I'm a Shadow Knight and I'm just starting out so I'd like to know if there is an up to date leveling guide.
I boxed but I think the path I took as a new (returning player starting fresh) worked very well and is doable molo (solo w/ merc). Use recruit program and make a new account if you haven't gone through recruit program. Once the account is made, log in and get past the first part of the tutorial. Once you kill the first mob and turn in the key you get sent to another area. At that point, type /claim and claim your recruit rewards. The key ones being the large 100% weight reduction bag and the defiant armor set. Use it every 10 levels for an upgraded armor set. You won't have to actually acquire armor until level 70+. The path I took for levelling = 01-10 Tutorial 10-18 Crescent Reach 18-26 Bloodfire Moors 26-35 Frontier Mountains Giant Fort (can go a little beyond 35 if the next step proves too hard) 35-50 Burning Woods (roamers, then statics near chardok once cappable) 50-55 I had a hard time finding a good spot that I liked. Think I mostly did Bloodfields 55-72 Hands down, The Hole (shows as ruins of old paineel in zone guide) I'm currently level 72 in my boxed set. Throughout my leveling in the hole I took in between 4k-10k plat per hour from selling vendor trash (gems, crowns, necklaces, etc) and the xp rate is killer there. 6 boxing I did about 15aa / hour at 56 down to 12aa / hour at 71 for each character. As a molo'ist you should be able to far surpass that. As for your path it's up to you but don't skip the hole if you're a new player. You'll need the plats you gain from their to buy armor/weapon upgrades and spells beyond level 72 when defiant gear starts to just not quite be enough IMO. Alternately, the hero's journey zones in the level 65+ range have some really good quest rewards I've been told. But the difficulty goes up big time too. In the hole mobs hit for 100-350 or so and since you'll get the important AA done at around 400 spent, you'll have decent defenses by the time you leave. Head to level appropriate hero's journey zones and suddenly you're getting hit for 800-1200+ by a lot of trash mobs. Tanking blue and even light blue named mobs in defiant is harsh for sure at level 70+ even as a shield warrior with defensive/offensive/planar power AAs maxed out. Best of Luck
Do the hot zone daily quests for your level, and the two levels below, every time they refresh - skip ones that obviously suck, after you have tried them. There is travel time involved, but the high exp is good compensation. Gloomingdeep, Crescent Reach, Blightfire Moors, Blackfeather Roost - all good spots on the Hero's Journey. You want fast, which usually means skipping quests and grinding, but you imply that you are new to EQ, so I'd advise taking it a little slower and experience some of the older content. Popular zones with good experience along the way include Howling Stones, Grieg's End, the Hole, City of Mist, Chardok, Sebilis, Nurga, Droga, Lower Guk - those are for the 35-70 range. Later on, Split Paw, Dragonscale Hills, Wall of Slaughter are generally good for 70-80. You should have discovered evilgamer.net by then .
I'm really interested in taking it a bit slower and enjoying the journey through some old zones. Guess I'm a bit nostalgic after taking a 9 year break.
It is still worthwhile following general advice (Gloomingdeep, Crescent Reach, Blightfire, hot zone quests). Those will bring you to the most populous areas the soonest, as well as familiarise you with current gameplay. Favourite zones tend to depend on when you started: Blackburrow, Mistmoore, Befallen, Lower Guk, SolA/B for 1999; Kunark starters might prefer LOIO, Sebilis, Nurga/Droga, Charasis and Chardok; Velious added Crystal Caverns Iceclad, Velks Lab; Luclin Paludal, Dawnshroud and Grieg's End. It's hard to go wrong, really.
I enjoyed Najena at level 13-26. It is a fun zone and plenty of undead for an SK. Unrest is still fun also. If you check your map and click " zone guide " in the top right corner then click " my level" you will see the good ole zones.
I played a couple of characters through blackburrow back in the day. One was an ogre shadowknight in a full suit of black alloy gear from runnyeye including the giant halberd. He was quite the sight running around BB and the Qeynos areas back in the day when having the wrong faction was deadly. I made a few friends that stayed with me until they quit just because I was the giant ogre knight in black armor followed by my pet. I miss the good ole days.
Don't know much about SK's but I've soloed my shammy to 69 and 800+ aa's in mostly old world, (Pre Omens/GoD), zones. I went to 10 in the tutorial then to 20 in crescent reach and blightfire. After that it was off to Unrest-Overthere-The Great Divide-Crystal Caverns-Dawnshroud-Orc fort in Easternwastes-Greigs End, (GE was a little tough at first but by my mid fifties it was not bad at all.) I worked GE into my low 60's then went to Bastion of Thunder and stayed there to around 67 and my first 700ish aa's. Always I would do the hotzone quests from Franklin Teek in PoK. If I had trouble finding gear upgrades I'd use loyalty points to get plat and then buy in the baz and from the item vendors by the loyalty merch in pok. Right now I'm doing xp grind in HoH and Erslai, Kingdom of Wind aka plane of air. The latter is the first zone that is really proving to be difficult to solo in but I just started using a merc and that seems to be getting me back on track. Plus it's a hotzone for level 65+ and I'm getting elaborate gear both from drops and the Teek quests as well as some nice augs. Anyhow, that's how I did it/am doing it. Going to be doing more Current content after 70 but I'm still in pop for the time being. Also, I should add that I'm an addicted tradeskiller and if you really want to see norrath, start doing tradeskill quests. They will run you all over the place and in the end you can gain some very useful skills. One last thing, do the wanderlust lodestone and serpent seekers charm of lore quests. You can do them together and get a very nice item w/aug for your charm slot and you get to travel the serpents spine zones.
This helped me: http://almarsguides.com/eq/leveling/ For me, I did do some time in PC at the appropriate level. I did HGs in the late 30's, early 40's for coin and exp albeit slow. BW was great in the 40's. As soon as I got the message to go to GE (Griegs End) I did in the low 50's and stayed well into the 60's. Good coin, exp and AA's. I can't recommend this zone enough. The Hole is great too. After that, DSH (Dragonscale Hills) was great and just keep following the progression. I bounce around to test it. Some zones are better and some spots are the best. I do dailies and use the lower ones for AA's and the appropriate and above for exp. Good luck and have fun.
After you leave the hole and fire, places like Splitpaw, and jewel of atiki/thallassus become pretty nice. get your 2.0, will help you tackle an extra 2-50 mobs depending on gear and zones. can start that pretty early, 60s maybe. Post epic you will earn your best xp doing light blues in large numbers, lots of AAs to get for that to work well, gear/ac augs, lots to consider.
Did anyone try Old Sebilis from 50-55? I'm debating between there and howling stones, but from what I remember back in the old days, Old Seb had much better vendor trash. I'm running two gold accounts. Cleric+Enchanter, j-man tank+j-man melee dps mercs. Pretty sure I could handle the zone in and the area around the entrance and exit. Think it's a good idea? I'm a returning player, so having cash as I level is as important as leveling itself.
Sebilis shouldn't be a problem - I levelling in there (before Defiant/mercs), at least once with a 4 man group 50-55. So with Defiant, even the Gloomingdeep version, and mercs you should have it easy. Howling Stones is easier overall, if that helps.
The Hole is great, I also did Bloodfields, the Undershore, also Crypt of Decay is a great zone 50-70, I dinged 70 now doing WoS. Try and stick to the hot zones, all except PoA you might want to skip it even though it's a 65 hot zone. I hate that zone and so do a lot of others.
I leveled 50-55 wizard with tank merc in Old Sebilis because I needed the platinum to buy spells and gear. I do not think the xp is as good as The Hole but the platinum is good. I was able to keep Froggy, Armsman, and Armorer (I think those are the 3 named) spawns clear before repops. Btw Singing Steel Helm sells to vendors for 300+ platinum.
I'm in the same position Saphfyre, I wasn't able to recover my old account so I need platinum more than I need xp. Obviously, xp is important, but I need to be able to buy stuff as well without being completely poor.
Recovering you old account (for the veteran rewards) and using the recruit program on it (for new rewards) should be your two highest priorities. You can call CS, research your old credit card that you used. "Whatever it takes" mentality is needed on this. -R
I think I have done Old Sebilis twice in the last 3-4 years, i.e. after mercs. It was certainly viable, but my characters (Bard and SK) had snare. Without snare, a SOWed frog can escape and cause a bigger train than your merc can handle, which happened to me a couple of times. You won't have snare, but with an Enchanter in your group, you can stun/mez runners and, besides, your mercs may have enough DPS to kill them so quickly that it won't be a problem. Still, it's something to be aware of in Sebilis while HS doesn't have this problem. Only the devourers (and one skelly) run at low health and very slowly at that. On the other hand, HS has traps. As far as cash goes, Sebilis is generally better because of the dropped gems and spells. You may also want to try selling Nodding Lilies in the Bazaar since they are used to level Alchemy. Perhaps other trade skills drops too depending on your server's economy.
Between cleric/enchanter stuns and roots, hopefully I'll be okay. I might do Howling Stones till 51 or 52 just for nostalgia. Back in 2000-2001, it was the main leveling place for the dark team on vallon zek, so I spent a lot of time in there.
Quick update. So far I did Kurn's tower from 10-15. Unrest 15-20 Mistmoore 20-28 Lower Guk Deadside 28-35 City of Mist 35-44. Howling Stones 44-48. I was able to clear all of North and part of South before it got pretty tough. Old Sebilis 48-50. I can break and clear all the way to Disco 2, which is pretty neat. In Sebilis the xp isn't that special, but the cash is phenomenal because of the ridiculous drop rate of high-priced gems for vendor trash. I think I'm going to stay here till 55 and some aaxp just to build up a good bank. After that, I'm going to try out the Hole, as many people have suggested.
