I played from Kunark release to SoL release (and a short return for LDoN) so just about everything has changed. Mostly for the better but its practically an entirely new game to me now and I have a ton of questions. 1. Crude Defiant gear seems to trump even the Epic 50 gear when I left. Is there any old world dungeon / quest loot worth going for anymore? 2. Evolving gear? still exist? worth bothering with? 3. Attunable gear?? supposed to be the upgrade to defiant what is it exactly? 4. Crafting / Cultural.. Still worthless? 5. LDoN gear also appears to pale in comparison to defiant.. any other reason to bother with LDoN. 6. Instanced dungeons? I was reading where someone was doing a "Befallen instance" at level 70? Can you do that with any dungeon now? 7. Monster missions - These i only read about but seemed interesting being a raid boss and defending against NPC adventurers. Is this still around? Only in the lands that came with that expansion maybe? Do you get exp or just something to do for fun. 8. Pre 80 is there anything other than hurry and get to 80 with AAs that is necessary or is that basically the point now is to get to 80 ASAP to catch up with the current content. 9. At what point (if ever) can you no longer solo. 10. Can you get by with just random PUGs or is a Raiding guild really necessary to experience any of the endgame content. 11. When I first logged in and was trying to figure out my hotkeys and stuff some dude saw me on my Rogue and rode up. Gave me 10k pp and told me to delete the Rogue and make either a Magician, Necro, or Ranger.. Those used to be the 3 most undesirable group classes back in 2001 was he just being an (although for 10k pp he can do so anytime or are those really the only classes now that wont be laughed out of a group. Mercs cant be THAT good endgame are they? 12. SoW stick! I missed out on the free SoW rod that you get from the Tutorial since I skipped it. Is there some sort of J-boots or other clicky SoW I can get somewhere. Actually come to think of it I should be able to ride a horse now. Those are new to me too is that essentially the same as SoW or no? So far I am enjoying it. I basically took a nostalgic tour from G-Fay aross Faydwer and circled Antonica (waited forever for the boat that never came before noticing the port gnome lol) and finished in Qeynos about 3 hours later at nearly level 30. Going on 48 now after half a circle around Kunark. I'm going to out level all the content it took my whole first YEAR of playing in 3 days! That is absolutely astounding compared to 2001.
1) Some of it is, for click buffs/illusions or other perks. For raw stats, probably not. 2) Yes, and not really, aside from the newest evolving raid stuff. 3) Attunable just means it becomes no drop when you equip it. Nothing else special about it. 4) Cultural is no longer worthless, it's very nice gear. 5) Augs. 6) No, they did not instance all open world dungeons, if that's what you are asking. 7) I remember doing these in places like Icewell and Nektulos but I believe they are gone now, at least the ones I am thinking of. 8) There is a large bump up at level 80 with HoT gear which makes things easier, however AA grinding to me seemed to go by a lot faster during the 60s since you will vastly outgear the content with Defiant and mercs shred at those levels. Personal preference will dictate here. 9) Largely class dependent - some will prefer solo all the way to max level. 10) If raiding is what you want to do, you will most likely do more of it in a raiding guild. Some guilds will do open raids, but it's not as prevalent as it used to be. 11) Pocket the 10k and keep playing your rogue. You will grow into your new abilities and rip things up. 12) It depends on what kind of mount you get, they have variable speeds. They are nice for long distances but they can be annoying if you need to do a lot of starting and stopping.
1. Crude Defiant gear seems to trump even the Epic 50 gear when I left. Is there any old world dungeon / quest loot worth going for anymore? For clickies they still are. Old Hot Zones are still worthwhile for augs. 2. Evolving gear? still exist? worth bothering with? Still around, mostly not worthwhile, unless you want to evolve an item to twink another toon later, as you'll most likely out level the worthiness of the item before it gets maxed. Also tradeskill trophies are worthwhile to evolve, and get them once past 50 in a skill to evolve them while skilling up. See http://eqitems.13th-floor.org/itemsearch.php?searchtype=advanced&field_0=items.slots&compare_0=>&text_0=0&next_0=1&field_1=items.evolvinglevel&compare_1=>&text_1=0&next_1=0&field_2=&compare_2=&text_2=&next_2=0&field_3=&compare_3=&text_3=&next_3=0&field_4=&compare_4=&text_4=&next_4=0 for almost all evolving items. See Very Small Stone Tear at http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=100106 for a newer, maybe worthwhile item. Definitely unique for the now available for stats Ammo slot. 3. Attunable gear?? supposed to be the upgrade to defiant what is it exactly? Defiant is Attuneable. Attuneable items are trade-able until equipped (Attuned) at which point they become No Trade. See http://eq.zam.com/wiki/EQ:Lucy_Item_Definitions for more item terms explained. 4. Crafting / Cultural.. Still worthless? Never has been worthless, just generally a time sink and possibly expensive. Smithing and Tailoring have been good since DoN Cultural armor revamp, and recently with cultural weapons. Alchemy has always been worthwhile. Jewelcrafting has been valuable recently again with some good twink gear. See www.kyros.info/Tradeskills/JC-Calc/ for examples. 5. LDoN gear also appears to pale in comparison to defiant.. any other reason to bother with LDoN. Tradeskill supplies; Tribute Items; Vendor bought Augs, specifically Icy Prism of Avoidance for all classes at http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=23668 6. Instanced dungeons? I was reading where someone was doing a "Befallen instance" at level 70? Can you do that with any dungeon now? Not any / all, but particular ones. See Instanced Zones and Quests for some more info. See http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/zone.html?mode=questsbycont and look for zones with a colon ) in the name. Most, but not all will be instances. Some will be revamps. 7. Monster missions - These i only read about but seemed interesting being a raid boss and defending against NPC adventurers. Is this still around? Only in the lands that came with that expansion maybe? Do you get exp or just something to do for fun. See http://everquest.allakhazam.com/monstermissions.html list of all. Yes you get exp, and some offer level appropriate rewards. However, most, if not all require 3 people to get the mission, and most don't do them much any more, other than maybe the Old Man McKenzie ones. 8. Pre 80 is there anything other than hurry and get to 80 with AAs that is necessary or is that basically the point now is to get to 80 ASAP to catch up with the current content. Depends on you. I still work on DoN Progression on all my toons at level appropriate times ( 50s to 70s ). See Dragons of Norrath Progression (Evil) or Dragons of Norrath Progression (Good). 9. At what point (if ever) can you no longer solo. Depends on class, and with Mercenaries (molo) you can go on to the end group game if you want, depending on gear and assuming keeping merc upgraded. See Mercenaries. Also, use a Journeyman, if gold, or the highest Tier Apprentice Tank merc to help level upto the 60s, no matter what class. Advice on Mercs for some more info. 10. Can you get by with just random PUGs or is a Raiding guild really necessary to experience any of the endgame content. Depends on server, but many offer open raids so you can do some near end game raiding to upgrade over end game group gear. 11. When I first logged in and was trying to figure out my hotkeys and stuff some dude saw me on my Rogue and rode up. Gave me 10k pp and told me to delete the Rogue and make either a Magician, Necro, or Ranger.. Those used to be the 3 most undesirable group classes back in 2001 was he just being an **** (although for 10k pp he can do so anytime or are those really the only classes now that wont be laughed out of a group. Mercs cant be THAT good endgame are they? For group content, mercs are still viable. The 3 classes he suggested are better at soloing than a Rogue. I still like rogue and play them, but Ranger is my first love, and Warrior is my close second. Most people don't think Warriors can solo well, but they can until close to end-game, then with a merc it's not too bad, even molo. 12. SoW stick! I missed out on the free SoW rod that you get from the Tutorial since I skipped it. Is there some sort of J-boots or other clicky SoW I can get somewhere. Actually come to think of it I should be able to ride a horse now. Those are new to me too is that essentially the same as SoW or no? Potions are available. See http://everquest.allakhazam.com/search.html?q=philter of the wolf. As fast as it is to level, you're better off just leveling and getting http://eq.zam.com/wiki/EQ:Innate_Run_Speed AAs, Run 3 at 51 is as fast as the long quest for JBoots. Yes, various mounts may help. They have various speeds of Slow, Run1, Run2, Fast, which you can find by looking the item up, then clicking on the clickie effect link and look at the Summon line which will have like Summon Horse: SumMPUm4Run2 which is a Run2. Avoid Slow, and Run1 will be about Run 3-5 speed, while Run2 will be faster than SoW. Many of these questions could of been answer at http://www.paullynch.org/tnzfaq/ Yther Ore.
Thanks for replies. Pretty much answered all the stuff that wasnt immediately apparent on my initial return. That final link is a good one I didnt know about Yther.. Ive mostly been using EQAtlas, Allakhazam (free so cant search), and Almars guide for leveling. I know the Atlas is dated but I've mostly only been doing old world content anyway so it suffices. I think MapFiend or something like that is the newer site. I am also aware of EQTraders and whatever pops up on google for specific searches except in most cases it's a forum post or guide from 2006 and is most likely no longer valid. What are the main sites now for up to date info. It seems a lot of stuff is dated. Is Allakhazam worth subscribing too still? What about Magelo? It was still fairly new back when I quit so I never used it. When did EQ go free btw? Like just very recently? I have gold if that matters at all. Even having grinded for a year to get to 50 in this game, as grueling as that was, nothing is as brutal as only 4 inventory slots. Another question... As far as faction goes, Velious faction in particular, do those even matter later on? With the rate I am leveling by the time I grinded out the faction for one of the Velious factions I will have long since outleveled Velious and any of the gear is probably obsolete anyways. Mainly I am asking other than nostalgia is there any reason at all to bother with faction grinding or any of the classic storyline stuff. I am looking forward to the PoP and beyond content and also nostalgia for classic but I can just grind in nostalgic places rather than waste time doing the storyline if it is completely useless at this point. TL,DR Are any factions / storyline worth grinding now and how does grinding faction scale with the increased experience now. Also can you name a few Classic Clickys worth going after. Also: GEMS (a game you could play while staring at your spellbook to med in the old days.) Do they still have any sort of minigames like that anymore? What about /pizza LOL. That may have been EQ2 but are there any other not immediately apparent to a born again newbie features aside from the standard grind and quests that I am missing out on.
Yea Mapfiend Map Packs Select All Maps and hit the Download button to get the newest in-game maps. Usng Winzip for you Mapfiend map packs may help, and if you have trouble Setting Folder Permissions to allow installation of maps. You can access maps with either Backspace or M key (not sure what the current default is). http://eqitems.13th-floor.org/ is free to search and has most items upto Rain of Fear. The current datastream hasn't been debugged to determine what the new stuff / format is, so it hasn't been updated since RoF came out. About a year ago on f2p. Faction is not needed until you're end-game for the most part. There's new features that make recent expansions factioning not needed, like all Rk 1 or no rank spells upto level 90 for sale in the bazaar. One notable exception is if you work on the DoN progression AAs, you'll have to do a little faction work there, but just doing the missions necessary to progress gets alot of it. Rarely they offer double faction, but not often. Heroic Charisma is supposed to increse faction changes, but parses haven't shown any change. So basically it's the same as it was, unlike experience. Gems is still in the game. Pizza was probably EQ2, I don't remember it, but I only played EQ2 for the first year. You can read the expansion release notes at http://eq.zam.com/wiki/EQ:Expansions to get up to date on the newest features. Mercenaries, Group Roles, in-game mail, the Parcel system, are just some of the newer features. http://www.eqresource.com/ is also another good site. EQTraders lists merchants that sell the item that you can't see on free Alla, as well as the recipes. Clicky Items isn't finished but lists lots of clickies. It depends on class, but invis is always a good clickie for those that don't get the spells / ability. Tanks could always use trash buffs (Ultravision, as an example). You may also want to look Special Procs or Aggro Procs depending on class and needs. Yther Ore.
