So as I write this the new Expansion for Everquest 2 called Planes of Prophecy is suppose to launch tomorrow November 28th.
This is the first expansion where I actually gave up on the beta test and I'll explain why.
The main issue I had with the beta is the grind, I have no problem doing repeatable quests when its my own choice to do them, I do have a problem when I have to grind them to advance the story and with having three different factions to grind after I got thru one, I just did not feel up to grinding thru the other two.
Next I found that the crafting quest series will be added later, while not a huge deal it does mean the only way to level a crafter to 110 is to grind writs. So this makes the expansion feel unfinished.
Lastly is the solo zones, once again your going to need to do a lot of gearing up depending on your class. I play a Ranger currently wearing T3 Raid Armor and I had to go and completely regear with the beta armor to even have a chance to survive. Now most people are going to say well of course your going to need to regear this is a new expansion, to that I'm going to have to say that is true if the gear that was given to you during the quest lines was better than the gear you were already wearing. Most of the gear that dropped while running the zones was jewelry and the odd time a piece of armor, only it was never chain armor.
The other issue with the solo zones is that they feel to much like a grind and less like a dungeon, once I have gone thru the dungeon once I probably won't be back unless I need collection pieces.
Lastly is the fact you can't depend on your merc. I would strongly recommend carrying anything that can help you self heal because if you don't your most likely going to die.
Mercenaries were first added with the expansion Age of Discovery back in Dec 2011, in all that time they still haven't been able to come up with an ai fix that will actually make healer merc heal.
Hopefully some of the issues will be fixed before the expansion goes live, but right now I just can't get excited about the new expansion.
RGX
