I came in pre-Planes but post Kunark. Originally was playing before Dec. 2001.
Dont remember what exactly the armors and weapons were, nor the mobs, but i do remember the zones.
The lag in Faydark, or as it was called, Faymart since it was where everyone wet to trade (pre-bazaar).
Being the first in my guild to zone into PoK using the books. Saw my first outside Kelethin and it did nothing the first few days, then I clicked on it asnd went Elsewhere. Neat zone. Explored PoK for an hour, giving a running commentary to the guildies who were on.
BOATS: I would load up on trade skill items and do combines while waiting. To do beginning smithing, you needed to head from Faydwer to Antonica, to Freeport, and buy sharpening stones, and take a boat both ways. Good way to waste an hour easily.
[/b]SPIRES[b]. Sitting waiting for the spires to activate and carry you to the nexus. At that time it was an extra-planar zone, with no connections except through its big and small spires. The luclin connections came later. Took forever to run around, using boats, spires, and shoe leather. Druids were vital. Knew a ghuild mate who spent all her time making plat just porting, after she hit 40.
QUESTS: actually doing quests, searching out people and items, legends and lore, and playing everQUEST.
I'll tell you this: check Allakazam for items that date form Kunrk or Velious era, and check them out. then check the posts. Fine Steel whas a great set of weapons, in 2000 and 2001, but the posts of people from 2004 and 2005, saying what crap they are, is hilarious.
The armor, weapons, and general items have changed so much. More and more uper-twink items. great montyhaul syndrome. As someone in an earlier post alluded to, a dungeons and dragons referance. roll them 20 siders!
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Questions for the OldtimersFollow
Hey, every one has forgotten about Kedge Keep!
Phinny was considered the "end game" (I hate that term) for a long time.
Phinny was considered the "end game" (I hate that term) for a long time.
Lol. Me thinks your memories were a bit vague (not surprising actually given the start time since alot of this stuff would have been very "new" to you back then).
Pre-Planes of Power certainly. But the Plane of Hate, Plane of Fear, and Plane of Air (sky whatever) existed prior to Kunark Release. Lots of us were "raiding in the planes" long before Kunark let alone the Planes of Power.
See this bit I don't get. Maybe you were just starting the game, and didn't have all the expansions or something, but Luclin had been out for quite some time when PoP came out. Most folks were already spending most of their time there, and little of it on Norrath (again, except for the very low level folks). Since PoK is right off the Nexus, and we did most of our traveling through that zone, I never saw PoK as some amazingly distant thing. It was just a new zone right off a zone I'd already traveled thorugh a zillion times.
What I do remember about the PoP release was being incredibly concerned about clicking stuff in PoT. Remember, I'd come from a history of planar zones as strictly raiding zones, usually requiring a raid just to "break" them. With PoP release, I didn't know what to expect in those various zones. I recall accidentally zoning into PoJ the first day, and being terrified to move because I had no idea how to get out, and just kinda assumed I was surrounded by KOS mobs. Had I known that there was nothing KOS anywhere near the zonein, nor anywhere remotely between the zonein and the zoneout, I'd not have been nearly as concerned. Fortunately, a raiding party of TMO members showed up (cause this was the first day, right? Had to start planar progression somewhere), and their wizard was kind enough to TL me out.
Not to burst your "uphill both ways" story, but sharpening stones could be purchased in Kaladim. I'm pretty sure you could buy them in Ak'anon, Felwith, and Kelethin as well (but never checked since I had did most of my really early smithing in Kaladim).
You did have to move around from vendor to vendor to get everything you needed, but if you worked in the right spot it wasn't that bad. For smithing, you ended up wearing a furrow into the path between the merchants at the shop in NFP (near the temple), and the merchants in EFP that sold many of the goods you'd need, along with stops at a couple other nearby places to buy water flasks and such. However, once you got into the 120ish range (working on banded), you could get everything you needed from just one smithing shop in EFP (with a forge right outside). It was one of the harder spots to find of course, but it was always busy...
Eh? Maybe it was if you didn't purchase the Luclin expansion. I have no idea. But the Nexus zone is part of the Luclin expansion. It appeared on release of that expansion. The spires did nothing but look really impressive until that time. There was no time at which you could use a spire to travel to the nexus, but not also travel from the nexus to the rest of the luclin expansion (except maybe if they made it available to people who didn't own the expansion or something).
Definately true about the travel time bit though. Even with the spires, traveling was *very* slow. It was one of the reasons I made my wizard. You could easily spend 45 minutes to an hour just getting to a zone you wanted to hunt in. And there was no guarantee that you'd be able to find a zone when you got there. Today, most off us camp our characters by traveling back to a town, usually parking in PoK or somewhere near there. Back then, you simply didn't do that. You travelled to where you were to hunt, and you *stayed there* for as long as possible, traveling back to town only to get supplies that you couldn't buy near where you were.
I specifically recall when I was spending a number of levels in my 30s hunting in CT. It was a good 20+ minute run from FP to CT. Usually, you just camped right outside the dungeon when done for the night, and logged back in and continued hunting when you came back on. People often carried around backpacks full of food and water just so they could avoid having to run back to town. Usually, I'd go 3 or 4 full days worth of play sessions without ever setting foot back in town. Of course, if you died, you could always just buy supplies back at your bind point as well, so that worked too. The travel issue really cut into vendor selling though. For the most part, once you were "full" on gear, you were done looting. Today, people habitually hunt for an hour or so, then run off to a vendor to sell before continuing. It's just that easy to do that today, when it was incredibly time consuming back then.
jpstarcher wrote:
I came in pre-Planes but post Kunark. Originally was playing before Dec. 2001.
Pre-Planes of Power certainly. But the Plane of Hate, Plane of Fear, and Plane of Air (sky whatever) existed prior to Kunark Release. Lots of us were "raiding in the planes" long before Kunark let alone the Planes of Power.
Quote:
Being the first in my guild to zone into PoK using the books. Saw my first outside Kelethin and it did nothing the first few days, then I clicked on it asnd went Elsewhere. Neat zone. Explored PoK for an hour, giving a running commentary to the guildies who were on.
See this bit I don't get. Maybe you were just starting the game, and didn't have all the expansions or something, but Luclin had been out for quite some time when PoP came out. Most folks were already spending most of their time there, and little of it on Norrath (again, except for the very low level folks). Since PoK is right off the Nexus, and we did most of our traveling through that zone, I never saw PoK as some amazingly distant thing. It was just a new zone right off a zone I'd already traveled thorugh a zillion times.
What I do remember about the PoP release was being incredibly concerned about clicking stuff in PoT. Remember, I'd come from a history of planar zones as strictly raiding zones, usually requiring a raid just to "break" them. With PoP release, I didn't know what to expect in those various zones. I recall accidentally zoning into PoJ the first day, and being terrified to move because I had no idea how to get out, and just kinda assumed I was surrounded by KOS mobs. Had I known that there was nothing KOS anywhere near the zonein, nor anywhere remotely between the zonein and the zoneout, I'd not have been nearly as concerned. Fortunately, a raiding party of TMO members showed up (cause this was the first day, right? Had to start planar progression somewhere), and their wizard was kind enough to TL me out.
Quote:
BOATS: I would load up on trade skill items and do combines while waiting. To do beginning smithing, you needed to head from Faydwer to Antonica, to Freeport, and buy sharpening stones, and take a boat both ways. Good way to waste an hour easily.
Not to burst your "uphill both ways" story, but sharpening stones could be purchased in Kaladim. I'm pretty sure you could buy them in Ak'anon, Felwith, and Kelethin as well (but never checked since I had did most of my really early smithing in Kaladim).
You did have to move around from vendor to vendor to get everything you needed, but if you worked in the right spot it wasn't that bad. For smithing, you ended up wearing a furrow into the path between the merchants at the shop in NFP (near the temple), and the merchants in EFP that sold many of the goods you'd need, along with stops at a couple other nearby places to buy water flasks and such. However, once you got into the 120ish range (working on banded), you could get everything you needed from just one smithing shop in EFP (with a forge right outside). It was one of the harder spots to find of course, but it was always busy...
Quote:
SPIRES. Sitting waiting for the spires to activate and carry you to the nexus. At that time it was an extra-planar zone, with no connections except through its big and small spires. The luclin connections came later. Took forever to run around, using boats, spires, and shoe leather. Druids were vital. Knew a ghuild mate who spent all her time making plat just porting, after she hit 40.
Eh? Maybe it was if you didn't purchase the Luclin expansion. I have no idea. But the Nexus zone is part of the Luclin expansion. It appeared on release of that expansion. The spires did nothing but look really impressive until that time. There was no time at which you could use a spire to travel to the nexus, but not also travel from the nexus to the rest of the luclin expansion (except maybe if they made it available to people who didn't own the expansion or something).
Definately true about the travel time bit though. Even with the spires, traveling was *very* slow. It was one of the reasons I made my wizard. You could easily spend 45 minutes to an hour just getting to a zone you wanted to hunt in. And there was no guarantee that you'd be able to find a zone when you got there. Today, most off us camp our characters by traveling back to a town, usually parking in PoK or somewhere near there. Back then, you simply didn't do that. You travelled to where you were to hunt, and you *stayed there* for as long as possible, traveling back to town only to get supplies that you couldn't buy near where you were.
I specifically recall when I was spending a number of levels in my 30s hunting in CT. It was a good 20+ minute run from FP to CT. Usually, you just camped right outside the dungeon when done for the night, and logged back in and continued hunting when you came back on. People often carried around backpacks full of food and water just so they could avoid having to run back to town. Usually, I'd go 3 or 4 full days worth of play sessions without ever setting foot back in town. Of course, if you died, you could always just buy supplies back at your bind point as well, so that worked too. The travel issue really cut into vendor selling though. For the most part, once you were "full" on gear, you were done looting. Today, people habitually hunt for an hour or so, then run off to a vendor to sell before continuing. It's just that easy to do that today, when it was incredibly time consuming back then.
King Nobby wrote:
More words please
gbaji wrote:
Not to burst your "uphill both ways" story, but sharpening stones could be purchased in Kaladim. I'm pretty sure you could buy them in Ak'anon, Felwith, and Kelethin as well (but never checked since I had did most of my really early smithing in Kaladim).
Nope, no sharpening stones in Kelethin, my first great adventure out of Greater Faydark was driven by the desperate need to run to Kaladim to sharpen my rusty ******* sword
gbaji wrote:
You did have to move around from vendor to vendor to get everything you needed, but if you worked in the right spot it wasn't that bad. For smithing, you ended up wearing a furrow into the path between the merchants at the shop in NFP (near the temple), and the merchants in EFP that sold many of the goods you'd need, along with stops at a couple other nearby places to buy water flasks and such. However, once you got into the 120ish range (working on banded), you could get everything you needed from just one smithing shop in EFP (with a forge right outside). It was one of the harder spots to find of course, but it was always busy...
Heh, I recall a time when High Hold Pass was considered the "in place" to do TSing because there was a nice selection of TS merchants and tools all close together.
Just had to be awake enough to dodge the occasional wayward Gnoll that would come visiting
gbaji wrote:
I'd go 3 or 4 full days worth of play sessions without ever setting foot back in town. Of course, if you died, you could always just buy supplies back at your bind point as well, so that worked too. The travel issue really cut into vendor selling though. For the most part, once you were "full" on gear, you were done looting. Today, people habitually hunt for an hour or so, then run off to a vendor to sell before continuing. It's just that easy to do that today, when it was incredibly time consuming back then.
The Warrens were typical of the pita that this was.
Seems hard to believe now, but The Warrens was once a very isolated spot (for goodies) and the run from Erudin seemed long dangerous
and a couple of back packs full of the bamboo armour stuff would have you encumbered and crawling along like a snail. P.S.
Although I am not usually one who views the early game through "rose tinted glasses" and do think that on the whole the game is much better today, there is one aspect that has been lost and has taken away some of the good feel to the game.
It is true that in the early days it did literally take several hours of game time to run from Kelethin to Qeynos, but there was something about the journey that gave a very real feeling of travel and having finally arived at your destination there was a sense of accompishment.
I think that in part it was because there were actually people there at your destination who in those days would greet you with a warm welcome. I guess that running from Kelethin to Qeynos now to find that you had arrived at a ghost town would be a majot let down.
But also part of it was the "adventure" along the way. I don't mean so much "dieing in Runnyeye" (or HHP) and having to do a 2 hour CR. More along the lines of the changes of scenery and environement, and community along the way.
For some one from Kelethin the run tothe boat in Butcherblock was slightly risky but mundane enough because it was home territory, but arriving in Freeport after the trip through Ocean of Tears was really exciting, aside from frequently getting lost and being afraid of the seweres and the "bad" part of town, it was full of different races (PCs I mean not NPCs), the West Freeport gates would be crowded with people all talking and going about there business, giving a real feeling of a bustling busy city.
Then as you ran through the commons the people got thinner on the ground and the mobs became more dangerous and seemed to be everywhere (remember the patrolling Griffon who killed PC and NPC alike at will). By the time you hit Kithicor you were feeling that you were really now a very very long way from civilisation and strated to run for your life.
Rivervale was like a sanctuary in the midst of all this danger. Again there would be the feeling that you had come out of the wilderness into "civilisation"
there would be people there to great you ask about your journey give some helpful advice (like don't go left in Runnyeye or you will be killed for certain and never get you corpse back, just to add to the tension 
). Then again as you left Rivervale and headed for Runnyeye you began to get that feeling of forboding, it really did feel like you were leaving civilisation behind and heading into the depths of some unknown evil.
(Actually we never did die in Runnyeye, we always made it through feeling very happy with ourselves and then got killed variously by Mudmen and Minatours in the Gorge
) Zoning out of The Gorge into East Karana was like stepping out of the darkness into a warm sunny morning, there were merchants and camps of people to run to for safety. Little did we realise that East Karana was even more dangerous than The Gorge until death by various spiders, gnolls and Evil Eyes taught us differently. And so began the terifying run through East Karana, into North Karana, where we would try our best to dodge the incessent criss crossing Griffawns, Hill Giants and lions while stnding in the gypsey camp calling out for a bind.
The number of brave but hapless casters who died at the gypsey camp trying to bind people were countless
but we thank them from the bottom of our hearts. Bind or no bind you then had to push on into what seemed like the endless run through West Karana, again the progression through WK gave a real feeling of gradually leaving the dangerous wilderness and coming closeer to civilisation and safety. As you got closer there were more people, there were settlements, then guards and then, if you were lucky enough to have dodged the Werewolf's periodic patrol you zoned into Qeynos Hills. Suddenly you had the feeling that the journey was coming to an end and you were very near to civilisation, there were nice roads, patrolling guards, groups of people out hunting in the fields.
Yes you did still have to keep your wits about you as you dodged the skeletons and gnolls, but then finally you arived at the steps into Qeynos and there would be a crowd of people sitting and milling around, just like there was at the gates of Freeport when you had left so many days ago (seemed like).
The friendly greeting, the buzz of converation and the feel of a crowd of people going about their daily business really did make it feel like you had arrived somewhere important after a long and hazardous journey.
I understand how this is impractical from a day to day game playing perspective, but loosing this really has changed the feel of the game and I'm not to sure that that was such a good thing.
Edited, Mon Jun 20 21:38:33 2005 by Iluien
Great post Iluien! 
This brought up so many memories, so many feelings, but also so much pain.
Having started pre-Luclin, I still hunt mostly in old-world zones nowadays (only doing an LDoN from time to time), and it makes me really sad to see most of the zones and cities empty, except for very few new lowbie players or higher level players gathering for an LDoN. It's a bit better since the servers merged, but most of the time when I enter a zone and do a /who, I'm pretty lonely...
Travelling around is still fun, although I use the PoK books; but tell me, when was the last time you ran to Unrest? I still get that feeling of having to hide, sneaking past the mobs, running to the zone line.
Creating and playing several characters, it was hard even to reach level 20, and I constantly ran out of money. Fine steel was the best I could get for my toons, as well as some bronze armor. When I got back to the game in spring 2004, my lvl 20 warrior was still wearing some pieces of cloth armor! It was then that I learned of the newbie armor quests...
I'm missing the old times, the boats, the way from Qeynos to Freeport, not having SoW, exploring the dangers... maybe also because I had much more time to play in those days!
This brought up so many memories, so many feelings, but also so much pain.
Having started pre-Luclin, I still hunt mostly in old-world zones nowadays (only doing an LDoN from time to time), and it makes me really sad to see most of the zones and cities empty, except for very few new lowbie players or higher level players gathering for an LDoN. It's a bit better since the servers merged, but most of the time when I enter a zone and do a /who, I'm pretty lonely...
Travelling around is still fun, although I use the PoK books; but tell me, when was the last time you ran to Unrest? I still get that feeling of having to hide, sneaking past the mobs, running to the zone line.
Creating and playing several characters, it was hard even to reach level 20, and I constantly ran out of money. Fine steel was the best I could get for my toons, as well as some bronze armor. When I got back to the game in spring 2004, my lvl 20 warrior was still wearing some pieces of cloth armor! It was then that I learned of the newbie armor quests...
I'm missing the old times, the boats, the way from Qeynos to Freeport, not having SoW, exploring the dangers... maybe also because I had much more time to play in those days!
Quote:
It is true that in the early days it did literally take several hours of game time to run from Kelethin to Qeynos, but there was something about the journey that gave a very real feeling of travel and having finally arived at your destination there was a sense of accompishment.
At the risk of getting slapped with one of Jay's patented dead-horse icons (lol), I have to say that I completely relate to that lost feeling of adventure that came from being a long way from home. Stonebrunt used to be a favorite place of mine to hunt, with my first ranger. Later in his career, Gunthak and Dulak were also favorite spots. Running through the Warrens, then Stonebrunt, etc, really made Gunthak and Dulak feel a lot more exciting and isolated. I really miss that, although I am a big fan of PoK books in general because of all the time they save.
I came in just after PoP, and didn't buy the expansion right away. My little woody ranger, Caelinthas, took the BB boat to the Freeport Docks (for the first time) one Saturday afternoon to join his first guild, and it was one of the most exciting gaming I've ever done. The world seemed so big and intimidating back then. I suppose it's an inevitable result, even with or without the introduction of transportation shortcuts, that the world is destined to become smaller everytime one plays.
I've been playing since May of 1999, and reading these posts brings back memories. I started off with a human cleric hailing from Freeport. One of my most vivid memories of the early game was my first trip across the OOT. I remember running from the dock and cresting a hill to get my first glimpse of Kaladim. The huge dwarf statue standing atop the entrance was an awesome sight to see. I miss some of the wonder of exploration that the game was rich in back then. Can't say I miss boat travel though...
Salnos Silverthorn
level 70 druid of Tunare
Saryrn
Edited, Tue Jun 21 09:15:31 2005 by Salnos
Salnos Silverthorn
level 70 druid of Tunare
Saryrn
Edited, Tue Jun 21 09:15:31 2005 by Salnos
My first boat ride ended up with me getting knocked off the boat because the docks in OOT pushed me backwards when it took off (glitch). I was freaking out! I had heard of giants being in that zone, and...
You have gotten better at Swimming!!! (6)
You have gotten better at Swimming!!! (6)
Old World Pre Kunark the max level was 49 and for gear Cloak of Flames was godly the standard haste belt was the Flowing Black Silk Sash. Short Sword of the Yakshea was the weapon of choice for Tanking. Armor choices varied but Planes (PoF PoH and PoSky which I think was called PoAir)drops were the best you could get. Another old world thought was when you gave consent the player could loot your corpse.
Quote:
Old World Pre Kunark the max level was 49
Are you sure about this?
Max level was 50 as stated above.
Seeler
Seeler
1 post
Old days hehe...
Greater Lightstones so I could see as a human monk...
Gloves that were magic so I could hit wisps to get said greater lightstones...
Weapons? I'm a monk, I don't need any stinking weapons!
Staring at a book to medidate on my enchanter...
Stein Runs!
Running down the ramp to East Karana thinking I'm almost through the zone only to have a friend tell me, "Ok you're in EK for real now, we still have to run across it..." then seeing the bridge that connected the Karanas
Camping a PGT with a friend for her paladin because she wanted it so bad...
Getting on the list for the FG in LGuk...FBSS..'nuff said!
Level 17 and getting feign death...wheee pre-Play nice rules...KS'ers beware! =)
So much fun back then =)
Greater Lightstones so I could see as a human monk...
Gloves that were magic so I could hit wisps to get said greater lightstones...
Weapons? I'm a monk, I don't need any stinking weapons!
Staring at a book to medidate on my enchanter...
Stein Runs!
Running down the ramp to East Karana thinking I'm almost through the zone only to have a friend tell me, "Ok you're in EK for real now, we still have to run across it..." then seeing the bridge that connected the Karanas
Camping a PGT with a friend for her paladin because she wanted it so bad...
Getting on the list for the FG in LGuk...FBSS..'nuff said!
Level 17 and getting feign death...wheee pre-Play nice rules...KS'ers beware! =)
So much fun back then =)
Krackum wrote:
Old World Pre Kunark the max level was 49 and for gear Cloak of Flames was godly the standard haste belt was the Flowing Black Silk Sash. Short Sword of the Yakshea was the weapon of choice for Tanking. Armor choices varied but Planes (PoF PoH and PoSky which I think was called PoAir)drops were the best you could get. Another old world thought was when you gave consent the player could loot your corpse.
Actually, plane of sky was called "plane of sky" when you zoned in. However, a /who would reveal the name as "airplane". Go figure.
SSoY was the most commonly used 1h weapon, but there were scattered "god/dragon weapons" that were actually better. Especially the PoSky quested weapons. They were actually the best in the game pre-kunark (the dragon dropped ones were actually kinda craptastic even back then).
There were better haste items then the cloak of flames as well (again PoSky quested items), but very very few ever got those due to the ridiculous difficulty involved.
Best armors dropped in PoH/PoF. PoSky did not have any major armor pieces (bit pieces were nice though, and I wore an "uber" pally only necklace from there for quite a while).
Illuien's post hit the nail on the head. The world felt "big" back then. It was a journey to get from one city to the next. You really got the sense that you were traveling in a hostile world, with ocassional islands of safety between seas of hazard. When you arrived somewhere new, you "arrived" there. There were people to greet you. You made sure to get a bind because the trip was so dangerous. Obviously, this changed as you gained levels, but it was still an issue. Even at level 50, you made sure you travelled to and bound at the nearest city to wherever you were going to hunt/raid. Heck. I remember taking the time the day before a raid to make sure I was situated properly for the raid. If you didn't do that, you'd end up spending an hour or so just getting to where you needed to be. Sure, wizards and druids made things easier, but you still might spend 15 minutes running to the nearest portal location, and then 15 more minutes running from there to wherever you were hunting. Contrasted to today, where I can literally get to pretty much the farthest hunting spots in the game in less then 5 minutes...
King Nobby wrote:
More words please
Thanks again to everyone!
Just for perspective, I came into the game just before the Ykesha expansion. They were just in the process of putting in the newbie armor quests, and the ones in Kelethin were complete. I started a Wood Elf Bard and was off. My friend, an EQ Vet and member of an elite raiding guild would gladly answer all my questions in game and in e-mails. He would buy my leather padding and silk at the going rate too. I felt rich with 1000pp in the bank. Every once in a while (like the time he trained the whole of Mistmore and AE nuked them) he would help me with a drop but for the most part I was on my own to group and discover stuff.
Mind you I only had the Trilogy, no Luclin, no PoP, no Ykesha either.
Recollections:
I noticed A LOT of frogs then since everyone was trying out that race.
First trip to Crushbone was a trip! Couple of friends pulled mobs from the TR to me at the entrance. Very exciting to see Emperor Crush for the first time.
I think I was level 10, took the boat ride from Butcherblock to Freeport to buy some song sold there. Boat ride was very long! (Remember I didn't have PoK yet)
Got Luclin, made a cleric and at level 9 took him through the Nexus portal to Dreadlands to FV. Gated back. Not much to risk but still exciting.
Ran my level 16 bard from North Karana to High Pass back to Freeport. Saw my first Hill Giant.
Got PoP finally. Ran my bard through Runnyeye, got killed in WK by the Ogres (ran into them, didn't even know they were there). My first real CR.
When LDoN came out, I got it right away. Very first one I did was a Mistmoore with my cleric. We succeeded with 4 people! heh
Anyway, thanks to everyone again for their Original Game recollections!
Just for perspective, I came into the game just before the Ykesha expansion. They were just in the process of putting in the newbie armor quests, and the ones in Kelethin were complete. I started a Wood Elf Bard and was off. My friend, an EQ Vet and member of an elite raiding guild would gladly answer all my questions in game and in e-mails. He would buy my leather padding and silk at the going rate too. I felt rich with 1000pp in the bank. Every once in a while (like the time he trained the whole of Mistmore and AE nuked them) he would help me with a drop but for the most part I was on my own to group and discover stuff.
Mind you I only had the Trilogy, no Luclin, no PoP, no Ykesha either.
Recollections:
I noticed A LOT of frogs then since everyone was trying out that race.
First trip to Crushbone was a trip! Couple of friends pulled mobs from the TR to me at the entrance. Very exciting to see Emperor Crush for the first time.
I think I was level 10, took the boat ride from Butcherblock to Freeport to buy some song sold there. Boat ride was very long! (Remember I didn't have PoK yet)
Got Luclin, made a cleric and at level 9 took him through the Nexus portal to Dreadlands to FV. Gated back. Not much to risk but still exciting.
Ran my level 16 bard from North Karana to High Pass back to Freeport. Saw my first Hill Giant.
Got PoP finally. Ran my bard through Runnyeye, got killed in WK by the Ogres (ran into them, didn't even know they were there). My first real CR.
When LDoN came out, I got it right away. Very first one I did was a Mistmoore with my cleric. We succeeded with 4 people! heh
Anyway, thanks to everyone again for their Original Game recollections!
Couple more dawned on me (thanks to the poll about old planes)...
Remember 2-day Air raids? You'd clear to a particular island then log off since it took seven hours to get there. Everyone would log back in a pre-determined time the next day. Usually spread over a Saturday and Sunday.
Remember when there was not a level restriction to zone into the Plane of Fear.
Ports (more after the release of Kunark) were usually 5pp per seat.
There was no tinting of armor. So you could actually tell what someone was wearing (in the visible spots) just by looking at them. Later when Fine Steel was introduced, it could be colored, but only a handful of colors were available.
At some point, everyone made at least one piece of armor for themselves. Patchwork armor brings back memories.
DON'T SIT ON THE THRONE IN MAESTRO'S ROOM!!!!!
Frostbite - quest vs. someone camping him.
As others pointed out, travelling from one side of the world to the other often conjures up good memories. With my barbarian warrior (i.e. blind), a latern that I saved up to buy and the map that came with the game, I set out at around level 10 to go from Halas to Freeport. I didn't know about SoW or Binds. I actually followed the paths that are in the zones, and try my best not to wander too far off the path in the fear of getting lost. If I found somewhere safe like the NK bridge to EK (not knowing where exactly the zone lines were) I would wait out the night until daybreak to start travelling again. This luckily saved my bacon in Kithior Woods.
Remember 2-day Air raids? You'd clear to a particular island then log off since it took seven hours to get there. Everyone would log back in a pre-determined time the next day. Usually spread over a Saturday and Sunday.
Remember when there was not a level restriction to zone into the Plane of Fear.
Ports (more after the release of Kunark) were usually 5pp per seat.
There was no tinting of armor. So you could actually tell what someone was wearing (in the visible spots) just by looking at them. Later when Fine Steel was introduced, it could be colored, but only a handful of colors were available.
At some point, everyone made at least one piece of armor for themselves. Patchwork armor brings back memories.
DON'T SIT ON THE THRONE IN MAESTRO'S ROOM!!!!!
Frostbite - quest vs. someone camping him.
As others pointed out, travelling from one side of the world to the other often conjures up good memories. With my barbarian warrior (i.e. blind), a latern that I saved up to buy and the map that came with the game, I set out at around level 10 to go from Halas to Freeport. I didn't know about SoW or Binds. I actually followed the paths that are in the zones, and try my best not to wander too far off the path in the fear of getting lost. If I found somewhere safe like the NK bridge to EK (not knowing where exactly the zone lines were) I would wait out the night until daybreak to start travelling again. This luckily saved my bacon in Kithior Woods.
SDC/BF was the uber-weapon combo pre-Kunark. That's Spined Dragon Claws and Bloodfire, the latter for the proc. Bladestorm was an awesome weapon before it was removed.
Lustrous Russet was a set of planar armor that was removed. Cryosilk was also removed. Both of those were replaced with class-specific armor, and at least in the case of Russet, the class armor was often worse. For lower end folks, there was rubicite, then mithril for dragon raids (the MR for Fear). Caster gear back then was only useful for increasing your manapool, it had no other measurable effect, and you reached the cap of 200 int pretty quickly (int above that didn't give much/any benefit).
The biggest difference between EQ then and now is the quantity of items. You could name every dropped item in the game, and a great many things you could get at level 20 you'd still use at level 50. What was called a glaring game flaw back then may have largely contributed to how memorable EQ was - you could spend days camping/going after these little items that may have had no real effect on your character, but was nonetheless the best thing you could get for that slot. Of course, people weren't stupid - the biggest camps in the game were for the items that mattered, like jboots or fbss, and there's a reason why cloak of flames was so highly valued. I should also mention that yaks/fbss/mithril 2-handers were more or less used as currency. It was a pure barter system until Plane of Sky introduced massive money sinks into the game.
One thing that surprised me - I have more /played time on my character in EQ2 at level 50 than I did in EQ1, despite EQ2 being widely accepted as an easier game. I guess I'm a lot more likely to just ***** around these days than race to the end like I was in old EQ, even though I did explore a lot.
Lustrous Russet was a set of planar armor that was removed. Cryosilk was also removed. Both of those were replaced with class-specific armor, and at least in the case of Russet, the class armor was often worse. For lower end folks, there was rubicite, then mithril for dragon raids (the MR for Fear). Caster gear back then was only useful for increasing your manapool, it had no other measurable effect, and you reached the cap of 200 int pretty quickly (int above that didn't give much/any benefit).
The biggest difference between EQ then and now is the quantity of items. You could name every dropped item in the game, and a great many things you could get at level 20 you'd still use at level 50. What was called a glaring game flaw back then may have largely contributed to how memorable EQ was - you could spend days camping/going after these little items that may have had no real effect on your character, but was nonetheless the best thing you could get for that slot. Of course, people weren't stupid - the biggest camps in the game were for the items that mattered, like jboots or fbss, and there's a reason why cloak of flames was so highly valued. I should also mention that yaks/fbss/mithril 2-handers were more or less used as currency. It was a pure barter system until Plane of Sky introduced massive money sinks into the game.
One thing that surprised me - I have more /played time on my character in EQ2 at level 50 than I did in EQ1, despite EQ2 being widely accepted as an easier game. I guess I'm a lot more likely to just ***** around these days than race to the end like I was in old EQ, even though I did explore a lot.
I didn't care for EQ2 much, but I doubt I'll ever put as much time into any character as I've put into Samira. Granted, a lot of that has been on behalf of other characters; even so, I've spent a ton of time just running around, poking my nose into everything, looking for rare NPCs just to see them.
In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.
Tehom wrote:
SDC/BF was the uber-weapon combo pre-Kunark. That's Spined Dragon Claws and Bloodfire, the latter for the proc. Bladestorm was an awesome weapon before it was removed.
More correctly, that was the most common "uber" weapon set. The weapons that resulted in quests in PoSky were better in every way (see: dagas). Of course, I don't think very many people completed them before Kunark came out (PoSky only came out a few months beforehand IIRC), so that's a pretty sketchy definition. Yeah. Just nitpicking.. ;)
Quote:
Lustrous Russet was a set of planar armor that was removed. Cryosilk was also removed. Both of those were replaced with class-specific armor, and at least in the case of Russet, the class armor was often worse. For lower end folks, there was rubicite, then mithril for dragon raids (the MR for Fear). Caster gear back then was only useful for increasing your manapool, it had no other measurable effect, and you reached the cap of 200 int pretty quickly (int above that didn't give much/any benefit).
Could have sworn Cryosilk dropped for quite some time after Kunark release. But then I wasn't paying that much attention to the caster stuff...
Quote:
The biggest difference between EQ then and now is the quantity of items. You could name every dropped item in the game, and a great many things you could get at level 20 you'd still use at level 50. What was called a glaring game flaw back then may have largely contributed to how memorable EQ was - you could spend days camping/going after these little items that may have had no real effect on your character, but was nonetheless the best thing you could get for that slot.
Truer words could not be spoken. There's a reason why everyone listed off a set of garbled seeming letters in the /auction channel back then. There were few enough items out there that you knew what each one was by the abbreviations. Can't do that today at all. Back then, even if you didn't have an item, or even had never seen one, you knew what it was and recognized it when it was mentioned (and often knew where it came from as well). Today, there are probably thousands of items that I've seen that I have no clue where they come from. Just impossible to keep track of them all anymore.
Quote:
One thing that surprised me - I have more /played time on my character in EQ2 at level 50 than I did in EQ1, despite EQ2 being widely accepted as an easier game. I guess I'm a lot more likely to just ***** around these days than race to the end like I was in old EQ, even though I did explore a lot.
Is that actual active played time though? EQ2 includes the whole merchanting thing from your home/whatever right out of the box. How much of that time is actual time spent leveling? Have the implemented the ability to sell stuff while not even logged in yet? I'm wondering if that counts towards your time as well.
Only experience with EQ2 is from watching my friend play it. It actually looks like they did a lot of things "right" with it, but may have lost some of the feel that made EQ great (lots of the stuff mentioned here). Hard for me to say without actually sitting down and playing for a few months though.
Edited, Wed Jun 22 23:44:22 2005 by gbaji
King Nobby wrote:
More words please
4 posts
I started a dwarf Paladin fairly soon after eq came out
After i got to 9th level i started smithing
When i needed ore i took the boat to freeport and when it zoned it dropped me off in the water i drowned lost that body .
Then i tried boat again ,this time i fell through bottom of boat and drowned but a gm got my body back after several days.
I tried boat again and someone hunting giants and clops then trained them to boat not sure if he meant to or just careless or what and whole boat died .
GM rezzed everyone later that day .
After this i gave up on boats .
So i started my first run to akanon no sow i had never seen or heard of it yet .
Heck i hadnt even seen a druid or shammi yet
Ran through greater Fay no problems ,zoned into lesser fay running along zone wall suddenly i see a cute little brownie .
I con him it says scowls what would you like your tombstone to say .I think oh **it i am dead ,he nukes me i see loading
Sigh i start again after 2 hours find body .
Continue to akanon ,enter zone see mobs con red run to city make it in .
Try to find bank wander for 30 min or so finally find it .
Go get ore unstackable of course
Find forge see line of 3 or more people waiting to use each
(mostly casters red to me )
After i got to 9th level i started smithing
When i needed ore i took the boat to freeport and when it zoned it dropped me off in the water i drowned lost that body .
Then i tried boat again ,this time i fell through bottom of boat and drowned but a gm got my body back after several days.
I tried boat again and someone hunting giants and clops then trained them to boat not sure if he meant to or just careless or what and whole boat died .
GM rezzed everyone later that day .
After this i gave up on boats .
So i started my first run to akanon no sow i had never seen or heard of it yet .
Heck i hadnt even seen a druid or shammi yet
Ran through greater Fay no problems ,zoned into lesser fay running along zone wall suddenly i see a cute little brownie .
I con him it says scowls what would you like your tombstone to say .I think oh **it i am dead ,he nukes me i see loading
Sigh i start again after 2 hours find body .
Continue to akanon ,enter zone see mobs con red run to city make it in .
Try to find bank wander for 30 min or so finally find it .
Go get ore unstackable of course
Find forge see line of 3 or more people waiting to use each
(mostly casters red to me )
4 posts
Xasily part 2
Decide to take other zone wall in lesser fay
Run into orc camp Die .
Do another CR and hour or so to get body
Start home run again ,start getting hit by a floating sword
You guessed it a red Shadowman die .
Another 30 min cr .
Start run to get to kaladim practice smithing .
Fail every time but get some skill ups but no armour.
Now totally broke .
Cry .
Went to vist eleves in Felwith guards are dubiuos but ok .
Walk around suddenly i hear its dwarves like you that have ruined your own lands you wont ruin mine
Suddenly i see message Your brains begin to melt .
I die
I do cr luckily whoever whatever it was is now gone i get body
run to boat.
Now try taking boat to freeport again .
The Land Of opportunity
After getting off boat at wrong stop i log for night .
Decide to take other zone wall in lesser fay
Run into orc camp Die .
Do another CR and hour or so to get body
Start home run again ,start getting hit by a floating sword
You guessed it a red Shadowman die .
Another 30 min cr .
Start run to get to kaladim practice smithing .
Fail every time but get some skill ups but no armour.
Now totally broke .
Cry .
Went to vist eleves in Felwith guards are dubiuos but ok .
Walk around suddenly i hear its dwarves like you that have ruined your own lands you wont ruin mine
Suddenly i see message Your brains begin to melt .
I die
I do cr luckily whoever whatever it was is now gone i get body
run to boat.
Now try taking boat to freeport again .
The Land Of opportunity
After getting off boat at wrong stop i log for night .
That was a nice... poem?
In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.
4 posts
arrive at Freeport
Guards glower ( Find out later Pallis and Militia have War on )
Wander around freeport Named Dog attacks me kills me so fast
Since i am bound in Kaladim Take boat etc to do cr .
Well thats what it was like for me as a young Dwarven Paladin off to see the world and learn smithing
At that time i wore some looted cloth,rawhide and an 8 ac breastplate and helm and boots from a scarab carapace quest in kaladim ( I may be wrong on ac its been six years and 4 accts and 25 or so major char since then )
And at that time i had never seen or heard of anyone who could do rezes ,and besides i had no pp or gold and just a few silver
and cp for food
But at that time you could fish off boats so on trip there i had gotten a few fish for food
Now my fav char is a 57 necro Iksar, 65 chanter Erudite, 51 monk iksar,53 druid We,54 shaman iksar 39 wizard froglok and lot of others But i wouldnt have missed the fun for anything
Guards glower ( Find out later Pallis and Militia have War on )
Wander around freeport Named Dog attacks me kills me so fast
Since i am bound in Kaladim Take boat etc to do cr .
Well thats what it was like for me as a young Dwarven Paladin off to see the world and learn smithing
At that time i wore some looted cloth,rawhide and an 8 ac breastplate and helm and boots from a scarab carapace quest in kaladim ( I may be wrong on ac its been six years and 4 accts and 25 or so major char since then )
And at that time i had never seen or heard of anyone who could do rezes ,and besides i had no pp or gold and just a few silver
and cp for food
But at that time you could fish off boats so on trip there i had gotten a few fish for food
Now my fav char is a 57 necro Iksar, 65 chanter Erudite, 51 monk iksar,53 druid We,54 shaman iksar 39 wizard froglok and lot of others But i wouldnt have missed the fun for anything
Duchess SamiraX wrote:
I didn't care for EQ2 much, but I doubt I'll ever put as much time into any character as I've put into Samira. Granted, a lot of that has been on behalf of other characters; even so, I've spent a ton of time just running around, poking my nose into everything, looking for rare NPCs just to see them.
Yeah. I wouldn't play EQ2 much if I didn't know a bunch of friends from other servers I never really got to play EQ1 with. I think I might enjoy the game more if coercers are upgraded enough with the combat changes, but meh.
gbaji wrote:
The weapons that resulted in quests in PoSky were better in every way (see: dagas). Of course, I don't think very many people completed them before Kunark came out (PoSky only came out a few months beforehand IIRC), so that's a pretty sketchy definition. Yeah. Just nitpicking.. ;)
Technically I don't think Dagas was completed at all before Kunark came out. The highest anyone got was FoH losing to the Bee Boss, and they went back and beat Sky after Kunark raised the level cap. They did manage to get Inte Akera's Sword of Death for fun, but that was promptly removed. I guess if you want to mention weapons like that, the Butcherblock Hammer was probably the best weapon you could see someone using as far as artifacts go.
Okay nice memories, I started playing April 1st, 1999, A high elf wizard based in Felwithe, a choice I'd soon regret. I didn't read every word of the above but no one seemed to mention the patching...patching....patching... and as hard as travel was back then for reasons nicely illuminated above, one of the real nasty realities back then was you'd often be blocked by zones that were down. The game was so unstable back then!!!
I remember getting a game guide to actually tell me if it was worth my time to try and get from Gfay to Freeport. He said not to bother!
Does anyone remember the web site that had pictures of people's rants when folks would loot their bodies and refuse to give the items back?
Ah the game was so viceral back then. I had hooked up with two players from California, I'm in Michigan, I remember just waiting for them to get online. Shinjin and Dale, both monks if I remember. Crushbone was a way scary place and someone above was right about not seeing anyone too exotic about. I remember the day two Barbarians came to Crushbone, a man and woman and they were kicking *** and seemed entirely too uber for their tunics.
Remember paying a plat to get bound at the orc lift? Getting bind affinity was such a cash cow back then!
On Tunare it was Gfay that was the /bazaar, it seems on other servers it was the tunnel in East Commonlands. A much more sane choice if you ask me. I hated getting to the bank in Kelethin as a newb.
Someone above mentioned seeing a player with a surname. When I saw my first 20+ character I was in awe. They conned SO red to me and I was thinking man they could kill anything!!! Then after geting past 20 myself finding out how many more mobs there were in the world who could squash me just as fast as when I was lvl 1. Ouch.
Speaking of which though, I'll never forget the day in North Karana when some robed caster type ran UP to a Hill Giant instead of fleeing, rooted him and proceeded to burn him dead! My eyes were out of my sockets. Then he only wanted the coin he let me loot the body!!! Woo Hoo!
Remember working the Green Room in Black Burrow? We could never just walk in to the room we had to have some more uber player help us break in first. Then once we were in we weren't going to leave for anything. Had to keep the room cleared lest we get pushed out again. And doing that was always a close thing.
I soon grew tired of playing a wizard however, the leveling was tough! Often times no one wanted you. I left the game for a time. When I came back I decided to be a cleric since they were the one class I always remember everyone searching for. Back in the day there weren't many clerics to be had so we often grouped without one. When we did get one it was like being in heaven man those guys could heal the crap out of ya!
Without a cleric we'd get heals from druids, kinda thinking shammys couldn't heal much back then... anyone recall? Anyway we'd have to rest up and stop the killing sometimes just to recover HP when the mana was spent.
Remember Dorn, sitting up on that sand dune staring down at the tent he'd spawn in wacking Dervs in the meantime. The bam Dorn would spawn and someone would aggro him and we'd all run like hens for the Oasis zone line. Sometimes made it, sometimes not. Remember jumping until you were exhasuted to get a little bit of a quicker run out of your toon?
Then you'd just hope someone hadn't trained Lockjaw or some Sand Giants to the other side of the zone line.
I do get kinda sad as I pass through zone after zone after zone, empty of players, which used to be so packed with newbies running around like maniacs having the time of their lifes.
Evenkeel, Yack, Sunmist <---formerly AugieBenDogie Yea!!! they actually made me change my name back then since Augie wasn't in the spirit of the game!!! Can you believe it!?!?!
I remember getting a game guide to actually tell me if it was worth my time to try and get from Gfay to Freeport. He said not to bother!
Does anyone remember the web site that had pictures of people's rants when folks would loot their bodies and refuse to give the items back?
Ah the game was so viceral back then. I had hooked up with two players from California, I'm in Michigan, I remember just waiting for them to get online. Shinjin and Dale, both monks if I remember. Crushbone was a way scary place and someone above was right about not seeing anyone too exotic about. I remember the day two Barbarians came to Crushbone, a man and woman and they were kicking *** and seemed entirely too uber for their tunics.
Remember paying a plat to get bound at the orc lift? Getting bind affinity was such a cash cow back then!
On Tunare it was Gfay that was the /bazaar, it seems on other servers it was the tunnel in East Commonlands. A much more sane choice if you ask me. I hated getting to the bank in Kelethin as a newb.
Someone above mentioned seeing a player with a surname. When I saw my first 20+ character I was in awe. They conned SO red to me and I was thinking man they could kill anything!!! Then after geting past 20 myself finding out how many more mobs there were in the world who could squash me just as fast as when I was lvl 1. Ouch.
Speaking of which though, I'll never forget the day in North Karana when some robed caster type ran UP to a Hill Giant instead of fleeing, rooted him and proceeded to burn him dead! My eyes were out of my sockets. Then he only wanted the coin he let me loot the body!!! Woo Hoo!
Remember working the Green Room in Black Burrow? We could never just walk in to the room we had to have some more uber player help us break in first. Then once we were in we weren't going to leave for anything. Had to keep the room cleared lest we get pushed out again. And doing that was always a close thing.
I soon grew tired of playing a wizard however, the leveling was tough! Often times no one wanted you. I left the game for a time. When I came back I decided to be a cleric since they were the one class I always remember everyone searching for. Back in the day there weren't many clerics to be had so we often grouped without one. When we did get one it was like being in heaven man those guys could heal the crap out of ya!
Without a cleric we'd get heals from druids, kinda thinking shammys couldn't heal much back then... anyone recall? Anyway we'd have to rest up and stop the killing sometimes just to recover HP when the mana was spent.
Remember Dorn, sitting up on that sand dune staring down at the tent he'd spawn in wacking Dervs in the meantime. The bam Dorn would spawn and someone would aggro him and we'd all run like hens for the Oasis zone line. Sometimes made it, sometimes not. Remember jumping until you were exhasuted to get a little bit of a quicker run out of your toon?
Then you'd just hope someone hadn't trained Lockjaw or some Sand Giants to the other side of the zone line.
I do get kinda sad as I pass through zone after zone after zone, empty of players, which used to be so packed with newbies running around like maniacs having the time of their lifes.
Evenkeel, Yack, Sunmist <---formerly AugieBenDogie Yea!!! they actually made me change my name back then since Augie wasn't in the spirit of the game!!! Can you believe it!?!?!
Just to add some of my own memories.
All of the following were uber at one point pre Kunark:
Short Sword of the Ykesha (Lower Guk)
Mithril Two Handed Sword (Upper Guk)
Barbed Leather Whip (Najena)
Bone Bladed Claymore (Befallen)
Minotaur Battle Axe (Steamfont Mountains)
Fine Steel Daggers (Especially for pets)
Combine Weapons sold at Gypsy camps were what most people who could not "raid" the above strived for.
Quote:
Just curious again (mainly because of all the old-world/old school guild talk).
We are talking pre-Kunark here.
What was the max level? 60? It was 50.
What was the best gear? Celestial Temper stuff like Fierce Heraldic or other cultural tradeskilled?
This did not exist. Pre planes, it was Rubicite, Banded, Bronze.
What were the top 'raid' mobs? Naggy? Vox? any higher? Nagafen and Vox were the highest level monsters.
Did most people run around in Banded or Fine Plate?
Yes to banded. Fine Plate was not in game.
What were some of the uber weapons?
We are talking pre-Kunark here.
What was the max level? 60? It was 50.
What was the best gear? Celestial Temper stuff like Fierce Heraldic or other cultural tradeskilled?
This did not exist. Pre planes, it was Rubicite, Banded, Bronze.
What were the top 'raid' mobs? Naggy? Vox? any higher? Nagafen and Vox were the highest level monsters.
Did most people run around in Banded or Fine Plate?
Yes to banded. Fine Plate was not in game.
What were some of the uber weapons?
All of the following were uber at one point pre Kunark:
Short Sword of the Ykesha (Lower Guk)
Mithril Two Handed Sword (Upper Guk)
Barbed Leather Whip (Najena)
Bone Bladed Claymore (Befallen)
Minotaur Battle Axe (Steamfont Mountains)
Fine Steel Daggers (Especially for pets)
Combine Weapons sold at Gypsy camps were what most people who could not "raid" the above strived for.
After 16 years, I'm not listing every friggin character.
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