Title says it all. sources i've found on the web say it should have unlocked around April but I can't find any official announcement.
No, it never did. As far as I am aware, there has been zero DBG dev or otherwise announcement about the unlocking of TDS (there was a response to questions about TBM opening for FTP...not at this time...at the beginning of this year). People (including myself) made assumptions that DBG would stick to their previous schedule for releasing locked expansion content. And we were wrong. It's actually not a bad progression (if you can get over Caverns or Degmar...both those zones seem to elicit the most negativity).
Thanks for the responses, I logged in after work and confirmed that I cant getto the locked zones. Quite a bummer
I hope they unlock it soon - especially for new players to get their spells. I gave away all the glowing Briny I had by now and I dont want to camp them anymore. Another thing many people here are not thinking about, when they say lvling and getting to max lvl is easy ......
Unlocking zones that require keys/progression doesn't make getting your spells easier. You can get those gems from nameds in any of the unlocked zones and off trash. Bad logic.
If you have access to TBM, it's much easier to get your TDS rank II spells with the essences of life.
BS - best way to get glowing briny is Thullu Island - I did TDS for 20+ chars and never had a glowing dropping in Brother Island or Caverns.
New player or old is irrelevant, I'm saying post 100 you can't be a free player anyway, you will get nowhere. You need to buy expansions (yearly) and you need to subscribe at least long enough to max out your AAs. Otherwise it's not worth playing.
The best caster-weapon augs are still locked behind tds progression. Getting power-sources that are soloable(maybe? haven't tried yet) could be another reason to go there, as I definitely can't solo any named in RoS. I have no clue how rare they are though, the xorrb PS is too rare to be practical. At least a burned-out RoS-PS is still comparable to the crafted ones. There are reasons to visit tds-zones. I don't think the subject is about being a free player, its about the zones being locked behind progression. Tds has been unlocked for FTP players for a while now...
It only takes a few hours to do TDS progression now, with ONE character doing the work. It's VERY easy. Mercenary tasks you speak of in Thul are *NOT* needed at all. Just the Partisan tasks and missions are needed. For all the time people have been complaining about unlocking TDS, they could have done TDS progression for 50-60 characters one at a time
It takes much longer than a few simple hours to progress through all of TDS and it's a really crappy quest series. Small boxing nightmare in some of those zones too. Slowly work on it throughout the week you'll get there depending on your play schedule and level of your character/s. Yeah, people really should force their way through it for that Hero AA, but for those who just want to play in the content it should be opened. It was a poorly thought of expansion locking well over half the content behind annoying progression and by now they should definitely open it. We've dealt with the bleh expansion for 4 years now. I mean, I guess I don't really care, I make decent plat selling some stuff I farm out their because its empty due to nobody wanting to TDS progession, but there's really no reason not open it at this point.
If all you want is zone access, those progression tasks can all be done in a couple hours. Even when it was current, required progression was fairly quick. The biggest roadblock was foraging on Brother's Island and they removed that. I thought it was a bad idea then and stt do locking zones behind linear progression. It made it hard to find people at the same step as you to join. Regardless, it is what it is and is trivial now. People leveling up can skip ahead to TBM, get geared, AA and all their spells then backtrack if desired with that extra power that trivializes TDS.
TDS Power sources are still very nice and relevant. Perhaps the devs want players to "earn access" to TDS Power sources by completing TDS progression. Personally, I would like to campfire my alts into Combine Dredge to loot Geomantic Steelstones. But then everyone would be doing that too...which would likely precipitate a possible nerf to TDS powersources. The only difficult part of TDS Progression was the final mission in Arx Mentis (DPS power conduit and Uma).
I also feel like people are looking at the EQResource or Allakhazam TDS Progression write-ups as daunting. Take it by chunks (1 zone set of partisans and missions per week). Caverns of Endless Song can be discouraging. Degmar is actually easier when broken down (final mission mobs are very easy). Thuli's mission is meh but then you're into Combine Dredge (and, if you just want powersources, you need not progress to Arx Mentis but the +Swim trophy at the end of it all is nice).
