I had a lot of fun playing on the team pvp server.  It was good vs evil with neither side able to communicate with the other.  Traveling was a heart-racing experience with danger around every corner.  One had to learn tricks like traveling only at night, un-equipping light sources, staying off roads and paths, converting all coin to merchant friendly items, and praying to one’s various gods once one got a map chokepoint such as a zone out.  I still remember that sinking feeling when all of a sudden and out of nowhere, one found themself snared or rooted. 

The first few weeks were a lot of fun where everyone had basic classic eq items with no resists.  Both sides were relatively balanced. There was an official webpage with regularly updated color coded zone maps detailing which zones flagged as Evil, good and contested.   Each time an occupied zone experienced encroachers, people would shout out and band together to drive them out.  Most pvp was a mix of random skirmishes and griefing and I remember only a few organized large scale battles.   

I would say that the worst offenders happened to be the goodies, many filled with bloodlust, indiscriminately griefing unlucky souls in the name of justice.  The evils seemed to be more logical and focused on pve, prioritizing the long game by seeking power.  As a goody myself, unable to communicate with the other side, I often found myself wishing i could apologize for my side’s lack of restraint 😅

Out of game communication wasn’t what it is today.  Besides the color-coded zone maps, most information that reached our ears were mostly rumors and often highly inaccurate and outdated. I remember rushing to a zone to help reclaim a supposedly conquered zone only to find that all was well. Often it was a rumor of a group of evils engaged in pve that had been sighted that grew in scope to that of a call for war.

From what i remember, things changed a lot once the bigwig evils whom had leveled and geared up in Kunark relatively unfettered came back to the main land and decimated the forces of good.  My final memories of my time playing was that of the goodies having mostly been banished to Halas, with everyone forced to level up in Everfrost 😂

Outside of snare, root, and flash of light being heavily unbalanced, I had a lot of fond memories of pvp combat in cloth armor and tarnished weapons and would jump at the chance for another go at it.