Hi Guild, its finally happened! With update 49, the Guild Halls have now gone LIVE.

So far, I am still unable to log in, server is supposedly still down for another hour at time of writing this. But there is the Update notes, giving more details on what else has been added to the update. ill post that next, but for now, the guild halls are finally here, and you can access them via the bells on the Commonlands dock, as Crimson Death is an evil based Guild.

Good players will have no trouble getting in either, as the soldiers once guarding the docks have gone.

Game Update 49 October / 7 / 2008
SPECIAL EVENTS

During "Raising the Banner": A team of dedicated excavators and researchers have begun to uncover a remarkable find in the dunes of Sinking Sands. They have numerous tasks for any recruits willing to help defend the site, excavate relics, maintain their assisting clockworks and provide crafted supplies for the team. They cannot fathom how important this project is and how it is fated to reshape the world of Norrath for years to come!

GUILD HALLS



Construction of the Guild Halls has been completed.  Guilds of qualifying levels can now purchase halls in a variety of locations.  Smaller halls can be found in North Qeynos, South Freeport, Kelethin, Neriak, and Gorowyn.  Medium halls are found in South Qeynos and North Freeport, and large halls are found off the shores of Antonica and Commonlands.  Click on the corresponding doors, or mariner bells on the docks, to access these new structures.

With the work completed on the coastal fortresses in Antonica and Commonlands the involved parties have retired to their cities and the guards have been recalled to the barracks.


MULTICORE SUPPORT

EQII now runs better with more than one CPU.
The game automatically detects if you have more than one CPU.
There is an option to control whether the game uses multicore mode in the Options Window under Display -> Performance.
If you're running multiple clients on the same computer you may want to disable multicore mode.
Game clients prefer running on CPUs other than the first CPU.
Setting the multicore option has no effect on machines with one CPU.


HOUSING & HALLS

You can now pay upkeep on your house or guild hall up to 12 weeks in advance.

Wall-placed house items now use a different method to stick to the wall that should keep them from disappearing into the world geometry.

The payments tab has been renamed to "History" and will now display payments and credits to the escrow account.

The deposits tab will only display contributions to the escrow account from players.

GAMEPLAY

The experience requirements for levels have been significantly lowered primarily affecting the 20 thru 70 level range.  Along with the experience changes, the drop rate for Adept I spells has been increased slightly.

QUESTS

The Invasion of the Vale quest is now a more appropriate level for its difficulty.  The Shattered Vale in Antonica now has an escape point inside it.

GUILD RECRUITMENT

Guilds will no longer appear in the guild recruiting list if they don’t have any recruiters online.

MENTORING


Mentoring other players now grants greater achievement reward for the mentor.
0-5 level difference: 0% bonus
6-10 level difference: 50% bonus
11-20 level difference: 100% bonus
21-30 level difference: 150% bonus
31-50 level difference: 200% bonus
51+ level difference: 300% bonus

This bonus is only applied to achievement experience gained through combat or loot items, not through quests or exploration.

Mentors will now receive experience when their apprentice has disabled combat experience.

ITEMS



Most house items can now be scaled in size, by using shift + mousewheel while moving or placing them.  Picking them up again will reset the size to default.  Shift and the + and - keys on the numpad also work.

You can no longer turn auto consume on while using a griffon or sokokar.

Bayle’s Amulet and the Trinket of the Venerated Fanatic can now be mounted and used as a house item.

SPELLS

Spells which do not expire have been made uninterruptable.  There are some exceptions which include spells which summon pets or have limited uses.

Bruiser
Divide and Conquer should now properly apply hate to the entire encounter.

Fury
Natural Mask should now gray out when casted.

Ranger
Thorny trap should now work properly for evil rangers on pvp servers.

ACHIEVEMENTS

Defiler
Enhance: Fuliginous Sphere will now work correctly.

Sorceror
Ward of Sages should now toggle properly.

Templar
Blessings is now toggleable and has a recast of 2 seconds.

SHADOWS

Shadows should no longer disappear unexpectedly.

TRADESKILLS

Merchants in the Maj'dul courts are now selling a wider range of ancient teachings recipes.

Alchemy
Rare cure potions have been removed and standard cure potions have been upgraded to cure the appropriate levels of effects.  This in turn should help reduce some of the demand for dusts.

Carpentry
With the advent of scalable furniture, carpenters no longer require recipes that make items of different sizes.  The following redundant recipes were removed:  comely teak table, small teak table, large light cedar table, vale briarwood guest bed, large vale briarwood corner bar, small redwood room divider, small tynnonium brazier, small purple lilies, small white lilies, embellished rug, eccentric alder chair.  Existing items will not be affected.

Carpenters studying the architecture of Unrest have designed a number of new recipes for furnishings in a similar style, to replace the redundant recipes that have been retired.

Tailoring
Artisans have designed some new recipes for threadbare and sackcloth vests, and will continue to work on more vest-type cloth armor appearances for the future.
 
Scholars
Merchants in the courts of Maj'dul are now stocking some additional "Ancient Teachings" recipe scrolls.

PVP

Illusionists on their epic quest should no longer take lose faction with Freeport when using the Lucan illusion and then removing it.

The additional experience multiplier for PvP kills has been reduced slightly.


USER INTERFACE


Status values on the housing window will now display separators so large numbers are easier to read.

There is now an option in the Persona window to block voice invites.

ZONES

Veeshans Peak
The gem drop rate of Veeshan's Peak has been slightly increased to account for the more frequent patterns.

Each of the bosses in Veeshan's Peak now drop an additional gem.

The Taskmaster in Veeshan’s Peak has made new use of his arcane knowledge! Raiders Beware!

Kelethin
A few of the fae in Kelethin react to a good aligned arasai now.

FAN FAIRE FEEDBACK

Tunare's touch has reached the door step of the Teir'dal.  The druid ring in Darklight Wood has sprouted a Blessed Shrubbery.  Druids and adventurers alike should seek out the ring to extend their travel possibilities.

Better search filters for the Recipe window and Tracking window:
Instead of a direct match, each word must be present
Words preceded with '-' (hyphen) must not be present to be matches
i.e. recipe filtering with "rigid bow" would show 'rigid scale bow'
i.e. recipe filtering with "gno -therm" would show 'gnomish level' but not 'gnomish thermometer'

If you find a Lore and Legend item for a Lore and Legend quest that you're on, the tooltip will indicate whether you've already examined it or need to examine it.

Sir Valinayle in Stormhold now corrects himself after calling Stormhold Befallen.

Removed the option to go to Prize of Prexus and The Maid for the Mist on the mariner bells unless someone in the group is on that part of the quest.

Deleting a quest from your quest journal will now select the next quest in the list.

Hiya Guild, the server has dropped for a few hours....interesting to note there are alot of Guild Hall named files entering into the download, but until it pops back up I cant find out for sure. So until that time, wrap your chompers around this tasty information morsel.

Finally, new, worthy equipment of the Halloween themed event, slated for an as yet unknown time. Personally, Im aiming for the shackles, chain Torell to the wall when he has been a bad warlock boy...

Good luck everyone, and enjoy the Events.


Ghoulies, Ghosties, and Long-Legged Beasties ...

... but if something goes bump in the night, Mum is breaking out the RPoD!!

These events and items are currently on the Test server, so the usual disclaimers that things can/will change before this is released to the general public apply. In addition, we do not yet know when the release date is for this event. (Given past events, it may be patched in at the same time as GU49, whenever that is, but not turned "on" until later in the month.) When I know more, I'll let you know.

Soon, very soon, it will once again be time for Norrath to celebrate the Nights of the Dead. Trick or Treating, haunted houses, and crafted goodies.

You read that right! This year, the crafters of Norrath get to make many items in celebration of the Nights of the Dead. This won't be some little pumpkin carving bit, folks, but much more solid items to wear and to decorate with.

How It Will Work

Much like the Erollisi Day crafting, you will need a specially-purchased recipe book. The book is sold at crafting faction society headquarters, such as the Ironforge Exchange, for a modest fee, and requires Artisan level 2 to scribe. The recipes themselves will be level 28, and will use cross-skill reaction arts. This allows pretty much anyone a chance to make the items, though low-level crafters will understandably have more of a struggle to finish the items to pristine due to the level. Yield on all items is currently 1-2 (I confirmed 2 each on pristine, I have not yet tested to see if 3rd quality level yields 1 or 2).

Again, like Erollisi Day crafting, the items can be made year-round. However, the drops needed for the primary ingredient will be a limited-time drop while the event is going on. The drops will be body drops (so can drop off grey mobs), and they all work interchangeably for the Nights of the Dead recipes. Here is what we know so far regarding the drops:

Mob	Drop
Ghosts	Marshmallow
Golems	Nutty Chocolate Bar
Rats	Jelly Beans
Scorpions	Chocolate Bar
Skeletons	Peanut Brittle
Snakes	Caramels
Spiders	Licorice Rope
Vampires	Chewing Gum
Zombies	Gummy Worms
?	Candy Corn

Notice the pattern? Creepy, crawly, spooky sorts of mobs!

In addition to these mob-dropped treats, you will need common tier 2 resources (tubers, maple, iron, etc.)

The Items

Firstly, there is one cloth clothing set, the Sinister set, that is purely decorative (no stats). This set includes both a robe and a vest, for more versatile looks.

Then there's all the lovely furniture. All of these pieces will be difficulty level 28, and use tier 2 resources. The exact resources needed, as well as the fuel and equipment used, will vary based on the item. (Forge, loom, woodworking table, chemistry table, work bench and stove & keg are all used for different items.)

Wall Shackles	Pumpkin Pie	Shackled Human Skeleton
Butcher Block	Alchemical Flasks	Sinister Pillows
Sinister Cauldron	Sinister Spider Legs	Orb of Death
Sinister Chandelier	Sinister Tapestry	Sinister Sconce
Captive Audience	Sinister Candelabra	Shackled Elf Skeleton
Chained Blightbat

More enlarged views of the furniture can be found here

Added Notes

This section will be for any updates since this article was published.

To start it off, I'd like to note that while the haunted house instance from the past few years will be making a return, there is a second, very different, heroic haunted house event this year as well.