New Items: Wilderness Warrior's Shoulderpads ;  Void Energy Ring ;  Black Skin Hardwarmers ;  Idol of the Kor ;  Pantaloons of the Netherealm ;  Talisman of Ahk ;  Hood of the Rising Sun ;  Deepwater Girdle ;  Aramid Robe of the Voidcaller ;  Boots of Banditry ;  Exalted Leggings of Grace ;  Scorched Deep Forge Greaves ;  Shoulders of the Shin Protector ;  Wavebreaker's Sword ;  Scorched Deep Forge Leggings ;  Tormenting Pauldrons ;  Bracelet of the Ydal Lord ;  Tactician's Band ;  Numinous Voidlink Hauberk ;  Sash of the Inquisitor ;  Doom Knight's Scale Shirt ;  Forest Hunter's Leggings ;  Marksman's Chestguard ;  Executioner's Chopper ;  Vashotan Cleric's Choker ;  Warbelt of the Everdark ;  Bauble of the Swale ;  Wyrmguard Shield ;  Darkthread Slippers of Rift Evocation ;  Linked-steel Bracer ;  Knowledge-bound Handwraps ;  Wilderness Warrior's Leggings ;  Headsock of Clinging Darkness ;  Vashotan Cleric's Mark ;  Exalted Earring of Clouds ;  Exalted Breastplate of the Deep ;  Bone-toed Boots ;  Fiendish Footwraps ;  Adamantite Epaulets ;  Energized Orb of Destruction ;  Meat Cleaver of the Ethernaut Chef ;  Obsession Wristlet ;  Unholy Band ;  Overlord's Cloak of the Formidable Warrior ;  Sathirian Shroud of Dynasty ;  Exalted Greaves of the Stoic ;  Fiendish Brass Loop ;  Mystmyrian Charm ;  Darkened Flesh Coif ;  Lava Rock Bangle ;  Holy Warrior's Sabatons ;  Boots of the Frostwight ;  Band of Great Wisdom ;  Rift Guardian's Gloves of Order ;  Inner Power Wristwrap ;  Shoes of Corporeal Corruption ;  

There will be some nice little game tweaks coming to EQII players just before Christmas!  An SOE press release sent us over to EQII Players, where we saw a tidy bunch of player-requested changes to the game.  These include:

• Quest Journal: The mechanics and sorting options of the collection tab are being improved, making it easier to sort and find collections.
• Harvesting Depots: The guild halls harvesting depots have been increased by 50%, leading to more storage space.
• Raised Spell Drop Rates: Players level 50-60 in Desert of Flames will notice an increase in master spell drops.
• Home Addresses: No need to worry about finding your way home anymore. Your Persona window will now display your full house address and zone name. This will require visiting your home once before it will display your full address.
• Increased number of icons displayed in the Spell Effects and Detriments window by 50%.

For more details, see EQII Players!

The introduction of Station Cash, a pay-for-stuff micrortransaction service offered by SOE for EverQuest and EverQuestII, caused less bruhaha than one might expect.  At first glance the program looks quite controversial, but the first week has been successful enough for new items for EQII to be added to the Station Marketplace!

See all the EQII Marketplace items on the EQII Station Cash page.

See the announcement of these new items at EQII Players.

Do you have what it takes to defeat Mr. McScroogle? Well, you'll get the chance to find out in the new Saving Frosfell holiday scenario in Legends of Norrath .

Legends of Norrath is offering a new scenario this holiday season with great gifts for players who can defeat the nasty Mr. McScroogle! The Saving Frostfell scenario will be offered in Legends of Norrath from Dec. 15 through Jan. 10 at 2PM PT. The first time you rescue Queen Bunny and defeat McScroogle, you'll win the Frostfell Showglobe (5P19) promo card AND either the Discordian Great Mace Ornament (5EQP13) loot card for EverQuest or the Tapestry of the Di'Zok (5EQIIP13) loot card for EverQuest II, depending on your in-game settings.

You can receive additional copies of the Frostfell Snowglobe promo card each time you defeat McScroogle with a different avatar archetype (limit 4).

Craig "Grimwell" Dalrymple, SOE Senior Community Relations Manager, posted on the official forums :

The initial response to Station Cash has been a success for SOE and we are looking forward to new offerings for both EverQuest and EverQuest II in the not too distant future.

In fact, the response has been so strong that game teams are adding new employees dedicated to Station Cash, to allow us to continue to add new and exciting items to the marketplace, without having to pull from the core development.

In addition to strengthening our development teams with new staff; we want to be very open to you and your ideas for future items in the marketplace. Which is the purpose of this thread, what would you like to see in the marketplace next?

Please share your ideas for things you would like to see that fit within the spirit of the marketplace (please don’t ask for Epic’s…). I’ll be tracking this thread and reporting internally on the things that you guys ask for. While I can’t guarantee that every single requested item will make it in the games, and can’t set a schedule from your idea to delivery as a game asset, I want you to know that we are quite serious about not only hearing your input, but putting it to work if it’s viable.

Jennifer "Kirstie" Gerull, EQII Associate Producer, commented in the December 11 Allakhazam EQ2 Developer's Chat that real life posters of your characters are already in the works.  What else would you like?

EverQuestII players can comment here on the EQII Official Forums. 

EverQuest players can comment in this thread on the EQ Official Forums.

Ever wanted to work on Allakhazam? Are you a strong writer with knowledge about what makes the gaming industry tick? We're hiring!

The Editorial team is hiring two part-time editors to help improve the overall quality of our content. If you're interested in finding out more about the requirements, check our job opening page.

It's Frostfell in Norrath again, and Allakhazam has the inofz!  This annual winter holiday event will run from December 11 through January 5, and includes all your old Frostfell favorites and tons of new stuff!

Check out our Frostfell page !

Read the rest of this article to see the SOE Frostfell video!

With The Shadow Odyssey releasing tomorrow I thought it would be good to give everyone an update on the status of our upcoming site revamp that we announced at Fan Faire.

Our development team has been working diligently with SOE in order to make sure we can deliver everything you guys want.  Internally from the start, our goal has been to not launch until we can deliver everything at once.  We've recently gotten a huge influx of data that we're working on integrating but it's worth noting that with features such as the live broker data, both SOE and Zam are treading new water - it's challenging to everyone involved to get things perfected.

We'll try to provide more frequent updates until launch.  I don't want to give any date yet, but we're hoping for "soon(tm)".  If you have questions feel free to leave them in the comments and we'll try to answer them.

Combining the convenience of an Internet cafe or hotel business center with the thrill of action-packed gaming to create an ideal environment for work or play, The Office Games in San Diego is hosting a launch event for the Sony Online Entertainment’s EverQuest II: The Shadow Odyssey. This will be an exclusive event for fans to play the game, get tips and tricks from SOE’s Community Relations team and EQII developers, as well as have the chance at exciting prizes and giveaways. Light refreshments will be available.

When: Tuesday, November 18, 2008
2 p.m. to 6 p.m.

Where:  The Office Games, Mission Valley Westfield Shopping Center
1640 Camino Del Rio N #1228
San Diego, CA 92108

AND THE WINNERS ARE....

skipen
Uinamil
knoble
Brailynx
Vikingstaff
Olgie
litterflinger
lovemuffenn
Shadowydreamer
Miut

Each winner has been emailed a The Shadow Odyssey Retail Key, as noted in the official rules.