The number one rule of Nostalgia the Guild is that we level together and nobody gets left behind (unless they stop showing up). Last night we had the twin goals of getting everyone up to our current cap of level 55, and to explore the sunken city of Veksar, deep beneath the waves of the Lake of Ill Omen. SOE introduced the original Veksar as a free content update in June of 2003, and are poised to do it once again in EverQuest II. ...
The clock on the cable box in the living room is twenty minutes slow; I know I shouldn’t rely upon it. I was trying to be clever and use my Asus Eee from the living room to SSH into my Linux box and copy the latest episode of The Middleman to my Vista laptop so that my PS3 could find it and play it. I have this crazy idea that I can use the Eee to control every piece of electronics in the house. I’d managed all that, when I noticed the Eee had a different time from the cable box – the correct time – and that I was late for the Tuesday Nostalgia group. ...
Come Hell or high water, we were going to start leveling again after last night’s dragon raids. Everyone has been getting antsy about perpetually staying at level 52 solely to farm the dragons. Last night, we killed them both, and have killed each of them three times. Nostalgia the Guild has gone back in time nine years to when mega guilds used to roam the world, throwing themselves against the greatest monsters of the age. But now, we’re moving on to EverQuest’s first expansion. Next week: Veksar, the city hidden beneath the smoothly lapping waves of the Lake of Ill Omen. Nostalgians, remember that for the next two weeks, we’re meeting on Thursday instead of Friday. And that the new level cap is 55. ...
Game Update 47 went live yesterday, though not without problems for me. I was a little apprehensive about the patch because it had consistently crashed my computer when I was trying to check it out on Test, but I patched (eventually) and logged in fine. Stargrace was after me to get on voice chat, and even after all her detailed, patient instructions, it just didn’t work. It would say “You are not in a channel” whenever I pressed the push to talk button, even though I had selected a channel. Midway through the evening, it suddenly began working. No, I don’t know why. ...
After some false starts, the intrepid Tuesday group, full (for the first time in a long time) with the addition of Maromi’s bard, we made it up easily to the third floor of the Tower of Frozen Shadow, the servant’s quarters. Well, I shouldn’t say it was easy. Fada and Hakiko kept getting disconnected. But we did eventually make it with all hands, cleared to the butler room and settled in for a nice camp. Alas, things did not end well. The butler room repopped (two zombies) at the same time Bjoern was bringing back a skeleton and an armored shadow. But that skeleton brought friends, and by the time he got back to us, it was a barbecue. And THEN one of the butlers spawned the Enraged Shadow Beast that holds the key to floor 4, the home of the witch Cara Omica (who also holds the key to floor 5, the Wedding). Anyway, it was an unlucky pull and we wiped. But we wiped knowing the keyholder was up for the next floor. ...
Well, anyway, if you believe what NPCs tell you, then I am solely responsible for breaking Hate’s grip on the natural world and letting fields and forests alike grow strong and healthy. That’s right, that was me. If you believe the NPCs, anyway. And heck, I do! After running around for my epic stuff yesterday, I only had three things I needed – the Swirling Sphere of Color from the Plane of Sky, the Shattered Emerald of Corruption from the Plane of Hate, and the Soulbound Hammer from Jaeil in The Hole. The first two could be multi-quested, so I logged in Brita and went to Hate. ...
It’s weird, but whenever we have the perfect dragon killing strategy, the people who make it possible don’t show up the next week. Last week we used a gnome (we’ve determined gnomes are extremely important as bait) and translocate to pull Naggy’s room and port the puller safely elsewhere. With no izards last night, we were a little befuddled until Callendra suggested using the druid’s one translocate to Blightfire as a substitute, and this kinda worked when Soaridor put this into practice. ...
Terror – if you’re a dragon. Nostalgia the Guild set up a face-to-face for Naggy and Vox with old Veeshan, and I don’t think Queen Vee will be too happy with her progeny. We’ve been tracking Lord Nagafen all week to see that he remained up. And shockingly, the elder guilds with their twink brigades didn’t move on the dragon, so Friday night, it was Nostalgia’s turn. We were short handed and had only one healer, the incredibly overworked Coldheat, but we weren’t going to be stopped. Also, we didn’t have a FD puller, but we weren’t going to let that stop us either. ...
Mayong Mistmoore looks so hunky in that portrait! He makes ALL the inky ladies swoon! I keep saying EverQuest isn’t hard, but what I should probably say is, EverQuest isn’t hard, if you have great equipment. I haven’t put the same sort of care into Sela’s gear as I did for Tipa’s, and it shows. Empty item slots, missing spells, statless gear in at least one spot… I suspect the same is true for the other members of the Tuesday group. This gives us quite a different experience. Instead of laughing off danger as we slice through enemies without thinking, we can, and do, get overwhelmed, and die. ...
I haven’t written up a raid report for YEARS. But I absolutely have never been as happy to do so. Tonight, ten people, level 42 to 52, waded through hundreds of goblins, dozens of giants, and a couple spiders and tentacle terrors, to take down the Queen of Permafrost, the ice dragon Lady Vox. The technique we’d figured out to get the giants out of her lair without having Vox come along worked wonderfully. We tried various pull spots in order to best bring Vox without the adds from her room, and Soaridor suggested the Flag Room, which turned out to be the perfect Vox-pulling spot. ...