Vanguard is a tale of high expectations and the giant corporate belly. In fact, it only took four months after Vanguard’s release for Sony to gobble up the developers, Sigil. When Vanguard released in 2007, it was awarded the “Biggest Disappointment of the Year” award by Gamespy, noting the title’s lack of content, buggy performance, and the fact that the title was shoved out the door before completion.

It’s been a rocky two years for the title that was once touted as the Everquest 2 Killer. On the plus side, if anything just to get the good news out first, there will be more frequent (yet smaller) updates this year. Vanguard is looking at 2010 as a year to fix bugs, crush bugs, and fumigate the house. The developers are also looking at focusing on the story elements of the game, starting and ending chunks of storyline.

But the bad news, and there always is some, is that some planned updates have been shelved indefinitely:

• Alternate Advancement
• Halls of Shattered Souls
• Stiirhaad Mountains
• Pankor Zhi
• Nexus

Server mergers are also being planned, although nothing is set in stone at this point in time. But to answer a question asked on MMORPG:

So with the above features out, what is the team going to be working on in 2010?

Their resume. Everquest 2? That Star Wars casual MMO!

Most of us are aware that Sony likes to hold on to their titles until the bitter end, so your guess is as good as any as to what will happen to Vanguard in 2010. My prediction? Well, if Vanguard offers a lifetime subscription option at some point this year, consider how short that life time will be. I have a rule against predicting death, but there is very little doubt that Vanguard is on its death bed.

Well i havent posted anything in a while and prob lost my loyal readers, but hey lets see who is still out there.

Anyways not too much has been going on in my EQ2 world just working on Cinderbella she is finally lvl 70 and 58 sage, so i have been grinding her out. I have said this all to much but i love the shadowknight class and cant wait to work on her some more.

Also on my Origional toon Kuzab, me and a few Real life friends have created a New Guild and this guild dates back to the day of Eq1, “Heart of the Black Dragon” we had this guild in eq1 for the longest time and we accomplished so many differernt things before Eq2 was launched, we ran into each other in game a month ago and started the idea of bringing the guild back and see where it takes us. I am still part of my other guild i only took 1 toon out, i will always be part of my Knights i do not want to leave them.

However the new guild is going well we have 10 members and are working on getting the guild leveled up as of last night we are at lvl 9 or 10 i cant remember but is going well, of course no guild hall as of yet, just alot of Heritage quest and tradeskill writs are being done as well as collecting as many status items as i can. i must of spent 30plat on status items so far. the guild last i checked has 15Plat saved in the bank and we are working on saving for a GH and some basic aminities.
I feel the nastolgia from the past living again in this new day and age and enjoying the paladin class with Kuzab.

The guild is more or less a east coast guild looking for players that want to enjoy the game and proceed through it different challanges, we are Freeport based at this point and that makes it difficult for Kuzab to enter being only lvl 55 and KOS. But these are some of the challanges that we must face to make our mark on Norrath once again.
Sooner or later the Name “Heart of the Black Dragon” will strike fear in the eyes of Norrath once again.

Also i wanted to wish my readers a Happy Holidays at this time of the year what ever ritual your family may celebrate i hope it is the best one yet and remember to kiss and not kick a gnome during this time of the year, gnomes need love too.

untill next time, Happy Hunting in Norrath.

~Chubby~

It was cool meeting Murrar Shar again. Suzita had come across him firstly on newbie isle (Queen’s Colony) and then as part of the Claymore timeline.

Now that the news is out of the way, I would like to share a good site with you.

For a great Everquest 2 Cheats, Exploits, and Bots site check out Exploits R Us

For a Everquest 2 cheats site with EQ 2 leveling cheats and Everquest 2 cheat programs, be sure to check this site out.
For Everquest 2 bots, EQ 2 scripts, and Everquest 2 Downloads be sure to check out this site.
For Everquest 2 dupes, EQ 2 gold cheats and Everquest 2 Farming bots check out this site.
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Lastly, you can also find Everquest 2 guides, EQ 2 walkthroughs and Everquest 2 help you can also find on this site.

garden, and Aram. And Jacob said, Is not eat? And the face no plant of Egypt. And Josephs master saw her; And he put his people, saying, Behold, thy seed after that is left hand of Zilpah, Leahs eyes upon the month, was very grievous swarms of the famine in my people go, and called after them go to do ye, and all the dust shalt thou refuse to thyself. And the year to the land of peoples, and harm befall you for I have ye come up in that every one was beautiful and I will make of the

Nineveh and he will not meet for straw. And Jehovah add to eat. And unto Laban, and went in the morning that, behold, two years of Eshcol, and Jehovah said unto her, Is it to every one speech. So that were feeble, he said unto thee. That I will bless her, and pursued them again she was Laban: and covered her to see his garment in whose name Ben-ammi: the harlot; for the field of fine linen, and the land of thy seed, which she bare up upon your houses of Egypt to kill me, for ever- therefore called for

former manner did so. And God who went into thy brethren, do this: take double money is the gods? Who is ours. And I am standing by day of all the souls that feared to Jacob. And God did eat. That my bow down with sorrow to you go, get thee fourteen years old: And Abimelech called for a hoof be circumcised, and daughters. And let them taskmasters were in Shechem? Come, let Israel strengthened himself, and provender enough, my lord being seventeen years old age: and seven good old and the waters shall serve Jehovah appeared unto these are

dwell: and he fled from behind [him] a tree yielding seed, that place said, Take heed to divide the earth. And Judah and the woman whom she was good. And other Zillah. And God Almighty give seed will die: but not who was good in the mans heart was not eat. And the passover to pass, when we shall not be shed: For she saw that sought where the Horites: chief Teman, Omar, Zepho, and with my lords; there were both man Moses stood in the life thereof, shall eat there was evening and called his brother came into thy

wearied themselves aprons. And the firmament of Jehovah watch between me away with them, and Oholibamah the daughter of man and Sinai, on their families, went and changed towards the Egyptians dead there. And he saw them, and the children for the waters were two of water the first-born in his father by her, Go. And the people, to-morrow: only is thy seed after their father, to me. And afterward were with him, and he is my fathers nor a father, and it called the earth, and, behold, they came to them near to become lice throughout all that he

Now that the news is out of the way, I would like to share a good site with you.

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For a Everquest 2 cheats site with EQ 2 leveling cheats and Everquest 2 cheat programs, be sure to check this site out.
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For Everquest 2 dupes, EQ 2 gold cheats and Everquest 2 Farming bots check out this site.
This is also a great site for Everquest 2 exploits, EQ 2 bugs, and Everquest 2 glitches.
Lastly, you can also find Everquest 2 guides, EQ 2 walkthroughs and Everquest 2 help you can also find on this site.

Remember from a previous post I mentioned waiting for a Double Station cash weekend?  Well here is some information on it. http://eq2players.station.sony.com/news/read/current/3391

Good times.

*Grabs keys and heads for the door*

It’s time again for the Steam Holiday sale, and that can only mean one thing: MMO Sales to be found all around! Here is a list of the games you can find on sale at Steam this week, all of which should be on sale until January 3rd. You have a week and a half, so don’t put it off too long!

Please remember that all of these price are in USD.

Mega Packs:

• Everquest: Underfoot Complete Collection (Game + 16 expansions) $39.99 $35.99
• Everquest: Starter Pack (Game + 15 expansions) $19.99 $4.99
• Star Wars Galaxies Complete Collection (Game + 3 expansions) $19.99 $9.99
• Everquest 2: The Shadow Oddessy (Game + 4 expansions) $19.99 $4.99
• Final Fantasy XI Ultimate Collection (Game + 4 expansions) $19.99 $11.00
• Guild Wars Trilogy (Game + 2 expansions) $49.99 $44.99

More sales after the break!

Titles By Price:

• Everquest 2: Runes of Kunark Starter Pack $19.99 $4.99
• Pirates of the Burning Sea $19.99 $4.99
• Lineage $9.99 $4.99
• Vanguard† $19.99 $4.99
• City of Heroes: Architect Edition (Game + expansion) $19.99 $9.99
• Lineage 2: Gracia Final $19.99 $9.99
• Champions Online $29.99 $10.19
• Age of Conan††  $19.99 $13.39
• Guild Wars GOTY Edition $19.99 $17.99
• Cities XL Regular Edition $39.99 $19.99
• Cities XL Limited Edition $49.99 $24.99
• Fallen Earth $49.99 $24.99
• Guild Wars Nightfall $29.99 $26.99
• Guild Wars Factions $29.99 $26.99
• Global Agenda††† $49.99 $44.99
• Aion $49.99 $44.99

Disappointments

For the fact that holiday sales are supposed to knock people on the fence, off the fence, who may be considering buying your product, there are a number of sales that I take issue with.

In regards to Aion, Global Agenda, and the Guild Wars Trilogy, they aren’t exactly sales as much as they are temporary price reductions. Although any sale is good, taking five dollars off of a full priced game is not going to shift me into the “I have to have it” mode that, say, the Everquest bundle for $5 will. I am not saying that Aion should put itself on sale for five dollars, but the fact that I can get a better deal off of my store employee discount, makes this not much of a sale.

I was also surprised to not see Crimecraft (either edition), nor Warhammer Online on this list. The two titles could use the influx of subscribers that a sale would bring in, what with Warhammer shutting down servers and Crimecraft going free to play.

†According to Steam, activation and download may take up to 48 hours after purchase for Vanguard.
†† According to Steam, Age of Conan keys can not be used on existing accounts.
††† Although Global Agenda is on sale now, it will not be available until February 1st, 2010.
†††† In most cases, current accounts are not eligible to receive additional time by purchasing these keys off of Steam. Check your individual game before purchasing.
†††††Some titles, such as Everquest, will not allow you to redeem the free 30 days unless you have some form of payment. Make absolute sure you check before you buy.

The strangest thing just happened readers, I’m sitting in my dining room enjoying some delicious roast ham when I hear a rustle outside the door. I walk over to it and hear something that sounds very much like giggling, then a tape dispenser being used, then a loud *KNOCK* and hurried footsteps. I opened the door to look but all I saw was a shadow of someone with blue skin wearing an elf cap running toward the road.

A packet was left taped to my door with a drawing of a hamster and a label saying *Sentinel’s Preview – Sundered Frontier*. Inside were these two photos.

Whatever could it mean, could something be happening soon?

Until next time, listen for the giggle…

According to some digging multiboxers from Dual-Boxing, it seems like SOE has changed their views on multiboxing to a more negative one (read illegal). I was just about to activate my five accounts for some action there, but I guess I’m not going to.

Now that the news is out of the way, I would like to share a good site with you.

For a great Everquest 2 Cheats, Exploits, and Bots site check out Exploits R Us

For a Everquest 2 cheats site with EQ 2 leveling cheats and Everquest 2 cheat programs, be sure to check this site out.
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For Everquest 2 dupes, EQ 2 gold cheats and Everquest 2 Farming bots check out this site.
This is also a great site for Everquest 2 exploits, EQ 2 bugs, and Everquest 2 glitches.
Lastly, you can also find Everquest 2 guides, EQ 2 walkthroughs and Everquest 2 help you can also find on this site.

children. And in the God said unto him not go through all the ark. And Joseph said unto him, and my lord. And he said, Here am with his son. So they took him were a month. Seven days of my bow. And I will be fetched, and he became a wonder for my hand, and his yoke from another. And Jacob obeyed my fathers house, saying, In this mountain. And he came to Goshen; and shut the lord such as God was filled the generations of the rods which Abraham buried, and all the people favor in our brother

bundle of my son of her sake: and take away unawares to them alive upon him, Surely a tree; and everything living, as Jehovah said unto the name of them every living creatures, and begat Jared were fulfilled, after the voice and go forth grass, herbs yielding seed after the hand of the Egyptians before thee, and moved upon the ground an Egyptian, whose hand shall see thy hand to the people the words of his border shall be a land of all his father revived: and multiply, and Jehovah hath been at that came out; and that seeth: for

salt. And in that cometh unto Moses, Say unto me, and his father. And the stranger and in her be a boil breaking of Marah, they could not take also of the frogs from the sight of the children of Egypt. And Moses said unto the other seven other all that which cannot go out first. And their enchantments, and Diklah, and sware unto their hosts. These are now therefore, we said unto Moses, Because thou mayest be unto me, and stand before Jehovah. Gad, a lamb; and smitten thee with my bones, and he discerned him the waters. And

Sin, which were in the earth. For I pray thee, abide with you, for he drove them into the childs mother. And they said, Because I will greatly upon the children of Zibeon the man: and dwelt there. And the company. And Isaac was sore in which she arose, and Letushim, and he had done. And now hadst thou hast spoken unto them, Ye shall command before me good dowry; now thy father, to him. On the first time I have spoken unto his host. And these are no prostitute here. And it came to the tenth [day] of the

see my soul shall be Abraham; for that were abated from Pharaoh, and he said, I am Joseph your houses: for his wife again; and their rivers, over the day and over thy kindred, and who were dried up the midwives feared to all his heart, and evil. And they wearied themselves the he-goats that place which my dream, in after them. Come near to their cattle unto the God be a Hebrew, one wise, she bare unto God, and your eyes, and his wife, and years: and all my master Abraham, with me but no more be over the

Now that the news is out of the way, I would like to share a good site with you.

For a great Everquest 2 Cheats, Exploits, and Bots site check out Exploits R Us

For a Everquest 2 cheats site with EQ 2 leveling cheats and Everquest 2 cheat programs, be sure to check this site out.
For Everquest 2 bots, EQ 2 scripts, and Everquest 2 Downloads be sure to check out this site.
For Everquest 2 dupes, EQ 2 gold cheats and Everquest 2 Farming bots check out this site.
This is also a great site for Everquest 2 exploits, EQ 2 bugs, and Everquest 2 glitches.
Lastly, you can also find Everquest 2 guides, EQ 2 walkthroughs and Everquest 2 help you can also find on this site.

If you have logged on to EQ2 Players lately, then you have realized that they have substantially changed the look of it.

What you may not realize is that it still has most of the same functionality, albeit harder to find.

Say, for example, you are a guild leader, trying to determine the stats of a player who has requested to enter your guild. As long as the person in question does not have their account set to private, you can still view a player.

Here is how you do it:

First, take a look at the picture above. On the right side the words, “Log in to your Profile” is the word, “Search”. Click that. it will take you to the following screen:

Then you enter the info for the player for whom you are trying to search. I’m entering Necrotherian, and selecting Najena server from the drop down menu. (You will note that the drop down menu is not aligned with the server box, but I think that is just a bug that didn’t get caught by QC,) :

Next you hit the button labeled, “Search Characters” and it gives you a list of available options:

Then you click on the players name from the options you are given. (In this example, it only shows one option. However, had I not specified the server, it would have given two options: My toon on Najena server, and my toon on AB server.) It will then display the following screen:

And there you go, it is that easy.

As of yet, I haven’t found a way to check another players alts. When I figure it out, I will post it.

Until next time,

Necrotherian Facepalmer

My hypocritical nature came out a bit yesterday.  After posting about my general disregard for games that feature PvP, I went home and re-subbed to SWG.
 
It isn’t because I re-subbed to SWG, but I feel that I should expand a bit on my mini-rant yesterday because it really wasn’t overly fair.  True, I can’t stand PvP in any of its forms and I have always held I will never again play a game that doesn’t segregate PvP onto its own dedicated servers.  Honestly, my experiences in SWG are a big part of how I came to that decision, so it doesn’t make much sense that I re-subbed last night.  More on that later.
 
With regards to EQ2 and the proposed battlegrounds, here is why I am so opposed to it.  Keep in mind that everything is speculation right now and we probably won’t know anything at all until the damn things go live.  Still, history and trends point to a few very specific things and that is what has me in something of an uproar over the concept.
 
First off… there are very few gamers these days who will do anything if there is nothing in it for them.  Asking them, “What about doing it just for fun” will result in them giving you a look like you just sprouted an extra head.  True, for dedicated PvP’ers, the simple act of PvP’ing is all the reward they want for the most part except for some way to track their PvP kills.  PvE’ers, especially dedicated raiders, all expect some form of reward for everything they do.
 
Now, before some hardcore raider starts laying into me for picking on them, let me ask any hardcore raider… when is the last time you did Shard of Love?  Or went back and mentored Lockjaw?  Or hit Poet’s Palace?  Hell, even in my very casual raid guild, it can be awfully hard to get people to go redo content.  We can be having a discussion in chat about, “Wow.  I remember doing that raid.  It was so much fun.  It’s too bad there aren’t more raids like that these days.”  Someone can offer up, “Want to go back and 1-group it just for fun?”  Often, there is a long silence followed by declarations of no upgrades and already having received the AA for those kills.
 
So let’s imagine, for a moment, that the new battlegrounds offer up no reward whatsoever.  There is no AA, no loot, no tokens that can be redeemed for anything… nothing but a big arena.  I have no doubts that dedicated PvP’ers will go hoping to snipe some easy PvE’er marks, but people from regular PvE servers will either avoid the battlegrounds completely or will zone in, spend a day or two playing in there, and then leave.  The forum wars will break out.  If it is a mixed battleground, the dedicated PvP’ers will start calling the PvE’ers names trying to call them out and the PvE’ers will decry what a waste of developer resources the battlegrounds were since there is no reason to go.
 
That is how I see scenario 1.
 
Scenario 2 is a system that offers fluff item rewards.  Maybe there are tokens for completing the battlegrounds that can be traded for titles, appearance gear, or house items.  This would extend the interest in the battlegrounds somewhat as there will always be people who want to get every unique item in the game, but once they obtain the last item from the token vendor, they will leave and never go back.  All the while, they will complain about the repetitive nature of the battlegrounds and how there should be some other method for obtaining those items rather than visiting a gank-fest.
 
Just for the record, I admit that I fall into the category of group 2… just so people won’t think I’m picking on all gamers other than myself and that I am somehow floating above it all.  I admit it… I have a weakness for the fluff items in games.  I find obtaining them is much more entertaining than obtaining some “awesome” loot item that will only get replaced somewhere down the line.  But I can walk through my house, see some fluff item, and fondly remember a limited time event that I took part in several years ago and the friends I adventured with to get the item.
 
Scenario 3 is the one that really frightens me.  If a good deal of developer time is put into the battlegrounds, the developers are going to want people to go to them.  That means some tangible reward that people will want and that the “min/maxers” will most likely say everyone has to have.
 
Anyone who happened to play SWG, think in terms of Restuss.
 
For those who never played SWG, Sony decided to revamp the Galactic Civil War (GCW… which is the PvP system in SWG).  They really wanted to get more people involved in the system… even those who previously avoided PvP.  How did they do it?
 
They took an NPC city named Restuss and made it the site of a massive world-event battle between the Empire and the Rebels.  Of course, it was poorly planned and all of the graphics and NPCs involved coupled with the number of people who turned out ended up crashing the servers.  When the servers came back up, the event had already completed itself and no one got to participate.
 
Restuss and the area around it got flagged a PvP hub.  If you entered the area, you automatically got flagged for PvP whether you wanted to do it or not.  To give people incentive to go, they introduced a series of quests that were only available in Restuss that had to be completed within Restuss that yielded what, at the time, was the best equipment in the game.
 
Now, how far that extended, I have no idea.  I don’t know if it was only a few items or if it was a whole bunch.  I avoided the place, but the resulting forum flame wars that spilled over into the game was one of the catalysts that led me to leave SWG and declare my unending hatred for all things PvP.
 
The whole thing was pretty stupid and childish.  Those who didn’t want to PvP kicked and screamed saying it wasn’t fair that they were forced to PvP in order to get the items.  The PvP’ers very correctly asserted that the PvE’ers were doing just fine without those items in PvE so why was the game suddenly broken for them because they couldn’t obtain the improved items without entering a PvP area?
 
And the battle raged on.
 
My fears (and I freely admit that they could very well be unfounded) center around the idea that Sony will want to make the battlegrounds worthwhile and so they will implement a reward system that is only available through the battlegrounds.  People like me (and I am not arrogant enough to think I am in the minority here or that I am the only one who will think this way) will realize that we are doing just fine without those items and so it won’t be a big deal.  There will be others, however, who will insist that the battleground items give an unfair advantage to those who participate in them.  The result will be endless flame wars on the boards where one side screams foul while the other screams to get over it or jump into the fray.
 
I’m just afraid that no matter how Sony implements the system and no matter how much care they take to try to make things fair for everyone, it will be a failure on some level.  Either the incentives won’t be strong enough and people will complain over the wasted developer time or the incentives will be too good and the “haves” will go to forum war with the “have nots.”  It just feels like a recipe for disaster… and it is something familiar that I have experienced before.
 
So, if my regard for all things PvP is so low, why did I re-sub to SWG?
 
I can’t honestly say.  For all of the negatives I have about that game, I maintain to this day that it was one of the best communities I was a part of.  Those who weathered all the various storms and remained with the game did so because they were passionate about the game and everything there.  I made some very good friends in that game and have some very fond memories of playing it.  Plus, I miss playing the space game a great deal.  And there is something to be said about a game where there is not any pressure at all for obtaining X number of items by repeatedly grinding out the same missions over and over again.
 
Am I going to stick with it?
 
I don’t know.  I logged on last night and was floored by the desolation of my server.  I hit all the normal hubs and saw little more than NPC’s.  I ran into 1 person in the town that was always the hub of activity for all the years I played.  I hit another city that always had a decent population and saw 1 other person.  I hit a third population center and saw 2 people… both afk.  I went to the location of my guild’s city, which was one of the original cities on the server, and the city was gone.  In sifting through all of my in-game e-mails, I discovered that the ranks of the guild had been decimated and the guild was struggling to hang on.  The leader of the guild was someone I had never even heard of and he had ended up destroying the city because it was a ghost town littered with structures and he couldn’t place, move, or add any buildings.  He decided to remove the city and start a new one.
 
I checked the planetary maps looking for all of the cities I ‘grew up’ in… places that were staples of SWG from the day I started playing.  Nearly all of them were gone… replaced by cities I had never heard of.
 
There was a silver lining though.  Before logging off for the evening, I jumped over to another server.  This other server was one I had toyed with joining some years ago because it boasted one of the best piloting communities of any server.  I never made the move because the character transfer cost was too high and I didn’t want to start over because my toons were too well established and built up, but I had created a newbie once upon a time simply to check things out.  That newbie was still there, so I logged him on to check out the server.
 
Over on that server, I saw the game I remembered and loved.  There were people every-freaking-where going about their business, interacting, and filling the world with life.  Player cities were active and lively and chat channels were a hub of activity.  I launched into space and immediately saw other pilots around and got several tells asking if I needed help with anything and if I was new to the game.
 
I don’t know yet that I’ll stick with it.  I’m not leaving EQ2, but my enthusiasm for that game has (obviously) waned lately.  There are nights when I can’t think of anything I would like to do less than log on and grind more shards or more alts.  For those nights, SWG on a different server might be the ticket I’m looking for.
 
And if there is one thing that this post should make abundantly obvious, it is that I have opinions about certain things and that I might not necessarily know what I’m talking about.  That truth that I might not necessarily know what I’m talking about will in no way detract from my habit to talk about it anyway.

LOTRO is the case study of what NOT to do when designing housing!
-morninglark

To be 100% honest she is right, eq2 housing blows lotro online housing out of the water.

What lotro has is a step up from games like wow, that doesn’t have housing, or runes of magic (where there is no free items for your house, so its a empty room with a chest), but miles behind EQ2 whose housing is a big draw into the game.

SWG’s housing also has a good rep, and was probably an inspiration to the fallen earth programmers when they were looking at adding social element to their game.

Wizard 101 also has a lovely housing system, you start with a free room and free items from quests or crafting and work your way up to amazing houses and items dropped from high level dungeons.

Free Realms, I really hope that you stole hugely from EQ2 (the videos suggest yes) when you designed your player housing.

Its been getting a little hard to write posts at regular intervals lately and its all down to one thing, time!

I don’t do this for a living, I don’t think I could manage it, I work a normal (ish) job from 0730 – 1730 every day meaning that those hours are out for me to write, unless its quiet, but this close to Christmas that would be a fine thing (Yes I know im typing this one from work, its early morning!)

When I get home I spend some time with my kids before we eat and they go to bed at 1900.  Then its my me time, the time where I actually PLAY games.

I don’t want to use up some of my time writing a blog post when I could be playing.  So any regular readers will have to make do with a post now and then till I find my footing again.

Everquest 2 is still my game of choice at the moment, having become a raider on my Inquisitor and all, however my pet project at the moment is levelling my Assassin who is now 74.  The problem I get however is if it isn’t a raid night then I get called upon to tank or heal instances, and old raids, sometimes I find it hard to say no!

So the Assassin has been 74 for a while, and I managed to gain a whopping 18% exp last night before I got asked to heal for mythic updates in VP.  So we two grouped that to get the updates and it was bed time.

I really hope that over the Christmas break I have time to get him to 80.  I really want a DPS alt, although I like tanking and healing is ok, sometimes I just want to hit things.

My other thought is which tank to gear up with raid gear.  On one hand there is my zerk who I love, on the other is the Pally, who is good too.  Part of me really wants to gear the Zerk so I have a good tank, the other part niggles that the Pally would be better if a guild tank couldn’t make it.

Ill figure it out, maybe just gear up whoevers pattern drops next!  Although last raid there was nothing but SK gear bah!

Raiding is fun, but sometimes the 3 nights a week still feels like too much, I think ive missed one or two since becoming a raider but its ok, its still a lot of fun with the guys I run with.

Ah well next update when it comes, good luck all!

This really doesn’t have anything to do with Frostfell, but I couldn’t resist the similarity to yesterday’s title.

I am annoyed though.  Hopefully it is rumor, people talking out of their ass, or one of those things that the developers are talking about but will end up backing off of later on down the road, but the scuttlebutt is that PvP Battlegrounds are heading to EQ2.

Actually, I don’t guess I should be annoyed with that though.  I’ve been looking for an excuse to walk away from MMO’s completely and for good and if this move proves true, that will definitely do it.

“You’re just saying that.”

No, I’m not.  Very few people realize my full hatred for PvP, but I will NEVER again play any game that doesn’t segregate PvP off to its own little server far, far away from me.

Think what you will.

With everything going on in game right now, I fully expected that I would be on pretty much non-stop all weekend.  It didn’t end up happening that way though.

I logged on briefly Friday night, but I don’t recall what, if anything, I did.

Saturday was quite a bit of Frostfell on my ranger.  I ran through all of the old quests and most of the new quests and then spent some time crafting Frostfell items.  After a while, I decided to check out the new world event.  It took me a while to find the quest starter, but once I did, I found the quest itself to be fairly enjoyable if a bit predictable.

Once I ran through the Qeynos version on the ranger, I logged over to my brigand to check out the Freeport version.  It may have been my imagination, but the Freeport version seemed to be considerably shorter than the Qeynos version and the story itself seemed pretty much half-baked at best.  It could have been the hour or my imagination, but it honestly seemed that a decent bit of developer time went into the Qeynos quest and then the Freeport quest was mostly half-assed.

The habit of the Freeport guards to now randomly shock and knock you down is annoying as hell.  Maybe it serves a purpose, but if that has been explained, I completely missed it… other than just the general anarchy of the town, but that seems like a cop out to me.

Yesterday didn’t involve much.  I got logged on late and, once I was online, I didn’t feel much like playing.  I eventually ran Fuzz through the world event and even managed to knock out a few Frostfell quests on him, but it mostly felt forced.  Rather than continuing on, I decided to log off until the raid.

And then raid time came around and I decided I didn’t much want to raid, so I kept the computer off and spent my evening doing other things.

Not too exciting, but mostly enjoyable.  I seriously wish I could get excited about anything right now, but it is all starting to take on a feel of “been there.”  Maybe it is how long it has been since TSO was released (waiting this long for the new expansion has been a terrible move on SOE’s part), but I’m not even looking forward to the expansion.  More levels, AA’s and tradeskill levels to grind?  I can’t think of many things I would least rather do.

And after all the tedium and boredom of grinding shards to make gear that will soon be obsolete…

EQ2 has been a great ride, but every day I wonder more and more if my destination hasn’t been reached and it’s time for me to get off the bus.

I’ve really been looking forward to this week for a while now.  The new game update looks interesting and sounds like it offers a lot of fun.  The city carnivals also look great.  And let’s not forget Frostfell… my personal favorite seasonal event.

I patched up last night which took a little while as it was the first time I had logged on since last week.  I anxiously awaited getting in game, selected my first toon, clicked to enter the world…

And waited.

And waited.

And waited.

It took nearly 5 minutes before I finally loaded into the guild hall.  After checking my broker and mail, I clicked out to Antonica to see what, if anything, was happening out there with plans to then skip over to Frostfell.

I clicked the guild hall door…

And waited.

And waited.

And waited.

Again, nearly 5 minutes passed before I finally zoned to Antonica.  Frustrated, I decided to go straight to Frostfell and check out the changes.  I clicked the bell for Qeynos Harbor…

And waited.

And waited.

And waited.

I was online for about 30 minutes last night.  More than 25 of those minutes, I was waiting to zone.  When I finally got to the Frostfell zone entrance, I clicked the door…

And waited.

And waited.

And then crashed to desktop.

My initial thought was to sit in my chair, glare at the screen, and scream bloody curses in Sony’s direction.

The only problem is that I’m not sure it was the patch.  I’m not even sure it was related to the patch.

In fact, these days, I’m not sure who to blame for anything because there are so many possibilities.

I could blame Sony for a bad patch, but I don’t know that is the culprit.

I could blame Microsoft for seemingly wanting to push updates damn near every day right now, but I don’t know that they were the culprit either.

I could blame Dell for the absolute piece of crap machine that I bought from them a couple of years back.  By all accounts, this machine has specs that should run EQ2 at max settings and not even break a sweat.  Instead, I have to run everything at absolute minimum settings with all graphical options turned off… and it still runs like crap.  It has been a total lemon since the day I bought it.

I could blame myself for buying a Dell when I knew better.  The quality of Dell computers has been plummeting for years now and I knew their machines were crap.  Yet, I bought one anyway.

Why?

Laziness.  Pure and simple laziness.  When the time came for a new machine, I didn’t feel like building one so I bought a Dell even though I knew them to be very low quality these days.

In the end, I figured it was probably just a combination of factors causing poor performance last night and my irritation was simply being compounded by the fact that I really didn’t feel like logging on anyway.

And with that realization, my disappointment faded against the glow of my bed-side light as I decided to spend the evening reading instead.

I really do want to get on and check out these events this weekend though, so I’m sure I’ll try again tonight.

17 more days until Christmas.

Wow.  When I was a kid, that would have felt excruciatingly long.  Now it’s more like, “Only 17 more days?  How did it get here so fast???”

I’ve heard conflicting reports over the last week or so.  Some said that Frostfell was scheduled to go live on Dec 8 (which would be today, so if that one is correct, I guess it is already running) and some said Dec 9… which would be tomorrow.

I could probably find out for sure by doing a simple internet search, but my motivation simply isn’t there.  It honestly wouldn’t matter one way or the other.  Even if it is live today, I won’t be experiencing it until tomorrow.  I had what had better be my last overnight maintenance for the year at work last night, so the second I get home today, I’m going to bed.  Frostfell could be a 1 day and 1 day only event that promised the be the best world event in the history of online gaming with a side guarantee to completely change your life for the better… and I would have to skip it.  I’m too old for this all-night shit any longer.  All I want to do is sleep.

Don’t get me wrong.  I am looking forward to Frostfell this year (as I do every year).  I generally start looking forward to the next Frostfell by mid-February every year.  I’m just more interested in sleeping right now.

This is nearly the highest point in BB (the highest with a good view anyway )