I promised you yesterday that I would still announce the final round which is set for Monday. This final round is named "A Traveler's Tale". You have from this announcement till the end of this coming Monday December 20th, to submit a storyline series of screenshots. Anyone regardless of previously winning may enter this final round.

This storyline series must be a minimum of four screenshots and can have a maximum of up to nine. The objective is to display in some fashion, whether you use text as a guide or simply graphics, is to tell us a story of somesort. For example, you could use chat bubbles to tell a story of an adventuring party ready to enter the scariest dungeon ever, and then they at the end come under attack and.... ?

You can edit the screenshots to add some simplified text areas, and arrows if you wish to highlight the story you are trying to tell through the pictures. I can't wait to see what everyone comes up with! Good luck!

Click here for final round and general contest information.

-- Berek-Halfhand @ Fri 17 Dec 2004


Professor Cogglesworth - Legendary Figures
[Post A Comment] - Print News | Mail News
Go check out Professor Cogglesworth's Comprehensive Compendium of Legendary Figures at the Official EQII Site.

---

"Professor Cogglesworth is a gnome sage of some renown. In the course of his dealings with adventurers, he has compiled a journal detailing some of the encounters these brave souls have had with persons and creatures of great power. While the professor has gone to great lengths to compile accurate information, it should be noted that certain entries may not contain all pertinent information necessary when facing these exceptional entities. Consider yourselves warned.

The figures described in this compendium are said to possess great wealth that is worth the risks associated with confronting them. Generally speaking, only weapons of exceptional quality will have any effect against such formidable foes."

---

---

"Hello everyone -

In the General Chat from launchpad, I am hearing multiple reports of players missing everything from their quest journal, missing spells, and missing abilities. Please post here your experience and details. Include what your server, what is and is not missing (spells, quest journal, abilities, recipes, etc.) what zone you were in or zoned to when they were lost, if you do or do not us a custom UI, anything else you think is pertinent to the symptoms or causes. Thank you for your patience and for submitting information.

Regards,
GM Grog the Humble
EverQuest II"

---

---

"What's the deal with the 'dual-wield' skill that monks and bruisers get at 20? It doesn't seem to be linked to dual-wield weapons, as those are usable pre-20 when we don't have the skill and dual-wield weapons always swing.

Moorgard: Dual wield isn't actually a skill. Dual wield in our game is a type of weapon (the others being one-handed and two-handed). We added dual wield to the skill window simply to make it more clear which professions have the ability to use dual-wield weapons, but there is no skill check or impact on your damage numbers. It is a skill for display purposes only.

The way dual wield weapons work in our game is quite different from how the skill functions in EverQuest. Basically a dual-wield weapon does 50% of the damage of a two-handed weapon of the same quality. There is no off-hand delay; dual-wield weapons swing based on the delay of the weapon itself. Neither hand is more likely to hit than the other, nor is there a main-hand bonus.

Dual wield weapons allow you to swing more often and therefore proc effects more; however, they also increase the opportunities for an opponent to riposte you. And remember, weapon type does not affect your combat arts in any way....."

---

---

"Just to keep you all informed, we will likely wait until early next week to update the live servers with our major update. We want to give our Test community some extra time to help us iron out a few issues so that the game is stable for all our customers.

I'd like to send a big thanks to all our testers working so hard to help us improve the game. It is much appreciated!"

---

---

"Despite the problems mentioned above, I find EverQuest II to be pure fun. It may not be for everyone, but my personal satisfaction in playing it is well worth the price of admission. With graphics that rival those of the top shooters, in-game systems that strive to do something other than "the same thing only better", and combat that scales dependent on player ability (the heroic opportunity system can separate novice gamers from advanced), Sony's parallel online world is a deep, involving, and intellectually stimulating game that creates a "need" for me to log in and play. As Senior Producer John Blakely said at the launch event in San Francisco last month, "games are all about fun, and no matter how cool the graphics or complex the systems, a game without fun is dead software." EverQuest II definitely hits the mark in this department."

---

---

"Due to some additional fixes we wanted to incorporate into this week's update, we have changed out timetable slightly. Our goal is to push the update to the Test server Thursday afternoon, and then to the live servers either Friday or at the beginning of next week.

We appreciate that many of you are anxious to see these changes. However, we would rather wait a little longer so that we can offer a more comprehensive update that addresses a greater number of issues and has a higher degree of stability. When you see the lengthy notes that accompany this update, you'll understand why we're taking some extra time to get it right.

Thanks again for your patience.
===========================
Moorgard
EverQuest II Community Guy"

---

---

"Two factions of adventures, miles apart, make a discovery which could change the balance between Qeynos and Freeport. Each of the adventurers will be faced with difficult choices and sacrifices. Which ones will survive, and which ones will triumph? Will Qeynos or Freeport gain an advantage over the other?"

---

---

"As you may be aware, I have been alluding to a substantial update scheduled for this week which will include many bug fixes and content updates. I wanted to inform everyone of our schedule so far, as I know many of you are looking forward to some of the fixes.

The update is currently being tested internally. We plan to move this build to our Test server tomorrow, so those of you interested in trying out some of the changes are encouraged to create a character there. Assuming all goes well, we will then update the live servers with this same build on Thursday.

If anything changes regarding this plan, I will let you know.
===========================
Moorgard
EverQuest II Community Guy"

---

---

"There is nothing wrong with a person playing multiple characters on separate accounts simultaneously. I was guilded with some people in EQ who could play two or even three characters extremely well, and my hat was off to them. I tried it myself a few times with disasterous results.

Using third-party programs to run characters unattended is another matter entirely. We can and do take action against such accounts, so if you have evidence of it taking place please /petition it.

Once again, though, I remind you that GMs or other customer service representatives will not discuss the results of investigations into other players' accounts with you. We have to respect the privacy of all registered accounts, even if there is foul play suspected."

---

---

"*** Gameplay ***

- Corrected an issue with stamina debuffs that was causing opponents to lose an excessive amount of health.
- Grey NPCs that had decided to attack certain players should no longer do so.
- Made certain repeatable quests no longer repeatable if they fail to provide players a suitable challenge at their level.
- Fixed several issues involving access to the Maid for the Mist."

---

---

"Overall, I feel SOE has delivered a respectable product. It's not as revolutionary as the original, but is addictive and fun. There always seems to be a goal that's �just out of your reach� that kept me interested in playing. It's also a radical departure from the original, so people who found fault with EverQuestmight want to give the sequel a try. While it doesn't push the genre into new waters, it does put a high level of polish on existing tenets. There were things about EverQuest 2 that bothered me (the shared XP debt for deaths incurred while grouping being the biggest), but they didn't take much away from my enjoyment of the game."

---