EverQuest: Bones Everywhere.

I saw my bf running around in Nektulos Forest yesterday on his baby cleric, and just had to join in.

When the Aradune TLP server drops in a couple weeks (May 27, same day that astronauts launch from the US since Space Shuttle Atlantis made her final trip), Kasul is going to be playing a shaman (probably a troll) and I’m going to be a dark elf shadowknight. We’d already decided upon a shaman/SK combo, and Kasul was excited to find out that Reddit agreed with us.

It’s been years since we played (and here I would tag my Nostalgia the Guild posts, but I still need to work on importing the West Karana content). A LOT of things have changed.

Just for one example: Looting. It used to be simple: Kneel down, loot corpse. Now comes the advanced looting window, where you can specify what you’re interested in, what you’re not interested in, stuff you might be interested in… we kept getting it wrong. Kasul watched a video (below) and kinda figured it out? I dunno. When you have to have a 20 minute video explaining how to loot, then I think you have missed the mark.

I’d been soloing at the undead pyramid in Nektulos as I worked on my quest gear. As I super slowly and with a lot of death, worked on my quest gear. Kasul joined me there and things were going okay, except for the bright red young kodiak bears that path through there. Or the high level undead that pile on.

A few deaths and a few dashes to the PoK book later, and we decided to seek out friendlier forests.

Misty Thicket decidedly wasn’t one. Not only did their undead (and rats!) hit harder than the kind, caring ones back home in Nektulos, but the stinkyfoot haffers wouldn’t let us run into their cramped little hovel town.

We tried one more time, in the Field of Bone outside Cabilis. That went pretty well. We were pulling and killing. A semi-twinked level 5 wood elf bard was running around looking for a group. The three of us grouped up and the experience was great.

I couldn’t keep aggro off him, with him playing the AE damage song, but that was okay. He was probably a better tank, to be honest. I’m still in cloth armor (with just one piece of quest gear) and am wielding rusty weapons. He had bronze armor.

I remembered then how absolutely godlike even newbie armor was, back in the day, when nothing else was available. This is how it’ll be on Aradune. Tradeskills are going to be mandatory. They are a huge money sink in EverQuest, but I just don’t see how else to make things work.

I remember saving up all my platinum and finding a crafter to make me leather armor when I started my halfling druid, Etha.

As part of EverQuest’s 21st birthday celebration, people were sharing their character’s birthdays. Etha, born June 14, 1999, still a young 424 years old in Norrathian time, was actually my second character. I’d started an Erudite Wizard on day 1. I hadn’t gotten very far when I was urged to make the run to Commandlands for better grouping.

After a harrowing trip through the Karanas, the Beholder Maze and Runnyeye, I came to Misty Thicket and fell in love with the place. I camped out in Rivervale, created Etha, and that was that.

I met up with some other folks xping in Misty (Noffin and Lorika) and traveled the world with them, eventually joining the United Norrath Coalition, my first guild ever. It was the true start of my EverQuest journey.