Hello all, First I want to point out that I am no stranger to EQ, I initially started playing EQ back when Kunark was released. However, LvL 75 was as high as I ever leveled by conventional means. After a long break I have come back to run through my all time favorite game to find that there is SOOOooo much more to adventure through. So, instead of starting over from lvl 1 I decided to go ahead and plunge into lvl 85 through the heroic upgrade. My main question is the gear upgrades from 85 onwards. I am not on the FV server so getting the best gear will have to be farmed and not bought. I am just lost on what my gear path should be. Do I keep the Heroic gear given to me and look to the next expansion or should I start with the HOT gear? Thanks, just lost on how to get better gear
I think the heroic upgrade was meant for people starting in HOT. The heroic gear is a good starting point, so keep it until you find upgrades. The first few quests in HOT even reward heroic characters with augs, and some of them even gives you dream-motes, you can spend to get upgrades. The first quest you do, should be the mercenary quest(you start with it). Starting with HOT and working through all the questlines in the following expansions in chronological order, is not a bad Idea if you have the time and friends to help you. Alternatively you could try HA's from CotF, and earn currency there, and buy gear for those. TBM-progression and HA's will also yield currency you can spend on gear upgrades.
Thank you, I have done the J5 merc quest and have done some HOT quests to get those augs but just didnt know where to go. If it was worth spending time in HOT or to move onward and look for better gear down the road vs right in front of my nose type thing.
Many players who went Heroic found HOT a little hard to start with. The mobs hit much harder than past expansions. HA's are very hard at those levels too unless your raid geared or have a good group. All that aside there is a special group of augs from HOT that only Heroic characters can wear. Many of these are well worth it to get as they will help you for a few levels. Augs are just as important as your armor. Altogether there are 19 30AC augs, 1 35AC aug(shield) plus 2 +6 dmg augs(one prestige, one non-prestige, maybe the prestige was a random drop) out of 20 solo tasks in HOT and Feerrott covering all slots. The quests to get augs are: (you can look these up on allah to see the steps) HOT (can do all 10 at once, can pre-loot too) Find My Brudders The Beast of Horror The Beast of Rage The Beast of Rot The Beast of the Unknown Thinning Out Their Numbers: Bone Crafters and Quaking Haunts Thinning Out Their Numbers: Rotdogs and Snakes Thinning Out Their Numbers: Skeletons and Bone Golems Thinning Out Their Numbers: Terror Guards Thinning Out Their Numbers: Terror Spinners and Sleeper Cubes Feerrott(can't pre-loot most of them, have to do some in succession): A Panting Lizard A Strong Silk Appeasing a Teir'Dal Meat For Eat Tangling With Wolves Rupkerr #1: An Expedition Gone Awry Rupkerr #2: Uncovering the Truth Rupkerr #3: A Cursed Cure Illian #1: Protecting the Weak (Minded) Illian #2: There's Something in the Water Completing 15th quest gave charm aug, 18th gave 35 AC shield aug and non-prestige dmg +6 aug for 1h 19th gave waist 20th gave chest aug completing the full set While your doing those quests you will get remnants to make Abstruse armor with. You can usually get someone on the server or find in the baz the templates you need cheaper than buying it off the merchants.But it won't be much better than you started with. https://everquest.allakhazam.com/wiki/eq:House_of_Thule_Armor_Guide 85 through 90: tier one Rustic (Alaris, Valley) will give you about 1400 hp an item https://everquest.allakhazam.com/wiki/eq:Veil_of_Alaris_Armor_Guide TBM is very good for armor that will last many levels but personally I found it a pain to keep track of https://www.almarsguides.com/eq/quests/TBM/GroupGear/ When you get a little higher you can look at fear touched which starts at 92 and you can buy the armor component in the baz then the combine kit in the zone so no hunting involved at all. http://everquest.allakhazam.com/wiki/eq:Rain_of_Fear_Armor_Guide There are quite a few write ups on gear etc for heroic and normal progression, it all depends on your likes and playstyle.
CatPaws nailed it. It seems slow, but work those Feerrott and HoT quests for the Augs. It is an excellent base set [like nearly the best you will get if F2P, and good for All Access also] HoT is a great expansion, and its easy to navigate around. If you are finding mobs too difficult, you can look backwards, but HoT is a rewarding expansion to work through. If you've done the merc quest and some of the Augs already, it sounds like you'll be okay to start there and work forward. For reference, I think tier 4 HoT stuff goes up to around 1400 HME. So there is room for some upgrades over Heroic, for sure. Edit: the reason I say do *all* the Augs is they are just so easy to move from one to another. If you were to go about attempting to collect a full set of Augs outside of the Heroic ones, it would take far, far longer and involve a whole lot of moving around and learning new zones, camps.
Check out Gyrospire Zeka for easy mobs at lvl 85 if you think that HoT is to hard or slow exp. The expansion before HoT was Seeds of Destruction which is easier. Zones like Field of Scale, Kurn's stronghold and Old Bloodfields which you do reach from PoK over Plane of Time and The Void. The entrance garden of the HoT mansion (Lower floors) is pretty easy but the named mobs can be strong. Also check out The Grounds
Expac before HoT was Underfoot (UF), considered very hard for the time. SoD was before that. I second Iven's review of SoD. Also, Grounds is really good in HoT, and if you have access to a druid, you can port right in to a safe spot near the middle of the zone.
