Fuck you SOE!

[miir]

For giving us expansions!

Rise of Kunark is Here!
To arms! The continent of Kunark has been rediscovered in the waters of the Timorous Deep! The lich emperor, Venril Sathir, has spent the last 500 years nearly conquering the breadth of the land, driving the Di’Zok to make their final stand in the city of Chardok. Suddenly awakened into a hostile world, the sarnak of Gorowyn have begun to explore not only a vast and varied land, but also their own mysterious past -- not stopping for anything that might stand in their way. Will you be able to tame this harsh land, or will you be unable to stop the Rise of Kunark?

RACIAL TRAITS
Most races have had their racial traits improved to be useful from levels 1-80!

Along with the new racial traits there is a new way to see what racial and class traits you can choose now and further along in your adventuring career.

By pressing the ‘L’ button you will open a window that contains three tabs. Two of them are for spending your Achievement points, and the third is the new “Character Development” tab. Check out this new tab to see all your options and at what level you will achieve them.

As a part of the launch of this new system, every existing player will be able to review and change their character development choices one time.
GAMEPLAY
Level 20-70 experience gain rate has been smoothed to be more beneficial, and pre-70 quests now pay out more experience!

New characters who choose Gorowyn or Kelethin as their home city will be greeted with a new, in-game, cinematic when they first enter the game.

Only items in ranged and melee weapon slots can be swapped while in combat.
MAP SYSTEM
Zoom, pan and resizing have been added to the in game map.

To zoom in use your mouse wheel or the buttons in the lower right corner of the map.

Once you are zoomed in you can pan around the map my clicking and dragging your mouse when the cursor displays as a hand.

The map window can now be resized just like other UI windows in the game.

Always wanted a minimap? Now you can make one!
MUSIC
EverQuest II now boasts all-new adaptive combat music!

Expect fights to sound differently based on the pace of combat, whether you're winning or losing, as well as how difficult the fight is

Turn your combat music back on! It's seriously worth it.
SPELLS
Troubador

The daze effect has been removed from Precision of the Maestro.

Concentration is no longer needed for the Performer’s Talent line.

Performer’s Talent line will now only trigger on the initial damage hits.
Dirge

The Death’s Door line no longer requires concentration.
TRADESKILLS
The level cap on all primary and secondary tradeskills has been raised to 80 for players who have purchased the Rise of Kunark expansion.

New level 70-80 tradeskill recipes are now available for all classes, as are level 70-79 tradeskill city writs for all starting cities.

Several new quests are now available in Kunark for higher level crafters of all adventure levels. Speak to
Assistant Jones at the docks in Kylong Plains, and Taskmaster Greeblentus in Teren’s Grasp to learn how you can assist.

Several optional new faction paths allow crafters to assist certain factions within Kunark and earn their trust. Taskmaster Greeblentus can guide you towards these.

A new tradeskill faction has entered Norrath with the discovery of Gorowyn: the Academy of Logistics, bringing more titles for players to earn and new faction furniture items to be purchased.

Stack sizes of harvested items have been increased across all level ranges.

Changes to the crafting UI automatically bring up the reaction arts you need, and will override your 1-6 keys while the window is up. If you want to continue using your old hotbars, simply click elsewhere so the crafting window loses focus.

Tradeskill delegates now offer a new tradeskill tutorial quest series to give more information to new crafters (or old ones who would like a refresher). If you were in the middle of the old tutorial quest series you will find these autocomplete, and you can pick up the new one.

Tradeskill reaction arts now auto-upgrade as you level up, no more hunting in knowledge books to find your latest!

Tinkerers and transmuters now have 6 reaction arts like other classes. These still need to be purchased from the appropriate vendors, however.

Harvesting tools no longer need to be equipped to be used. They do however still need to be attuned.

Recipes no longer yield non-pristine products. Instead, if you fail to create a pristine quality product, your fuel will be returned for handcrafted recipes, or your rare for mastercrafted. More details can be found in this discussion: http://forums.station.sony.com/eq2/post ... _id=366825

Carpenters will find some belated evil furniture items appearing in their existing recipe books … just in time for a very evil Frostfell?

Experience granted by tradeskill writs will now scale more smoothly. They should grant about 5% at higher levels and a bit more at lower levels.
FOUR YEAR VETERAN REWARDS
It's only our third birthday! Why four year veteran rewards already? Remember that you get 90 days free Veteran Reward time for each expansion that you own. Four expansions plus three years means new rewards!
A title The Zealous
Your fame has grown. Tales of your exploits have been told among the citizenry of major cities across Norrath. In the cities, children grow up wanting to be just like you. Don't be surprised if you're worshipped by all while gracing them with your presence.
Treasure Hoard
A treasure chest that symbolizes your amassed wealth as an accomplished citizen of Norrath. Your home city is lucky to have you as a citizen. Placing one of these items in your home will cause all landlords to give you a 25% discount on your coin rent.
Mystic Moppet Billy
All that fame and constant recognition can be draining on Norrath's own superstars. Sometimes it's refreshing to be able to disappear into the background. You can do so more easily with your own Billy Illusion.
Draft of the Skilled (x3) anDraft of the Wise (x3)
Not that a person of your stature would need such assistance, but famous people lead busy lives. Any time they can save leads to more time for heroic deeds and economic exploits. The most advanced adventurers and crafters do have their public to think about, after all

[Xatrei]

I almost wish I didn't dislike EQ2 so much. I always wanted playable Sarnaks for some reason. Not that I have time to play lately anyway.

[Canelek]

This would explain the large update... so is Kunark purchasable yet or is this just the pre-patch?

I like the idea of having larger stacks of harvested crap, as well as the non-pristine recipe.

[Kaldaur]

I'm interested in logging on and checking out the "Character Development" tab. Huzzah for more AA points!

[Funkmasterr]

This would explain the large update... so is Kunark purchasable yet or is this just the pre-patch?

I like the idea of having larger stacks of harvested crap, as well as the non-pristine recipe.

It's available now. I was in Gamestop today and they only got 1 (one) copy of it, lol. Funny thing was they had a ton of copies of the EQ1 expansion.

I'll be picking this up next week (I only have the very first expansion so far and want aa's!) only have monies for mario and assassin's creed this week

Nice to see that change on the dirge deaths door series, I always thought it was kind of stupid that those required concentration.

[cadalano]

This is like one tenth of patch 2.3 and I didn't have to pay for it


*exits stage left*

[miir]

This is like one tenth of patch 2.3 and I didn't have to pay for it


*exits stage left*

LOL nice try... at least EQ2 players don't have to wait years between expansions.

[Aardor]

For the love of god and all that is holy, please don't turn this into a WoW vs EQ2 thread~

[Aslanna]

Can we turn it into an EQ vs EQ2 thread? How come everyone seems to go back to EQ2 but not many go back to EQ1?

( EQx > WoW )

[miir]

For the love of god and all that is holy, please don't turn this into a WoW vs EQ2 thread~

Why not?
This forum has been far too tame lately...

[Winnow]

If this turns into a flame war, my stance will be as follows:

EQ > SL > EQ2 > WoW

[Canelek]

Ah cool. I think I will go pick this crap up after work.


Meh! Best Buy isn't getting it till tomorrow. Will try and D/L, if they still allow it.

[Aardor]

For the love of god and all that is holy, please don't turn this into a WoW vs EQ2 thread~

Why not?
This forum has been far too tame lately...

I'd like to read about the new expansion. I could care less if the argument was brought up on another thread.

[Boogahz]

Any difference between the digital and the store copies? I seem to remember different bonus items in the past based on how you bought them.

[miir]

Holy crap that was fun.

I had so much fun just exploring the new zones.
Man, they're fucking HUGE.

The Overthere area brought back a lot of memories as did the entrance to Veeshans Peak and Burned Woods.
Popped into Charisis and Chardok but coudln't see much more than just the entrance areas.
I got pretty much an entire level just putzing around and doing a few quests.
The Sarnak starting area in Timorous Deep is excellent.

I love the new racial traditions and the new UI tweaks.


Mobs are considerably tougher which is a nice change.

[Ashur]

Is this a good time to start playing?

Can leezards start in Cabilis or do you think Sarnak is the way to go for Kunark fun? I'd probably be playing the evil shaman class (on Guk server).

This is all very tentative, I may get this as an early christmas gift.

[nneenaK]

Holy crap that was fun.

I had so much fun just exploring the new zones.
Man, they're fucking HUGE.

The Overthere area brought back a lot of memories as did the entrance to Veeshans Peak and Burned Woods.
Popped into Charisis and Chardok but coudln't see much more than just the entrance areas.
I got pretty much an entire level just putzing around and doing a few quests.
The Sarnak starting area in Timorous Deep is excellent.

I love the new racial traditions and the new UI tweaks.


Mobs are considerably tougher which is a nice change.

I agree with everything you have said. I do have one complaint though. Pet speed. In older zones, it is not that big of a problem. In the new zones though, little Jabober can get very far behind. Yes, you can always summon your pet, but this is not reasonable there needs to be a FIX. Pet speed should match that of the caster. I got caught a few times last night without my pet near and it wasn't pretty.

[Ashur]

I named the cat Jabober.

True story.

[Canelek]

I don't think that is a starting city(yet) Ash. However, this is an excellent time to start playing! Definately go to Guk--more than happy to help out! I am still pretty new as well, but it is fun!

[Fash]

Makes me want to re-sub and check it out...

[Kwonryu DragonFist]

Permafrost is the place for all re-subbers!

[Ashur]

So is this new package like EverQuest Evolutions with all content to date? Or do you still have other stuff to buy?

[Canelek]

So is this new package like EverQuest Evolutions with all content to date? Or do you still have other stuff to buy?

It will have every expansion included, which is nice!

[Ashur]

Is "every expansion" = "everything"? I thought I saw some adventure packs or other content for sale some time ago in addition to the expansions. If not included, are they important?

[Boogahz]

It includes the expansions and the adventure packs

[Ashur]

Sweet. Well, I guess this will be my Christmas present and I'll pray my PC/video card is up to the task.

[Canelek]

Not sure what requirements are. Runs great on my laptop...

[Funkmasterr]

My cheap ass XFX 128 mb card from like 5 years ago is having a tough time. It plays fine, but sporadically (sometimes it will happen a few times in a day, hasn't happened now in over a week) my screen will go black, monitor will lose signal, then regain signal but monitor stays black. I need to buy a new video card sometime after christmas is done

[Al]

Huzzah for more AA points!

Unless you already had 100... I thought they were taking it to 150AP or something like that. Of course, I also thought I read somewhere that there would be an extra character slot added as well. I guess I thought wrong.

Edit: Upon reaching level 70 the maximum AP becomes 140, so they did raise that, but I still haven't seen my extra character slot...

[Niffoni]

Damn this expansion's fun so far.

EQ2's system reqs are retarded for a game that's 3 years old though. It won't reach full potential on almost any system because so much is tied to the CPU. My Intel 6600 dual core is sobbing to itself while my 8800 video card sighs in boredom.