EQ - Original - TLP Info

[Rumblebore]

EQ Original has opened a Time-Locked Progression Server called "Ragefire" last Wednesday. Only subscription players (paying) can access it. FTP cannot.

They had initial problems with newly made characters appearing as level 50+ fully Geared characters, which may have had its roots in being able to make a level 1 character on old servers and 'buy' the ability to make it a level 85 character with premium level subscriptions. They fixed it and effectively the server was open and available for play Thursday afternoon.

The volume of players was horrible. They had 'instanced' some newbie zones like Gfay so that up to 10 instances of the zone were in play and you could switch over to other instances if your buddies were in them. Assuming there was room.

The next VERY noticeable problem were the Bot-ers. One primary character running around and 5 other chars, mostly mages, following along and all assisting at the same nanosecond with the same attack. Needless to say there were many.

Also people would go AFK and stay in game for hours, preventing those trying to get in long wait times to get in to play.

So it was not very surprising that Friday night, one guild killed Nagafen, then Vox, and later, Phinegal. Saturday Innoruuk was killed. And since then Cazic Thule was killed, so according to the rules of the server, a 6-month timer is active for a vote on Kunark. And that timer started not even 3 days into the servers existence.

Daybreak Games, who now owns Everquest, (hereafter, DBG), instituted a new code to create a login Queue. one click and you are on the list to get into the game. Also along with this, anyone AFK about 20-30 minutes gets booted. These 2 things means you can get into game and actively play so that those creating the overpopulation but are not playing get knocked out for players to have a chance to play.

But now, another nugget has appeared: Lockjaw server is being brought online.

Ragefire Exceeded Expectations - What Now? (Linked)

They are actually bringing another on (IMO) because it makes good business sense to address the huge interest in a new server to accommodate the need.

We can only hope they institute rules regarding BOTing players, which is being hotly discussed in the forums and that such play styles can be effectively prevented. When Vulak'Aerr and Fippy servers opened, similar issues came up and people rushed into the content and it became a race between the higher guilds to push their server ahead of the other.

I think that the interest is great and have a wizard on Ragefire who is turning out to be fun, but I also see chat about people thinking these servers are actual 'Original" content. it is and it isn't. some old-school rules are there, but graphics are modern (but can be turned off in the Options feature) and new rules are clearly present. One such rule is the new "advanced loot" function. With it on, solo or grouped, each drop off each separate creature, even if it is the same drop (such as cloth armor pieces) have to be selected as always greed, always need, never loot, and a few more choices. You have to set it sometime, either at the first looting or later. But once set, the looting becomes automatic.

For example, in Steamfont Mountains there are clockworks you can kill that drop "No-Trade" or "No-Drop" quest items. The quests and uses of these items are from later expansions and have no sellable use at this time. They are effectively junk, and are never needed to be looted. Using the Advanced Loot system, they can always be left on the creatures corpse. Which causes a lot of corpses piling up given the huge amount of players. And that means.... graphic Lag. Solution? the "Hidecorpse" series of commands as hotbuttons. Hidecorpse removes all corpses so graphic stability is maintained.

Now by Tuesday night, the number of players in newbie zones has dropped, which is good. They just moved on to higher zones.

And lets face it, having the server come up right before a 3-day weekend which is right before many summer breaks for schools means this issue will remain around until the gaming junkies grow tired and move on to some other game. But with players rushing to get to Kunark we will always face the issue of diehard high-level raiders dominating end content.

Overall though, that the interest is so huge should be noted. EQ is still alive and vibrant.

I will try to keep folks up to date on news as I can.

[Rumblebore]

I am currently running a character on Lockjaw named Mistborn, a High Elf Enchanter and am having a lot of fun with him. I am in The Faceless Guild, which was The Faceless on Vulak'Aerr when I played there.

[Borg]

Awesome update and news Rumble.....thank you!!!