Played Lately: Everquest II Extended

• I'm having trouble starting this blog post, so I'm doing things a little different. I want to tell everyone about Everquest 2 Extended, because I am enjoying the game. However I just don't feel like thinking all much. So, here's a brain dump of everything going on.


• Five things I like about EQ2X


1. New Halas is very good. At various points, I tried the newbie isles (can't remember the real name), Kelethin, and Gorowyn. I stuck with Gorowyn for a couple characters because it was the most polished, but New Halas is great. I'm enjoying the story and the quest flow. I'm not sure why multiple levels of quests are bundled together, but I haven't seen any difficulty problems, even with the different levels listed. (Um, have I really tried to play this game that many times? Wow.) I also think it's cool that there is a back door into New Halas if you want to skip all the questing zones. Bravo, SOE.


2. I finally found the right class. After trying a something (from the Isle of the Trial, way too long ago), a swashbuckler, a warden, and a wizard, I decided to try out the inquisitor this time. Holy moly, that is class good. Nice ranged spells, excellent melee options (even is the right melee weapon for my stats is a staff), plate armor, and the occasional heal all add up to a class that does just about everything. I'm sure it helps that I finally figured out Heroic Opportunities. That only took several years, but it has helped the fights go faster.


3. For some reason, SOE fixes the AA slider to divert fifty percent of all combat and quest experience to alternate advancement experience. Green Armadillo already has a post up about this and offers much greater analysis than I'm going to. But I will say that I actually like the idea. I was hoping to play with the slider myself, but 50/50 feels right to me. I am rather lost where to use all of them (I'm up to 32 AAs after the double experience weekend) but I've enjoyed trying things out.


4. This is stupid, but I really like the armor available in the New Halas starting zone. Much better than just about anything else I've seen in the game. Will it look strange if I'm wearing that as appearance armor all the way to level 80?


5. The double experience weekend was a real winner for me. I ended up at level 22 Inquistor, 21 Armorer, and 32 AAs. And there is still one quest hub between me and New Halas. I can't believe I did enough crafting to specialize. Crazy.


• Three things I don't like about EQ2X


1. I feel like a serious leech on my guild. There are enough things in the game that I want that require guild membership, so I have to be in a guild. But at the same time, I don't really know anyone in the guild, I'm seriously introverted, and I'm going to solo my way through the game anyway. The guild was up to level 16 before I started seeing status items drop, so I haven't been able to contribute at all. Hopefully I'll be able to contribute to the guild eventually, but it all feels like an extra line on my nameplate right now.


2. The membership nags are getting a little old. It's easy to skip past them, but really, folks. I'm not paying $15 a month for a sub-par subscription just to make them go away.


3. I'm still not sold on the payment model. SOE got ten dollars out of me because the silver membership seemed fine with me. But unless something really interesting arrives on the Station Cash store, they won't get another cent from me.


• That's it. Go forth and game!

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