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November 18th, 2004
* Topic is 'Join us tonight, November 18th, at 5pm
Pacific / 8pm Eastern for a dev chat with the developers of Everquest2!'
*
Brekkee - We will be starting shortly
* Brekkee changes topic to 'Welcome to the EverQuest
2 House of Commons. Tonight’s topic is General Discussion. Please send
your questions to [QT]Gowel or [QT]Jetuser' *
Brekkee - Good evening and welcome
to another great Stratics House of Commons chat, tonight our guests are
the developers of EverQuest 2! Tonight’s topic is General Discussion so
all questions are welcome.
Brekkee - Please send your questions
to [QT]Gowel or [QT]Jetuser - to do so type /query NICK and type in the
window that pops up. Questions sent to me or the developers will not make
it into the lineup, so don't bother. Full logs of the chat will be up
on http://eq2.stratics.com shortly after the chat.
Brekkee - We'll start with a brief
introduction from the developers, now would be a good time to send those
questions.
Froech - Hello, I'm Bruce Ferguson,
Live producer of EverQuest II. Welcome!
Cao - Hi, I'm Chris Cao, Lead Content
Designer for EQII.
Moorgard - Hi, I'm Steve Danuser,
community manager.
Russo - Hello, I'm Joe Russo, Lead
Mechanics Designer for EQII.
Gallenite - Hi there! I'm Troy McClure.
err.. Scott Hartsman, Technical Director of EQ II.
Brekkee - *Lister* There are quite
a lot of tradeskill recipes, even at low levels. Would it be possible
to add some more filters, such as by raw materials, or by subcomponents
of a certain recipe?
Gallenite - Good question. There's
really a lot of info involved in EQ II tradeskills, and as people get
farther and farther into it, it's one of the many areas in the UI that
we're looking to add more abilities to get useful access to that info.
Nothing major planned short term, but I'd expect additional polish and
usefulness showing up in every update.
Gallenite - (done)
Brekkee - *Banhammer* Is there anything
in the works to make it possible for those who completed the betrayal
quest to retrieve the contents of their housing?
Cao - If you don’t collect your housing
items before you betray, you will need to sneak back into the city via
a traitor’s gate and grab your stuff. You’ll also want to release your
ownership of the house.
Cao - Done
Brekkee - *Guest88* Will EQ2 be more
available to the solo player or will it follow EQ as a primarily group/guild
game and why?
Cao - In the coming months look for
the addition of solo quests and encounters from levels 15 through 50.
These quests will all be possible for a single player to work through
and complete by themselves. We will always want to encourage grouping
through the use of more frequent rewards and special zones (typically
dungeons), but we want to make solo play viable and fun throughout the
game.
Cao - Done.
Brekkee - *Murdoc* My question is...Will
we ever see user customizable macros to cast spells. I miss being able
to hit one button to, lets say, cast a heal, and say "Healing to %t".
Gallenite - Agreed. The UI team is
adding some more useful abilities for hotkeys now. No specific ETA on
our first non-hotfix style update, but the hotkey improves will be a part
of it.
Gallenite - (done)
Brekkee - *Anon367* Hi there, I have
a quick question: Are you aware of the growing complaints that soloing
is not particularly viable (even for 1-2 hour periods as seemed to be
Sony's original intent) past level 15 or so, and will you be rethinking
or re-evaluating your current stance on solo content as a result?
Cao - Opinions will always vary on
how much soloing should be rewarded in comparison to grouping. Our goal
is to make sure that players can progress to 50 on their own if they chose,
but we want to entice them to group up with others. The core of our game
is based on player-to-player interaction and we want to reward players
who play with others. As I mentioned in the above post, we are adding
more content specifically for solo play.
Cao - Done.
Brekkee - *Lister* What's been the
most unexpected development so far since launch?
Froech - Being able to sleep.
Russo - A day off :)
Moorgard - They like us! They really
like us!
Gallenite - The reaction has been
a lot more positive than a lot of us expected. :)
Cao - That halflings are the MOST
popular...err...least popular race. RIVERVALE!
Gallenite - hahahaha
Moorgard - I think we're done!
Brekkee - *aaron|eq2* Question for
the team: Are there any plans to modify the current player merchant /
seller system, perhaps for example allowing players to advertise themselves
on the merchant boards as 'Armorer' so that players can get in touch directly,
rather than needing Armorers to wait in their rooms for customers
Gallenite - Excellent suggestion.
We do have /LFW (looking for work) in the works and the ability to display
trade class in /who as well. Displaying it as a part of in-house storefronts
does seem like it'd make a lot of sense. :) I'll pass it by the gentleman
who wrote that bit and see what happens.
Gallenite - (done)
Brekkee - *Sass_Tonya* During Beta,
we saw an update (for the most part) once a week. Once the daily fixes
that are currently happening calm down, what will the players be able
to expect as far as patches go ?
Froech - We've mostly been in "fix
the broken stuff" since release, but we're moving forward now with new
content. Next week you'll see a new release of some art fixes which should
help as well, and we're hoping to be doing at least weekly releases of
more fixes and new content. Our design staff has some pretty neat ideas
up their sleeves which will be developing in the game in the future.
Froech - done
Brekkee - *LadyJade* Has the community
responded well to eqplayers.com and do you think the guides and features
will impact the fan site popularity, magelo etc
Moorgard - The response to eq2players.com
has been great. It provides a lot of great tools all in one place to keep
the in-game experience going when you're at work and so forth.
Moorgard - Our intention was never
to hinder other fansites, but rather to provide a central place for players
to learn more about the game and interact with one another.
Moorgard - There are a ton of great
EQII fansites that continue to provide a lot of useful information, guides,
maps, and forums for players.
Moorgard - Fansites are alive and
well in EQII!
Moorgard - done
Brekkee - *Anon367* Can you provide
a few hints on how we can expect the Qeynos v Freeport (i.e. Good v Evil)
rivalry to manifest itself in game?
Cao - The stage has been set for the
cold war conflict between the two cities. As players level up their guilds,
they will uncover a series of plots (quests) and actions (raids) that
involve the ongoing struggle between the two cities. The first of these
opportunities to further the goals of your city are already in game. Look
for us to build on these in the future…and listen to the statues of your
leaders. They have clues to the coming conflicts
Cao - Done.
Brekkee - *Guest88* Ok. Will players
ever be allowed to become Menders? This will make forays into deep dungeons
and remote areas more viable.
Russo - Currently there are no plans
for players to become members. A goal of the repair system is for players
to return to the cities after an adventure to regroup and resupply. It
is also vital to the lavish lifestyle that the menders have come to enjoy
:)
Russo - done
Brekkee - *Serpentor* what is the
reasoning behind no house storage?
Cao - Storage in housing is something
that we’d love to add as time allows. Our current plan is to offer larger
storage options based on the size of the house.
Cao - Done.
Brekkee - *LadyJade* When can we
expect the email system to be implemented in game?
Gallenite - In-game mail is definitely
on the list of things we'd like to get 01added to the live game. We're
still a little too soon after launch to be 01committing to specific dates
on additions of major systems like that 01one, but we want it there too.
:) Sorry I can't be more specific, but we 01don't have a firm date on
it yet, and I don't want to pretend that we do.
Gallenite - (done)
Brekkee - *Squeg* Several crafting
changes went in just before the game went live. Are there more changes
in store? For instance, what's up with those crafting tools on certain
merchants?
Russo - There will be a few tweaks
and balances done to the tradeskill system. As Scott mentioned the UI
should be getting refined over time. Also, the harvesting tools you see
on merchants will be coming into play soon and will aid in your ability
to harvest.
Russo - done.
Brekkee - *Hiroh* How are the release
servers holding up under the load? Did you receive greater initial interest
than anticipated?
Gallenite - Surprisingly well. The
load we're seeing in live is actually somewhat larger than what we'd expected.
They're really good problems to be having right now, and for the most
part, the servers are performing very well, and getting better pretty
much daily. I don't know that I've ever been more proud of a team than
I am of this one. :)
Gallenite - (done)
Brekkee - *LadyJade* Can you tell
us who is the highest level character?
Moorgard - Hold on while we check
eq2players.com!
Gallenite - Sure, one sec :)
Gallenite - Right now.. Noah, on Permafrost.
Gallenite - (done)
Brekkee - *LadyJade* Are there any
plans to make chat tabbed? it takes up entirely to much space with 2 or
more windows. One for Chat and one for combat messages.
Gallenite - THats
Gallenite - Bah!
Gallenite - That's another one of
the convenience mods on the UI todo list. :)
Gallenite - (done)
Gallenite - (Need to duck out early
-- We may have launched, but the meetings never stop. Take care, all,
and thanks!)
Brekkee - That will wrap it up for
tonight. I’d like to thank the devs for coming! The log for tonight’s
chat will be up shortly on http://eq2.stratics.com But don’t leave just
yet! We still have the prizes to give away.
Cao - Thanks all, see you in game!
Russo - Thanks all, Freeport rules!
Froech - Thanks, folks... we appreciate
all of your support! Have fun in game!
Moorgard - Thanks everyone! The response
to EQII has been great and we really appreciate it!
Brekkee - Contest time!
Brekkee - Four lucky attendees will
be winning Rubik’s Cubes. We’re sorry but you must be in the United States
to win.
Brekkee - To win, please send an email
to EQ2hoc@stratics.com with the subject line: Rubik’s Cube. The 1st, 4th,
8th, and 12th emails received will win the prizes!
Brekkee - Good luck!
Brekkee - Thanks again for coming!
You can join #EverQuest2 to chat more about the game.
Brekkee - The Rubik's Cubes are EQ2
themed :)
Brekkee - You will be contacted via
email if you've won |