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I've recently gotten back in to Everquest II because I pretty much got bored with WAR, which is unfortunate, because WAR has great gameplay IMHO. I guess I'm too much of a raider/quester.

Anyone else play EQII?

I don't play everquest 2 but I saw the trailer like thing on a local chow,awesome.

I also loved the old Lords of Everquest game,aaaah...happy memories,die mech spider die!

Deff Dread red Edition wrote:I don't play everquest 2 but I saw the trailer like thing on a local chow,awesome.

I also loved the old Lords of Everquest game,aaaah...happy memories,die mech spider die!

Oddly enough I didn't play any of the other EQ games, except the first EQ for about three weeks. The reason I went over to EQII is because they originally brought over one of the designers from UO, and because the crafting looked to be good ( it is).

I see.
Well I have warched some vids the game play looks rather solid to me.

Oh yah, no question. WAR is certainly better as far as PvP goes, but they have a monstrous amount of content for EQII now, across all levels. And EQII has fine gameplay, though that really isn't why I'm back with it.

I played EQ2 for 5 years, I quit finally due to the fading population, gakky expansion and the continued treatment of my class (inquisitor) as the most useless healer (or indeed class) in the game (to the point where high end groups would ask for a healer except inq). The final straw for me came via SOE starting to sneak microtransactions into the game.

SOE were without doubt the worst company I have ever dealt with. I was never a crafter or quester but loved the raids on EQ2, I topped the Rise of Kunark stuff but the Odessey expansion was such weaksauce I couldn't summon up the effort for it.

I have many happy memories of the game, I met my girlfriend on it and made many friends there, but the game is dying and when I talk to folks still playing, it is obvious the population is still in a terminal decline.

I've also been playing WAR, it's a grand game, shame about the playerbase (folks in RvR thinking it's PvP instead of understanding that to win you should be treating it like a raid).

So I am looking forward to TOR myself, going to build a guild and get all the old EQ2 folks I can and rock it.

MeanGreenStompa wrote:I played EQ2 for 5 years, I quit finally due to the fading population, gakky expansion and the continued treatment of my class (inquisitor) as the most useless healer (or indeed class) in the game (to the point where high end groups would ask for a healer except inq). The final straw for me came via SOE starting to sneak microtransactions into the game.

SOE were without doubt the worst company I have ever dealt with. I was never a crafter or quester but loved the raids on EQ2, I topped the Rise of Kunark stuff but the Odessey expansion was such weaksauce I couldn't summon up the effort for it.

I have many happy memories of the game, I met my girlfriend on it and made many friends there, but the game is dying and when I talk to folks still playing, it is obvious the population is still in a terminal decline.

I've also been playing WAR, it's a grand game, shame about the playerbase (folks in RvR thinking it's PvP instead of understanding that to win you should be treating it like a raid).

So I am looking forward to TOR myself, going to build a guild and get all the old EQ2 folks I can and rock it.

Antonia Bayle server still seems to have decent population. I've never played an inquisitor but I play its Qeynos equivalent, the Templar, though I haven't grouped since I started again.

I see people around in popular areas, namely the Kingdom of Sky areas, but some zones are indeed pretty dead.

What is TOR by the way?

Grignard wrote:
Antonia Bayle server still seems to have decent population. I've never played an inquisitor but I play its Qeynos equivalent, the Templar, though I haven't grouped since I started again.

I see people around in popular areas, namely the Kingdom of Sky areas, but some zones are indeed pretty dead.

What is TOR by the way?

I played on AB, as a Brit on a US server it was always slightly quieter, but AB used to be so vibrant any time of day, the times I was on it got worse and worse, even peak US times are now far quieter than they used to be, but you are seeing folks transferring over from LDL and some other servers.

Whilst templar and inq are sister classes, the difference between them are staggering, the templar is the most powerful healer in the game spell for spell, the inq is the weakest, same slow casting speeds but half the power (the difference SOE claim is the melee dps inq does but that stopped increasing at the top of the EoF expansion aa lines). A templar can solo heal Maiden's dungeon runs or even Runnyeye 2, an inquisitor cannot (doubtless someone will say they can and maybe it's possible with top end fabled/mythical and master spells but I doubt it). Most inquisitors just sucked it up and betrayed to templar, my character was part of a RP guild and had quite the rep as a bad guy, I had no intention of turning him good, so I just retired him instead.

I played a warlock to the high 70s in short order, then hit the RoK soloing quests and gave up, unable to get groups in my playing time as the server grew quieter and quieter, I finally ran out of steam and out of love with the game.

TOR = The Old Republic, the star wars mmo my gang are waiting for, it will be owned...oh yesss.

TOR:The Old Rebuplic.
It's a star wars MMO scheduled for release late this year or early next year IIRC.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Dang posted the explanation the same time as you.

I had a go on the trial reccently, and it is a pretty solid game, the fact I could play an equivilent Drow being a huge plus. Although seeing MeanGreenStompa's comments about the Inquisitor class (which I picked) probably glad I didn't stick around.

However to be honest I'm really only dragging my heals until Champions comes out, which I am hoping will keep me entertained until TOR arrives next year.

I'll probably also play the next WoW expansion, although that may be dependant on how good or bad Champions and then TOR is.

Yeah I also might try TOR,been thinking of trying Archlord:

http://www.archlordgame.com/


On topic,do you have to pay per month to pay Everquest 2?

Deff Dread red Edition wrote:Yeah I also might try TOR,been thinking of trying Archlord:

http://www.archlordgame.com/


On topic,do you have to pay per month to pay Everquest 2?

14.99 per with discounts if you pay by the quarter or year. You can get their station pass which gives you additional character slots and access to their other MMOs for 29.99. It isn't a bad deal if you play their other games and actually have the time to do all that.

Lord of the Rings Online is a good one if you like RAIDAN and LOOTAN more than PvP and has a fairly mature user base. Not real life mature, but mature as far as online standards go.

I loved EQ2. Lead a RP/family guild on the Lucan D'Lere server. Unfortunately, the game is all about raiding now. When they introduced Mythical weapons in the Kunark expansion, they basically signed the death warrant of virtually every non-raiding guild, as members left just to get their uber-loots weapon.

It is a solid game, and if you like raiding its VERY good. However, the current state of the game is such that 95% of people just power-level up to 80 and raid. Personally I don't understand that mentality (or the mentality of people willing to commit to raiding 7 hours a night 5-6 days a week), but that's just me. If you like raiding, this game is for you.

-Tyr

Tyr wrote:I loved EQ2. Lead a RP/family guild on the Lucan D'Lere server. Unfortunately, the game is all about raiding now. When they introduced Mythical weapons in the Kunark expansion, they basically signed the death warrant of virtually every non-raiding guild, as members left just to get their uber-loots weapon.

It is a solid game, and if you like raiding its VERY good. However, the current state of the game is such that 95% of people just power-level up to 80 and raid. Personally I don't understand that mentality (or the mentality of people willing to commit to raiding 7 hours a night 5-6 days a week), but that's just me. If you like raiding, this game is for you.

-Tyr

I'm seeing quite a few people spread through all the levels, including a level 15 or so raid party leaving out of Antonica the other day. I have managed to get pick up groups fairly easily, though I'm a healer so it is going to be easier to do. I do see a lot of activity in high level raid areas. There is a new area like that now that branches off of one of the older areas, and that zone actually had enough people to branch off into a second instance, which I hadn't seen in some time. So I suppose the high level raiding game is where it is at.

Also Antonia Bayle is a pretty crowded server relative to the others, I understand.

Folks are coming over to AB from the other servers as I understand, so it's population may have increased since I left. SOE should bite the bullet and merge a few of the others to promote populations on them.

Antonia Bayle was always alot heavier in population, due to being a RP preferred server on the one hand, and starting with the letter A on the other, so it was always top of the 'choose your server' list.

With regards the branching off from old areas, do you mean the dungeons added following the Shadow O expansions? Those are fast and furious instances that have many linked mobs to make up for the utter lack of linked mobs in RoK expansion, something that lead to warlocks and others who thrive on group mobs and chain attacks suffering from a lack of dps and success.

How has the tank changes worked out btw? I know alot of tank aggro management was being introduced as I was leaving and many of the tanks were very angry about reduction of their dps and ability to duo/solo.

MeanGreenStompa wrote:Folks are coming over to AB from the other servers as I understand, so it's population may have increased since I left. SOE should bite the bullet and merge a few of the others to promote populations on them.

Antonia Bayle was always alot heavier in population, due to being a RP preferred server on the one hand, and starting with the letter A on the other, so it was always top of the 'choose your server' list.

With regards the branching off from old areas, do you mean the dungeons added following the Shadow O expansions? Those are fast and furious instances that have many linked mobs to make up for the utter lack of linked mobs in RoK expansion, something that lead to warlocks and others who thrive on group mobs and chain attacks suffering from a lack of dps and success.

How has the tank changes worked out btw? I know alot of tank aggro management was being introduced as I was leaving and many of the tanks were very angry about reduction of their dps and ability to duo/solo.

I haven't played with tanks any since I've gotten back. I didn't know about the changes so I might try to play around with it for an hour or so when I get home. I myself would not be upset with trading off DPS for more aggro management, as if I'm going to play a tank, I want to be grouping. If I want to solo, I'd rather be using a DPS melee or wizard. I've mostly played with my templar, and I'm pleased so far. One of the few things I did not like about WAR is that the healing classes tended to require a balance between attack and healing, which I suppose was done because apparently people find healing boring. I, on the other hand, do not. If I'm a priest, I want to be the guy in charge of healing. I don't want to worry about putting out attacks, except for debuffs and what not. If I pull out my mace I'm either soloing, bored, or depserate.

True that, I have all too often suffered in WAR from being put into a group with a solo melee specc'd Warrior Priest or some whirling dervish DoK or even an Arch Mage who only read the 'mage' part of the name and was dps crazy shooting beams of light whilst I stood in front of him with DoTs pissing out of me... Poor healing and the whole herding cats aspect of the WBs in RvR is what killed WAR for me, having raided efficiently in EQ2, WAR was so chaotic and disorganised.

As to tanks in EQ2, as I said, not overly clear on how the changes had taken place, but I know I played a Shadow Knight to 70 as an alt and I used his massive dps to aggro control since the Crusaders were so poor on taunts.

I loved crafting in EQ2.

Never was one for crafting, they then massively simplified it and I tried it and didn't mind it. Some folks in my guild were tycoons on the server, with all their alts being top end crafters of this or that.

MeanGreenStompa wrote:Never was one for crafting, they then massively simplified it and I tried it and didn't mind it. Some folks in my guild were tycoons on the server, with all their alts being top end crafters of this or that.

See, I'm big into the crafting, and I was somewhat dissapointed when they simplified it. It used to be that you HAD to trade with other players or make an alt for sub components, so there was lots of trading going on.

Grignard wrote:

MeanGreenStompa wrote:Never was one for crafting, they then massively simplified it and I tried it and didn't mind it. Some folks in my guild were tycoons on the server, with all their alts being top end crafters of this or that.

See, I'm big into the crafting, and I was somewhat dissapointed when they simplified it. It used to be that you HAD to trade with other players or make an alt for sub components, so there was lots of trading going on.

That is how it is in LotRO crafting. No one craft is self-sufficent and requires the others to create items. A metalsmith needs some leather to make armor but only a forester can turn hides into leather, ect ect.

Ahtman wrote:

Grignard wrote:

MeanGreenStompa wrote:Never was one for crafting, they then massively simplified it and I tried it and didn't mind it. Some folks in my guild were tycoons on the server, with all their alts being top end crafters of this or that.

See, I'm big into the crafting, and I was somewhat dissapointed when they simplified it. It used to be that you HAD to trade with other players or make an alt for sub components, so there was lots of trading going on.

That is how it is in LotRO crafting. No one craft is self-sufficent and requires the others to create items. A metalsmith needs some leather to make armor but only a forester can turn hides into leather, ect ect.

See, that is neat. Unfortunately you need a lot of players to support that, I would imagine. That may be part of the reason Sony simplified it in EQII, the really expected to have more players than they got. They haven't consolidated servers for some reason. Maybe there are good reasons not to, but I don't see why they won't consolidate, say, the RP servers ( there are two ). One has a much greater population than the other but not so much that I would see even doubling it ( which won't happen) causing a problem.