red. A few more dings, and we both found ourselves sitting at level 25. Only 75 more levels to go before we reach the current EverQuest cap of 100.
I decided to explore the bazaar a bit, it has changed over the years. You can now set up a trader in offline mode, but it doesn’t work the way I thought it would. What you do is set yourself up with trader satchels like you would if you were staying online, and when you click the trader window to offline mode, it kicks you from the game. You are only allowed to have 1 character total per account in offline mode, and you can’t be connected to the game while you are offline selling. So it’s great before you go to bed, or if you’re going to work for the day, but not if you want to be around in-game or on another character. I haven’t checked to see if I’ve sold anything yet, but a handful of plat would be nice because mercenary costs are going up. I’m now up to over 2 plat every 15 minutes to hire one.
Even though I’ve “started over” on a new server, veteran players are at a significant advantage over a brand new player. See, veterans earn loyalty points the longer their accounts are active, and I’ve racked up over 5,000 of these points. You can use them to purchase bags of plat, gear, a character slot, and house items as well as a handful of other things. I love loyalty points and I think it’s a great motivational tool to keep your loyal customers feeling special. I did spend 500 points on a bag of platinum, and received 17,000 plat. That goes towards keeping my mercenary paid for. I also had a mount in /claim and a package of level appropriate defiant gear in /claim, so I took advantage of those. I’m still missing a lot of gear, but I’m not wandering around the Moors naked any more at least.
I think the plan is to stay at the Moors for a bit longer and then move on. I’m also going to begin crafting in Crescent Reach with the ‘free’ crafting they have for players to work their way to 50 in all tradeskills for no cost. These mimic the quests you can do at Abysmal Sea. It may also be time to find a casual guild to join, we’ll just have to see.
As always, happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!