[EQ2] Information from Fan Faire

[Xaxius]

Information pulled from Average Joe Blog.

Let me summarize.

Epics, Epics, Epics
Trakanon
Karnor's Castle
Veeshan's Peak
Plane of Fear
Plane of Hate
Fully Customizable Guild Housing

There is more, read on below. Feel free to add anything else you heard/found from Fan Faire here.

TONS OF FAN FAIRE INFORMATION

OK, there was a TON of information released this year at Fan Faire… I am SOOO overwhelmed with everything, but I wanted to touch on a couple of things before you start seeing these elsewhere: Please keep in mind these are from my scribbled notes, so some may be true, some may not be. This is just from what I took from it.

Legends of Norrath - Free card based game (you already know about this)

Cards are no trade till you meet a minimum purchase ($3.00 est)

These cards are PER account

These cards can either be bought or TREASURED items from mob drops.

The drops from mobs are on a seperate loot table, not affectingcurrent loot tables

These are dropped by SETS, not individual cards

Once you redeem a item reward, it’s flagged as no trade

Can claim multiple cards on your account, per char slot

The game will initially be 1 on 1, but may eventually be 2 v 2 and higher

Each game is estimated 10 to 20 minutes


Rise of Kunark Information

They really want to recapture the glory of EQ1 Kunark

This will incorporate a new concept…Inter zone environmental Blending

To put zones into comparison…they are huge….2 times to size of commonlands (flightpaths are confirmed)

The starting city will be an EVIL city, at this moment

Veeshan’s Peak is the end game from it and Trakanon seems to be the final boss of the expansion

There will be 11 or 12 raid encounters….dynamic save point raid zones that are VERY VERY large.

There are at least 3 assessible raid dungeons, all persistant… the rest may have some sort of “flagging” or “progression” to get in

EOF AVATARS are confirmed to rise in levels with rise of level caps. The avatars will raise to level 80 with ROK and the loot will be tiered up.

Everything will be x4.

They really kind of drilled it that x2 content is on the very low priority list.

Any group instance will aso be persistant saved zones. And they are planning on going back and doing this to current in game content also.

EPICS are a HUGE focus here….are said to be being made to be the BEST items in the expansion.

There will be two kinds…group completed will award legendary, epic quest reward will be UBER fabled.

These quests will be intentionally vague to promote community working together to solve the quests.

May incorporate raid flagging concept in some way, but not like plane progession. But not everyone in raid will need to be flagged

Almost all overland content will be SOLO content

There will not be any additional AA LINES

Travel to get there will be by boat….not confirmed from where

You will be able to obtain a device that will set acheivement profiles that you can switch back and forth for AA lines.
For example, you can AA spec for raid and then head back to your innroom and get another AA spec to go solo or raid.

Druid Portals may not be in ROK

Armored Wargs @ Guild Level 80

Rhino Mounts

No Heritage Quests will be In game… they will be epic quests instead

Guild Housing will be in the near future (confirmed and shown)

Significant Dynamic Raid encounters…no more TANK/HEAL/DPS

Kunark Race Trait will be Fire Breathe

Karnor’s Castle is here, and in it’s perfect form from EQ1

As you approach KC, it’s a very environmental blending effect FUTURE OF EQ2

Guild Halls Confirmed - SOTA studio is doing it

As you level, you will build you guild hall, buying additional rooms and assigning the room use.

Buy teleport NPCs, bankers, guild vaults, Banners, Boats/Bell travel, Tradeskill halls, etc…

Guild Halls will be located in the ocean, in instanced rooms.

Probably Antonica and Commonlands.

Don’t count on anything till after ROK releases.

There will be 2 new zones introduced prior to ROK release Shard of Fear (group instance) Shard of Hate (raid instance) They are confirmed PLANES

Bristlebane will be released prior ROK

2 layers of clothing to keep stats of items, and also color customize

Adaptice Combat Music System

Exp/AA exp pop up menu that tells you how much exp you gained and how much till next ding

Again, confirmed epics will probably be best items in game in and up to ROK

On Guild Housing...

So we got word this afternoon, (WITH IMAGES!!!) that Guild Housing will be introduced in Everquest 2. Now it won’t be anytime soon, in fact will be well after ROK release, however, they did show concept art concerning both QEYNOS and FREEPORT based housing. It will be completely innovative and sounds like something that has not been done before. Specifically the team that worked on The Fallen Dynasty will be working together on this to incorporate this into the game, giving it a special look and appeal. It really looked impressive and I’m sure you’ll be seeing these images all over the place by tonight.

The guild halls will be located in the oceans around Norrath. Specifically, they are said to possible be on the coastlines in Antonica and Commonlands. Don’t worry about having to fight for prime real estate, because they will be instanced. You guild houses will be damn near anything you want it to be. As your guild levels, you will have the ability to customize and buy additional rooms. These rooms you specifically assign them a use. For example, you can purchase an additional room in the guild and assign NPC teleporter, guild vault, Menders, Brokers, Bankers, Tradeskill machines, etc…. You will also be able to customize your guild banner and travel via boat and bells from your guild home. Seemed very innovative and there was enormous eruption of cheers when this was shown. It was truly impressive to say the least.

Again, don’t get too excited, this is said to still be in concept form and will not probably be full blown developing probably till after ROK is released.

And Epics...

The epics that are going to be coming out with Rise of Kunark is getting a HUGE amount of press on the developer panels. It seemed like just about every panel I attended here at Fan Faire, at one point or another, brought up the epic. These item rewards will be given for completing probably the most in-depth and possibly the hardest quest that we’ve seen up to date so far. Every class will specifically gain their item at completion. There’s essentially 2 types of rewards. The first one is for completing the group quest…rewarding a legendary epic item. The second, probably significantly harder reward will be given for completing the epic portion of the quest, most likely involving Trakanon, who orignally led the assault on the Iksar in the original everquest.

And Shards or Fear and Hate...

There should be 2 new zones introduced shortly in the next couple of months, prior to the Rise of Kunark Expansion release. Specifically the following:

SHARD OF FEAR

-Not really much information concerning this that I’ve gathered except for this will be an extremely high end GROUP INSTANCE.

SHARD OF HATE

-Again, not really much information converning this zone other than that this will be a END GAME RAID ZONE. They specifically would not talk about the difficulty of the zone, just said it would be a raid zone.

They were said to be “PLANES” Both of these zones are said to be finished and they will be internally testing these once they return to the studios. I assume that it will take approx. 5 weeks for internal testing, and then 1 or 2 weeks on test. So probably late September release on LIVE SERVERS probably.

OOOO… you read the entire blog???? Here’s some more information. Prior ROK release, Bristlebane is also going to be introduced.

[Arrr]

I should point out that the hardcore/contested-loving community is going psycho and threatening to quit the game over some of these proposed changes.

Although, imo, they just don't like ANYTHING anymore. They hate that the avatars are scaling up in level, hate that they're adding new raid instances in between now and Kunark, hate the fact that raids are becoming instances, the changes to buttonmashing, etc. You just really can't win.

[Aria]

With all the complaining that goes on between players and MMO dev's, it's really awesome to see that despite all the shortcoming in the beginning SOE is still pumping out some of the best changes I've ever seen

[Sinter1]

Holy shit, I think I just wet myself a little bit.

[Jait]

Trakanon taking over VP? Atta boy Trak, way to take out that filthy Ring.

I don't like that one of the so called "Planes" is a group instance (I can understand it though), but the other 99.9999% seems pretty damn awesome.

[Tananthalas]

I am continually surprised by how spot on the EQ2 team nails down new stuff. While I understand these are subject to change, I'm very excited to see all this shit go live.

[xregg]

I see talk of flagging. The only way I can see flagging not pissing everyone off like in PoP is to just award guild flags. When a guild kills a certain mob everyone past and future who wear that guild tag should be able to progress.

[Xaxius]

Link to Smed's keynote address from Friday. Scott starts talking about ROK at 33 minutes in, if you want to skip the rest, and then goes into a pretty extensive presentation of Legends of Norrath. This also contains a higher quality trailer for ROK than the one found on Game Trailers.

More info... mostly repeats... from EQ2-Daily.com boards as well below.

Day 2 Updates:

Guild Halls are coming - They showed concept art for Freeport and Qeynos based guild halls that will be visible off the coasts of commonlands and antonica. The interiors will be instanced but people in the distance can see your guild banners etc... Time frame - after kunark

Shard of Fear - new pre Kunark heroic dungeon zone is done and in testing
Shard of Hate - new pre Kunark x4 raid dungeon is also done and in testing
New Avatar is supposed to come before Kunark as well

ROK Raiding:

Veeshan's Peak

Volcano x4 raid instances - Guarded by the Ring of Scale. Zone has Flame Spurts, Magma Raptors / Wyverns / Golems and enslaved Iksars and Sarnaks who we have to free. There 5 guardians of the Peak which are all raid mobs. There are 7-8 dragons on top of that including Silver Wing and the end boss is Trakanon. He has his own lair within the zone. Xygoz is another dragon who is sleeping and his dreams will attack you. There are 11 unique scripted encounters inside the zone (dragons) and they've been working on that aspect exclusively on the raid side for the last two months.

Karana, Bertox and Tribunal will be new Avatars. As I mentioned yesterday the old avatars (plus the new one coming before Kunark) will all scale up with the expansion and their loot will scale as well. The intent is for them to still be the hardest end game mobs with the exception of Trakanon.

Mounts will increase in run speed and the Neriak Wyvern will be ridable among other new mounts.

Chardok is in - very similar to old zone and included the bottomless pit.

There will be no 3 group raid content. As far as contesteds go, some will be and some won't but their focus is on persistent raid zones that are instanced.

There are no new pvp mechanics in the expansion

Exiles can level to 80 in both level and guild level although the pvp devs were pretty anti-exile in their comments - basically they say we have it too easy.

Large zones in the expansion many of the 2x side of commonlands.

Fens of Nathsar is one of them. It contains Lake of Ill Omen, Field of Bone and Timorous Deep. Each subset can have different weather and effects etc so a bridge will look different from each side of it.

New Device coming for you home where you can program a raid spec and a pvp spec or a solo spec. Visiting the device and using it allows you to switch to suit your desired playstyle for the night. Designed to be like a lamp you can rub to so you arent always specced our for raids etc... Sounds cool.

No more heritage quests in the expansion. Epic quest development took its place. All items are 1 handers except ranger Currently they are designed as the end game weapon for each class.

Epics wont have unique raids for each class

There will be 3 raid zones open to all and flagging / progression up from there but not as rigid as say EQ1 planes of power

Sarnak racial - dragon breath and maybe a super jump

Timourous Deep was playable - took some videos will post when I get home.

Clothing is going to have layering. This means that if you have a mismatched set of armor you can have your stats on one set of armor but also wear a top set of clothes to give you a uniform appearance.

Day 1 Updates

Avatars supposed to scale up in level with ROK release
Epic weapons will be two tiers and one for each subclass (legendary & fabled)
Itemization in ROK being done from the top down to make sure raiding rewards are as epic as they should be vs. other gear
The new character modeling system is pretty sweet but it's on the back burner as most of the team works on ROK. They did show the new human model and they look tight.
They are introducing a new card game inside the EQ2 client by the end of August with in game loot among other rewards. Can challenge and play any other EQ1 or EQ2 character on any server - Legends of Norrath or something it's called
Grimwell said he likes Faabio but sorry no forum unbanning lol
They will be combining many of our spells into one spell - i.e. 3 priest buffs will merge to 1 spell etc... You will get highest rank so if you have one thats a master the new spell is master Not sure on eta for that
The new spell refreshable is going from 14 levels to 10 levels with ROK
Fighter classes will be getting raid wide buffs soon to increase their desirability to raids (i.e. you may want another fighter instead of dps just due to this raid wide buff)
They may make shards/hearts group castable or even raid castable (no guarantee)
They are redoing the +healing and +damage bonuses on gear making wisdom and stamina matter more and doing the +damage on the first tick of dots instead of spread out throughout the entire dot cycle
The Agency and Pirates were displayed today. Both games look pretty bad ass. Mass PVP on ships in Pirates looks very cool

More (Same) information from another poster...

Legends of Norrath - Free card based game (you already know about this)
Cards are no trade till you meet a minimum purchase ($3.00 est)
These cards are PER account
These cards can either be bought or TREASURED items from mob drops.
The drops from mobs are on a seperate loot table, not affecting current loot tables
These are dropped by SETS, not individual cards
Once you redeem a item reward, it's flagged as no trade
Can claim multiple cards on your account, per char slot
The game will initially be 1 on 1, but may eventually be 2 v 2 and higher
Each game is estimated 10 to 20 minutes

Rise of Kunark Information
They really want to recapture the glory of EQ1 Kunark
This will incorporate a new concept...Inter zone environmental Blending
To put zones into comparison...they are huge....2 times to size of commonlands (flightpaths are confirmed)
The starting city will be an EVIL city, at this moment
Veeshan's Peak is the end game from it and Trakanon seems to be the final boss of the expansion
There will be 11 or 12 raid encounters....dynamic save point raid zones that are VERY VERY large.
There are at least 3 assessible raid dungeons, all persistant... the reast may have some sort of "flagging" or "progression" to get in
EOF AVATARS are confirmed to rise in levels with rise of level caps. The avatars will raise to level 80 with ROK and the loot will be tiered up.
Everything will be x4. They really kind of drilled it that x2 content is on the very low priority list.
Any group instance will also be persistant saved zones. And they are planning on going back and doing this to current in game content also.
EPICS are a HUGE focus here....are said to be being made to be the BEST items in the expansion. There will be two kinds...group completed will award legendary, epic quest reward will be UBER fabled. These quests will be intentionally vague to promote community working together to solve the quests. May incorporate raid flagging concept in some way, but not like plane progession. But not everyone in raid will need to be flagged
Almost all overland content will be SOLO content
There will not be any additional AA LINES
Travel to get there will be by boat....not confirmed from where
You will be able to obtain a device that will set acheivement profiles that you can switch back and forth for AA lines. For example, you can AA spec for raid and then head back to your innroom and get another AA spec to go solo or raid.
Druid Portals may not be in ROK
Armored Wargs @ Guild Level 80
Rhino Mounts
No Heritage Quests will be in game... they will be epic quests instead
Guild Housing will be in the near future (confirmed and shown)
Significant Dynamic Raid encounters...no more TANK/HEAL/DPS
Kunark Race Trait will be Fire Breathe
Karnor's Castle is here, and in it's perfect form from EQ1
As you approach KC, it's a very environmental blending effect

FUTURE OF EQ2

Guild Halls Confirmed - SOTA studio is doing it
As you level, you will build you guild hall, buying additional rooms and assigning the room use. Buy teleport NPCs, bankers, guild vaults, Banners, Boats/Bell travel, Tradeskil halls, etc...
Guild Halls will be located in the ocean, in instanced rooms Probably Antonica and Commonlands.
Don't count on anything till after ROK releases
There will be 2 new zones introduced prior to ROK release
Shard of Fear (group instance)
Shard of Hate (raid instance)
They are confirmed PLANES
Bristlebane will be released prior ROK
2 layers of clothing to keep stats of items, and also color customize
Adaptice Combat Music System
Exp/AA exp pop up menu that tells you how much exp you gained and how much till next ding
Again, confirmed epics will probably be best items in game in and up to ROK

Spell tiers will not longer be every 14 levels.. They will be every 10. Ancient Teaching spells are confirmed upgrade unless they were a %. Not sure what this meant.

Dispatch confirmed going to be updated.
Buff spells will be incorporated all into one cast
Debuffs will be incorporate into one cast (agro issue raised)
It was not confirmed if it will clear up additional concentration slots.

Possible AE or raidwide heart/shard cast... Lotta questions about this is multiple panels.

Some poor concept pics for the Guild Halls from the EQ2-Daily boards...

[Sinter1]

Originally Posted by Arrr

I should point out that the hardcore/contested-loving community is going psycho and threatening to quit the game over some of these proposed changes.

Although, imo, they just don't like ANYTHING anymore. They hate that the avatars are scaling up in level, hate that they're adding new raid instances in between now and Kunark, hate the fact that raids are becoming instances, the changes to buttonmashing, etc. You just really can't win.

You mean the morons over at EQ2 flames? Seems to be the same 10 guys sitting around in a circle jerk crying over the changes. I'm sure Sony doesn't want to lose any customers, but if they have to lose a few to bring in many more who will see these changes as positive so be it. No more contested is kind of depressing, but as long as the raid zones provide a challange that keeps most busy, not a major loss.

[Zuuljin]

You will be able to obtain a device that will set acheivement profiles that you can switch back and forth for AA lines. For example, you can AA spec for raid and then head back to your innroom and get another AA spec to go solo or raid.

They will be combining many of our spells into one spell - i.e. 3 priest buffs will merge to 1 spell etc... You will get highest rank so if you have one thats a master the new spell is master Not sure on eta for that
The new spell refreshable is going from 14 levels to 10 levels with ROK

Ho-ly shit.

Exp/AA exp pop up menu that tells you how much exp you gained and how much till next ding

Let the min/max number crunching begin!

[Laerazi]

EQ2 seems to be quite the daring one these days; adding features that WoW apparently won't.

[cyanbane]

I just posted an interview with Evan Ryans a few hours ago. Explains the actual gameplay mechanics and card types of Legends of Norrath:


To listen online (just click play on first song in playlist):

EQ2-Daily.com : Weekly Podcasts, Daily News about EQ2



To Download mp3 - right click save as:


FanFaire 2007 - Val Interviews Evan Ryans from SOE Denver about Legends of Norrath Details (mp3)

[jayrebb]

Looks good.

Big content and big changes on the horizon.

EQ2 never really had a great "contested content" feel anyway. Im sure nobody will miss it.

[cyanbane]

Originally Posted by Sinter1

You mean the morons over at EQ2 flames? Seems to be the same 10 guys sitting around in a circle jerk crying over the changes. I'm sure Sony doesn't want to lose any customers, but if they have to lose a few to bring in many more who will see these changes as positive so be it. No more contested is kind of depressing, but as long as the raid zones provide a challange that keeps most busy, not a major loss.

A-fucking-men.

[Jait]

Originally Posted by jayrebb

Looks good.

Big content and big changes on the horizon.

EQ2 never really had a great "contested content" feel anyway. Im sure nobody will miss it.

Absolutely correct. Contesteds are hella fun on PvP servers. Fighting off 2 raids while killing Hurricanus, MO, 3Princes, Matron (We never downed Pumpkin tho) is some of the best fun I've ever had in EQ2. But they're an absolute headache on PvE servers. As long as they throw us a bone with one or two, I'll be more than happy.

As for "ubers" being unhappy, ignore those fools Arrr, they really don't represent it. All the folks I know are stoked over this news. Personally I think these are the most positive changes ever to EQ2, and considering all the great changes in the past....that's really saying something.