Just came back about 6 months ago. Played my old toons of Chanter and Ranger for a while using mercs then rolled a new team of SK, SHM and WIZ. Skipping through the easy zones I've made it to lvl 76 with them. Now ready for more challenges. I left EQ in 2003, around the time of Ykesha expac. I was in a small time guild and we didn't do much of the progression. Raided a little but mostly just hung out and grouped. Several of the players were real life friends so it was more social than hard core EQ. Now I'm looking to learn about progression and try some expeditions, missions and tasks. (I'm pretty sure that's what they are called) I've looked over ALLA and Eqresource but frankly.. my brain is not wrapping itself around the concepts. I've read over Samanna's "Dragons of Norrath Progression Quest Walkthrough" but I'm more confused now that I was before. good, evil, faction for this, faction for that.. What I need is step by step. Go here, do this, go there, do that. At least to get me started. Also.. would like to try some instanced zones.. Any recommendations? I remember going into Gyrospire Beza with my Chanter/Ranger duo but that's about it. Any I can take my trio into? Where to start? Thanks
The hard part of explaining/demystifying missions/expeditions/progression is that every expansion has its' own method of doing these things. They really didn't standardize that stuff until Secrets of Faydwer, and even still they tend to switch it up a little each expansion just to keep us all guessing. I'll pick Dragons of Norrath since you specified that one, and I believe you're in a proper level range to deal with it. You start by picking a side. Either evil or good. There are camps in Lavastorm mountains that will give you starting quests to increase your faction with one camp or the other. They are outside the tunnels in the northern half of the zone. The camps inside the tunnels are for requesting missions once you've gotten your faction high enough to request them. Typically, these quests give each participant a little teardrop shaped item that you turn in to an NPC in one of the camps to increase your faction. You start out at dubious, I think. Each tier of the quests requires that you be at a higher level of faction. If I recall, you have to be indifferent to your camp of choice before you can go in the tunnels to get quests. This means repeating the crappy quests at the outside camp a bunch of times, or finding someone with better faction to request missions.
I'd advise looking at the Hero's Journey quests, as they guide you along and give decent rewards. Jonas Dagmire's Skeletal Hand, or the Bayle's Heraldic Crest are two series worth looking at. Progression as such is only really important when you get to the current expansions. Of the older expansions, you can cherry pick the best parts - dodge aug from LDoN, the AAs from DoN (although you have to do it all to get those), MPG trials and epic 2.0 from Omens, etc.
I like doing the DoN quests. Just pick a side, any side. It hardly matters. You can still buy from either side, you just can't request their missions. And, you go KoS with the guards in the tunnels with one side but at 76 that is a trivial issue. I run by, and just purchase what I need, and leave back out toward the other side. The guards lose interest fairly fast. You might need to do some questing first to build up faction. That are a bit boring, but fast since there is no competition for mobs and you can just kill everything and loot what you need. I try to get quests which are "kill x of type y", since everyone in your group gets the kills at the same time. The quests in which you need to loot x items mean you do the work for each box in your group. They lead to harder raid missions, which you can do since they are tuned for a level 70 raid. The raid size increased each set of missions, first you get group content, then small raid (18 people I think), then it keeps increasing. Doing older raid content with just a group can be fun.
Not sure if you would like this, kind of 'EQ Adventure Lite' task. It does fit your description and the experience is good. It adjusts to PC level, ZAM is wrong about it being level 90. It is on a six hour timer to complete. Last time I did it took about an hour and a half since I didn't kill everything. Only important tip you have to remember is run out of the hatchery as the eggs start to hatch. Soon as a couple have hatched, pull them out of aggro range of the new haltchlings. Much easier to pull the first 2-3 then take on the rest then try to kill all 8 at once. http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/quest.html?quest=5767
Took the plunge on the "Hatching a Plan". All going great until we got three yellows. Bard had just memmed new spells and I failed to realize that his new slow song was also a DD song and AOE to top it off. Broke all mezzes and we wiped. The exp was good so we will be going back after the 6 hour cool down. Which brings up the question. What happens with corpses? Do I have to summon them or are they kicked out? Thanks for the info.
They get kicked out eventually, once the task is dropped. It takes a little while for the instance to end,b ut once it does it will move your corpse out around the zone in.
Only thing corpses do is let your priest class or cleric merc give you a rez with some restored hitpoints. It is a bit tricky in that cleric mercs jump the gun and try to rez at the site of the corpse, so if you don't turn them down to drag it out of the middle of the monsters first, you get a free second corpse. Just an opinion, corpse rez it would probably work great in The Hatchery since monsters don't respawn. Just about everywhere else you make so much experience fighting your way back to your corpse, it is break even. Of course corpse summoning and dragging if you can do it are fine. I'm not sure on the mechanics of running the Hatchery multiple times. I know you can do it but it seems like the loot drops shut off. I still take the hit for rough leveling spots. I hate Corathus Creep so much I would rather get no loot in the Hatchery then spend another minute in the Creep. It's a personal thing.
There is no cool down. Win or lose, you just drop the mission and take it again. I do some in 20 minutes, and then just take it again. The timer is your maximum time to complete the mission, after which you fail and get booted from the instance. Another thread has someone saying that some DoN missions are bugged (no access to the area you need), and I haven't run them in the last month.
I'll add that you are a PERFECT level to start on the "Seeds of Destruction" expac. It's a totally self-contained "box game" within the game. (and it's FUN too!) It has it's own story line, progression, and a beginning and an end. To get to the opening of it: Poknowledge > Herald of Druzzil Ro > PoTime > The Void. (takes 2 minutes if that once you know it) The Void is the opening zone of this expac. There is only one NPC in there to get you started. Hear him out and go from there. (1st "assigned" theme is Oceangreen Hills) Look up "Bayle's Heraldic Crest" on Zam. You pretty much have to complete the Oceangreen theme to get the reward. Then it's time to move on to the next theme until you "save the world by correcting it's distant past". Also - once you learn how to "flip" and overlap the Oeangeen quests - combined with the Frankin Teek daily hotzone task (Level 75 task - in Oceangreen) - you can pull down 50+ AA a day including the 1/2 hour "Lesson Hunt". -Rat
I know what you mean. I tried a little of Corathus Creep before it was a hotzone. Did not like it at all. Seeds of Destruction? I'll check that out. I spent a few days in OGH with my Ranger on his way to 87. Only quest I did was the few that are in the castle in the corner by zombies. Repeated that ring quest a dozen times and still have a few of them banked. If I could just stop that DenMotherBear or what ever that's called. Very irritating. That's good to know. I kept hearing 6 hour cool down. Seems I misunderstood that. How to get back in after a wipe? Do the encounters scale to the level of the players? Seems the one I did last night scales with player level. I read that a lvl 49 druid did the task and mobs were blue to him. Most mobs were DB, Even and Yellow to me. Is that based on avg level or highest level or what? Thanks for the great info up to this point.
Zoned into OGH, got the quest from Sergeant and made our way toward the Magus. SK playing tank is dressed in Defiant and MGB buffs from GL, 21K HP and 2720 AC. Not uber enough for OGH. The Den Mother Bear showed up about a minute after we got the quest and had killed a few DB mobs on our way. Bear was yellow to the SK. Didn't wipe the party but sucked up about 70% of the Shammy mana to keep him alive. It was close a few times. Don't think 77 is a good level to go to OGH unless there is some better armor he can wear.
The Den Mother is a semi-rare pop and your good news is that she is the toughest MoB in the zone. That said when she does pop - she's a "griefer" of the first water. Better to pull her than to let her find you by surprise. I've never seen her more than 2wice in a play session. She tends to scare people (like you LOL) away from what is otherwise a great zone. (many have argued that she needs to get yanked - or at least nerfed a bit) You want the task "Does this look infected" from Tabron in the fortress, the one from Sergeant Bronal in the fortress, and the Magus one you got. Also the Franklin Teek daily hotzone quest (skip the 5 grizzly days). Later, you want 'Follow your nose" from Jennica outside the fort too. You also want to gather 10 rings from the undead for Sergents 2nd task. You need 1 snake venom gland, one deathcap mushroom, one fetid flesh, and one reanimated bone dust for Tabron's second quest. Tor Tabron's first one you need 5 infected organs, and one undamaged organ (it's free "open" loot from diseased corpses found already dead) The goal is to take the kill quests and only take the "gather item" guests AFTER you have the items. (they are pre-lootable). Best place to set up camp is at the mouth of the cave. On the LEFT side if you are facing the cave from the road. The Magus is a seperate camp at the other end of the zone. You can get him by clearing only 2 of his henchmen. (lull pull). -Rat
When I did Oceangreen at the launch of SoD, I never saw the Den Monther - on 2? characters, done separately. I've been running the zone again recently, and she's a pain. It is possible that she only aggros if you are killing wolves/bears, I'm not sure. It's worth pointing out that the kill quests are repeatable (e.g.Gavin's kill 15 diseased animals quest). Isn't Bronal at the guard tower? There is a problem with the quests, in that there are obvious quest areas: animals, undead, Surefall, and gnolls; but the quests stretch these out a lot, and have you switching areas. Also, the Crest series requires you to do most of the quests in the area, apart from (most of) the progression quests. So if you complete both progression and the Crest, there is quite possibly nothing else left.
Ok. Going on the advice that Den mother is the toughest mob I gathered the team and headed back in. We took out the Magus and completed that quest. Got the next, kill 15 Cultists. Cleared them out and ran back to finish up quest. Ran into the fort in the North East corner and got the "Familiarity is the Key" quest and knocked it out. Ran into some sort of shade named "Malign" or something like that. Will come back later and run the "Stop the Contamination" quest. Seems I get to protect the village from invaders. Great fun and something different than the exp grind. You could be right about the Den Mother. She showed up just after we killed a wolf that was standing in our way. I didn't see her at all when we were killing skellies, bats and snakes.
Speculation as to why the Den Mother appears and aggros has been going on for years. She always aggros on my wife's Chanter, and never aggros on my Ranger unless I pull her. Borek is right Bronal is at the guard tower. But also see the NPC's inside and outside the fortress. The ZAM guide to the Crest quests has the progression easily mapped out. Just keep flipping the kill quests for exp and cash until you have the right stuff for the "turn-in the stuff" quests. -Rat
I was just checking, and the Den Mother aggroed on my group twice in one session, without any of us aggroing anything apart from rats, bats, beetles and lurkers. A little excessive, I feel - although a reasonable way of gathering a lot of Archaic Chain Wristguards (and no Eyes, strangely enough).
Ya, we feed the eyes to the Chanter pet. Archaic Chain Wristguards are not heeded here. Rat has better, Jam can't wear them, and our secondaries are a Pally / Cleric plate class duo. My "always and never" comment was based upon both characters being in a non-combat stance. In combat it might indeed be situational depending on the MoB under attack. I've gotten in the habit of tracking and pulling her before conducting normal pulls - but she's just a PITA in general. -R
It would make some sort of sense if she was a Holly Windstalker substitute, but general aggro is a pain, given the level that the zone is intended to be for (under 75). It seems I left out the <sarcasm> tag on my comment about Archaic Chain Wristguards ;-).
My original character was on Tarew Marr too. I haven't logged in yet, but it looks as though Drinal might be his new home if that's where you landed.
