*** Official EverQuest II Screenshot thread ***

[Glus]

There has not been a server trouble that lasted more than oh 8 hours, in past 12 months. The 8 hour or so downtimes happen only for big game updates about once a month. Then there are often 1 hour or so small patches starting at 9 am cst.

[MOTÖRHEAD]

I just re-subbed to EQ2. The new changes to crafting ontop of the vast improvements made overall to the game are great ! WoW IMHO is now officially dead in my heart. Finally a EQ2 is begining to look like a real contender despite it being a little late at doing so. I played this game at launch and it is not the same game now but that is a good thing !

P.S. You guys don't play at those graphic levels I bet ? Doing so would make a for slide show on most mid-high end pc.

[MOTÖRHEAD]

I'd like to play eq2 again but I just don;t wanna deal with the performance my pc will dish out for it. Unfortunally I can't afford to build a new one so I guess I'm stuck playing wow for a bit more while. It's an alright game but I tend to agree, it's graphically just blah and with the lack of different BG zones and new content it's just putting me to sleep.

I mean really, why can't they develope 15 BG zones. 5 for each of the diffent BG types. Can't tell me the funding isn't there, greedy lazy bitches.

Pray that Warhammer Online ships on time. It is the game you will be drooling over if you are into PvP and want PvP as end game instead of lame arse raids.

[MOTÖRHEAD]

How is the pvp action in eq2? Is it still where only you can lock on to your target(like fighting the npcs when first realease) and no one can help you, heal you, etc? Is there world pvp. Can you post some pictures of pvp battles please..thanks :)

I can tell you off hand from what I know that PvP in EQ2 allows for looting of some coin and items off people if they have a full inventory. On PvP servers you can attack people of the rival faction Freeport/Qeynos and city guards attack to kill you rather then teleport you as it was during luanch. That's all I know since I haven' rolled on a PvP server.

[alindiras]

...P.S. You guys don't play at those graphic levels I bet ? Doing so would make a for slide show on most mid-high end pc.

Yes I do

I have CPU AMD 3000 xp+ (32 bits) 1.5 go of ram , nforce2 onboard, GPU 7800Gs 256 Mb AGP

I play in the highest quality mode (with some setting even higher than default value from SOE setting).
I only reduce shadows when I am in full group or raid .

The minimun FPS is 7 (during battle if I keep the shadows activated) the maximum is 64 (somewhere in the thundering steps by example) , average is 20 to 25.(highest ,but it is not significant, was 107 looking the sky)

Nvidia driver setting are : high quality - anisotropic texture on 8 - aa desactivated.
Resolution is 1280x1024

This game is really the best MMORPG I have ever played and I am still in for a long time.

http://www.web-grim.com/edr/modules/coppermine/albums/userpics/10005/normal_eq2_000694.jpg

[MOTÖRHEAD]

Yes I do

I have CPU AMD 3000 xp+ (32 bits) 1.5 go of ram , nforce2 onboard, GPU 7800Gs 256 Mb AGP

I play in the highest quality mode (with some setting even higher than default value from SOE setting).
I only reduce shadows when I am in full group or raid .

The minimun FPS is 7 (during battle if I keep the shadows activated) the maximum is 64 (somewhere in the thundering steps by example) , average is 20 to 25.(highest ,but it is not significant, was 107 looking the sky)

Nvidia driver setting are : high quality - anisotropic texture on 8 - aa desactivated.
Resolution is 1280x1024

This game is really the best MMORPG I have ever played and I am still in for a long time.

http://www.web-grim.com/edr/modules/coppermine/albums/userpics/10005/normal_eq2_000694.jpg

I agree it is the best MMORPG out there right now. That is beside the point though. Your system is not even close to matching mine and even I don't run in extreme graphic settings. A AMD 3000 XP CPU and 1.5 gigs is not enough for EQ2 at the very highest graphic settings and your video card means very little unless you play beyond 1600x1200 resolution as the game is very CPU bound with anything at our below that resolution. I'd like to see FRAPS video or pics with your fps being shown of your preformance in game in areas like Qeynos Harbor or East Freeport and during combat and in raid encounters.

[Tyr-Sog]

So, I signed back up and all I have to say is WOW! They really changed this game. Much more polished and actually feels like more of a finished product. When I left it, it was just a mess. Much more solo friendly now it seems, game mechanics seem more polished, controls a bit tighter. Granted I just got off a noob island but just from that quick experience it really seems like the game has went through a major overhaul.

So now, do I play a necro or a conjuror? lol.... I swinging a conjuror because I play on the good side with that. Necro seems cool, I just cannot get into the freeport atmosphere as much for some reason.

[MOTÖRHEAD]

So, I signed back up and all I have to say is WOW! They really changed this game. Much more polished and actually feels like more of a finished product. When I left it, it was just a mess. Much more solo friendly now it seems, game mechanics seem more polished, controls a bit tighter. Granted I just got off a noob island but just from that quick experience it really seems like the game has went through a major overhaul.

So now, do I play a necro or a conjuror? lol.... I swinging a conjuror because I play on the good side with that. Necro seems cool, I just cannot get into the freeport atmosphere as much for some reason.

I like the way necro's pets look like IMHO but that is a personal choice and most of my toons ( save one in Qeynos that I use to purchase stuff from their broker ) are FP based so yeah am biased.

Crafting has been made into less of a chore with no sub-combines. All you have to do now is harvest the raws to make an item. Of course items require slightly more raws to make then before I think but don't qoute me on this for sure.

The rate at which you get rares has increased as well. The next big patch will bring in more xp for green and blue mobs which is a nice added bonus for solo/duo players along with re-adding new tradeskill crafting writs which were pulled out to be redone after the big tradeskill update.

I think EQ2 started at rock bottom but slowly but surely the game is moving on up with tons of lessons learned by the devs and SOE. Overall I am very happy playing this game which IMHO has more depth then WoW.

[Tyr-Sog]

Yea, I noticed while surfing the eq2 forums a ton of wow players migrating over to eq becasue the lack of end game and depth in wow. I feel the same way and I'm basically just a casual player that has end game experience(although casually). Don't get me wrong, wow is a great game but like mentioned just leaves something to be disired at endgame.

Well I actually decided against both necro and conjuror(got both to lvl 9). I decided to play a froglok warlock. They just seem to be rare in the game and I do love to dish out aoe, which I believe the lock excels at in this game. I have got him to lvl 12 and have a little feel for this class and am really enjoying it so I think I will stick with it. So many choices compared to wow though but knew it would be a mage type. Lock it is.

I'm on the RP(PVP) Server(forget name).

Name is Soso if anyone cares.

[alindiras]

I agree it is the best MMORPG out there right now. That is beside the point though. Your system is not even close to matching mine and even I don't run in extreme graphic settings. A AMD 3000 XP CPU and 1.5 gigs is not enough for EQ2 at the very highest graphic settings and your video card means very little unless you play beyond 1600x1200 resolution as the game is very CPU bound with anything at our below that resolution. I'd like to see FRAPS video or pics with your fps being shown of your preformance in game in areas like Qeynos Harbor or East Freeport and during combat and in raid encounters.

I have no fraps video, sorry.
In qeynos harbor, my FPS are from 7 to 16. In combat like I said, it is around 7 with more than 4 players in group.
There are several tunning clues to get good result with Eq2.
1) set a reasonnable amount of ligth more than 5 is not good in place with lot of ligths as qeynos harbor or mage tower
2) set a reasonnable amount of specular ligth . the effect of reducing this value can be check on the dock of the thundering step (during sunny day). You will notice no very big visual differences when reducing this value but noticeable difference on performance.
3)reduce number of spell display by character is usefull to increase fps in big combat (as raid) : I keep 8 in samll group (less than 3 players) and put 1 or even 0 in raid (0 display only your spells effects)
4)Texture maximum with 256Mo of Vram, high with 128 mo of vram
5)the shadow... with my 7800gs I always set all shadows in high quality. 7800gs (which have the same gpu as 7900gt on my vcard) render them without a big loss of performances.
6)hardware : to have 2 HD on for the system and one for Eq2
7)hardware : to have an real hardware 3d sound acceleration , because this is very important and have a great effect in raid where a lot of sounds are rendered in the same time. (integrated chipset 3d sound (exception of the nforce2) are not totally hardware accelerated sound and make a cpu usage to render sound)
8)to set a raisonnable amount of simultaneous sound according your 3d sound card possibilities.

you want to see ingame screenshot : check here http://edr.web-grim.com/galerie/thumbnails.php?album=36 (click on the pictures to get full size 1280x1024)

I did these screenshots yesterday in a combat with my guildmate . And it was not slide show.

In fact all is a matter of tunning with Eq2 and you have to pass a lot of time tunning to get the best result it is possible to get.
The performances of the pc are also very important. I get less performance on my wife pc which chipset is a VIA and not a nforce2 as mine.


Before I was playing eq2 with the same pc but a 6600gt, I played almost with the same Eq2 settings but not all shadows activated and texture was high and not on maximum.


And to conclude , yes A AMD 3000 XP CPU and 1.5 gigs IS enough for EQ2 at the very highest graphic settings ,I verify this each day I play EQ2.

[Sgt_Pitt]

some new ones from upcoming expansion Echoes of Faydwer :)

http://everquest2.station.sony.com/en/expansions/echoesoffaydwer/images/screenshots/hires/11.jpg

http://everquest2.station.sony.com/en/expansions/echoesoffaydwer/images/screenshots/hires/1.jpg


http://everquest2.station.sony.com/en/expansions/echoesoffaydwer/images/screenshots/hires/18.jpg

http://everquest2.station.sony.com/en/expansions/echoesoffaydwer/images/screenshots/hires/21.jpg

http://everquest2.station.sony.com/en/expansions/echoesoffaydwer/images/screenshots/hires/24.jpg

http://everquest2.station.sony.com/en/expansions/echoesoffaydwer/images/screenshots/hires/26.jpg

[Son Goku]

Those gfx do look a bit nicer then EQ1 with the xpack (meh there were several, so that says almost nothing; but forgot name off top of my head to the xpack I had which added better gfx), when I played it. In those days (though they didn't get far due to crashing issues), my mains were a paladin, and a high elf conjurer or something to that effect.

All said, and while discussing gfx between EQ2 and WoW, it would be fair to mention Blizzard's own rationale for why Burning Crusade, which will introduce flying mounts, will not allow them to be used in the older continents. In making the gfx, Blizzard indicated that they had some illusiory effects (giving flying over Stormwind as an example); which if one didn't approach it on the pre-determined flight path would look like utter crap. From Blizzard's own indication, they just do not want people to see how bad it would look, so won't allow the "fly anywhere" on older continents.

The newer continent (to allow for fly anywhere mounts) will be avoiding these "short cuts" and provide better gfx I imagine.

[nrdstrm]

I'll be interested to see how WOW and Vanguard both handle flying mounts (and EQ2 as well, since it seems like it will be the new standard). I'm sure they all have differing ideas on how to impliment it. When does Burning Crusade come out? I know that flying mounts arn't in Vanguard beta atm, but should be SOON(tm) .

[Son Goku]

I've heard November, and I've heard Janaury... Burning Crusade might be on pre-order now; so if it is one could check Gamestop or some other site for the expected release date...

Yeah, will be interesting... I sort of wish that flying mounts would be allowed in the older continents; but s'pose it would be a lot of work to go back and re-do the graphics for all the old zones to clean up the visual glitches people would see that they were hinting too. I know one EQ 1 xpack did re-do the graphics for higher gfx quality (well when I applied it, all zones looked better, and supported some newer features from newer gfx cards). Not sure how much work Verant/Sony put into it however...

[ShinaKitsune]

the 1280x1024 where with an old video card... the 1440x900 with my new 7900GS oc'd + widescreen LCD.
Oddly enough the game sucks i get about 62fps in antonica with it on "extreme performance" but with the highest setting "extreme quality"(?) or whatever i get 22... not that much of a difference with that much going on in the game... its really too cpu intensive when it doesn't have to be.
http://home.comcast.net/~miyabina/EQ2_000008.jpg
http://home.comcast.net/~miyabina/EQ2_000015.jpg
http://home.comcast.net/~miyabina/EQ2_000034a.jpg