Crypt of Agony

7th Epic Completed, it’s a Sickness, I know.

When I logged in yesterday I didn’t have a very clear indication of what I wanted to do. I figured I’d work on obtaining some achievements and maybe do a few instances as per usual. Instead it was suggested fairly on in the day that we work on my illusionist epic, and so that’s what we spent most of the day doing.

The first portion of the quest is spent retrieving instruments for a bard who hangs out in Kylong Plains. He’s agreed to give you a book in return for said instruments. The only problem is that once you do your part, he gives you an empty book with the pages torn out. Seems like he’s got a bit of a money problem, and he’s ripped those pages out and used them as IOU’s to various people throughout Norrath. The IOU comes up to 189 plat, which is more then it would cost to purchase the actual mythical weapon these days so it’s your job to run around to each NPC doing various tasks for them in order to pay off the debt.

There are 10 pages in total that you’re sent out to retrieve all with varying tasks like killing 100 yah-li for updates, and obtaining 30 pieces of T8 player crafted furniture. That portion cost me approx 5 plat to complete, and then there’s a portion later on where you’re sent to retrieve 6 masks for a halfling that requires you to have completed the hool’oh hat quest in Barren Sky. The alternative method to completing that quest (because of course I have not done this on my illusionist) is to pay off the bird with 5 plat. So in total my epic cost about 10p give or take a few coins – and a lot of time. There are a LOT of sub components to this quest.

Instance wise it was not so bad. I needed to get one of my masks from the Queen in Chardok which we did fairly painlessly. She was even up rather then a place holder. Then there was the Maidens update which also went really well (though the zone itself didn’t drop all that much).

Finally after a full day of questing I completed the fabled version of my epic. This marks the 7th epic that I’ve completed to date. I have the epics for: Mystic, Templar, Warden, Coercer, Troubador, Dirge, and now Illusionist. I know, it’s a sickness. Once the quest was finally done we headed over to Obelisk of Ahkzul where the healer shield refused to drop (again) but it was the daily double shard zone so we all walked away with three shards and I managed to get the illusionist her first piece of T2 gear which was nice. The final mob also dropped a master for her which was a great bonus, she has all of her adept3 but illusionist masters on kithicor are priced insanely, and she hasn’t owned a single one. Pessimism marks her first.

We headed to Crypt of Agony shortly after that to attempt (once again) to get the fabled range item for Ultann but our luck held steady and we got a treasured chest from that particular named. The Farseer eludes us once more. On the plus side a level 73 mystic master did drop, a temporary pet that helps heal and cure the group. Not as wonderful as a heal or a buff spell but hey it’s better then nothing. The mystic actually doesn’t have horrible luck when it comes to getting her masters, and that one marked her 4th drop.

All in all it was a very productive Sunday game-wise. Kasul also managed to tear up the levels with his baby assassin and inched his way to 61 with a handful of aa via the new hotzones that were around for the weekend. Before long we’ll have ourselves another DPS in the group – and a full group at that, which will be great. The faster we can kill stuff before it tears us to shreds the better. I hope everyone enjoys their Monday, and if you happen to have today off for the holiday, enjoy!

See you in Norrath

CoA (again)

I’ll admit, lately in EQ2 there hasn’t really been anything new going on. Not the fault of the game since there has obviously been some updates (Lavastorm revamp, new raid zones, etc) but I haven’t actually gotten involved in any of it which is odd for me. I did the level 40-50 solo quests in Lavastorm so that I could purchase the armor molds (they look amazing) on my bard, but have not done any of the higher end Lavastorm quests. I have never set foot in the x2 Ward of Elements, and I have not completed the TSO quest chains in Moors because, well. Just because.

I did head back down to Crypt of Agony with Wpus and Ultann last night to see if the ranged item would finally drop (which it did not) though the drops were not completely horrible as we saw a fair number of legendary. No Cardiocutter either though I wasn’t surprised at that.

Eventually I should work on obtaining my epic weapon for the illusionist, but the thought of killing 100 yah-li and purchasing a bunch of T8 crafted furniture really doesn’t appeal to my gamer self compared to the coercer epic that I completed in a day. I wish there was not such a huge variance in between the difficulty levels of epics.

Now, one bit of interesting news that did come up is that Thom Terrazas is taking over as the new Producer for EverQuest. If you subscribe to Beckett MOG you may recognize his name this month from an interview I did with the Vanguard team back in February (the article will be in the next issue of Beckett MOG due to release at the end of May). I absolutely loved his passion for Vanguard (at the time of the interview) and I have no doubt that he will carry this passion over to EverQuest. In fact I enjoyed interviewing the entire Vanguard team an incredible amount, they were very open and easy to talk to. I was a little surprised (ok, maybe not) that he didn’t mention Vanguard at all in his opening talk about joining on with EverQuest, I suppose Vanguard is a dirty word that shouldn’t be said too much (even though I really do love that game).

I need to get back into some crafting, and doing some decorating some time. That usually refreshes my mood about things. The guild is creeping closer to level 30, and a new guild hall should be on the way shortly after that (which I know Wpus and Ultann are really looking forward to). It will be nice to port from our own hall instead of smuggling ourselves into the T3 ones in Antonica and Commonlands to locate a guild who has their ports open to the public.

See you in Norrath!

Taking in the View

Ever have one of those days where you log into game with visions of grandeur about all the things you’d love to finish off and accomplish, and then actually get none of them done? Well, that was me yesterday. I was hoping to finish off some writs but I only managed to get a few done before I was side tracked into something else.

The trio headed off to Crypt of Agony in the hopes that perhaps Ultann’s fabled range item would drop (or the Cardiocutter!) but alas neither of them made an appearance. The instance was still great fun though, and the illusionist managed to finally (remember she’s power leveled and quite far behind) get enough aa to pick up time compression, which made a huge difference in the groups over all DPS. We blew through the instance quite fast.

Pictured above is the Oracle Tower in Antonica, one of my favorite locations. It’s huge once you get up close, and I just absolutely love the way it was designed. Of course at the top is the zone in to the isle of refuge and Darathar. There’s a few quests that involve the Oracles down below as well though I’m not certain that I’ve ever completed them.

I want to get back into the swing of doing some of the older quests that you can find in the shattered lands, it’s been a while and while they may not be as fancy as the quests that are out in TSO (Moors) or RoK, they do give you that Nostalgic feeling that’s always important, especially lately it seems.

A Little Bit of Everything

I decided to disrupt Princess (my cat) for most of the day yesterday, and spent it spring cleaning. Moved all of her ‘beds’ around and rearranged the apartment, it looks much better now. I still have a few rooms to go, but it’s a start. Once that was done I headed in game to find Ultann’s boxed inquisitor at level 80 – woohoo! Less then a month to level from 1-80 using the recruit a friend method, which means he can start working on his epic now. We decided to head to Crypt of Agony and see if the Cardiocutter would drop (which it didn’t) or even the fabled ranged item for Ultann (which also didn’t drop). What DID drop though was that caster ring (legendary) with some pretty nice spell crit on it. Of course it would drop, since I had been trying to get it for my illusionist for quite some time and we never saw it. Thankfully, it’s also a nice ring for a bard who makes use of both CA’s and spells.

That was the only thing of note to drop within the instance, and afterward we decided to head to Courts off of Pillars of Flame in order to get some more guild experience (not to mention a good handful of craft rares). We one grouped everything except the final Black Witch who happens to elude us because our dps is too slow to take down a x4 before she ports most of us all over the zone, leaving either no healer, or no tank, or no dps (which makes everything even more slow). She also places curse of insanity upon the group which means you can get one shot if you go below a certain amount of power. Seeing as we were one group trying to take down an encounter meant for 24, we use a lot of power.

It was still a lot of fun, we still gained a lot of aa and the guild is nearing level 30 where we’ll be able to purchase a guild hall.

After that we headed to Chardok in an attempt to obtain the inquisitor starter which has been noted as dropping either there, or in Chelsith (or outside Chelsith). We didn’t see it and ended up calling it early because red encounters were absolutely ripping my bard to shreds.

The evening went well over all. The bard dinged level 74 and is 30% or so into it. As you can see above, she gets a good chunk of experience each kill. I wish it worked for quest experience too but such is not the case. At level 75 she can start doing shard missions, though you do have to be 79 to pick up the daily doubles. I haven’t begin to work on obtaining her skills yet, but that will be next. I cringe at the number of silicate loams I’m going to have to get.

I hope everyone else had an amazing Saturday, don’t forget next Sunday is Mother’s day!

Instances and Sleep

With all SOE games being down for a few hours yesterday I didn’t play a great deal. Last night the trio (with me as my 73 dirge and 80 mystic) headed to Crypt of Agony which was surprisingly fun even at level 72. I was hoping that Cardiocutter would drop because we’ve yet to see it drop, but alas my luck holds as true as ever and we saw nothing of use this run. After we decided to head to The Anathema in Everfrost. The bard picked up a new pair of earrings, a new charm items, and Ultann’s healer picked up a few goodies as well.

Aside from that, the day was fairly uneventful and my mood was sour to boot in a typical-Monday-but-not-so-typical-for-me mindset. Ended up calling it an early night and getting some much needed sleep after getting only  4 hours the previous night. I hope everyone else had an incredible day.