EverQuest Producer's Letter April 2025

Angeliana

Angeliana

Senior Community Manager
Staff member
Community Team

We've got a lot to chew on in this letter!
​
With a quarter of 2025 already gone, it's time for an update on where we are and what's coming up!

The Darkpaw Swag Store has been getting updated with posters and other goodies, and we're far from finished. As a matter of fact, we've just added the 26th Anniversary Key Art Poster. Keep your eyes peeled for more updates to the store throughout the year. If you have suggestions or ideas on what you'd like to see in the swag store next, please send them by Norrathian Express to Angeliana.


26th Anniversary Key Art Poster
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Fundraising for Extra Life has already started! This year's Darkpaw Games page is up and ready for sign-ups. Check out our handy Extra Life Guide for more details. And stay tuned for an article detailing our group and individual incentives in the coming months. We look forward to surpassing our goal once again this year with your help.

Darkpaw Games is recruiting once again! And our search is on for weavers, of a sort. If you fancy yourself a storyteller (designer) or a costumer (character artist), look at our openings. We are seeking those special someones who are as passionate about Norrath as we are. You should love to have fun, enjoy working with amazing people, and want to contribute your talents to the best game ever created (I'm not biased on any of that)! If you're interested in joining our rather active guild, please apply through our Careers Page HERE! We look forward to meeting you!

Now, onto what has happened so far this year. We've had The Outer Brood's raids unlocked with Tier 1's in January, Tier 2's in February, and Tier 3's in March. Erollisi Day saw some new quests. We put out EverQuest's The Outer Brood and EverQuest II's Scars of Destruction expansions music together onto streaming services, and we had several unlocks across our Time-Locked Progression Servers. Brew Day has come and gone with the hoisting of ales in honor of Brell. Bristlebane's Day saw some new content and new fun paper bag ornaments, and Stomples' Day made a reappearance.

And lastly, we had a blast celebrating EverQuest's 26th Anniversary with new content and some awesome jade items just for logging in. Be quick if you haven't already gotten them because these free jade items are only available up to April 20, 2025, at 11:00 P.M. PST! The Anniversary Tower, the Year of Darkpaw items, as well as an unvaulting of all the old Heritage Crates for a limited time, also arrived with this Anniversary. There is still time to get your jade items and complete the quests! That's not all, new anniversary missions are coming out later this month as well, so log in today!

January 
February 
March 

Now let's look forward into the coming months! Rathe Day is our way of bringing attention to Earth Day. Be sure to join us as we help to save something endangered in Norrath! Tempest Festival will be back with some new content, our new Time-Locked Progression (TLP) server will launch, Pride Month will return with some new Pet Illusions for your collection, Hardcore Heritage and Scorched Sky will make their return, and we have a host of unlocks across our current TLPs.

April 
  • Rathe Day
  • More 26th Anniversary Updates
  • Tempest Festival – New Content
  • Aradune and Rizlona unlock Torment of Velious
  • Mischief unlocks Empires of Kunark
May 
  • Progression Server Launch
  • Yelinak unlocks Veil of Alaris
  • Oakwynd unlocks Secrets of Faydwer
  • Teek and Tormax unlock Omens of War and Dragons of Norrath
June 
  • Pride month giveaway
  • Hardcore Heritage
  • Scorched Sky
  • Mischief unlocks Ring of Scale

Now, to discuss what many of you've been waiting for — the new TLP server ruleset will be Expanded Start with Resource Hunter, Encounter Locking, Legacy Characters, and True Box. True Box will be removed when Planes of Power unlocks. Read on for more details below!
  • Expanded Start
    • Start with Ruins of Kunark, Scars of Velious, and Shadows of Luclin unlocked and level-locked to level 50.
    • Enjoy access to a more varied level 50 experience with Iksar and Vah Shir available on launch day!
    • Spend 24 weeks experiencing everything our first 3 expansions have to offer before the level cap is increased to 60.
    • Planes of Power unlocks 12 weeks later, followed by additional unlocks happening at the regular cadence with a compressed level 70 range.
  • Resource Hunter
    • The hunt is on for daily, zone-wide bonuses!
    • Every day at midnight Pacific, a limited number of zones in each unlocked expansion will be assigned a random bonus.
    • Find the zones to find the bonuses and share your discovery with the community!
    • Bonuses may include any of the following:
      • Increased EXP
      • Increased Loot
      • Increased AA EXP (In level 50+ zones)
      • Increased Coin Drops
      • Reduced NPC Spawn Times
      • Increased Rare NPC Spawns
      • ... and more!
  • Name Reservations
    • Want to make sure you get your character's name before launch? Name reservations will once again be available via the /reservename command. The following dates indicate when you'll be able to reserve names for the new server, and how much /played time your character needs from an existing server to be able to reserve the name:
      • April 30: 200 days played
      • May 7: 100 days played
      • May 14: 40 days played
      • May 21: 10 days played
    • Keep in mind, characters cannot reserve their name if they have changed names in the past 30 days.
  • This TLP will launch at 12:00 P.M. (noon) PDT on May 28, 2025!

Now that the high-level bullet points are listed. I'd like to take a moment to talk about the story behind the story with this TLP server. First off this is an experimental server, so we're trying some new things combined with some classic things and also bringing back a few of the experiments from years past.

Expanded Start. It's been a request for some years where some players wanted to have more expansions unlocked from the start (here's looking at you players that main Iksar and Vah Shir). With this year's expanded start, players will have access to more player races, locations, and tons more content with oodles of loot to obtain right from the start.

Slow Initial Unlocks. The fact is the population on every progression server declines as more and more expansions unlock. So, to keep a healthy server population for a longer period, we are extending the unlock time within some of the early expansions. We hope the slower initial progression leads to a longer, healthier progression server over the lifespan of the server.

Resource Hunter. The concept behind this ruleset is to expand the experience of hot zones to a new daily method. We hope that it will not only bring the thrill of finding new special areas but also bring the community together in the hunt. The Resource Hunter ruleset of random daily bonuses should not only encourage playing in a variety of zones and exploring more of Norrath, but also make it more rewarding to roam in different zones than you might normally on a TLP.

Encounter Locking. While it initially had some controversy, looking at the lifespan of Oakwynd it has been seen as a net good for the server. We received enough feedback and analyzed the data, and it appears to have ultimately benefited the server enough to try it again.

Legacy Characters. We're big fans of this ruleset. We tried it and we liked it overall, so we're doing it again. It will be interesting to see how it works in parallel with the Alternate Personas feature.

I hope you are as excited about this year's Time-Locked Progression server as we are!

EDIT:
Thank you to everyone who provided constructive feedback and regarding this year’s TLP Ruleset. The game team has taken it all into consideration and has decided on the following changes for the Expanded start and Unlocks.
  • Expanded Start
    • Launch with Ruins of Kunark to Shadows of Luclin unlocked and level locked to 50
    • Increase level lock to 51 after 8 weeks
    • Increase level lock to 55 after 8 weeks
    • Increase level lock to 60 after 8 weeks
  • Unlock Planes of Power after 12 weeks
  • New expansions unlock automatically every 8/12 weeks
Thank you all for your continued feedback and support.

And with that this Producer's Letter has come to an end but our journey is far from over.


Sharpen up your Fangs,
Jenn Chan
Head of Studio


 
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M

Mayzee

Member
I have an idea of how to help server population health...don't release a new TLP every year. Especially if they are going to make us be level 50 for 6 months. Actual nightmare.
 
Elvengard

Elvengard

Member
What about the trading rules? Free trade including Krono or...? There is no information about that and it's important I would say.
 
L

Lucerin

Member
Like Frank said, Vaniki Resist logic, no-level-req gear is a minimum for era locking. There's no actual reward in encounters that will take significant portions of time and people to clear, unless the gear can actually be equipped.

Secondarily, the per character lockouts were required to get buy in on Oakwynd's AOC era for Legacy Characters. There needs to be a healthy look at making them tied to specific personas. As in, you can run them on the same character when utilizing a different persona. Eventually flagging goes achievement-based and this becomes the norm. But it isn't for a long time.

No free trade, and heirloom loot is conspicuously missing. How do you get people to stay involved when their characters are sitting at lvl 50 on week 20? Allow them to use that loot elsewhere without cannibalizing free-trade population from Teek.

Consider untying the clockwork banker from veteran AA's to be usable immediately.

Some of these lessons felt learned, but I can't quite understand why rulesets get released without real congruency that could be provided with input from any active, experienced player from these prior servers.
 
Nira

Nira

Well-known member
Just launch at 60. Nobody needs 24 weeks at 50, and if they do, suddenly only giving them 12 to do 50-60 plus AA is a very high bar. If one of these unlocks is right, the other is too fast or too slow.
 
Novocaine

Novocaine

New member
Lucerin said:
Like Frank said, Vaniki Resist logic, no-level-req gear is a minimum for era locking. There's no actual reward in encounters that will take significant portions of time and people to clear, unless the gear can actually be equipped.

Secondarily, the per character lockouts were required to get buy in on Oakwynd's AOC era for Legacy Characters. There needs to be a healthy look at making them tied to specific personas. As in, you can run them on the same character when utilizing a different persona. Eventually flagging goes achievement-based and this becomes the norm. But it isn't for a long time.

No free trade, and heirloom loot is conspicuously missing. How do you get people to stay involved when their characters are sitting at lvl 50 on week 20? Allow them to use that loot elsewhere without cannibalizing free-trade population from Teek.

Consider untying the clockwork banker from veteran AA's to be usable immediately.

Some of these lessons felt learned, but I can't quite understand why rulesets get released without real congruency that could be provided with input from any active, experienced player from these prior servers.
Click to expand...
I assumed legacy characters meant heirloom gear as well.
 
L

Lucerin

Member
Novocaine said:
I assumed legacy characters meant heirloom gear as well.
Click to expand...
Remember, legacy announcement did not include that. It was a player requested feature they met about prior to launch to add it. I'd be pleasantly surprised if it did, but assuming it's included at this point is a risk. The closer this TLP is to release, the harder it will be to get them to fine tune the details. And it's basically immovable if it makes it to launch without the rule included. It's not unprecedented to see change, but it's by no means a regular occurence.
 
S

snailish

Well-known member
I applaud that this is a different remix.

The long start at 50 gives people lots of time to join late and push to catch up --might just be timed to see if Teek holds population or do they ignore this new server for 4 months and then move? Might be a sage play looking back later.


To me, this naturally pairs with a Selos 2.0 server with the Vaniki rules (even though I wouldn't play on that).
 
V

Vincent

New member
My feedback:

I really like the direction of the new TLP with the Expanded Start and bonuses. I also like having more time in the early expansions. Thank you for continuing to iterate with new ideas and receiving feedback from previous experiements.

However, I think it would be better to have 12 weeks at level 50 and 24 weeks at 60, instead of the proposed 24 weeks at 50 and only 12 weeks at 60. I think having more time at 60 with Kunark, Velious, and Luclin available would be nicer than having more time at level 50. There is a lot more to do from 51-60 with AAs then there is from 1-50 without AAs, so it makes more sense to have more time for the 51-60 range. I also feel like struggling to fight expansion raids at level 50 for too long would be frustrating. A short time is a good idea for those who want a challenge, but too long leaves regular players without real progression available until they are able to get to level 60. Another option would be to enable AAs at level 50, or having an intermediate period of 12 weeks at level 55 or something, so that there is some progression available.
 
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E

Endacer

Active member
The 9 month slog with no new content is....LOL. Not to mention there was no mention of resists or anything from Vaniki, so it will be even more of a bind rush....to get gear you cant even wear due to level requirements for 2/3 of that slog. I like the idea of the Resource Hunter, but daily seems a bit much...log off in lguk, run to dawnshroud the next day, why not weekly? Also....how do you find out what zone it is? And yay...the grief heavy locking mechanic that made Oakwynd near doa....nice. Ya, gonna hard pass on this TLP, i'll stay on Teek.
 
S

snailish

Well-known member
Endacer said:
The 9 month slog with no new content is....LOL. Not to mention there was no mention of resists or anything from Vaniki, so it will be even more of a bind rush....to get gear you cant even wear due to level requirements for 2/3 of that slog. I like the idea of the Resource Hunter, but daily seems a bit much...log off in lguk, run to dawnshroud the next day, why not weekly? Also....how do you find out what zone it is? And yay...the grief heavy locking mechanic that made Oakwynd near doa....nice. Ya, gonna hard pass on this TLP, i'll stay on Teek.
Click to expand...

I didn't play Oakwynd... I have for sure read about it having a rough start in some respects, but it sounds like there were a few factors in that not just FTE?

Forums seem favorable to what that was in hindsight, and apparently the population has stabilized up from a valley?

So it seems like FTE really works for some, and not for others?
 
G

Gialana

Well-known member
Lucerin said:
Remember, legacy announcement did not include that. It was a player requested feature they met about prior to launch to add it. I'd be pleasantly surprised if it did, but assuming it's included at this point is a risk. The closer this TLP is to release, the harder it will be to get them to fine tune the details. And it's basically immovable if it makes it to launch without the rule included. It's not unprecedented to see change, but it's by no means a regular occurence.
Click to expand...
It wasn't included in the initial announcement of the Oakwynd ruleset, but it was added in this post:
https://forums.everquest.com/index.php?threads/oakwynd-information-and-faq.290122/

From the linked post, the following are included with the Legacy Character Ruleset going forward:

  • We will change the account lock for Agents of Change instances to be character based instead of account based. Note, this rule will be attached to the Legacy Characters Ruleset, so if future servers get the Legacy Characters Ruleset, they will also experience this change.
  • We will make it so No Drop items that are NOT Free-Trade No Drop will automatically be Heirloom items. This does not affect items that are already Heirloom, they will stay Heirloom. Note, this rule will be attached to the Legacy Characters Ruleset, so if future servers get the Legacy Characters Ruleset, they will also experience this change.
 
E

Endacer

Active member
snailish said:
I didn't play Oakwynd... I have for sure read about it having a rough start in some respects, but it sounds like there were a few factors in that not just FTE?

Forums seem favorable to what that was in hindsight, and apparently the population has stabilized up from a valley?

So it seems like FTE really works for some, and not for others?
Click to expand...
In theory yes, but people foudnd ways of unlocking mobs at will, and taking advantage of the mechanics of it. You didn't see as much of that on Oakwynd due to the lower population, but if it existed in places with higher population, it has the potential to be an absolute nightmare.
 
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