EverQuest Tenth Anniversary Update

One of the editors at MMORPG.com was in attendance at the recent SOE Fan Faire, and has brought us back an update on EverQuest’s tenth anniversary and latest expansion pack.

According to Thom, the last expansion, Seeds of Destruction has surpassed all expectations. The introduction of Mercenaries (in-game hirelings), moving the level cap to 85 and the 10th anniversary events have also helped draw in old players and retain them.

“We do polls more often as well, to see what our players want.” Tom continued. “Only about 10% of our players visit and post on the forums. These are what we call our vocal minority. The player polls are more representative of what our player base really want.”

That result is the roll out of the 51/50 Mayong server at the Fan Faire. On this server, players start at level 51, receive a full set of Defiant armor and start of with 50 Alternate Advancement XP points to distribute. “Why level 51?” I wanted to know.

“50 was the original level cap. How many players never got there? That’s also the Kunark and Luclin glory days that many never experienced and this is their chance now.”

Not to mention the hell levels and excruciating XP loss when you died in the good-old, bad-old days. At this time in the game’s life, the only new players the game sees are being brought into the game by existing players and again, the developers believe that starting at those levels were some of the best levels and expansions that the game has ever had. Level 51 is just about “hero” level. It’s dragon killing level: Lord Nagafen, Lady Vox, Trakanon, Gorenaire, watch out. Players are gunning for you and that was exactly what the EverQuest players at Fan Faire did, they headed directly for Nagafen and Vox before moving on from there.