test patch notes

[Tony]

Welcome to the Test Server!

The Test Server is updated frequently with changes, new content or new
features that may or may not make it to the Live servers.

To report a bug, please use the /bug command in game. The /bug reports
allow us to collect, properly categorize, and track bug report
information in a bug database. If you have additional information to
submit that cannot be detailed in the bug reports, like screenshots,
diagrams, etc., then please be sure to include a link to where the
information can be found in your /bug report, i.e. if you have posted a
screenshot on the forums.

Tips on Submitting Bug Reports


4/10/2008

*** Test Server Update ***

Here is a list of some of our more visible changes that have been made
with this update.


*** Highlights ***

- The 10th Veteran Reward, Summon Resupply Agent, is now available!

- Type 3 augmentations are now available. Check your local Faydwer
faction vendor!

- Alternate Advancement experience has been accelerated significantly
for those with fewer AAs spent and will scale back down to the normal
rate as more AAs are earned.

- The experience gained formulas have been modified to present players
with a much smoother increase in the number of kills required to
progress through a level as they gain more levels. This change has the
side effect of reducing the number of kills required to gain a level in
certain scenarios between levels 50 and 75.

- All keyed zones from the Ruins of Kunark, Scars of Velious, Shadows of
Luclin, Planes of Power, Gates of Discord, Omens of War, Depths of
Darkhollow, and Prophecy of Ro have had their key/flag requirements
modified. All players that have obtained the key/flag will still be
allowed entry into the zones, as will players that have met minimum
level requirements for the zones. The minimum level requirements are as
follows:

Required Level 46

* The Howling Stones
* Old Sebilis
* Skyshrine


Required Level 55

* Veeshan's Peak
* Vex Thal
* Locked areas of the Temple of Ssraeshza


Required level 57

* Bastion of Thunder
* Halls of Honor
* The Temple of Marr
* Tower of Solusek Ro
* Drunder, The Fortress of Zek


Required Level 60

* Plane of Water
* Plane of Air
* Plane of Fire
* Plane of Earth
* Ikkinz
* Uqua
* Yxtta
* Kodtaz


Required Level 62

* Plane of Time
* Inktuta
* Qvic


Required Level 65

* Txevu
* Tacvi


Required Level 68

* Anquish


Required Level 70

* Dreadspire
* Demiplane of Blood


Required Level 72

* Theater of Blood
* Deathknell


*** Items ***

- The engineer steamworks that work within the guardian have developed
devices that help them move within the beast. Fortunately for
adventurers they can be a bit absent minded about them and adventures
can find them lying about.
- A vial of raging heartblood is not as vile as it was previously.


*** Spells ***

- Secrets of Faydwer's Talisman of the Puma has been renamed to Talisman
of the Cougar.
- Cast time on Quellious' Word of Tranquility has been reduced from 4 to
2 seconds.
- The Adrenal Boost focus effect has been changed to Life Line, which is
a mana cost reduction on Pure Life.
- The Closefisted Claw focus effect has been changed to Ethereal Breath,
which is a damage increase on Ethereal Conflagration.
- Breastplate worn effects that enhanced one rank of a spell or
discipline now enhance all three ranks.
- Reuse time reduction bonus on Assassin's Efficacy, Impenetrable Body,
and Fit of Berserking Rage have been set to 25%.
- The Rage of Tri'Qaras effect triggered from Bulwark of Tri'Qaras is
now a damage bonus that stacks with other effects.
- The recourse from the Challenge for Honor line will now appear in the
bard buff box.
- The Vinelash Ensnare effect triggered from Vinelash Cascade will no
longer overwrite Entrap.
- The efficiency of Secrets of Faydwer direct damage spells now scales
up on higher ranks of the same spell.


*** NPC ***

- Halima in Crescent Reach can now be found in the find window.
- Henrik O`Danos no longer sells Hypericum twice.


*** Quests & Events ***

- Rylin Coil will now show and give all three tinkering mastery books
for the tinkering mastery quest.


*** AA ***

- Increased the range of the Wrath of the Wild AA line to match other
Damage Shield spells that Druids have.
- Increased the hitpoints and resists of all "Wards" for all classes to
make them better able to resist ambient damage while performing the
tasks the abilities were created for.


*** Miscellaneous ***

- Hidden corpses should now be hidden properly when entering proximity.
- The 'pop in' delay of hidden corpses when entering proximity should no
longer exist.
- /who corpse should now properly display player corpses in zone.
- Changed NPC summon behavior to summon the player right in front of
their current heading at 1/2 their melee range. Calculations used to
determine when the NPC should summon have been made a bit more accurate.
Please let us know if you experience any odd behavior when being
summoned, either problems with being placed in geometry or some other
location that seems incorrect. Also let us know if an NPC summons when
it still seems like you are in its melee range.
- Pet Hold should no longer prevent the pet from attacking when it is
ordered to attack.
- Iksar should now be able to receive a cap increase after purchasing AA.
- Corrected a problem with hate generation from skill attack abilities
such as Hail of Arrows and Decimator's Volley. They were generating
considerably more hate than they should and have been returned to their
previous, lower hate generation.


- The EverQuest Team

[the wharf rat]

Post by Tony
- Alternate Advancement experience has been accelerated significantly
for those with fewer AAs spent and will scale back down to the normal
rate as more AAs are earned.
- The experience gained formulas have been modified to present players
with a much smoother increase in the number of kills required to

Well, ok, enough is enough :-) Why not just add a parameter to
eqgame.exe: "eqgame.exe --character_levels=80" so no one would need to
bother will all that messy leveling at all? Heck, they could make it
dynamic: /level 80

I used to love 1st person shooters like serious sam and unreal,
but was absolutely terrible at them. So I'd get the cheat codes and grant
myself max weapons and so on just so I could run around and blast stuff.
It was fun but, well, mindless...

Post by Tony
- Secrets of Faydwer's Talisman of the Puma has been renamed to Talisman
of the Cougar.

Not Talisman of the Torino? (FMC joke... :-)

Post by Tony
Please let us know if you experience any odd behavior when being
summoned,

Well, for some reason I keep dieing...

[Vladesch]

Post by the wharf rat
Well, ok, enough is enough :-) Why not just add a parameter to
eqgame.exe: "eqgame.exe --character_levels=80" so no one would need to
bother will all that messy leveling at all? Heck, they could make it
dynamic: /level 80

because very few people are going to grind out 80 levels essentially solo to
join (or find) their friends.
I doubt this is a change they would make if their membership was steady or
increasing. Kind of an act of desperation.

Bit like the unlocked zones, which goes against everything they have
believed in for the last 8 years.

I have my doubts if its going to help them much.

[the wharf rat]

Post by Vladesch
because very few people are going to grind out 80 levels essentially solo to
join (or find) their friends.

Well, gee, if they have friends they don't NEED to solo. 2 level
80 friends could PL you to 75 in 3 days (maybe). I really see this
particular change aimed at the same class of "new" players who beg
for stuff in the bazaar or send random tells asking you to PL them.

The unlocked zones is good, I think, since it lets people who've
soloed a necro to 80 and 600 AA's over a couple of years get a look at
the rest of the world. Granting new characters a bye for 25 levels is
simply a mob too far IMHO.

Post by Vladesch
I doubt this is a change they would make if their membership was steady or
increasing. Kind of an act of desperation.

Well, yeah, I wish they could just make the lower levels more
fun so people would WANT to start new chars. There's no longer any
possibility of childhood on EQ and that sucks.

And a lot of the changes they make are "yeah, well, ok, no more
game until 75" rather than "let's make level 20 fun again!".

Post by Vladesch
I have my doubts if its going to help them much.

I'll play as long as the servers are up. I just like to kite
I guess. Never got much out of that whole group thing except complaints
about drawing aggro.

[Richard Carpenter]

Post by the wharf rat

Post by Vladesch
because very few people are going to grind out 80 levels essentially solo to
join (or find) their friends.

Well, gee, if they have friends they don't NEED to solo. 2 level
80 friends could PL you to 75 in 3 days (maybe). I really see this
particular change aimed at the same class of "new" players who beg
for stuff in the bazaar or send random tells asking you to PL them.

Getting PL'ed to 80 is different from making the non-PL route a bit less of
a chore how, exactly? You're suggestion completely supports their changes.
The game has moved to the 60's and up demographic. Throwing a bone to
players who lack the "luxury" of a level 80 PL team makes perfect sense.
Funny how on one hand you endorse PL'ing someone to 80, yet on the other
hand criticize those who would ask for it. Not exactly consistent with the
purist view you seem to support.

Post by the wharf rat
The unlocked zones is good, I think, since it lets people who've
soloed a necro to 80 and 600 AA's over a couple of years get a look at
the rest of the world. Granting new characters a bye for 25 levels is
simply a mob too far IMHO.

More than that it lets people of appropriate level access the content they
would otherwise not have a chance to see.

Post by the wharf rat

Post by Vladesch
I doubt this is a change they would make if their membership was steady or
increasing. Kind of an act of desperation.

Well, yeah, I wish they could just make the lower levels more
fun so people would WANT to start new chars. There's no longer any
possibility of childhood on EQ and that sucks.

Well, I've got to hand it to them. They tried with TSS. Unfortunately their
earlier efforts being almost exclusively directed toward the end game
created a gap between the lower levels and the other 90% of the player base
that sprucing up the early levels just can't do much to close.

Post by the wharf rat
And a lot of the changes they make are "yeah, well, ok, no more
game until 75" rather than "let's make level 20 fun again!".

I would tend to agree.

[Vladesch]

Post by the wharf rat

Post by Vladesch
because very few people are going to grind out 80 levels essentially solo to
join (or find) their friends.

Well, gee, if they have friends they don't NEED to solo. 2 level
80 friends could PL you to 75 in 3 days (maybe). I really see this
particular change aimed at the same class of "new" players who beg
for stuff in the bazaar or send random tells asking you to PL them.

Pretty lucky new player you envisage who has two level 80 friends and
prepared to spend 3 long days PL'ing them.
Face it, for the majority of new players, they wont know anyone and wont see
anyone (pretty much) in the zones they go to.

Heck back in 2004 when I levelled up my last alt, all the zones were empty.
Even when I got up to my 40's and 50's, once (extremely) popular zones like
karnors castle and velks lab were totally empty.
Places like aviak city in SK used to be so busy you had to fight for pulls.
That was totally deserted too.

I can just imagine its got worse since then.

Post by the wharf rat
Well, yeah, I wish they could just make the lower levels more
fun so people would WANT to start new chars. There's no longer any
possibility of childhood on EQ and that sucks.
And a lot of the changes they make are "yeah, well, ok, no more
game until 75" rather than "let's make level 20 fun again!".

I dont think that theres anything unfun about the game at 20, just that the
zones are deserted. Im not sure why EQ is such a top heavy game. WOW hasn't
been going as long of course, but for almost 4 years into existence its
playerbase seems a lot more spread out than EQ was at 4 years in. Most of
the early zones are still packed with players.

[murdocj]

Post by Vladesch

Post by the wharf rat

Post by Vladesch
because very few people are going to grind out 80 levels essentially solo to
join (or find) their friends.

Well, gee, if they have friends they don't NEED to solo. 2 level
80 friends could PL you to 75 in 3 days (maybe). I really see this
particular change aimed at the same class of "new" players who beg
for stuff in the bazaar or send random tells asking you to PL them.

Pretty lucky new player you envisage who has two level 80 friends and
prepared to spend 3 long days PL'ing them.
Face it, for the majority of new players, they wont know anyone and wont see
anyone (pretty much) in the zones they go to.
Heck back in 2004 when I levelled up my last alt, all the zones were empty.
Even when I got up to my 40's and 50's, once (extremely) popular zones like
karnors castle and velks lab were totally empty.
Places like aviak city in SK used to be so busy you had to fight for pulls.
That was totally deserted too.
I can just imagine its got worse since then.

Post by the wharf rat
Well, yeah, I wish they could just make the lower levels more
fun so people would WANT to start new chars. There's no longer any
possibility of childhood on EQ and that sucks.
And a lot of the changes they make are "yeah, well, ok, no more
game until 75" rather than "let's make level 20 fun again!".

I dont think that theres anything unfun about the game at 20, just that the
zones are deserted. Im not sure why EQ is such a top heavy game. WOW hasn't
been going as long of course, but for almost 4 years into existence its
playerbase seems a lot more spread out than EQ was at 4 years in. Most of
the early zones are still packed with players.

I'm sure some of it is just the fact that WoW hasn't been around as
long. And part of it is that Blizzard did a good job of making the
classes unique, which makes playing alts more attractive, just like
they managed to make the different races very unique in Starcraft.

Even with two level 70s I still sometimes get surprised by the
abilities of my comrades. I'm sure over the next few years I'm going
to be spending time with a lot of lower level chars, just to see how
their classes play.

[Tim Smith]

Post by murdocj

Post by Vladesch
I dont think that theres anything unfun about the game at 20, just that the
zones are deserted. Im not sure why EQ is such a top heavy game. WOW hasn't
been going as long of course, but for almost 4 years into existence its
playerbase seems a lot more spread out than EQ was at 4 years in. Most of
the early zones are still packed with players.

I'm sure some of it is just the fact that WoW hasn't been around as
long. And part of it is that Blizzard did a good job of making the
classes unique, which makes playing alts more attractive, just like
they managed to make the different races very unique in Starcraft.

Another major factor is that WoW has a lot more players than EQ ever
had. It's drawing from a wider base, so has a lot more casual players,
who level slower. That's going to account for a lot of the bigger
spread you find in WoW.

Another factor is Sony's emphasis on grouping. By making it so you
needed to group (or raid) to get good items and spells, and making it so
even leveling was hard solo for many classes, Sony pretty much
guaranteed that only hard-core players would stick with EQ. Hard-core
players, when they make alts, just don't tend to linger around at level
20. They want to get up to where their alt is near their main, so they
can participate in all their guild events with either.

A third difference is the pace of EQ at the lower levels. My main
character was a Dark Elf Wizard, so he spent his early levels in
Nektulos, East Commons, and then West Commons. That was fun,
interesting, and exciting. But because of the slow pace of EQ, that
character pretty much exhausted those zones for me. Doing any alts in
those zones would have been boring. In WoW, on the other hand, I've
noticed that at the low levels, I level out of a zone well before
exhausting all the mysteries of that zone. Another alt or two in that
same area is fine. (Part of this is because WoW has an ungodly number
of interesting quests, and quests give good experience, so I don't think
it is possible to do all the interesting quests in an area without
leveling out just from quest experience!).

[Richard Carpenter]

Post by Vladesch

Post by the wharf rat
Well, ok, enough is enough :-) Why not just add a parameter to
eqgame.exe: "eqgame.exe --character_levels=80" so no one would need to
bother will all that messy leveling at all? Heck, they could make it
dynamic: /level 80

because very few people are going to grind out 80 levels essentially solo
to join (or find) their friends.
I doubt this is a change they would make if their membership was steady or
increasing. Kind of an act of desperation.

I don't think so. I think it's just a natural progression of the game. The
level grind has gotten long enough that they have to make these sorts of
changes to make it even somewhat bearable to undertake.

[DanD]

Type 3 augmentations are now available. Check your local Faydwer
faction vendor!


Who needs this type of aug?Seems to me just LDoN items use these and no one
does these any more.My Glossy silk items need some type 13 augs,wish that
was what they were talking about.

DanD

[Tony]

Post by Tony
Type 3 augmentations are now available. Check your local Faydwer
faction vendor!
Who needs this type of aug?Seems to me just LDoN items use these and no one
does these any more.My Glossy silk items need some type 13 augs,wish that
was what they were talking about.

Rare versions of SoF droppable non-visible items have had slot 3's since
SoF went live.

Type 13 augs are available in Katta (and have been since TBS went live).