Old Player Returning Feel Like A Noob :( ....

Hello!
My name is Jonah, I am a long time player of EQOA, EQOAF, EQ1 and EQ2. I gave up EQ2 during Shadow Od, for many reasons. With the downing of EQOA I started woundering about my old account on EQ2 and noticed the game had gone Free To Play. While I can no longer excess my old account (forgot the answer the to SQ), I decided to try F2P and starting enjoying it a bit.
Long behold I hit level 20 and thought, woot time to start doing stuff with people - like the good ol' days. I paid for 30 days and then come to learn that the DF does not work, and the majority of the players no longer group to do stuff. This game appears to have gone from a MMORPG Group / Quest game, to a SOLO/MERC/DUO game. Which saddens me, as that is not an MMO.
Anyway, does anyone have any suggestions as to which server I should RESTART on? Permafrost, while the guild I am presently in is a great guild, appears to have leveled up to the point of no return. Or should I just quit and never return again?

You might try Freeport or AB but grouping at lower level is pretty much dead everywhere (gearflation + mercenary make old "heroic" content soloable for most classes)
EDIT : TBH you can group at lower lvl IF you start the group. Quite a few ppl solo leveling will jump on a group but can't be arsed to start one.

First things first ... call SOE Customer Service and try to revive your old account. You'll be much happier with the veteran rewards available from that accounts age.
Grouping is not dead, nor is the Dungeon Finder broken. The issue you'll find is that the game is 7+ years old and is quite top heavy. The Mercs were added, imo, for that specific reason. To help people level up in a top heavy game. Like the above poster said, if you start the groups you'll have a better chance forming them up. Yes, Freeport and AB will have the largest populatin from 1 to 89. Once you get to 90 - 92 many of the servers have a healthy enough population.

Unfortunately, lower level grouping isn't happening mostly because it isn't required. Leveling is so fast these days that people don't need to group up for the experience or loot. While I wish more grouping occured, this is the reality.
My suggestion would be to find a good guild, one that is friendly to new players and/or has players with a lot of alts. This way you can hopefully group up with some guild mates and enjoy some of the lower level group content. Otherwise, get AoD if you can, hire a merc, and enjoy it yourself

Koleg@Unrest_old wrote:

I figured this, and that is why this was the first thing I tried. As I said in my first post, I can not remember the answer to my SQ - so this is not an option.

NrthnStar5 wrote:

Leveling is only fast for those who can solo, and as I have stated this is NOT a solo game. This is an MMORPG, so I am not sure why they did this. And no, leveling is not fast - it is as slower now then in Shadow Od because you have almost NO ONE grouping (because they dont have to). Also on a side note the DF is broken, because it keeps putting NON-FULL groups together.

RedeyezBro wrote:

All classes can solo. Some classes are slower than others (ie, Defiler, Templar) however most players would agree that leveling in this game is fast. Leveling via questing is more efficient for most players, especially at lower levels. Yes, this is an MMORPG, but it's got 92 levels, and the game is top heavy. The devs response to this is to get players to level faster so they can join the max level crowd.
And yes, the DF is broken, and sadly there seems to be no effort from the devs to fix it as this time. It turned out to be a major disappointment.

25% bonus + Vit in Dungeons vs Vit questing... Dungeons are faster, plus you get to actually take part in something other then soloing, meet new people and actually DO something other then soloing. The only way this would NOT be true is if the Vit and 25% in dungeon's do not stack. I guess this game has just turned into a solo one. Again it saddens me to see this happen.

RedeyezBro wrote:

I understand. I love running dungeons. The Dungeon finder could have improved this a lot, if the dungeon finder worked really well, and if they offered cross server dungeons. But first priority is them making the DF work well, and there has been no signs from the Devs on if this is even on their radar.

Your vitality lasts MUCH longer while doing the solo quests (that often involve killing things) than when killing in dungeons, so you get the 200% xp for longer, you just don't get it for completing the quests. I sympathise with you about grouping. I prefer it but I also don't bother looking for it on my alts as I can do almost anything at the correct level with mercs and maybe 2 boxing. So I don't waste my time looking for others. If someone sent me a tell asking if I wanted to group however, and I wasn't planning on logging in the next 30 mins, I would group with them. I suggest each time you log on you do a /who all at your level range and send tells to them. Also advertise in 1-9 chat that you're forming a group at x level and looking for more. You may get some takers sometimes. If not, keep plugging away at the solo quests until you find some groupies!

I used DF on Freeport early on and had a good time with it. Oh, it was a crap shoot sometimes in terms of party make-up, but that just made it all the more interesting.
But over here on AB, no one uses DF at any level as far as I can tell. Plus Levels 1-89 are all but deserted at any given time of day. Thats okay with me since I solo mostly in my limited play time and don't find myself having to compete for mobs and drops. But if you like to group, Freeport may be better...or that was the case when I left. Maybe it changed in the last year? On the plus side, AB is a pretty decent community.
Raf