How to approach Alternate Advancement in practice?

Discussion in 'Tips, Tricks, FAQs, and New Player Discussion' started by Bardus, Jan 22, 2013.

  1. Bardus New Member

    Hi. After playing a character to level 20 as F2P I decided to subscribe and restart my character. When I reached level 10 I locked my AA bar this time to 100% and wondering if there is a rule of thumb for earning AA? It seems fairly slow questing it out so I'm wondering if questing is the way to go about it? Or is grinding it on certain type of mobs better? Any tips surrounding AA is very welcome! Thanks.
  2. Estred Well-Known Member

    Most people grind dungeons. Starting at lvl 15 in MC/HC gear or Reactant if you can afford it. A Berseker such as yours would head to Blackburrow (Antonica) or Wailing Caves (Commonlands) To help you out you can also do The Golden Path which is a quest-guide set up by SOE (though dated. You may also wish to use a custom UI and map program many veteran players use to enhance your experience making information much easier to access. You may also want to use Advanced Combat Tracker to keep track of how much damage you are doing/taking to better figure out what AA/Skill choices are giving you.

    The Golden Path
    http://eq2.wikia.com/wiki/The_Golden_Path

    EQ2 Maps
    http://maps.eq2interface.com/

    ProfitUI
    http://www.eq2interface.com/downloads/info4633-ProfitUIUpdater.html

    DrumsUI
    http://www.eq2interface.com/downloads/info4961-v1.39e.html

    Advanced Combat Tracker:
    http://advancedcombattracker.com/

    None of these are "required" to play Everquest 2 but many players find them useful. As said you can grind Heroic Instances for AA or follow Quest Series. Level Locking once you hit lvl X9, where the X stands for 1-8, is a usual strategy for players who wish to experience more of the game as normally you would out-level quests. There are also AA/EXP potions you can purchase for Station Cash if you are willing to spend more money. If you have further questions respond and I should be able to give a bit more.
    Charlice and Bardus like this.
  3. Ragna Well-Known Member

    For a new player like you, questing and grinding are about the same (without being PLed, using XP potions and/or on a double XP day, any of them would make grinding faster) For "old" players with several charaters at max level, grinding is faster (the "veteran bonus" for max level chars only apply to combat XP)
    TBH just use the method you prefer.
    Estred likes this.
  4. Estred Well-Known Member

    Well said Ragna. That is an oversight I had made. I have been at max level for quite some time and not leveled a new alt due to lack of interest in running old content because there are no dropped upgrades that I cannot buy with my mains plat XD. Guess even vets overlook stuff even while trying to not do so.
  5. Bardus New Member

    Wow... that's like everything I wanted to know and more. Big thanks Estred! And about your comment in the last paragraph I'm definitely the type of player that wants to explore every inch of the game world so level locking with 100% is a great feature for me.

    I do have a follow up question... ProfitUI doesn't seem to be as up to date as DrumsUI according to the dates on EQ2Interface.com so I went with DrumsUI. I read the how to install section on EQ2interace.com but I'm a little bit stuck on how to add EQ2Maps on top of DrumsUI? Do I really need to edit these xml files?

    I'm looking forward to meeting Ole' Man Silvers. :)

    Thanks. That's good to hear so it's just a matter of exploring the content slowly and sliding the bar back and forth to gain AA.
  6. Snowhaze Active Member

    I recently came back and I wanted to do lots of content and quests as well, but I knew I would want to come back with an alt, so I tried to do about half the zones, leaving a bunch that I did not do for my next character so the leveling would still be fun. I'm not a big fan of redoing a lot of content, even a second time.

    I'm also not going to worry too much about AA either on my next couple of characters since you get 2x 280 aa baubles with the purchase of CoE, AA's increase regardless of where the slider is while exploring and killing named mobs (* above their head), so you'll still have a lot when you reach level 90, even if you keep it at 0%.
  7. Estred Well-Known Member

    To answer your question regarding Installing EQ2 Maps over DrumsUI. Simply install it to a separate directory I am unsure of Drums but Profit has an updater as does EQ2Maps. Here is my setup roughly.

    Location of ProfitUI (this is where Drums goes if it is a manual install "no patcher") This is where the DrumsUI data folder goes.

    D:\Program Data\Sony Online Entertainment\Installed Games\EverQuest II\UI\DrumsUI
    - the final line of course is the Drums data folder.

    My EQ2Maps updater simply adds to the files to EQ2 via patcher.

    D:\Program Files (x86)\EQ2MAP Updater

    Is the location for that. Just run the updater. Basically Profit/Drums UI folders go in the UI folder of your game directory and the Maps patcher can be run from your program files just point it to the EQ2 Directory and it will take care of the rest. ProfitUI is maintained but no longer by the creator. It is just as up to date as Drums just some prefer Drums over Profit. Hope that helps, oh and for me Everquest 2 is on my D Drive lol not C.
  8. Bardus New Member

    That's a good point! Although if it is possible I would like to experiment with my AAs a bit too just for fun and to learn what's what as I level up. This is after all my first character that is going to take the journey to 95! :)

    That is great to know (that ProfitUI is still updated). I will have a look at both as I don't know what makes one different from the other! Thanks again for the great info!
  9. Bardus New Member

    I have to say what Ragna said holds very true.

    After completing a portion of Darkwood Light and Halas starter areas while being level 10 and the AA bar at 100% I managed to scrape together 31 AA points. I'm still level 10 and still have 2-4(?) starting areas to explore! This is just solo questing with newbie gear and no xp bonuses or any outside help just plain newbiness.

    This is an amazing chart for levels by zone... so nicely put together. I hope it's up to date cause I wouldn't know! :D

    http://eq2.wikia.com/wiki/Zones_By_Leve
  10. Ghizz New Member

    Hmm, I'm level 23 with 42 AA....any recommendations on what I should do? Grind AAs or what..?
  11. Lempo Well-Known Member

    Fallen Gate would be good
  12. Bardus New Member

  13. Feldon Well-Known Member

    Levels are extremely easy to gain from level 10-50 and 55-65. I wouldn't lower your AA slider below 50% within these windows. Levels 15-25 are the sweet spot for gaining dozens of AAs if you find the right zones.

    I think your goal should be at least 250 AAs by the time you hit level 85-90. But your mileage may vary. See store for details. Batteries not included.
  14. Hawkes Member

    Is there a "hell level" between 50 and 55? I'm just getting to 50, does the xp slow down until 55?
  15. Feldon Well-Known Member

    More a lack of things to do. Pillars of Flame and Lesser Faydark are pretty much it.
  16. Estred Well-Known Member

    To get past the 50's I grind Cazic Thule. Once I get to high 50's I move up to Tenebrous Tangle and start questing. Unless you really enjoyed DoF that expansion is quite confusing.
  17. Keuven New Member

    I am new also and I was wondering if it wouldn't be better, if you plan on buying the expansion, to just level to 90 with 0 in AA and then use the 280 aa boost?
  18. Snowhaze Active Member

    Thats what I was alluding to earlier, even though you level to 90 with AA set to 0%, you'll still end up with a ton of AA's, maybe even around 100 by the time you hit 90, then use the baubble to jump to 280.

    Its up to you, you will experience a lot more of the content if you shoot for 90/280 and level slowly, but probably less than half the content if you do 90/0%. I like that method because then I don't have to re-do everything on my next alt(s), there will still be new content for them to discover, keeping the leveling process fresh (assuming you don't plan to grind).
  19. Hawkes Member

    I'm an extremely casual player and have started a number of different alts, but my current char is the first that I tried to focus on the AA's - to the point that I think I had over 100 AA's by level 20 or so and couldn't spend them all. I did notice that it changed the play enormously, especially as I don't have a source to twink the toons. The AAs made the toon so much more durable and capable that it was a ton of fun to play.

    So, while it certainly does depend on what one wants from the time spent playing, I did have fun accumulating the AA's and experiencing different capabilities of the toon. I would have missed that if I would have "baubled".
    Karrane likes this.
  20. flameweaver Well-Known Member

    51 - 55 Back end of Lavastorm time line (starts in mid 40's) and Sinking Sands.
    51 - 60 Pillars of Flame and Lesser Faydark.
    55 - 60 Teneberous Tangle.
    55 - 65 Fallen Dynasty Timeline.
    57 - 67 (ish) Cloud Mount Timeline (also rewards a full set of Legendary Class Specific Armor)

    Should keep you busy :D - also check out the Solo timeline at EQ2 wikia http://eq2.wikia.com/wiki/Soloing_Timeline