Hello all, I was wondering if there's any grouping going on at all at lower levels or if everyone is pretty much soloing with mercs? Thanks, Crayno
You ask a fairly open-ended and hard-to-answer (but completely legitimate) question.... Is there "any"? One would have to answer "of course there is". The real question is, how much, under what circumstances, and on which servers. You also need to define your terms. What constitutes "lower levels"? If you're on a server with mercs, and you sub/Krono, any class with a J1 merc can get to the 60s very quickly and easily.... knowing what to do. If you're a truly new player (i.e never played EQ before), there are still many things you'd need to know to make that a smooth, quick trip to 60+. My best suggestion, without opening too many cans of worms, would be this: It sounds like you WANT to group and meet more players. The best two things to do: Make a post in the guild forum here, and just spell out you're looking for a group to play with, and/or a family/newbie guild to join which regularly groups and helps each other. Also, when you play, make occasional (every 20 minutes or so) posts in the General chat channel (have to sub to access that) about looking for a newbie guild. Oh, I think there's also a newbie players channel you would have access to whether you sub or not. Post there, too. A third thing you can do is follow up in this thread with server and common hours of play. Hope that helps! Tat
Thanks for the answer Last time I played was in 2001 and as you guessed correctly I want to group up if I decide to subscribe. Back then you'd solo until level 5 or so and then you put up LFG or start one yourself and usually it didn't take very long to end up in a (pickup) group. Yesterday I played on the EU server and asked the same question in the new player channel but didn't get a reply, so I'm guessing that those days are over. My hardcore gaming days are over so I'll be playing 1-2 hours in the evening and maybe a couple of hours during the day in the weekend meaning wouldn't be suited for any raiding guild Crayno
Most lower level zones on live servers are empty. You can sometimes find a group. "Live" servers are ones that are at the most recent expansion. Progression servers are servers that are era locked for a period of time, and eventually unlock the next expansion by original release. I believe servers like Agnarr are called "Era locked" but I am not sure, anyway, Agnarr is locked to Planes of Power (Well, pre-OoW I think so LDoN and Yeska are there). You should sub and try 1 of the 2 new progression servers. You missed almost the entire game as it only released 2 years before you quit. Progression servers are the place you want to be. You should be able to find a group on the most recent ones, and you will have a chance to experience a lot of what you missed. All progression servers are premium, so you will need a sub. Also they have different rulesets so be sure to check into those. Examples include the 2 newest servers, one has no limitations on boxing and the other allows only 2-box truebox. You probably want the truebox server so you get a more organic player experience.
I agree with what the above poster said about subbing and trying out Aradune if you're looking for a throwback experience. If you're looking to mainly solo though, you may have a better time on Live. You can get your main account going and maybe get a second free to play account to box/help the main. On live, using the tank merc can get you to about lvl 60 with minimal help from yourself, but if you add in another character and merc, you'll be able to kill yellows/reds that will net ~6% of a level a kill up to the 60's. Thats when it slows down a lot. I have about your same playtime and I recently rolled on live to get to slowly play through all the content. Over the weekend I worked on my shaman epic 1.0 and am almost done, which was a blast. Having a group of 3 with 3 mercs made all the fights easy, but still fun to go through and read all the lore. I'm playing on live to get access to the content. Rather play through 20 years of EQ than buy a bunch of single player games.
Newplayers chat is seldom helpful on any server. Although a few of us on Tunare do try and monitor and help folks out. But F2P can't get into General Chat - that's only for All Access. So that can limit your groupage. Look at it like this: there were over 300 players in general chat the other day but only 56 in newplayer on another server. Really cuts your odds of getting a group. And that figure is not just low levels, any F2P can only get in chat so out of the 56 maybe 40 were higher level. I tried the TLP when I returned and found them usually filled with friendly players but the game seemed harder than it used to be. But again you have to be paid to go on TLP. I went over to live, just me and my merc and can go at my own pace like Daimos5 says, doing epics, owning those old zones that used to haunt me So here is a suggestion. Make your F2P guy on a live server and run thru both tutorials. The one in Gloomingdeep and the one in POK that continues that one (its called Out of Gloomingdeep) While your in the tutorial you can ask in /ooc if anyone wants to group. That will put your chat in the zone so others can see it. Now once your level 20 ish you can start the Daily hot zones tasks from Franklin Teek and while getting those you can /ooc again if anyone wants to join you. So that is a way around the chat channel limit for F2P Lions of something on Xegony seems to be a friendly guild on live server so maybe try them? They post in the Guild forums often. Keep in mind if one way doesn't work you can always try another way. You are not limited to Live, F2P or TLP. You can do all 3 if you want.......and many of us do
