EQ2

5th Annual Festival of Unity Starts Sunday! #EQ2

stargrace June 14, 2011 No Comments

It’s almost that time again, time for the largest eq2 player run festival! The Festival of Unity has been around for a number of years now (5!), and this year it’s bigger then ever. I’ve gone to every single one, and even if you’re not a large roleplay gamer I HIGHLY suggest you check it out. Here are some of my older posts about the festivals on Antonia Bayle – I’m including posts from the counter-part, the festival of discord as well.

• 2007 festival (unity)
• 2008 festival (discord)
• 2009 festival (unity)
• 2009 festival (discord)
• 2010 festival (of the sands)

Each year the festivals grow in size, and this year there are 15 different guilds involved. You can check out the Festival on facebook, and you can also check out a map of the events as well as the time over on their guild portal page. The opening ceremonies begin June 19th (this Sunday) at 2pm EST and will end at 10pm EST. They’ve also included a very thorough FAQ about the festival, so if you have questions be sure to check out their forums.

Some events previously have included Feyiron Chef (one of my favorites) as well as races, matches of strength, and of course the grounds are filled with vendors selling their wears and entertaining the crowds. So many people show up to this that you may have to adjust your settings or risk crashing. I will be wandering the event in one guise or another (I haven’t decided which character I’ll be bringing yet) so if you want to say hello feel free! It’s worth creating a character on Antonia Bayle just for this event.

Behind the DoV Curve #EQ2

stargrace June 13, 2011 4 Comments

It’s amazing how easy it is to fall behind the curve in any given MMO when you take a little break from it. As mentioned previously, I had taken a break from EQ2 right before DoV hit – although to be honest I didn’t play that much Sentinel’s Fate, either.  It was getting hard for me to find inspiration within the game to keep me logging in and so in my true nomadic gamer fashion I wandered around to a few other games before eventually returning back to EQ2. One of my major issues has always been the number of alts I have. It’s incredibly difficult to concentrate on playing one character when you have 10 of them at max level and are not shy about volunteering whoever is required to get the job done. Sure, I have my favorites, but none of them are anywhere near the new cap of 300 aa, and I don’t even have any of them at 250 aa at this point in time. I need to work on that.

Of course after deciding to focus on my coercer (after all, I have 3 level 90 enchanters, two of them coercers, I obviously enjoy playing them) my group for the evening already contained one so I switched off to my troubador. Who then proceeded to get so many upgrades I lost count. The group consisted of Ultann (guild mate, Shadowknight), Ibeogur (another guild mate, berserker), and then three friends of Ultann’s, a wizard, inquisitor, and the coercer. We started out in Tower of Frozen Shadow: Shadowed corridors, and then moved to Umbral Halls, an finished off with Haunt of Syl’Tor. The zones are marked on eq2i as being ‘easy to moderate’ and they were. We had a little difficulty with the final boss of the last zone, but the group was amazing and didn’t wipe at all. Of course, myself and Ibeogur were completely new to DoV in general, and everything was an upgrade. We felt more like charity cases being pulled along then anything else – especially after I saw the parses that had everyone well above where I was. Granted, my coercer only has 175 aa at this point in time, but it was still really discouraging.

It will take me some time (and a lot of focusing and dedication) to get my characters where I think they ‘should’ be – but it gives me a goal to work towards and that’s always a great motivational tool. I also happened to pick up a few bits and pieces for my defiler, and at least the troubador is wearing some nice gear now. The rest of my evening was spent trying to decide if I wanted to 1. betray to dirge. and 2. switch from playing the coercer to the troubador (which is something I always end up debating when I switch characters, that’s why I have so many ‘mains’). I haven’t come to a conclusion yet, I suppose we’ll just have to see what this week brings.

Happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself! If you happen to be playing EQ2 (or EQ2X) you can say hello with a /tell antonia_bayle.name   I am typically on stargrace (defiler), although you can also find me there as minxes (the coercer), and goudia (my troubador), arysh (the warden), and a handful of other characters. If you happen to need an extra for a group be sure to look me up!

As a side note, the festival of unity starts next week – and I couldn’t be more excited! This will be the 5th year (I believe) that the festival has run, and I’ve had the pleasure of attending every year so far. If you’ve ever wanted to check out an amazing player run festival, this is the one for you.

A Bit of Public Quest Luck #EQ2

stargrace June 12, 2011 No Comments

My coercer (one of three level 90 enchanters that I have) is pretty behind in aa. I’ve neglected a few of my characters over the years, leveling them up and then barely playing them. Yesterday I was in the mood to play her so I spent some time hanging out with the guild while we did a few older dungeons as a trio, and then headed off to a PQ (public quest) or two to try to get myself some upgrades. It was a good thing I did, too. I ended up winning the breast plate from the very first PQ I did (the fabled one) and it was an enormous upgrade. I browsed the broker and picked up a few pieces of gear that were relatively cheap (a plat or two here and there) and by the time my day was done I’d gone from having 16,000 hp to some where upwards of 22,000 which is still relatively low but much better then I was at. I also managed to get my critical mitigation to 70%, and I need that stat much higher as well but again it’s a start.

The guild trio’d a few Sentinel’s Fate zones, library and research halls, it was good for coin and transmutables. I was concerned that we wouldn’t be able to trio research halls, but we did just fine. I played the coercer, and was joined by Ibeogur (berserker) and Noc (inquisitor). We had a good time, and it felt nice to be playing again.

It’s been a little while since I’ve devoted any serious time to EQ2, and I don’t have the faintest idea what dungeons are like in DoV. In fact I’ve barely done anything at all in DoV, aside from working on the flying mount quests and a few crafting quests here and there. I’m excited to get back into things – and lets not forget that the Festival of Unity starts very soon on the Antonia Bayle server. I’ve gone every year since they’ve hosted it, and this year will be no different. It’s one of the largest player run events in EQ2, and if you haven’t checked it out before I highly recommend it.

Happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!

Public Quests and Other Goodies #EQ2

stargrace May 25, 2011 No Comments

I managed to do a few more public quests yesterday but still feel like healers get the short end of the stick. I don’t believe that I’m the only one who feels this way either – out of three raids of 24 people there were only four healers (one per group) in any one of the raids. There were a LOT of crusaders, at least two or three for every group. They’ve been the flavour of the month for so long now due to their healing / dps / tanking capabilities that it no longer surprises me. Luck was with me for one PQ as I did manage to get the fabled weapon. The breast piece eludes me, but I healed my little heart out on all of the raids and after dropping my settings down to the lowest rank I at least had no issues with lag. I switched back to my regular settings as soon as the PQ was completed, and roamed around the area looking for shinies. A lot of people in the PQ were boxing – some were boxing full groups of players, I could see them all auto following one another. It was a little odd to watch. The rewards from PQ are not that great any more, having their critical mitigation nerfed into oblivion, but for those of us who are still getting their feet wet with DoV it’s quite a large improvement. Yesterday I picked up shoulders, shoes, forearms, and a fourth piece that I can’t remember. It wasn’t the head piece. Ah well, no matter.

I’ve got two or three more days of questing before I get my flying mount, and I’m looking forward to that. So far only my crafter has obtained hers, and since I don’t use the character for anything besides crafting she really hasn’t used it too often. I wish we could fly in the city zones, as that would make getting to and from my guild hall a lot easier when my guild port is down (I play mostly evil aligned characters and the guild hall is located in Qeynos).

I haven’t been doing much decorating in game lately, but I have added to my book collection and I’m some where near the 473 mark (ok, exactly near there, hehe). I had a generous contribution of 20 books yesterday and gladly added them to the collection. I do want to decorated the remaining homes that I own, Stargrace (my 90 defiler) owns a dojo for relaxation as well as a Freeport home on top of the museum that I’ve worked on. There are also a few more ‘artifacts’ I wish to collect, for example the tapestries that are representatives of the Courts of Maj’Dul from Sinking Sands. These are new quests that were added when Sinking Sands went through a revamp, and I haven’t had time (or the patience) to complete them yet.

On that same note, I went through my settings and decided to hide all of the rewards from my quests, so I don’t know ahead of time what I’m getting. You may think that’s an odd thing to have an option for, but I really like being surprised. I don’t know if I’m getting a piece of gear or a house item (unless I’ve done the quest so many times that I’ve memorized the rewards). It’s a neat little feature and allows me to customize my game play even further, which is something I appreciate. It’s all in the details after all!

Happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself. It’s a glorious Wednesday!

From 0 to 135 #EQ2 #EverQuest2

stargrace May 23, 2011 1 Comment

This weekend found me (much to my surprise) in EQ2 when I wasn’t out enjoying the Tulip Festival and gallivanting around the city with the other half. After exploring a little DoV (I’ve barely set foot into this expansion) and doing enough quests to be on the daily portion of my flying mount, I decided that I wanted to play a lower level character. I really enjoying older content in EQ2 and I had a level 6 Freeblood character that I had created some time ago. Myself and Ibeogur teamed up (while chattering to Ultann in guild) and headed first to Wailing Caverns. Because this weekend was double experience the levels came incredibly quickly (not to mention I have 120% bonus due to max level characters, and I used a potion, and I had vitality). Before too long the ranger was level 35 – and I had gone from 0 aa to 135. I’ve spent what I can in the first two trees until level 70 (50 points in each), and made my way down the Shadows tree. I didn’t want to level too fast, because there are a lot of quests I enjoy doing. 35 is a comfortable level, and I’ve set myself to 100% aa for the next little while. I’ve played a few rangers before – one all the way to levle 90 but I ended up deleting her because she didn’t have the aa and I didn’t feel like grinding them at end game. Looking back I suppose it’s a little foolish of me to constantly delete my levle 90 characters, but I only get rid of those that I feel no emotional ties to – my main characters I try to keep around.

I actually had a lot of fun playing – a lot more then I thought I would. It’s been ages since I’ve played EQ2 on a serious level and having guild mates around made an enormous difference. Of course it also took some getting used to as well. I barely remember how to get from one place to another or what any of the acronyms mean in game. Channels were bustling (at least on the Antonia Bayle server) and I managed to pick up 10 (that’s right, TEN!) new player-written books to add to my museum. That brings my total up to around 433 player-written books. I’m pretty proud of that fact.

I hope everyone else had an amazing weekend no matter where you spent it. It’s a long weekend here in Ottawa (Victoria Day is today) so I’m going to spend it indoors gaming after spending most of my weekend outside in the sun (plus it’s cloudy and just gross outside today). As always, happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!