EQ2 - How would you stay sane solo?

So I started out as a mage, enchanter, and ultimately illusionist. My wife, meanwhile, made and deleted a host of characters. We've been in one guild so far, which was extremely unsatisfying.

In the process of leveling my enchanter, I became very frustrated. I had a fair number of quests that I wanted to complete, but all of them required groups to kill mobs. Since my wife wasn't at a comparable level, and I was either effectively or actually guildless, I had to join or more often create pickup groups.

After the N+1th time doing this and accumulating debt, frustration, and entries on my /ignore list.. my favorite one being the follow who joined a group, whined incessantly until we helped him kill mobs he could've soloed, and then left once we killed them for him. Jerk.. and fairly typical, except for the whining and the ease of the mobs. Anyway, after N+1 times doing this and similar experiences on my wife's part, we went out and bought WoW.

Um.. wait.. no we didn't. None of the stores around here had it available that particular weekend. So we needed to do something to entertain ourselves til at least, say, Tuesday. No point in placing an order online, it still wouldn't arrive before then.. okay.. so now what do we do with our weekend?

We decided to see if a change in approach would improve things. We made new characters, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, and played them in lockstep. We'd do all the quests we possibly could, using the fact that being a tank/healer combination we had all the group we needed.. and if we needed more, the only real addition would be DPS classes.

Furthermore, we refused to do any delivery quests. If the job didn't involve killing something, it was for someone else.

..we're still playing EQ2. We no longer have any serious desire to go play WoW. The characters are level 18 and doing a couple quests in Stormhold right now - we've done quests pretty much the entire time, plus or minus a couple levels we spent farming mobs that weren't scarecrows in Antonica.

So, all of this has been background for an actual question/discussion/whathaveyou.

How does anyone play this game without having regular competent groupies (ie, people you can play with night after night) and remain sane? I'm scared to even log the illusionist on for anything but crafting. I'm not at all sure what we're going to do when and if the paired characters ding 50.. even a guild might not help, since you need someone close by in level.

And lots of luck doing the less-popular quests. Archer Woods is camped from dusk til dawn, but Stormhold apparently only exists for most people because the armor quests force them to go there.

And incidentally, if you're in a really chatty, fun, intelligent Qeynos guild on Everfrost, do let me know.

"Svlad" wrote:

How does anyone play this game without having regular competent groupies (ie, people you can play with night after night) and remain sane?

Short answer is you don''t. I was lucky to find a good guild (grouped with a couple of them for about a week to make sure it was a good fit), and grouping is generally not a problem. If my guildies are not on or already busy, I will do soloable writs while gathering to pass the time. But if this was all I could do, I probably would be playing wow now.

To me the key is the friends list, whenever I had a good pick up group experience, I would add people to my friends list, and then try to group with them again the next time I was on. This is the process I used to find my guild.

I''d have to agree with Badferret''s short answer. EQ2 past level 15 or so really sucks solo. And I play a conjuror, who is practically a mini-group unto himself! I had a solid group I was playing with for a while (Crusader, Druid, me) and we had a good time. The druid (now Warden) has been gone for about a week due to work. The crusader was gone for about 4 days as well. I finished up what solo stuff I could, and now find I can''t really progress any of my actually useful quests without a group. A couple of them I''m not even sure my regular group of 3 could handle.

The solo quests that are available are . . . tedious. I''m really not interested in spending 45 minutes running around antonica for the umpteenth time for 1.4 silver and 4% xp. Please.

Currently feeling pretty disillusioned with the game, especially since the economy is a joke, soloing is tedious, pickup groups are full of idiots, and the quests are becoming increasingly mundane. I''ll probably try WoW at some point, but mostly this just makes me want to play CoH :b

In an awesome guild on Najena.

i never for a sec thought hat a lot of stuff could happen solo, so have never been disillusioned.

I almost always have friends to group with in my guild for quests.

If not, I have a goal to finish as many books for my room as possible. Some of these books send you to far off places (I had to sneak into freeport for one book) and some send me back to old places with grey mobs, but I can solo in these instances. (have 9 books and one catalog that didnt give me a book done)

Like anything else, it is the people you have around you that makes it fun or not.

If anybody wants to start a cgaracter On Najena and is 25+ I can point you to a nice, intelligent guild.

Well I am on Oasis and we have a small guild that is just GWJ crew and a few friends. It is really to small i am affraid so there are times when we have to solo or get pickup groups.

First my main partner is a templar and I am a paladin and as I mentioned in previous threads this is just a great combo and we can handle ^^white content without a problem just hte 2 of us.

I also made a couple friends in pickup groups or crafting that I now group with on a more regular basis but even still I am on solo at times like 6am EST when I am up with the my child who wants to watch cartoons Saturday morning.

So here is what I do and at least for me I find it fun.

1. Solo actual solo creatures. Even at my current level of 29 this is not bad xp at all and the loot adds up rather fast.
2. Gater any and all resources I come accross. I usually do this while also doing 1 above that way it breaks up both and it gives me mini goals like trying to clear a path to that ore in the middle of the spawn.
3. Craft with the resources I gathered and save what I can not use for sale.
4. Quests. Many may be impossible to do solo but considering the number of quests out there that I have missed there is always something out there that I can do be it collection quests, book quests, or just quest in newbie areas that I missed. Sure these quest may not be great rewards but you never know when such a mundane quest is going to lead into say finding Ghoulbane, dusty blueston for example.
5. Have a couple alts. Yeah I made an alt or 2 for the other faction just so I can expereince that part of the game more. Not to mention since it is not my ""main"" I do not care if I am not super awesome with him. I also tend to read quest text or listen to the VO more often when solo.

I do wish more of us were on the same server but at this point not sure many of us would be willing to move.

The reason I''m done with the game is that I could not find a group without wasting two hours looking, playing for an hour, and logging off. That isn''t fun. I think it is a better game but they screwed up by not making it more solo friendly.

Wow. Well, it''s nice to know that pickup groups are the same exercise in futility for everyone..

Maladen, yeah, your list has some excellent advice. That''s why Bascan is a happy and productive crafting alt now

I think this issue is probably the one that''s causing us to have an entire board full of WoW players and one or two short threads for EQ2; EQ2 is a lot of fun if and only if you happen to have the right people handy to help you enjoy it. Otherwise.. umm.. go craft or something.]

Hey, Maladen, what class of crafter are you? Playing an alchemist in that particular subgame means I feel like I have a very limited perspective; ie I just deal with crafters, never with customers for finished product. What''s life like on the other side of the fence, if applicable?

And yeah, /friends are absolutely key. I''ve invited the couple people I know to a custom channel, which means we can generally chat, which keeps me in touch with them without finding excuses to send them tells

Hey Paladin, have you actually been playing CoH lately? Any news from over there?

I have 200 quests completed at lvl 25.

What is interesting about these threads is to see how people have different expereinces. For example as a Paladin I often get tells out of the blue asking if I need a group from people I do not know. Part of it I am sure is because I am towards the upper end of the leveling curve on our server so there just are not that many level 29ish tanks out there. Where Ulairi is in the thick of it with the masses.

Also been real lucky that most my pickup groups have gone well. Were on the other hand a couple people I know in the guild have had the worse pickup group experiences.

As for WoW being more solo friendly no doubt in my mind but at same time there is content to be had solo in EQ2. I think what they have though is not what a lot of the people at least in this thread are looking for. I for example hunted level 27ish solo skeletons near Varsoons one morning for about an hour or so and made about 10% xp. That to me was reasonable but I can see for some it is just not possible or maybe not reasonable.

I am a weaponsmith in crafting level 23 but sort of not going far right now. I can make some good carbonite weapons and at last check was in the top 10 highest level weaponsmiths on oasis but not sure it is worth my time other than as a distraction.

The reason is alchemist, at least on my server, charge about 3 silver per vial of neolith temper. Not counting time it cost an alchemist 3 copper to make 1 vial of pristine neolith temper.

It takes me 2 tempers, 1 wash, and 1 resin to make 1 weapon. So that is 12sp right there, huge profit going to alchemist.

Then I have to either make from a small selection of weapons that I can make all the parts for which if I do cost me another 6sp or buy parts from another player if I can find somebody selling what I need.

So what it boils down to that it cost me not counting time about 21sp to make 1 weapon which I am lucky to be able to sell at 30 to 35sp. The amount of time it takes me to do all this is huge compared to the alchemist but my profit margin is very small in comparisson.

I am not bitter at alchmeist for making what they can but basically they cut into my profit margin so much I am not finding it worth while to make weapons since the 9 to 16sp I make per weapon is easily eclipsed by hunting most the time for me for equal time spent crafting vs hunting.

I have 50gp though so I feel like I am doing ok and not sure if crafting will be anything more than a hobby at this point.

There''s a lot of bitterness out there towards alchemists. FWIW, I charge 1.5s for tempers, oils, resins, washes. I also take even trades for resources I can use. 1.5s-2s is reasonable for tier 3, and I''ll explain why in a minute. 3s is just gouging.

You''re wrong about it costing 3c to make a single neolith temper. It costs 3c and .25 of a resource. Resources, in tier 3, can be sold to the wholesale tasks for 3.2s each. Therefore, that is the value of those resources. Anything is worth what someone will pay for it; if I make you 4 neolith tempers I am deprived of 3.32s I could''ve had.

That argument made, doing alchemy at more than 100% profit over materialscosts is just silly. You''re just going to tick people off, causing them to either find another alchemist or stop crafting. I want to encourage people to craft so that when I level to tier 4 I can make more money from them.

Regarding the alchemists eating your profits, by the way, I don''t know. I make 3s per combine at my rate. You get 9-14s per sale you make; how many combines do you have to do per sale? I''m betting more than I do.. and I''m also betting, from what I see on the brokers, that you''re being conservative in how much you can sell things for.

And yeah, if your adventurer level gets far ahead of your crafting level it becomes hard to justify the time spent for the money produced. But hey, it *is* a lot of fun.

Yeah I have to second Maladen, that pick up groups were never that bad before I joined my guild. Part of that is playing a Tank, as a Guardain I generally make the decisions on what to pull and how to direct encounters.

The Tank and Healing classes really have a leg up on finding/starting groups so I never experienced waiting around for a long time.

Now with all of that, I think pick up groups might be getting worse now, because alot of the more competent players have found stable groups/guilds at this point. Last pickup was worse one by far, leader kept saying DUDE, needless to say the group did not last long. Decided after that just to stick with guild groups.

I also have been soloing the skellies in TS when not grouped. I can get a city writ for them, so I feel like I am accomplishing something, and still making 10+ percent an hour exp which is not bad for solo in my opinion

I did not price resources because to me they fall under the time category. After all it just takes time to go out there and gather them but I am willing to accept the wholesaler price for them for the sake of argument. In which case it drives my cost even higher as I need 1 carbonite for a blade, 1 carbonite for a crossgaurd/spike (or I buy a pommel), and 1 pelt for a hilt.

--edit--
Looking back at your post that means it cost me an additional 9sp in material so my total weapon cost is now 30sp.
--end edit--

The number of combine to make a weapon -

carbonite bar - 1
carbonit blade -1

carbonite bar - 1
carbonite crossgaurd/spike - 1 (could skip these 2 if I buy pommels and make weapons taht use pommels)

stretch leather - 1
hilt- 1

final weapon - 1

Total combine 5 or 7 to make a weapon. Usually 7 though as trying to get a jeweler to stop selling t3 jewelry for about 1g per item vs selling me a pommel for the inflated 10sp a pommel is worse than camping a rare.

--edit--
So I make even less than 1sp per combine and t hat is if I sell them at all.
--end edit--

On my server I am not being conservative becasue I had 6 forged carbonite stilletos for sale priced at 35sp each. Not one sold in the 3 days I had them up for sale.

I also tried to sell about 20 various axes for 25sp each and not one sold and was told by another weaponsmith they also could not sell axes at all.

In the end I decided the opportunity costs of giving up inventory space on loot I would get while hunting was too great to hold these weapons for more than 3 says and sold them to the vendor for a total of 12sp each.

Do not get me wrong I will still do it on the side I am guessing but currently there seems to be something odd going on at least in the world of weaponsmithing.

Oh and where are you getting your writs as for some reason my last writ sent me into the depths of the Crypt of Betrayal to kill 25 ^^ and grouped creatures that were blue to yellow to me. Needless to say I am still working on the stupid thing.

Honestly, I only do pickup groups. I walk solo into whatever zone I need to do something in, go lfg, and usually immediately find people of similar level who are doing something Im interested in. Even if its only xp, I can do quests later with someone else. I find players who are generally bad few and far between, Ive had a really enjoyable time in almost every random group Ive been in.

Someone should make us a rollcall thread.

karmajay, what guild are you in on najena? Im a level 22 paladin, just finished my aq3, got some stuff in ts and aq4 to do.

The Old Guard

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