The latest Producer's Letter:

Hello everyone! Now a Producer's letter that has a bit more meat to it compared to the one that rolled out prior to Fan Faire.

Fan Faire was an absolute blast and I want to thank all of the players that were able to make it. There were quite a few questions at the panels and I believe that most all of them were addressed. (I do have to say that there were a few that we had to take note of and look into J). We had some technical issues at the "next expansion" panel when the PC didn't have EQ installed, but luckily one of the EQ designers brought his laptop and we were up and running in no time.

The room was packed and everyone was able to see a few of the zones from the Secrets of Faydwer. There was even a short explanation of the retail vs digital business by Russ Shanks.

I feel sorry for the Gnomes out there, I mean you are very crafty and make some of the best machines around, but in this expansion you may have gone too far. The large catapult that fires players up to the floating fortress is slightly overpowered and as I said in the presentation... there are a few gnomes that have missed their target and can be found littered across the zone. (When you tinker, you win some and you lose some.)

We also announced the new TCG (trading card game) that will be implemented into EQ and EQ2. Our SOE Denver office has been doing the majority of the work and the EQ and EQ2 teams have been working on getting everything up and running. We have been spending tons of time playing and giving feedback to SOE Denver and we believe it will be a blast to see everyone on the public servers jump in and play. The game is a blast to play and the card art is really good. We worked on a few special loot cards that you will be able to get through booster packs.

It was critical that we included booster packs in the game for everyone. Sure you can buy booster packs whenever you want but you don't have to buy them to get them from creatures in the game. Keep in mind that we are not placing the boosters on specific NPC's in the game so for those of you that are planning on camping for boosters, sorry... no soup for you! One last thing, for the people that attended Fan Faire, your accounts will be flagged and the client will download automatically. We will be doing a closed beta on the TCG and we will be handing out booster packs throughout the beta period. Once the beta is over we will then open the game up to the remaining players and then the real challenge begins! TCG battles will be a great way to pass the time while playing if you are waiting for friends or that elusive NPC.

Once the game is open to everyone, booster packs will only be available via NPC drops and through the station store. I would encourage everyone to go visit http://www.station.sony.com/ and follow the Legends of Norrath link to find out more information including links to the exclusive loot cards found in both EQ and EQ2.

Now to a few ideas that I have been thinking of.

The progression servers were a great concept and they actually are a huge success. Although we did a server merge on these servers to keep the players tight and available for grouping and opening the new content it has made me think... think about the idea of having a set of servers that are setup with a special rule set. What do you all think of that? I know that there have been discussions about different gameplay types or different rule sets before but I figured it was a conversation worth having again. The development team has a few ideas of their own but I wanted to hear what the players had in mind. Join the Special Ruleset Servers discussion.

Another sticky point seems to be about getting low level players into the game. One of the things that I have noticed is that many of the more experienced players don't have much of an incentive to go back down and help lower level players. This is something that we have been discussing during our late nights and team meetings. I think it is something that you (the players) should have some feedback in. I mean we could put in one of the ideas that we have but I would rather get some feedback both on your ideas and on ours and make a decision that is best for the game. I will get a post up that we can all throw some ideas around in. Join the Incentive for Helping Lower Levels discussion.

And finally...

One of the panels that we had at Fan Faire was a quest workshop. It turned out to be a hit and the people made it had a great time. I would love to have events like that not just on Fan Faire! It is something that we would need to provide a system for the players to enter information in a useful way that we could use on our end when implementing quests and other content. Please let me know if that is something that you would be interested in. We have a ton of work with each expansion and various other Live events but I think that events where the players can actually participate would be a great addition to the game.

One last thing- Many of the people at Fan Faire were able to get a set of EQ dice that had unique logos on them from the upcoming expansion. We still have a ton left and will be finding some creative ways to get them out to you guys. I know that we will be handing out sets at Gencon so if you happen to be at the show, stop by the booth and get a set!

Clint "Jourdian" Worley
EverQuest Producer
Sony Online Entertainment