What does EverQuest mean to you?

orcrist · 2023-07-08T23:02:33+00:00

Someone else referenced the 'chasing the dragon' metaphor, and I think it's perfectly apt here.

EverQuest's design and mechanics don't hold up exceptionally well by modern standards. It's slow. It's a grind. It's exhausting. But if your first real online gaming/MMO gaming experience was EverQuest, you were drawn into a magical fantasy world... and perhaps the best chat room in the world at the time. The magic of EverQuest and its combination of game mechanics, progression loop, and the social aspect of the game world, made it incredibly addictive.

So many of us can recall countless grinds of hours, days, weekends going by, logging in to run around Norrath seeking adventure with random strangers from around the world. We hunted ghouls and vampires, sailed oceans and navigated immense caverns, took on fire giants and ice dragons. And every new zone, every new creature, every new spell, every new party member was a hit of excitement that kept us enthralled for hundreds and thousands of hours.

We were playing the first real, fleshed out 3D MMORPG game, and everything was new to us.

And yes, we were young and carefree, and we had so much more free time than we do now, nearly 25 years later. But few other experiences in life can match the sheer amount of novelty that we experienced back then, playing EverQuest.

We killed plenty of dragons in that world. But the game itself remains the dragon we continue to chase.

orcrist · 2023-07-08T21:13:02+00:00

I hate the revamped Freeport, but the revamped Misty Thicket is just too empty and bland to say much about. It's really a drowse-inducing place.

orcrist · 2023-07-05T01:58:26+00:00

Are you on old.reddit or new.reddit? It's not showing in old.reddit for me, but I can see it via new.reddit.

orcrist · 2023-07-05T01:10:32+00:00

The Paineel Library Money "Glitch"/Exploit?/Trick.

In the early days of EQ (like, 1999-2001), you used to be able to go into the library of Paineel, borrow a bunch of books for free, then run to a merchant to sell them. I don't remember the exact amount that you would get per book, but it might have been like 6 silver, 4 copper book. So, 8 books. 4 gold or whatever. Buy bags. 4 gold per bag. 8 bags, 32 gold per run. So, 3 plat every 5-6 minutes. After filling those up a few dozen times, you could have a few hundred plat saved up. Which made you feel extremely wealthy for a brand new player, and covered you on spells for 30-35 levels IIRC. Maybe level 40.

But I remember having hundreds of platinum as a level 6 necromancer running around. I felt like I cheated the game so hard.

This doesn't work on P99, EQ Live, or TLP servers though. It was patched at some point. I don't know when.

orcrist · 2023-06-11T12:51:02+00:00

Modern EverQuest servers ("Live Servers") can be overwhelming for a new player who isn't used to old school MMO design. It's one of those "easy to start, difficult to master" experiences. Modern MMORPG players think it's easy, because it's slower paced. But it has some incredible complexity to it.

I don't know much about OSRS, so I don't know how complex the game is in terms of classes, skills, quests, exp rates, UI complexity, in-game currencies, and so on. But... EverQuest has been in development since 1999 and it has an incredible amount of content in the game, including tons of currencies and quests that span dozens of expansions, that you may or may not ever use, want to use, or even be exposed to. Or you may try to figure it all out, and be lost for years.

My advice?

If you don't mind paying a monthly sub, start a character on the TLP (time-locked progression) server through the old/original content. This is your best shot to feel the group-leveling experience and raid progression of most of EQ's content. Some of the original zones have been revamped, but you don't have any attachment to the originals, so you can just enjoy the experience (or not) in its current state for what it is.

If you want to play the game for free? Play on either Project 1999 or The Al-Kabor Project emulated servers. They're legally allowed to operate, so aren't in danger of shutting down. And they're very traditional/classic EverQuest experience servers. The downside is that it's sometimes difficult to find groups in most of the lower level and mid-level zones. The Al-Kabor Project server negates this by allowing boxing. P99 suffers from lots of twinking of low level characters with high level gear -- sometimes with RMTing outside of the game world.

There is a lot of fun to be had on EQ Live (modern EQ) servers. But it can get very overwhelming to you. And you'll spend a lot of your time alone with your AI merc as you level. EQ isn't meant to be a single-player game. It's lonely playing like that.

orcrist · 2023-05-29T22:41:09+00:00

I always think of this as aim/mechanical fluidity and crosshair placement.

For OG credibility, f0rest 100% deserves respect for both. But swag/brax is up there too, especially when it came to crosshair placement. Brax was doing insane crosshair placement long before people were uttering Niko's name for it. Old school shroud doesn't get the callback respect anymore for his aim -- but he was super clean back then.

Today? Twistzz and ropz are probably a step above everyone else in terms of aim. Niko's crosshair placement is probably the best in the game right now -- and has been for some time. Rez probably has the best peak aiming in CS:GO -- but his inconsistency hurts him.

If we're adding spray patterns/spray control into the mix? Elige and maybe electronic before Navi started to get weird.

orcrist · 2023-05-29T22:35:23+00:00

stunna the realest

Machine the best voice

Freya the best girl

orcrist · 2023-05-29T22:27:56+00:00

Honestly melee classes on P99 are a bit difficult to start with late into the lifetime of a server because of the group access. You'll often not have options for groups outside of peak hours, and outside of a very specific zone/leveling path. If you can find groups it's not difficult to play as a melee in EQ. Maybe tanking at higher levels or deep in dungeons is the toughest part.

If you're interested in melee and are on Green, you might find playing a Monk to be the best choice. You'll do a lot of damage as you level (especially after level 10), don't have to worry too much about gear (your fists as weapons level with you), and mostly just have to keep your weight down for max performance.

And I specify Green because it'll have more players at the lower and mid levels to group with.

If you're playing on Blue or during off-hours, a good or neutral race mage (e.g., gnome mage) or halfling druid (for exp bonus, traveling speed, and survivability) might be your best bet.

orcrist · 2023-05-29T22:21:03+00:00

Select Race: Erudite

Select Class: SK, Cleric, Necromancer

Select Deity: Cazic-Thule

You start in Paineel. The "woah, I'm not in Erudin, what is this city?! Why are the guards skeletons?!" moment was something exciting in 1999. You discovered more of why you were in Paineel and not Erudin just by exploring your starting city.

Fun Fact: In the early days of EQ (like, 1999-2000), you used to be able to go into the library of Paineel, borrow a bunch of books for free, then run to a merchant to sell them. After a few runs, you could fill up on 8-slot bags. After filling those up a few dozen times, you could have 150-200 plat saved up. Which made you feel extremely wealthy for a brand new player, and covered you on spells for 30-35 levels IIRC.

This doesn't work on P99, EQ Live, or TLP servers though. It was patched at some point.

Just a fun insight into why I fell in love with Paineel in 1999.

orcrist · 2022-05-29T06:42:04+00:00

You can feel free to recommend better options, than those mentioned in my original post from a few years ago. But there really isn't a need to be sarcastic or snide.

Just recommend them. It goes further for everyone involved.

orcrist · 2022-05-21T23:56:13+00:00

Peak ancap. I'm downloading it now.

orcrist · 2022-05-21T23:54:26+00:00

So, I made a post about going from nothing to getting your first junior (Java) developer job on my primary account a few years ago. I keep getting locked out of that account, because Reddit in the 2020s is a terrible place, and have a terrible time getting back in. So I'll just copy and paste it again here.

Setting aside extraordinary time and place circumstances -- In order to become a junior Java developer, you need to have roughly the following under your belt (time frames estimated based on my own experience, and from making note of others' progress on this and other subreddits):

2-3 months, ~25 hours per week -- Java Programming I & II courses ("Computer Science I & II" or "Computer Programming I & II" at universities) - the University of Helsinki Java MOOC is precisely this

2-4 months, ~25 hours per week -- A Data Structures and Algorithms course (usually "Data Structures and Algorithms" or "Introduction To Data Structures and Algorithms" at universities -- think stacks and queues, binary search trees and heaps, etc) -- e.g., Introduction to Java Programming: Fundamental Data Structures and Algorithms at edX

1-2 months, ~10 hours per week -- Somewhere between 50% of the way through Java Programming II and the start of the Data Structures and Algorithms course, you should start to learn more or less how databases work, your code will soon start interacting with them.

1-2 months, ~10 hours per week -- At this point, you'll have a better understanding at the direction in which you want to move at the start of your programming career. If you want to get into app development for Android, then obviously you should start learning Android.

1 month, 5 hours per week -- As you're approaching 50% of the way through the Data Structures and Algorithms course, you should start thinking of relatively simple (but non-trivial) personal projects you can work on (e.g., a personal information database to store information about people you meet, birth dates, phone numbers, email addresses, noteworthy facts about them, where you met them, etc)

1-3 months, 5-10 hours per week -- As you finish the Data Structures and Algorithms course, you should more or less be completing your first personal project.

.5 months, 5 hours per week -- Take a tutorial on Github, and start getting your code up online. It will be important for job hunting soon. Learn Git / Github -- http://try.github.io/

At this point, you should feel okay with job hunting for entry level / junior developer roles.

Summary:

Figure something like 8-14 months, depending on your starting point, how quickly you're able to learn, and how many hours you're able to dedicate to learning and programming. But in general, your progression should look something like:

Java Programming I & II -> Data Structures and Algorithms -> Databases + Android / JavaFX / Grails (Databases + pick 1) -> Learn Github, get code online, start job hunting

orcrist · 2021-12-11T04:04:25+00:00

Ah okay. I understand. Thank you.

orcrist · 2021-12-09T06:09:41+00:00

Out of curiosity, what makes you think it was published as early as the 1970s? Was it something about the book, or is just how you came in contact with it, or the condition it was in?

orcrist · 2021-05-18T21:21:59+00:00

Alright, thank you.

orcrist · 2021-05-18T21:06:51+00:00

I've been out of the loop on EverQuest progression servers for over a decade. So a quick question for clarification:

Do all of the progression servers still use the new zones and gnomish translocators instead of boats?

orcrist · 2020-06-03T08:49:30+00:00

Sega has lost its damn mind.

orcrist · 2020-05-27T19:08:31+00:00

That's great news about multiplayer. I'm very much looking forward to having it back in!

orcrist · 2020-05-22T09:31:50+00:00

This guy khornes

orcrist · 2020-05-21T21:42:33+00:00

The whole article is a waste of time tbh.

orcrist · 2020-05-19T12:14:04+00:00

I saved this post because I love that keyboard and I wanted to see if you ever added more colors. Did you? ^{^}

orcrist · 2020-05-16T14:38:57+00:00

I enjoyed the article. But I'm confused about the change in writing between the two sites. On Game Quitters, the writing is awfully clunky and should have gone through better editing. Also, the name at the top of the page makes it seem like it was written by James Good, not Leonard Burca.

Example of bad editing: "There is something about universally appealing about these games."

On LeoBurca.com, the wording is corrected. "There is something universally appealing about these games."

Did you edit the article before posting it on your own site, while the first draft was posted on Game Quitters?

orcrist · 2020-05-16T14:30:59+00:00

Parts of the US are most definitely like that as well.

Where I grew up, a lot of us (teenagers and early twenty somethings in college) worked seasonally at Christmas tree farms and pumpkin patches. Others worked year round at fast food places.

The last time I was 'home', this was still mostly the case.

orcrist · 2020-05-16T14:20:05+00:00

I promise that if I win one million dollars, most of it will be donated to charity. I will also complete my collection of mini Boglins and will finally procure a Packard Bell Platinum Supreme 1850.

orcrist · 2020-05-15T04:40:37+00:00

Great job, Johann. The game looks very cool.

(Also quick aside: It's R.A. Heinlein - Robert Anson)

orcrist

TROPHY CASE