Seeking Hardcore Fastest Leveling Advice starting at 65.

Alright, will get smart on HA's. I haven't ever done one. Sounds like it's simply a group instanced dungeon crawl, same as LDoN.

Thank you.

Just remember that everything in a HA scales to your level, except the name that has a chance to spawn. They are easily avoidable for the most part. Specific to CotF, the experience comes from the task completion, not per mob kill. If you have lesson available, you pop it before the final hail, then take yourself off to a zone you can kill in until you get good enough to complete two or three task in a row.

Something I would do is grab the Teek hot zone kill task and plant a fire, then run over to Gribbles. At the final hail, pop lesson, hail, then fire over to the hot zone and finish the lesson off.

I have done a lot of Pl ing, when in the mood, as such have a number of level locked characters. Low levels to 60 ish is mostly Buff em up, and let the DS kill mobs for XP. At 57, my 85 ranger slaughters level 70 ish mobs, some where at or past 65 my 95 Ranger does the same to level 80 ish mobs. and I have a crew of 106 that can out power other areas on path to around 100. the expectation is that characters will spend time, with lt blues and greens getting the offense/defense/dodge up along the way. Since I don't charge, there is no need to do it, just guildies runts or some times find a character, when the mood strikes me, and bounce them 10 20 40 levels.
Been goofing off on Vaniki for months, but that will end once new Xpac is out.

Hello Familiar Name

Been having a ton of fun lately. I got distracted yesterday clearing ToV. While I knew it was more about nostalgia than loot, I really thought that since my toons were level 70, that I would get a key upgrade or two, but nope. Really just 1 piece for my Main box, nothing for my 2nd box, and 3 pieces for my "last to get everything" enc buff bot box. Anyway, not much leveling.

On the bright side, The Buried Sea was pretty good. The first island was a little too slow, but once I got to the Pirates/Blackhands, it was great exp. I finished the night heading to Loping Plains, and testing it out at level 72. To my surprise, destroyed a worg with zero effort. So hopefully today, by the time I go to bed, I'll be level 80.

The only thing around the corner now is no more depending on defiant and the occasional upgrade. I need to come up with a loot/gear plan. Fortunately there is a number of suggestions in this thread I'm going to refer back to. Plus I read the HA gear will fill my slots, that while not very good, won't be terrible to quote what I read.

If I actually do a semi-recent expansion (like House of Thule or newer) through the progression it was meant to be played, then you'll know I'm definitely hooked. Right now I just go around and grind like it's still evercamp. Still can't get my head wrapped around the fact that EQ has real quests now besides the occasional key quest or 1 piece of city gear.

So HAs won’t really drop gear. They drop currency for completing an HA (I forget how much per), and you use said currency to buy gear. Once you hit 75 you can start doing said HAs.

TBM expansion has HAs that offer Remnants as currency. You buy a base gear slot (say Chest), and in increments of 5 levels, you buy augs that go into those pieces of gear that upgrade and give you your stats. And I think that’s the best gear you can get for your level from 75-106 until you’re able to get Conflagrant gear that was player made from RoS expansion. Assuming you upgrade your augs every 5 levels.

Remnants happen to be currency that can be traded as well. As such, if coin isn’t an issue, you can buy the currency from players in the Bazaar.

Only thing is, you need to get your mirror fragment that’ll allow you to travel between zones for that expansion before being able to get the gear/augs with the currency.

That quest can be found here:

https://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/quest.html?quest=8049 (On my phone so can’t hyperlink it)

Thank you.

I just leveled up to 75 off Dragnols in looping plains. I guess I should go see about these HA's. Some not-here guides say it's amazing experience.

I didn't think coin was a problem, I had 600k in plat and with all the gear in the bank, I was like, ya I'm ball'n. Next thing I know, all my money is gone from buying spells! Haha. I do loot when I play, but man. They usually keep things pretty even, so I know I shouldn't be so broke. I figure I'm just not doing something right. But anyways, not too worried about the coin, as long as I have enough for spells.

By the way folks, what is considered good exp per kill? Earlier I was getting 1.5-3% a kill. Now a "good spot" seems to be about 1% (.9 - 1.2) without lesson or anything. Off yellows too. The Buried Sea zone was a little better being a hot zone, but nothing amazing.

You’re getting to the point where it’s not so much about exp per kill, but exp per X amount of time spent (say an hour or so). And it’s been awhile since i played in that level range so I can’t give you an accurate number.

But the thing with the CotF expansion HAs, is that they don’t take too terribly long. Especially the gribbles ones. And they bet anywhere between 10-20% of a level per completion. And more so with lessons running. Gribbles are the famous ones for how quick/easy they are to complete. You’ll get to the point where you’re finishing them in 15-20 minutes. Meaning if you’re fast enough, you can pop Lessons at the end of one, get the double exp, and run through a second one and get that turned in before Lessons runs out. Get close to 50% of a level in under an hour.

Nevermind. Apparently I missed the dialog from the Gnome who was going to teleport me to the instance. Regardless what is marked on the map for Deadhills. Geez. Thanks Discord for helping me out.

I suddenly feel very much like a noob. So sent a tell to random 120's hoping for on the spot help.

I talk to Teek, he sent me to Captain Russell's location. So I get there, but I guess this isn't an instance. This is Dead Hills, a hub it appears. So running around, I find this guy Gribble. I'm like "ahh" and a quick google pulled up Almar's instructions for the task.


The part i'm confused on. -- Why is everything level 97-101.. probably higher? Undead that see through invis.

There are two things at play here.

Allah is not right when it shows a min level for some of these as 75. It varies greatly. There are also some that are locked behind progression which Alla and Teek won't tell you till you try to go there. Like The Buried Sea ones

The mobs are supposed to scale to group level. I never saw that on any of them at 75 or even 80. Most players who post about how easy those are - are raid geared and waltz in and solo that stuff.

When I was finally able to get into HA I found that the Bixie ones and the Marla ones were far easier than the Gribble and Mad Max ones. Russell Cooper ones used to be really hard.

You can go get the HA without the Teek bonus and they still give a nice bonus at the end. So go to Tainted West Karana and speak to Marla in the camp and try one of hers.

So Dead Hills is a static zone from the Call of the Forsaken expansion. Being 90-100. The heroic adventures that are based in these zones from this expansion scale to the highest level person in your group, up to the max of the expansions max level (103 I think is where it’ll go to for Named mobs and all others 100).

So while you can enter these Heroic Adventures at 75, the zones will remain their current level. And if you pulled up Almars guide, I’m sure you know about “attuning” yourself to the zone so you can travel safely, and shortly, to camps without running through the zones?

.... no. Attuning to the zone? The only things I've ever done in this game after level 70 is some of the SoF stuff and some of the HoT stuff.

I'm familiar with Almar's guides and I know he's been around forever, but the page I went to was from a quick google, this link here.

https://www.almarsguides.com/eq/leveling/CoTF/Locations/DeadHillsGribbleHAs.cfm

But, the Discord told me I missed a gnome message since my text is too small, and I don't even think to look at that stuff. (Too long playing games with pop up boxes I guess). So I missed the part where it said "just tell me when you're ready, and I'll follow you" so now i res'ed up, and I'm back there buffing about to see if he's going to take me to an instance I can do.


Edit: My new issue is that the gnome says "Just say when.." and I'm all ready to do it, but when I click on "when" it says "the way is blocked, perhaps if you had some reason to be there"

Edit2: Turns out that's because I didn't join the instance right away even though it still said I had it. -- Then when I dropped the task and readded it, all it said was "strange magical presence blocks the way" which fortunately Discord said is just the instance loading up and to try again in like 30 seconds.

Man that was painful for me. geez.

So you have the task "Into the Hills" showing in your quest window like Almar shows?

Sounds like you have not clicked on the task or accepted it therefore you don't have it and no reason to go there - the accept is in the bottom left corner

-- I'm in. It's very easy. Destroying 3-4 at a time on this one.

Ya I did, but since I didn't join it right away, it bugged/timed out.

then when I tried to drop and re-add, then tried to click "just say when" it said "strange mystical force blocking you" (which Discord hand-held me and told me it was because I didn't wait long enough for it to load up"

I'm in now. It's easy.

I feel stupid, but whatever.

So for Gribbles, you have to complete the first one in order to get the second one, and the second one to get the third one.

And if I recall, the first and third tasks were the fast/easier ones. So once you’ve run through them all, and have gone through the lockout timer, try running one of the 2 I mentioned and using the Lessons trick to get 2 completed tasks in on the same lessons

just finished the 3rd one. There is lockout timers for these? ahh what a crime. And ya, got it on the lesson thing, that'll be great. They are good exp.

Also, this is the first time i've seen a "collectible" in this game. They're just like EQ2 except bigger and blurrier. Really cool.


and ya, what you said, 1st and 3rd are easiest. The 2nd one wouldn't be so bad if not 4 yellows on first pull, and 3 at a time often after that. But of course, that's why we have crowd control. Just was a wake up call after the first one.

There is a lockout timer, but each mission has its own timer, so you CAN do all three in quick succession. You only have to wait for the timer if you want to do the same HA again. And there are plenty of other easy HAs to do from other quest givers in CotF, so you can just go do those while waiting for these timers to end.

Also, right now, there is a bonus running where all mission timers are cut in half (til ~Oct. 10th)

Staying motivated and determined. So wanted to share.

I'm about 15 mins away from level 80. I need to try out all the other HA's. All 4 of my Teek HA's are level 85, so can't do those yet. I did do those two quests with Quellious and the Plane of Health. That was nice exp. First time I had been to the Plane of Health. First time I had seen Quellious aside from art drawn years ago. She's very approachable. It's hard to see her sitting at a big round-table of all the Gods with some of the others.

I guess I'm doing some SoD progression (the proper way) and will get some experience and gear that way. Then either skip Underfoot and go to House of Thule, or jump back to a bunch of HA's. Not sure. I've never done these expansions the proper way.

I had read, and kind of knew that at some point (I guess around SoD?) the game switched away from "Groups do dungeons and get drops from names once in a while, like say Seb" and Raiders get the real gear by killing trash and defeating a boss .. from my era of EQ playing.....to this probably better way of how EQ is today, where Groups have progression also, with great stats, just not quite raid stats. -- It's a smart choice that made (although it appears this happened in 2007, really reminds me just how many expansions EQ has, and how old it is) but this was smart of them to not only turn it more into questing with appeal and group-game than just Raiders get the gear and have the fun. -- Also, the tasks seem like they would be more interesting than just killing all the NToV trash and then slaying Aary, Vymm, and Vulak etc.

Interesting and fun stuff. I appreciate the help I've gotten along the way from about 5 or 6 people here. Thank you very much! -- and while this suddenly seems like a "Chikkin's leveling blog" .. I know 100% that there is lurkers or later people who will google and get some info from this thread, just like all the other Newbie Zone questions that come up on a google search for people returning to the game.

Wow! I just got the 2 paragon earrings from doing some of the Oceangreen Village tasks. HUGE upgrades for all 3 of my boxes. wow wow wow!