I Was Wrong Twice & Paid For It | EverQuest Adventures #3

[@plops993]

When I was a kid playing a monk on EQ for the first time, I thought blackburrow was like the entire game. I think I was 12 years old playing, and I thought that anyone who could tank a train from blackburrow was like a max level char. I remember seeing some troll sk holding off a train of like 10 mobs and thinking “wow he must be like max level and geared!” Little did I know how big the world really was, and how BB was really just a low level zone

[@IonBlaze1]

Oh yeah, it was a whole other experience when everything wasn't explained to death. Going through a zone and having no idea what to expect.

[@keimahane]

BB was where I first created my 'Train to Zone' shout macro, lol. I agree that Freeport is the worst, they should have left it the way it was.

[@hartdaniel224]

Ion - I played EQ from 2003-2005 when I was in high school, and leveled up to a 65 halfling druid (mostly solo’ed) Your videos bring back so many memories. Please keep it up! EQ was truly a virtual reality for me so many years ago!

[@banshee1020]

find myself coming back to these every few months

[@robertstallings3590]

Dude! So much nostalgia. Had my body dragged all the way highpass because I was traveling through as a newb and thought it was an empty zone… nope someone had cleared it completely and I so happened to show up right when they all respond lol

[@antondovydaitis2261]

I remember the Estate of Unrest fondly. I levelled my first character, Balanz, a Dwarven Paladin there.

[@kirbyrock5]

Just got back into EQ on Yelinak. It felt so good to revisit Black Burrow and thump some gnolls with my mage again. Won't say I didn't die a few times, but still worth it.

[@Sourcecode01]

Love your videos dude, keep them coming! I am an AC/DAOC man :)

[@Remianen]

Eruds Crossing used to be called 'Wisp Island' because of all the willowisps there. The madman was a prime source of WATER. He'd drop like 6 at a time. I'll disagree with you on one point. As you said, EQ had no choice but to upgrade the visuals of the zones. You don't want to have your game turn out like Anarchy Online (great game, HORRIBLE visuals in the modern age). Plus, they lost some top tier talent who were responsible for a lot of their best revamps. John "Kendricke" Capozzi, for example (Paw, Chardok, Chardok B, Acrylia Caverns, Highkeep (the 2nd one), Velketor's Labyrinth, Sol C, all those revamps were his work). From what he's said, none of those revamps were particularly labor intensive. It was just a matter of changing the ZEM, adjusting some mob abilities (like taking the poison from most of the spiders in Velks), and sometimes changing some zone geometry and mob density/spawn points. It just requires imagination and creativity, which seems to be in short supply nowadays. And Western Antonica was a ghost town even in 99/00. My first character was a half elf druid and my friend told me to 1) roll wood elf and 2) start in Greater Faydark. Pfft, whatever, whatever, I do what I want. 😖 After South Karana, there's nowhere to go. Rathe Mountains was the fiefdom of soloing druids killing hill giants. Kunark Express made it easy peasy though. 😉

[@undignified2843]

My first toon was a barb sham. It wasn't until I was about level 14 that I ventured a run to Freeport. The Karanas had me on the edge of my seat...

[@MrThree15]

Loving this series! Playing my monk on Thornblade as well. I'll keep an eye out for you!

[@IonBlaze1]

Thank you :)

[@RichardEKranz]

I agree with the lame revamps especially the new character models from luclin. New Freeport Blows.

[@WhyYouAskingMe]

Whoever made the new freeport. There is no level of Hell deep enough for that person.

[@RichardEKranz]

@@WhyYouAskingMe I'm on Friona Vie the so called "Role Playing" server. I got into a disagreement with a player about role playing on that server and that it never happens, then had a disagreement about the new Freeport zone with another player him saying its good for Role Playing. I don't think current gamers know what Role Playing is all about nor did any of the parent companies that own(d) EQ.

[@jyee4]

These are great! Bringing back memories :)

[@gnomercyplays2632]

9:45 Is that Thundering Steppes music I hear? EQ2 Easter Egg!

[@IonBlaze1]

Yeah I like the EQ2 soundtrack also

[@blarnach]

Love this series! Keep it up!

[@IonBlaze1]

Thank You :)

[@terricolarusso2639]

I heard, don’t know if it is true but, When Sony sold EQ they lost some of the code for the zones, and since the new guys had to change the zone structures. Could be just a story but seems to make sense. I heard that from a guy from Rizlona who once worked for Sony

[@IonBlaze1]

That seems like a good explanation. Yeah I thought it was just necessary to change the zones to add connections to stuff like DoN, DoDH, LDoN, TSS zones. Appreciate how the devs tried to stay in Norrath as opposed to doubling down on the planar & different dimensional stuff.

[@ruffnarbobnar5960]

Oh yeah... I swear I could almost hear you saying wtf haha good ole eq

[@IonBlaze1]

Oh yeah this bandit camp was bad!

[@TheBudkai]

Loving these!

[@IonBlaze1]

Thank you :)

[@Waggabagaboo]

Something that I have been somewhat hesitant to say in your videos because I really enjoy the kind of "playing on nostalgia" vibe you got going on, but the daybreak TLPs have nerfed quest exp across the board. Especially the lowbie 'repeatable' ones you are chasing, which may still be effective on P99. I have finally felt frustrated on your behalf at you chasing these quest turn ins under the basis of exp. I think it really hurts low lvl players especially the nostalgic EQ base, even though both TLPs and p99 cannot match the powerlevelling speed of a 50+ druid. It all started because on Ragefire, one of the original DBgames TLPs, a player went from 50 to 56 on bonechips alone. That being said, I hope you look into the Kunark Archeologist quests when you get there - these are powerful group content that bring purposeful quests into Kunark outside the epic items.

[@IonBlaze1]

Thank you for that. I JUST did the high keep goblin ear quest and it was the WORST exp by far. I didn't know that DBG did that across the board. It kinda stinks. It would make the Qeynos side of the map more viable as an exp pathway or for soloing/duoing. Right now people almost always go Faydwer to level.

[@Waggabagaboo]

@@IonBlaze1 Ouch - yea it's pretty harsh and basically unknowable at this point unless you try, which you certainly have. If the quest doesn't give you a good item or a key, ignore it. It's always better on TLPs to just sit down and grind. I managed to avoid Unrest and Uguk on my Wizard, but I also rode the server release wave. I spent a lot of time in Lake Rathe and SK (gnolls and aviaks). You should check out SolA, it's an awesome classic zone if you can stomach the ugly new Lavastorm. I hope you continue with Thornblade though, the loot rules make this the absolute best server to have box adventures on, and you can do some fun stuff like taking advantage of the awesome quests Iksars have by finding the quest items on your monk/shm and parcelling them on an alt lv1 Iksar - and parcelling it right back! Or vice versa, if you end up race changing. TLPs have kind of the inverse effect of P99 - where they went to great lengths to snip any Luclin content out, a lot of Luclin content is still in the TLP out of era - like the full Iksar Shaman cudgel quest or the 8th Prayer Shawl.

[@Courtj3st3r33]

If I remember correctly, the guards there are corrupt and there is a quest line to kill them.

[@dboydhome]

What magic hands and feet were you able to get so low?

[@IonBlaze1]

I bought the boots but the gloves came from a lvl 3 mob in Qeynos sewers. Shiny Silk Gloves or something

[@Sarnoth1984]

Key nos!?

[@IonBlaze1]

Sony EQ?

[@Melchior11]

Was that gnoll at 11:30 not feared/intimidated?

[@IonBlaze1]

I did fear one. But they do run pretty crazy at low health.

[@emmanuelalvarez364]

Yo bro is this the same Everquest that you was able to play on the PlayStation?

[@IonBlaze1]

Oh no this is the original PC game in '99. The ps2 one was EverQuest online adventures I think.

[@ruffnarbobnar5960]

I havnt messed with the ui in forever what ui is that and do you know if there is a way to revert to the old school spell effects

[@IonBlaze1]

You just open up your EverQuest directory and search for the 2 files "spellsnew" & delete them.

[@ruffnarbobnar5960]

@@IonBlaze1 thanks brother I'll try it when I get home from work

[@everquestfootpad6975]

Plan to race change to Iksar?

[@IonBlaze1]

Yeah once I get the Freeport & Qeynos monk quests done.

[@everquestfootpad6975]

Ok we need to hear your Iksar war cry

[@josephmarrero6538]

Hey Ion, does your dad still play? And if so do you guys play together?

[@IonBlaze1]

Oh not anymore. Never got a chance to play with him.

[@josephmarrero6538]

Oh ok 😉 it’s always fun to play with a family member. I played with my wife for a while, but we work for the post office and now have different shifts. Sucks!!!

[@hom-sha-bom]

Taunt pulling doesn't work any more. There were too many cheaters using far taunt to single pull mobs across zones daybreak finally patched it. Taunt pulled mobs will social agro now.

[@IonBlaze1]

Aww man. That's a bummer. It was really useful in Unrest, Hole, Karnors. Loved pulling on tanks.

[@SMOGDOGG949]

Just one problem: you complain about having to solo but your boxing a shaman?! That is not soloing trust and believe you would of had to head to unrest around level 10 instead of 13/14 whatever it was. Let's be real here I'm not hating I'm just saying it's quite obvious your shaman was created for times when you had no group. A monk soloing is not gonna happen until much later in the game once bind wound is perfected and even then it's not ideal at all. Sorry I have just been stuck "really soloing" not being a box player and reaped the unfortunate luck of not being able to find groups my level to the point of frustration so immense it lead to me quitting the game. The merc option had to happen as populations lowered and IMO should of be implemented WAY EARLIER. This would of caused MASSIVE AMOUNTS OF PLAYERS TO REMAIN PLAYING. I know I'm not the only one who took a 3-6 month break only to return to a server that is primarily filled with characters 15-20 levels your elder, with the zones you need to level in COMPLETELY ABANDONED and alts being PL'd by Uber guilds therefore not grouping with you. That caused me to quit EQ1/EQ2. RL happened I left for 6 months only to return and find it impossible to interact favorably with players MY LEVEL RANGE

[@tabarnacus5629]

What's the appeal man, this is even more easy mode than live.