I've been itching for a fantasy MMORPG again. All of the talk about WoW and the new expansion has gotten me in the mood again. However, I saw that Everquest 2 just came out with an expansion that also include all of the previous expansions (and the main game, I believe). And I've played WoW a LOT in that past. There's pretty much nothing I can do in that game that will be new to me, except for anything that's in the expansion. So I'm looking for something I haven't played yet.

I was wondering if anyone here plays or has played. I'm mostly a solo player, since I don't have much time for big raids anymore, but I do like to party up with people from time to time (please spare the "you're playing a multi-player game nonsense. It's been explained to you before, I'm sure. If you don't understand the appeal to solo-players of these types of game by now, you never will, so quite asking - /end rant).

I've read that there is a lot for solo-gamers to do, including solo-instances. How true is this? How important is crafting? I know that, with most MMORPG's, crafting weapons/armor is useless since instance drops are always better, but are there certain things you can craft that are actually useful?

I played EQ2 for a while until the desire to kill SOE became overwhelming (nothing to do with the game, just their business model.) When I left, crafting was still very viable, and IMO, one of the best parts of the game. What I particularly liked was that crafting was interactive - the better you managed (clicked) during crafting, the better the result. I still really miss EQ2 crafting, heh.

EQ2 can be soloed, but it's not easy to solo by any means - WoW is much better for painless soloing, IMO. As for solo-instances, I guess they introduced that after I left - if so, it may very well be that they improved the soloability.

All told, I think it's definitely worth a look, especially if you enjoy crafting.

I've had an EQ2 account since it went live, but I haven't played very much until recently. I just got a character up to level 35 after having gotten another one up to 21 many months ago. Keep this in mind, as I can't speak for any of the higher-level stuff.

For the first 30 levels or so, you should be able to solo fairly effectively. Obviously, there will be a lot of fights that you won't be able to handle, but you're not going to be completely bored. Since most mobs are in groups or 3 or 4, you'll have to pick your battles carefully. If you're level 20, try to fight mobs around level 15 or 16. You should be fine.

What's nice is that there's a very manageable progression as far as competing within your abilities. For the first 8 or 10 levels, there are nice newbie zones with guards that will help you out. As you advance, you can still fight right outside the main town and get experience. Of course, a lot of the zones do have a few "big" creatures that spawn and make everybody run for cover, but there are only a few, and they're easily avoided. What's great is that you absolutely do not have to go through any areas that are too high level for you in order to reach a manageable spot.

I know that you're looking to play mostly solo, but things are quite a bit more manageable if you have a partner. My wife and I very, very rarely group with anybody else, and we manage to handle some pretty tough fights. We've each done our share of solo adventures, though, and we've done OK.

Brillig is right about crafting. It's a lot of fun. My only wish for crafting is that I want a bank in the same zone as the tradeskill equipment. It sucks to run to the tradeskill room and try to make something only to realize that I accidentally left some of my ingredients in the bank. For my character, it's a pretty short run to a bank, but I still need to change zones, which just irks me a little.

Overall, I think it's a fun game, and the only reason I don't play it more often is that I don't want to burn every free hour of my life on this one game. :)

I've played a lot of EQ2 though I haven't been very active for the past month of so. It's a great game and the expansions that have come out have made it a lot better, the newest one in particular is really good.

As for soloing, depending on your class you can solo pretty well for most of the game, with occasional grouping, though grouping will in general be faster XP. There's a lot of good solo content in the first two expansions though those are mostly level 45+. The newest expansion gives you the opportunity to level up new characters from scratch and I've been pretty impressed by how well it's put together in terms of neat places to explore and a ton of good quests.

Crafting is fun but it's changed lately, and in my opinion they took out some of the complexity that was really annoying, but it also took some of the fun and sense of accomplishment out too. As it is it's still better than most of the other crafting systems out there. With the newest expansion they've added crafting equipment in other places than just the dedicated crafting zones, which some people really like for increased flexibility.

I've gone all the way to level 70 with the game, playing mostly on the roleplaying server Antonia Bayle, it's a great server with a lot of good people. I've played a lot of WoW too and I think it's a good game, but one thing EQ2 has in spades over it is a much better and more mature playerbase, if you're coming from WoW you'll notice in the first few days how much more helpful the players are, and *gasp* the official forums are actually helpful and usuable!

dola - I guess overall I will say that nothing compares to WoW for pure soloing, though ultimately that's what made me quit the game. EQ2 has been moving in that direction but it's really a group game that supports soloing, personally I prefer it more, especially as the class system is really designed to be cross-linked with other classes in a group to make the whole more than the sum of its parts.

I've been playing EQ2 for the past few months. I've gotten four characters into the mid 20s soloing. I've also crafted on them as well. Everything was shiny and new so there was lots to pick up on and keep me interested. I played on a PvP server so it gets a little tiresome getting ganked over and over by some level 14 twink that has spent a few plat on equipment and upgraded spells. I finally figured out it was better to sell rare ingredients you find than to use them at low levels and rapidly made about 3 plat.

Now I'm just trying to decide if I should reactivate my WoW account after it's been dormant for over a year or keep going with EQ2.

I haven't played EQ2 but, rather WoW. For those that have played both, are there any big differences in both?

If crafting is a big + in EQ over WoW, I should give it a whirl then. I'd like to actually craft something and have it have value as opposed to just raising some arbitrary skill level.

Crafting is great, and probably the best I've seen in any game. It's easy to make money early in the game by finding and selling rare goods.

I've played for 6 months now and most of that time has been solo and rather easy. There is a ton of solo content in the game now.

I'm on the Bazaar server if anyone is interested in playing together, my primary char is named Furd Terguson.

I haven't played EQ2 but, rather WoW. For those that have played both, are there any big differences in both?

If crafting is a big + in EQ over WoW, I should give it a whirl then. I'd like to actually craft something and have it have value as opposed to just raising some arbitrary skill level.

Well I would say there are differences, and I am really enjoying playing EQ2, though there are less differences than there once were, EQ2 has definitely added some WoW-like convenience features over the last year or so, but that's not really a bad thing. The crafting system in EQ2 is a lot better in my opinion than WoW, there's a lot better gathering system for all kinds of ingredients, there's a chance of failure in the crafting process, you have to use a variety of abilities as you craft to prevent critical failures and get the best results, and a lot of the crafted items are very useful, though this does need some improvement in weapons and armor.

A good example is spell-making, basically EQ2 has a variety of spell "levels" and the effect of the spell (or combat ability) will vary depending on what level you have, when you get a spell at level-up, it will be a pretty poor version, called Apprentice I. Apprentice II spells can be bought at merchants, but are still pretty bad. Apprentice IV can be made by crafters. After that it goes up to Adept I, which are dropped by mobs, and is probably the most common spell level. Adept III level is made by crafters from rare ingredients and they can make a lot of money from these. The highest level, Master I, is a very rare drop from monsters and is always very expensive.

Another major difference is the class system, this basically comes down to the fact that WoW was designed from the ground up as a solo game primarily. Because of this, they wanted strong and capable classes who could do a bit of everything, so they took all the powers and broke them up into just 9 classes. I'm not criticizing this, the system definitely works in a solo-oriented game, but I prefer having more options and having more differences between the classes. EQ2 has 24 classes, basically 6 in each primary division - fighter, scout, mage, priest. Some of the classes are similar, mostly the pairs where one class is good-only and the other is evil-only, but overall there is a remarkable variety, and even the differences between the healers are fun and interesting.

I'd also say the quest system is pretty different, both games have a lot of quests but I think EQ2 has even more, and does a really good job in making different types of them, some are just one-offs but there are others that are long chains of quests, some of them 20 or more steps and can take you over 10 levels or more. There are also Heritage Quests which are special longer and more difficult quests to find legendary objects (from the original Everquest, though you don't need to know all the lore) that are quite powerful.

There's a lot of add-on content you can get, for example the Splitpaw expansion pack, sort of a small expansion that opens up a dungeon which has a ton of solo content as well as instanced raids, with stuff for levels 20 up to 50. This is in addition to the big expansions, I highly recommend the newest one, Echoes of Faydwer, as it provides a new race and a new starting location where you can level all the way up from 1, it's got a ton of interesting quest content. The other two expansions are very good also but are geared for higher level players.

Anyway, that's enough for now I guess.

Yeesh... trying the demo out. Well.. I should say, downloading the demo and the 8 hours of patches needed. (??? :eek: )

Yeah there's always a ton of patching to be done with the demo or with installing a new game.

Does EQ2 have something similar to the auction houses in WoW? Back when I played WoW, that was one of my favorite features of the game.

Yes, it does. You can put things up for sale in your home when you buy a Marketplace board (which are very cheap). The goods will stay for sale while you're offline. You can also buy things at any time from other people's auctions.

As others have said, tradeskilling is pretty fun in EQ. They've dumbed down certain things where common components in recipes can be purchased directly in the tradeskilling house. Also, when you open a recipe it'll show you exactly what you need and things that are not in your inventory will be shown in red, which is a fairly new feature.

I have a 41 troubador and I partner with my wife, who's a wizard. Frankly, however, I like in WoW how you can actually transfer quests from one person to another to share them - you can't do that in EQ2, so sometimes it's hard to find common quests to work on.

I'm looking for something to play with my wife who is mostly a non-gamer. We played Titan Quest together and she loved it. She doesn't play many games on her own (except The Sims and Zuma), but she likes to play co-op stuff with me if the controls aren't too complicated. She has trouble using a mouse and keyboard at the same time. :D I was thinking about trying WoW, but EQ II might not be a bad idea either.

Silk Road is free. I've not tried it, because frankly those games take too much time, but the fact that i have to pay each month is the other limiting factor for me.

Well when the wife gets home from Florida next week, I think I'll download the demo and see if it's something she will enjoy. I would like to avoid WoW because when I played it before I started getting major disconnect issues that I never figured out how to fix.

I've been playing since September, on the Nagafen PvP server. My main is a 47 ranger, and I have a few low level characters.

Most of my levels were gained soloing, so it can be done. But you are better off grouping after you reach level 20 or so, because as someone said, the XP is quicker that way.

There are tons of quests, and a lot of emphasis on crafting.

All the kids in the game doesn't bother me too much, but the twinking does ruin things a bit (high level players pass their money on to their lower level players so they can get the best gear and skills/spells for PvP). It drives the prices way up on the rares, making it harder for newer players to get good stuff.

If you buy the game, I highly recommend you get the expansion, and not the base game -the expansions include the base, but adds much more. You should get the newest expansion, Echoes of Faydwer, as it adds zones for all levels, and new achievement lines. Kingdom of Sky is another expansion, but the zones are for the high-end players.

If anyone plays on Nagafen, send me a PM or an email here, and I'll hook up with you there.

Well, DL'd the demo to EQ2 to see how it was in comparison to WoW. A few of my impressions...

Interface - Similar to Warcraft. I didn't have any problems adjusting

Characters - I like the variety in races and classes. Alot more than WoW when you get stuck on just the few races and classes. The main character face though, are there different variations (I pick Eurdite.. maybe that has something to do with it or, maybe there is more in the real version). I know there are sliders but, would be nice to not just have the base to work off of.

Am I correct in that there are no skill points that I've seen in EQ2? Just seems that you gain skills as you go. I like that better because you don't have to worry about straying off one path and then having to respec because you needed more points in X then Y.

Crafting - Haven't gotten to that point yet. (Are the tradeskill guys in Highport?? I haven't seen them in the newb area just the trade craft tables as such...)

Graphics - Hmm... maybe I have the graphics turned up but, I have no problems with other games but, EQ2 just seems 'frenetic' and fast pace as opposed to WoW which is more fluid to me and a tad slower moving. It doesn't appear smooth but, I wouldn't say it is choopy. It is almost as though the animation was created and certain movements were left out...

Seems like a nice change of pace over WoW though. I'll pick up burning crusade sooner or later but, don't have a desire to right now...

Am I correct in that there are no skill points that I've seen in EQ2? Just seems that you gain skills as you go. I like that better because you don't have to worry about straying off one path and then having to respec because you needed more points in X then Y.

Crafting - Haven't gotten to that point yet. (Are the tradeskill guys in Highport?? I haven't seen them in the newb area just the trade craft tables as such...)


There is an achievement system that allows you to add certain skills to your characters. Here is the Sony FAQ (http://eqiiforums.station.sony.com/eq2/board/message?board.id=faq&message.id=27) which will explain it better than I can.

There should be a crating person in the newb area, and a quest to introduce you to the crafting system.

There should be a crating person in the newb area, and a quest to introduce you to the crafting system.

Said I had to talk to one of 7 people but, haven't found those guys yet.

I don't think you can start crafting until you get off the noob island, and you can't get off that island with the demo. The 7 people you mention are the ones in the city tradeskill instances

There are skill points, in several varieties. You gain strength, stamina, wisdom etc by leveling, and buying gear with modifiers on it. Every 10 levels or so, you get a choice to add 3-5 points to one of these skills. You also gain skills like piercing/slashing/crushing, focus, ranged (bow), and spell casting skills, but those are gained by using them. Same with harvesting - gain by using them. Then of course, there is upgrading your skills/spells. Every 14 levels you get a new version of an old skill/spell, but between those 14 levels you can upgrade the one you have by purchasing it or from killing stuff.


The graphics are slow for me as well, but it's because the suggested specs are much higher than your everyday PC. I have an average computer: 1.4G processor, 512 RAM, decent but not great video card, and things are sometimes clunky for me. If you have a true gaming system, you probably won't have those problems, but without it you'll see some lag.

I have a high end machine and ran into performance issues with the game when I first started playing and then I found a thread on the Sony forums about engine settings. Try some of the things in the Complete Guide to Display Settings Options (http://eqiiforums.station.sony.com/eq2/board/message?board.id=tech_support&message.id=3265) thread. This really helped me get the game running the way I wanted.

How are the graphics holding up? I think that the game has been released over 2 yrs ago.

However, I have played WoW a fair amount (that's an understatement) and have the itch for something new. I mostly play so due to family commitments (don't have the time like I once did) and it appears that this can satisfy solo questing.

What do you all who have played think?

When the game was released the graphics were really cutting edge, so they have held up well, and with all the expansions they have kept a very high level of graphics quality. Here's some sample screenshots.

My ogre brigand (evil scout class) up in the Kingdom of Sky, the floating islands of the game's second expansion.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v608/krm123/EQ2_000001.jpg

My ogre a little later in his career, with a wizard friend, at a nice scenic overlook in the Fallen Dynasty, one of the add-on packs to the game (basically it costs $7.99 and gives you a new area to explore, in this case a really impressive Oriental-themed one.)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v608/krm123/EQ2_000005.jpg


My new Fae wizard in the newest expansion, Echoes of Faydwer, these guys are the newest race, just added recently in this expansion and have their own starting tree-city.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v608/krm123/EQ2_000007-1.jpg

I've played a lot of EQ2 though I haven't been very active for the past month of so. It's a great game and the expansions that have come out have made it a lot better, the newest one in particular is really good.

As for soloing, depending on your class you can solo pretty well for most of the game, with occasional grouping, though grouping will in general be faster XP. There's a lot of good solo content in the first two expansions though those are mostly level 45+. The newest expansion gives you the opportunity to level up new characters from scratch and I've been pretty impressed by how well it's put together in terms of neat places to explore and a ton of good quests.

Crafting is fun but it's changed lately, and in my opinion they took out some of the complexity that was really annoying, but it also took some of the fun and sense of accomplishment out too. As it is it's still better than most of the other crafting systems out there. With the newest expansion they've added crafting equipment in other places than just the dedicated crafting zones, which some people really like for increased flexibility.

I've gone all the way to level 70 with the game, playing mostly on the roleplaying server Antonia Bayle, it's a great server with a lot of good people. I've played a lot of WoW too and I think it's a good game, but one thing EQ2 has in spades over it is a much better and more mature playerbase, if you're coming from WoW you'll notice in the first few days how much more helpful the players are, and *gasp* the official forums are actually helpful and usuable!

You have any alts around the mid teens? I just started playing EQ2 and coincidently am on Antonia Bayle. If you do, I have a lvl 16 high elf conjuror. We could group up some time. His name is Socratos.

Thx for the screenshots. I have heard that there is a free trial, so I may just give it a shot.

Also, with the new expansion, it includes the original and all previous expansions. That also makes the game a bit more affordable.

I hate to be a thread necro, but I thought I'd bump this to see who's still playing. I recently went active again in the game and am really loving it, I'm trying some different classes and as always, I really love the class design. Each class has a wide variety of spells, and a lot of them are things I haven't seen in other games. Currently I'm messing around with an inquisitor (an evil plate-armored healer class) and they have all kinds of cool toys

- a spell that you cast on an enemy and it nukes it every time it uses a combat art (melee spell)

- a spell that you cast on an enemy as he dies and then it nukes the rest of its group

- single and group reactive heals, you put the spell on them and for the next 5 times they get hit, the spell gives them a healing boost

Plus I'm really enjoying the new content of the last expansion, they've done some great things. They recently added a great new dungeon as a free content upgrade and at the end of the month they're going to add a whole new city and related zones as another free addition, Neriak the city of the dark elves.