Saturday, June 11, 2011

A Bugged Life

So, the last few days have seen Merecraft and I soldier on through the Swords of Destiny Timeline. We are actually getting somewhere. It’s really nice being able to duo zones, especially when they start to pose a challenge. Mistmoore Castle has certainly been providing us with that with Volt mentoring down. Taking just a party of two through there is only a challenge because there are just so many damn Vampires (it seems there’s so many they have bled over into naff teeny TV shows) and the Vamps respawn so quickly too. Add in to that most of the updates required us to dodge the Epic x2 Vikomt mob continuously and it really was a lot of fun.

I don’t think I have laughed so much playing EQ2 for along time like I did a couple of nights ago. Merecraft just couldn’t seem to stay alive.  It really was down to many reasons, his amazing ability to stand near doorways, healing whilst I tank and of course aggroing all the mobs in the room too. Then there was the fact that I was sluggish too. Quite a few times Mere would shout over voice “Got mobs on me” and by the time my lazy clicks had got round to targeting and taunting, he was invariably dead.

It wasn’t all our fault though!  Recently and I don’t know if anyone else has been experiencing this, there have been some pretty weird bugs in game. The thorn in our side last night was aggro. There was definitely something up with that.  At one point Mere had a mob on him and this time I was quick enough to get in there. But could I get the mob off of Mere? Nope. That was really weird. Really really weird. You see, Volt has no trouble grabbing mobs of trigger happy end game dps’rs hacking out crazy damage and the reason for this is the many tools bruisers have for insta grabbing aggro. Used correctly they rarely fail, apart from last night. For some reason at times they just loved Merecraft. We checked buffs, he monitored where he was standing and at times there was no reason whatsoever that the mob would run to him unless the mobs are using the advanced AI and selecting to target the healer in the group I guess. Or, it may have just been a buggy night.

A few nights ago I experienced another weird bug. I was in Velious knocking out some of the solo quests, which is an achievement in itself seeing as I immensely dislike the expansion. Blame boredom for that one.  Anyhow, thankfully for me very shortly after I had started questing there Merecraft logged in. I was by the Ring Public Quest event area.  As I was porting to Merecraft to join him in Steamfont for a jaunt in to the Court of Innovation to grab an SoD update, a guy 'Greatslasher' was camping right next to me.  Anyhow, as I arrived in Steamfont, I looked down and there was one of the cute little Winter Wolf doggy pets that follows you around. Cute as a button.  It’s tag said its name ‘Ghost’ and below that he was 'Greatslasher's Companion'.

It was really strange.  As I ran off to catch Mere up, the little doggy followed me, and kept following me for about thirty minutes, through zone ins and battles.  I have no idea what sort of weird bug meant this little fellow was following me around and not its master. I did check to see if the guy had logged back in but he wasn’t around. Mebbe his doggy didn’t want to stop playing just yet and attached itself to me for more adventures. Anyhow, it is probably one of the weirdest bugs I have ever experienced in the game. Kinda fun though.

'Ghost', Greatslasher's Companion (AoV Guildhall Entrance)

Greatslasher's Companion, hitching a ride with Voltaan 
(Steamfont Druid Ring)
 
I was playing EQ2 again last night as Ema helped her Dad at Kareoke, and the bugguyness seemed to have disappeared. We had a great night in Castle Mistmoore again, duo'd some epic x4's (which was fun!)  as we had finished the last part of the Swords of Destiny earlier and were looking to try and duo the x4 contested Mayong Mistmoore! Sadly, he de-popped just as we got to outside his room in the Castle but at least we got the Legendary versions of our Soulfires.  Plenty of time to go kill Mayong and grab the Fabled version. Also, later Mere got his Rain Caller from completing the Casualties of the Fay heritage quest. Grats! 

On to a completely different note, it looks like EQ2 may be getting a new character class as Dave Georgeson, EQ2 Executive producer let slip recently whilst talking to Massively.  So that will be 25 classes available. I'm not so sure about this myself. The classes as they stand are a little messed up still since they seem to buff/nerf them regulalrly and I can't help but try to imagine what gap they will fill.  Of course the EQ2 forums are alive with the 'I DO so hope it's the Beastlord' crew. problem with this is that in EQ1, the Beastlord really unsettled the level playing field and even though i don't play EQ1 anymore, I do hear that the Beastlord is still unbalanced after all this time.  I think if it is the Beastlord that we have coming our way that those expecting a carbon copy of the EQ1 Beastlord will be sorely dissapointed. The devs would be stupid to make them as OP'd as they initially were and to some extent still are in EQ1. personally, I think it may be the Beastlord that we have on our radars, but I honestly think it will be a huge jump away from what some may expect.

Another question this raises, is, will the class be the opposite of an already existing class? The reason this is poignant is that we could have level 90 'new class' toons running around within hours of it's release if betrayal and subsequent class change is allowed, as long as the class is an 'opposite' to another. That's a pretty steep learning curve by anyones book. I'm hoping the new class will only be available from level 1 and no betrayal will make it possible for you to get a level 90 straight away almost. I guess we'll just have to see.

In other EQ2 news, it looks like the dev crew are currently looking at mount development. If you check this you'll see that they are developing mounts that might not fly but kind of get you there slowly. This is how the layout is looking from that link. 1-29 : Walking and Ground mounts (horses, wargs, rhinos, etc.), 30-59 : Now also able to use Leapers!, 60-84 : Now also able to use Gliders!, 85+ : Able to use everything, including Fliers! Leapers are mounts that can leap great distances and change direction mid-leap, gliders can do the same, but at the apex of the leap they can extend wings then glide for a considerable distance. Check out the piccies borrowed from the above link to the EQ2 news pages.

Leaper!

Leaper & Glider (Wind Komodo)
But wait, theres more! For those of you who spend what seems like hours every time you create a new toon deliberating and agonisingly reviewing and discounting name after name for your toon, like me, then help is soon at hand. Finally, SmokeJumper is getting round to reviewing old used, but abandoned names. Don't worry you'll get plenty of chance and warning to log in with your toons that you haven't played for a while to make sure their names aren't stolen. I think this is great news. There are lots of cool names out there but they simply can't be used because they are there, unused on a level 4 Paladin sat in the Queens Colony for the last 5 years. Going to have to make sure I have some character slots free to reserve a couple of names, methinks. Good times.

Be well.

3 comments:

  1. Thanks for the help in Mistmoore mate, was lots of fun, despite the many comedy deaths the other night. I was in stiches! Definitely something a bit buggy though since the most recent patch - the horses in Loping Plains are messed up too.

    Looking forwards to getting my glider soon :)

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  2. Ahh, I bet you 2 had a Blast & the name freeing sounds like a great Idea.

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  3. Aye, we've been having a right laugh recently. Usually at our own expense :)

    Oh, yeah Mere. I forgot about the horses in LP being all messed up too.

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