Facing Off With The Faceless

Yesterday evening and again this morning, I did something unusual. I played EverQuest II.

I don't mean I logged in, collected my completed Overseer missions, set my new ones for the day and logged out, like I do every day. Although, I did do all of that... except the logging out part.

I'd been getting a slight itch to play an MMORPG "properly" again for a couple of days. It started, weirdly, when I was on Steam and noticed there were some patch notes for Rift.   

It's a constant surprise to see dribbles of content still dripping into the game during Gamigo's maintenance-mode custodianship but guess perhaps the oddest thing is that I still have Rift installed. It's not like I'm going to play it again. 

Or is it?

It was when I found myself seriously considering doing just that, wondering whether I ought to pick up one of my old characters and carry on with them or if it mightn't be better to roll up a new one and start over, that I had a little talk with myself and decided I'd be better off doing something productive in one of the games I was supposedly still playing istead, not taking a wholly ill-advised trip back in time to one I'd abandoned years ago.

The choice was pretty obvious. I clearly ought to patch up Wuthering Waves and try to get back up to date there yet again. There's another update coming and I haven't touched the last one yet. I'm already behind and soon I'll be too far behind to catch up.

So, I didn't do that.

Second choice would probably be Once Human. There's a lot going on there, too, and I haven't seen any of it. 

Didn't do that, either.

 

Also in the running, albeit as an outsider, there's New World. I realy like New World. It's my second most-played game on Steam, after Valheim. There's a major update - you could almost call it an expansion - coming to the game in less than two weeks and it looks very interesting, all vampires and werewolves and spooky castles. Just right for the season

It's a free update but you have to have New World Aeternum to get it and I don't. So I'd have to buy that, which would then give me even more new-to-me content. And contrary to what you might expect, that's actually a point against going back. I don't have the time or inclination to take on a big tranche of content in any game right now. I'm looking for something to fill the odd session, here and there, not some big commitment that could take weeks.

Something like, oh, I don't know, a new solo dungeon or an instance I haven't done. Even better, one that might have some drops I could use. I've always been a big advocate of the gameplay being its own reward but good drops are cake.

All of that led me back to EQII, where there have been two Game Updates this year that I haven't touched. 

Alright, that's not entirely true. I did set foot in the new, contested dungeon that came in GU128 back in April. It didn't go well.

That update is called Lure of Darkness and features a large dungeon by the name of Spiral of Vul. It's designed for multiple groups to explore at the same time, old-school style, but it does have a small, soloable area at the front, as has been the norm in EQII as far back as beta.

I can say from experience that the allocated area for solo players is soloable. I did a little bit of it back in April and I didn't die. I also didn't have much fun. The mobs were very tough and took ages to kill. If there are any soloable bosses, I never got far enough to try my luck with them. I did one quest, whch took about half an hour and gave up.

That was on my Berserker. Since then, I've upgraded all his gear using the Anniversary gift. He was mostly in 475-495 Resolve gear then and now he's wearing all 525. Resolve is a very sound indicator of performance, much like Gear Score in other games, and 30-50 points is enough to make a difference so I was hopeful I might get a little further this time.

I did not. I map-hopped over to the Sodden Archipelago and flew halfway across the zone to the entrance of the dungeon, went inside and immediately picked up a couple of shinies that completed a collection. That made the trip worthwhile, which was just as well because the trash mobs seemed no easier to kill than before. I tried a couple, decided it wasn't going to be any more fun than last time, so I  left.

The second of the annual updates arrived in August. It's called Fear of Eternity and consists of Fabled versions of the dungeons from the 2012 expansion, Chains of Eternity. Fabled dungeons are generally the same as the originals but with all the mobs revamped for the current level cap and all the loot similarly upgraded. They also come in all the regular flavors - Solo, Heroic I and Heroic II.

My experience with Fabled dungeons at the time they first appear has been patchy. There have been some I've been able to make progress in but mostly they're too tough for me. I usually give them a go, decide it's too much like hard work and leave them for later. Sometimes I do come back and finish them when I'm a bit tougher, sometimes I forget they exist.

I was fully expecting the first one I tried, Fabled Temple of the Faceless, to be at least as hard as Spiral of Vul. I mean, you'd think so, woudn't you? It's six months later, after all. What would be the point of adding something easier to the game at level cap?

It was easier. It was a lot easier. At least it was once I got myself sorted out.

The zone-in is much more conveniently placed, right on the dock where you zone in to Sodden Archipelago. No flying right across the map this time. That was nice. You can access all the available dungeons from the update from the same portal, too. Also nice.

I picked the first instance on the list, zoned in and pulled a mob to test the waters. They were warm. The mob, a three-up arrow spider, theoretically tough for trash, died in a reasonable time and didn't pose much of  threat. I worked my across the opening area towards the first boss, killing as I went and it felt comfortable. It wasn't a walkover but it wasn't a grind. I felt like I was moving through the zone at a reasonable pace.

I got in range of the boss and thought about looking him up for strats but I couldn't be bothered so I just pulled him to see what would happen. Nothing much. In fact, as far as he was concerned, nothing at all. His health stayed solidly at 100% no matter how hard and how often I hit him. Clearly there were unseen factors in play.

With my merc pumping out the healing and the Berserker having a pretty solid self-healing capacity of his own it was a stalemate, albeit one that was eventually only going to end one way, even if it was likely to take an hour to get there. I rummaged in my bags for a Totem of Escape to port myself to the zone entrance and couldn't find one so I just legged it to the zone-line with the boss beating on me all the way. He still didn't make much of a dent, even with my back turned.

Once I was safe outside, I looked at the wiki. It turns out there are two pillars, one in each of two side-temples, that have to be destroyed before the first boss can be damaged. I vaguely remembered that from whenever I did the dungeon when I was questing through the relevant expansion but that was years ago and I needed to be reminded.

I went back in, found the pillars, knocked them down, then had a second go at the boss. It went much better that time. 

I was curious to see what he'd drop. I was hoping it would be gear over 500 Resolve. In fact it was identical in quality to the Anniversary freebies - 525 Resolve. Since I was already fully kitted out in that, I was also hoping it wouldn't be Plate Armor. I could give that to my Inquisitor but she's not Level 130 yet so she'd have to do five more levels before she could wear it.

I was hoping for cloth so my Necro could have it and cloth was what I got. On the first boss, anyway.

It had been fun and profitable so far so I carried on. Temple of The Faceless is a fairly compact, to the point dungeon, without a lot of wandering about required. Exactly what I was looking for. I progressed through the next two bosses, checking strats just in case of any more surprises but having very little trouble with either.

That took me up to bedtime so I camped where I was and picked up again where I left off the next morning. There was only one more boss left but it was a dragon and they can be tricky. In the event, though, he went down as easily as the rest. 

I didn't get any more cloth armor but my Bruiser is going to be happy. The rest was all leather. The two sessions were fun, the difficulty just about right for me, requiring a certain amount of attention and concentration but not so much I couldn't take a few screenshots during the fights.

There are several more Fabled instances in the update so I'll most likely take a look at those next. The deciding factor on whether I do or not will be how much fun I'm having. The upgraded loot is nice but I'm all too aware it will be made obsolete by the free handouts at the start of the coming expansion, let alone the quest rewards from the storyline.

Not to mention there's the stuff the pandas are handing out. Which reminds me. As of this week's reset, I must have a new panda quest to do...