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What do you want to know about The Darkened Sea?Follow

#1 Oct 23 2014 at 2:20 PM Rating: Good
Hey all,

Of late, the decisions of the development team have ended up pissing me off, so I avoid the main forums. I can only assume that this late in the day that the NDA has been lifted. If not, I consider it late enough now that it is now null and void. So ask away with any questions you might have about The Darkened Sea.

There are eight zones, as any basic search will turn out. Four of them are semi-large and four are tiny. Two t1 zones that will be light blue at 105th, two t2 zones, and four t3 zones.

There are seven raids, two of which lock out upon request. So don't wipe or have raid reset or you'll be waiting until next week. Raids are tuned for 54 players in CotF t1 raid gear. Trash mobs hit upwards of 42k (in silk, granted).

Necromancers will finally be able to equip other weapons. Whether or not this will be desirable is yet to be seen.

There is a mount keyring that will store ten mounts. Additional mounts can be purchased from marketplace.

There were no new spell lines that I saw, granted I didn't look at *every* class. Most classes are having a good number of their key spells and abilities not seeing upgrades.

There were very few new AA. Most are but upgrades of current lines and, like the spells, many aren't seeing upgrades.

Weapon augmentations aren't seeing any upgrades. Gear upgrades are very minimal across the board, however, there are new powersources.

There is only one group mission per zone. Most, if not all, of them take place in open zones, so competition might be fierce. Looked to be only six HA.

Well, these are just a few highlights. I'll go into further details upon request and I encourage others to do the same.
#2 Oct 24 2014 at 8:10 AM Rating: Good
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If you are a solo/casual player, is it worth buying?
#3 Oct 24 2014 at 3:18 PM Rating: Excellent
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stdamm33 wrote:
If you are a solo/casual player, is it worth buying?



I will probably buy it. I haven't "used" much content past TSS. I buy an EQ expac about every 3 to get caught up. I figure it keeps the game going... so even though I'm really paying for them to keep the old stuff up and running that I want to do at least I am contributing. True... people that buy every expac contribute more. My thinking is I am paying 1/3 of the price for content I will likely never use. Maybe this is odd thinking?

Once in a while they do things that benefit anyone. The tweaks to the shared bank (my reading is bigger shared bank) make this expac useful. Granted they might be giving that to everyone anyways... sometimes hard to tell from Sony info.


I also have only played EQ in stretches over the last few years, maybe subbing for a few months at a time. $40 isn't a lot of money, depending on what kind of entertainment budget you have.

$40 is a lot of money if you run 3+ accounts and have a limited income.
#4 Oct 25 2014 at 5:19 AM Rating: Good
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snailish wrote:
tweaks to the shared bank (my reading is bigger shared bank)


I have not seen this information. This might be the best collateral news in the expansion.
#5 Oct 26 2014 at 3:18 PM Rating: Excellent
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Or, they never bought CotF (like me) and will get the extra bank slots due to that expansion being included.

Tat
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#6 Oct 27 2014 at 6:07 PM Rating: Good
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So... the SOE web pages on this expansion is not very helpful. What, besides the zones and paintings I cannot use, is included ?

( No, I'm not listening to that boring keynote speech... my ears couldn't handle it. )

Thanks !
Geroblue
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#7 Oct 28 2014 at 5:20 AM Rating: Excellent
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There is nothing in this expansion for me, so ill only purchase it on my mains account for now and even then, I wont be entering the TDS zones for at least a year. Maybe longer if they do not fix the level 101+ xp nerf to pre COTF zones.
#8 Oct 29 2014 at 5:44 PM Rating: Excellent
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The two unlocked zones, which everyone will have to spend time in doing access quests for the other zones, are lousy. They're small, despite being spin-offs of previous zones which were notorious for being HUGE (The Buried Sea and Katta.) These "descendants" of those zones almost look like a dev decided only to use a small chunk of the original because it would be too much work to upgrade the whole zone. The Buried Sea version is packed with mobs, tightly congested, they run very fast, assist even across mob types, and some cannot be snared/rooted. If you're a kiter or root-rot type, then forget it. I kept having to fade away adds even when I thought I had a perfect single pull. The zone is also surrounded by water and ANY running room will involve water. Even with lev on, this is a PITA since you'll run into issues where the mob won't take damage if it's underwater and you're not.

Yeah, the purpose of this is probably to discourage soloing and force everyone to group up, which is fine with me. But with the small size of these zones and the congestion of mobs, it's going to be a train-fest on busy evenings, especially when everyone's trying to finish missions in order to advance.

I just don't get the rationale for designing this xpac this way. I can't say for sure yet since I have only seen 2 of the 8 zones but this xpac is at least in the running for the title "Worst EQ Expansion Ever." I may well change my mind if/when I see any of the locked zones. We shall see.
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#9 Nov 01 2014 at 7:33 PM Rating: Good
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I get the impression TDS is to discourage us and get us to move on to Next or Landmark. Not going to happen with me.
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#10 Nov 02 2014 at 8:02 AM Rating: Good
Quote:
The tweaks to the shared bank (my reading is bigger shared bank) make this expac useful. Granted they might be giving that to everyone anyways... sometimes hard to tell from Sony info.


Shared bank increase came with Call of the Forsaken. There were no bank changes in TDS.

Edited, Nov 2nd 2014 9:16am by amastropolo
#11 Nov 02 2014 at 8:09 AM Rating: Good
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amastropolo wrote:
snailish wrote:
[quote=stdamm33]The tweaks to the shared bank (my reading is bigger shared bank) make this expac useful. Granted they might be giving that to everyone anyways... sometimes hard to tell from Sony info.


Shared bank increase came with Call of the Forsaken. There were no bank changes in TDS.




Thanks for the correction. I was reading really sketchy (as in hard to follow the paragraphs let alone the meaning) web reviews of TDS.
#12 Nov 02 2014 at 8:16 AM Rating: Good
TDSTruth wrote:
Of late, the decisions of the development team have ended up ******* me off, so I avoid the main forums. I can only assume that this late in the day that the NDA has been lifted. If not, I consider it late enough now that it is now null and void. So ask away with any questions you might have about The Darkened Sea.


Main forums are a cesspool of negativity. It is wise to avoide them.

TDSTruth wrote:
There are seven raids, two of which lock out upon request. So don't wipe or have raid reset or you'll be waiting until next week. Raids are tuned for 54 players in CotF t1 raid gear. Trash mobs hit upwards of 42k (in silk, granted).


This is one of my biggest concerns. The number of raids seems very small, especially for an expansion intended to last a year (if it was a 6 month thing, this would be fine.)

TDSTruth wrote:
There is a mount keyring that will store ten mounts. Additional mounts can be purchased from marketplace.


That is correct. In addition, mounts purchased from the station cash store will add an additional slot to the keyring (they do not take up space). LoN mounts do not.

TDSTruth wrote:
There were no new spell lines that I saw, granted I didn't look at *every* class. Most classes are having a good number of their key spells and abilities not seeing upgrades.

There were very few new AA. Most are but upgrades of current lines and, like the spells, many aren't seeing upgrades.


This is typical for a level cap increase expansion though. They do not have the time to work on the new spell or AA lines.

TDSTruth wrote:
There is only one group mission per zone. Most, if not all, of them take place in open zones, so competition might be fierce. Looked to be only six HA.


This is concern #2 (or big concern #1A if you will.) I thought they had said there would not be HAs in this expansion, but maybe I remember that wrong. However, only one group mission seems pretty small.

There are a lot of concerns about the size of this expansion. Especially after Smed said on the AMAA chat that the they heard the players and we want bigger expansions and that it would be much bigger than CotF.

They said that all of TDS was coming out at the launch, so there will not be a staggered release like CotF and RoF. Which leads me to this question. In the last 2 years, they spent a good portion of the year following the expansion release working on the expansion content. Now that TDS is released all at once, what is next? Does this mean the next expansion will be the larger one Smed talked about? Will there be more "stuff" in between - maybe for the March Anniversary, a few zones/raids/group missions?

I think the producer needs to put out a new producer letter soon to let people know what the plans are for the next 3-6 months, so people know that there is more content coming soon-ish.
#13 Nov 02 2014 at 9:16 AM Rating: Good
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I can't believe they'd make this expansion suck on purpose to get players to switch to EQNext. Since EQNext isn't even close to out yet all this would do is drive players away to a different on-line game (or to RL pursuits like bowling or Tiddly Winks! Smiley: eek) and be self-destructive for Sony. Of course, it wouldn't be the first time they take actions that appear to be suicidal.

The only good news so far is AFAIK the XP in older zones hasn't been nerfed as much as I feared. I got to 102 in about 2 hours of semi-casual play and am about to ding 103 in a little more time. I'm thinking I will wait till my toons are all 105 to tackle the advancement quests in TDS. Because it wouldn't be unprecedented for the devs to realize they screwed the pooch here and institute some serious "fixes" such as maybe opening more zones to all.
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#14 Nov 02 2014 at 3:39 PM Rating: Excellent
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tatankaseventh wrote:
Or, they never bought CotF (like me) and will get the extra bank slots due to that expansion being included.

Tat


Edited -- ahh, CotF...which I don't have either. For an extra bank slot I'll buy it. I've only been back a little over a year and I have already have 3 storage mules and my trader's business is steady. I almost need to stop playing for a week and just move things to my trader as slots open up.

Edited, Nov 2nd 2014 4:41pm by nekokirei
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#15 Nov 02 2014 at 7:24 PM Rating: Excellent
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I held off buying CotF since I returned in September, and figured I'd wait for TDS, and save $40. Missed the extra shared banks and HA's, but figured I'd rather save the money. Now with the huge stink over TDS, I'm postponing that, as well, until they address the issues. The issues don't really affect me, being only 87, but I'd rather lend support to the 100's who are livid over the changes.

Tat
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Michone, 115 Troll Shadowknight
Anaceup Mysleeves, 115 Erudite Mage, 2 x 300 Master Artisan
Snookims Whinslow, 112 Erudite Enchanter, 2 x 300 Master Artisan
<Inisfree>, Tunare (Seventh Hammer!)
#16 Nov 03 2014 at 5:52 AM Rating: Good
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amastropolo wrote:


TDSTruth wrote:
There is a mount keyring that will store ten mounts. Additional mounts can be purchased from marketplace.


That is correct. In addition, mounts purchased from the station cash store will add an additional slot to the keyring (they do not take up space). LoN mounts do not.



I remember the original "key ring". Once a key to enter a zone or area was recorded, the original key item could be destroyed safely. This does not seem to be the way the key ring for mounts operates. The mount "key ring" looks like extra storage space for mount activators. The original mount item should not be destroyed.
#17 Nov 03 2014 at 5:35 PM Rating: Good
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They've taken the mount "storage tab" as done a while ago in games like WoW (and probably elsewhere before that).

It's probably a good change.
#18 Nov 06 2014 at 9:13 PM Rating: Decent
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Grove wrote:
I remember the original "key ring". Once a key to enter a zone or area was recorded, the original key item could be destroyed safely. This does not seem to be the way the key ring for mounts operates. The mount "key ring" looks like extra storage space for mount activators. The original mount item should not be destroyed.


Um... Ok. Then what's the point? At the end of the day, I still have to use desktop space for a hotkey to activate them, and take up an inventory slot to hold the item (if there is one), so I've gained what exactly? I see they're tossing in other things like using the apperance of one mount and the abilities of another (which is kinda cool), but I'm not getting the whole mount keyring unless it allows us to free up inventory carrying around mount items.
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#19 Nov 06 2014 at 11:08 PM Rating: Decent
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For the mount key ring, I just click on the mount tab in inventory and right click on the mount I want. Only have TDS on one account though.
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#20 Nov 07 2014 at 5:28 PM Rating: Good
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I don not have TDS or CoTF, alas, they broke my sk's AA mounts...without the key-ring I am now forced to use a bag slot for my AA mount :-{
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#21 Nov 08 2014 at 1:22 PM Rating: Decent
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where do you get "Tropical Seafruit" in this expansion? cant find it anywhere
#22 Nov 10 2014 at 4:16 PM Rating: Decent
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alwayslost wrote:
I don not have TDS or CoTF, alas, they broke my sk's AA mounts...without the key-ring I am now forced to use a bag slot for my AA mount :-{


Maybe I'm misreadiing this or something. AA mounts don't have an inventory item associated with them, so I'm not sure how it can take up a bag slot. It's just a hotkey you create from the AA window.
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#23 Nov 11 2014 at 12:16 PM Rating: Good
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gbaji wrote:
Maybe I'm misreadiing this or something. AA mounts don't have an inventory item associated with them, so I'm not sure how it can take up a bag slot. It's just a hotkey you create from the AA window.


It's been changed. When I clicked on my hotkey, it started to cast like a spell instead of an instant mount. This created an inventory item from which you make a hotkey, place it on a hotbar, then you can right click to insta-cast mount. I must say, I dislike this change.....
#24 Nov 11 2014 at 2:30 PM Rating: Decent
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Ah. Ok. But you can presumably destroy the inventory item once you create a hotkey (and presumably re-create with the AA hotkey if you need it again later). I'm guessing this is because the mount keyring uses inventory sources for the ring. Hopefully, you don't have to keep the inventory item once it's placed in the ring, otherwise that would be really silly.
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