Ranking Everquest Starting Cities From Worst to Best
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- Опубликовано: 23 июл 2024
- How would you rank each and every starting city in Everquest? Which city would you recommend a brand new player start in? Which city has the best newbie zone? The best quests??
||| Time Stamps |||
0:00 Intro/methodology
2:00 Tier 5 - Bad [3 cities]
18:29 Tier 4 - Fine [3 cities]
25:39 Tier 3 - Good! [3 cities]
35:54 Tier 2 - Great! [3 cities]
49:42 Tier 1 - Best of the Best [2 cities]
1:00:12 Closing thoughts
1:00:25 Did I forget a city?
1:01:29 How did I do? Any other countdowns I should do?
P.S. I've had people ask if there's a way to support the channel. After looking at the options, I started a Buy Me A Coffee page because it doesn't require any registration or recurring subscriptions. If you want to support me, I appreciate it! But there's no pressure, I'm here to create fun content for people to enjoy however they please. www.buymeacoffee.com/sagefreke1K 
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I started EQ at 14 in 1999. I made a Human Ranger first and I remember spending 30 mins running through West Karana running for my life from a lion.
That is a hilarious memory 😂
That's hilarious! The comment section on this video is so full of nostalgia! Love it!
I got my 14 year old nephew playing EQ in 1999. Did you bash your computer with a plastic bat when loosing connection like he did?
My first character was Wood Elf warrior and man was that a mistake.
I think my 1st death was from my Guild Master . In those day they were active and could accidentally tarket them wrong LOL SO 5 min into game was my 1st death LOL
One thing I like about Rivervale is how it feels like a secluded little haven that functions as a little passage between completely different regions of the world. Those areas feel so far apart, and I'd often go through Rivervale on that journey.
If you were a halfling it's a great city but if your Tall well?
Hell yeah! So looking forward to this. Thanks for the incredible EQ content. So grateful for you and all the work you put into these!
Aw you're welcome. Hope you enjoy!
As an EQ oldhead I really enjoyed listening to this.
Cabilis is actually my favorite city. I like that it's all messed up and non newbie friendly - and I had a greatr time doing iksar weapon questts in swamp of no hope. It's different and I get that it might not be everyones cup of tea, but for me it's perfect. And it's very atmospheric, with secret nooks here and there, it really builds that feeling that kunark is a dangerous place
All sorts of opportunity to navigate in the city to get swim skill to 200.
I cheated on swimming skill and went auto swim in the nook in the halas pool.
I feel like running on the ice in everfrost gave swimming skill, too; for my barb zerker.
I vote for Cabilis too. That and Paineel are so fun to explore.
The necro spells not being at the guild or anywhere near the guild is infuriating lol
I played an Iksar Necromancer at Kunark's launch and it was my favorite character ever; I have no idea why the city and specifically the necromancer nonsense did not bother me, but yeah I imagine it must have felt like you really were earning your spells, haha.
I have never played Everquest in my life and clicked on this video just because I had the feeling it would be comfy. You delivered! Seeing all the footage of you wandering around the zones made me want to try Everquest '99 again. I made a character, logged in, was stuck in first person, tried every button on my keyboard to switch to third person, nothing worked, then I just sort of gave up.
Glad it hit the mark! And F9 didn't work?? Must've needed a remap
Hopefully you'll give it a retry, Just loaded up project 1999 again myself. Alt+O to acess the options menu so you can change the keybinds and so you can find the button to change views.
Wood Elf Warrior here. Played Kunark when I was 17 years old in high school in 2001. Mind was absolutely blown. Still playing EMU servers today.
My nostalgic city has to be Kelethin. The music, the proximity of CB, and not one, not two, but three other cities within two zones. That was one lively hub. Faydwer felt like a community in and of itself.
CB belt quests, players trying to take on the PoD near the lift to predictable grisly and hilarious results, giant chessboards, insane unicorns, shadowmen, faeries villages and nearly invisible brownies, and the Estate of Unrest. More trains served than any station on Earth.
Yeah, I loved that entire continent, but the Kelethin music just instantly drags me back to 1999.
Me too brother
My very first character was a high elf cleric. Way back then (1999) you could heal mobs so naturally I would sometimes forget to switch target and heal the orc peon instead of healing myself 😁. Kelethin was quite a sight: platforms in the trees! But it was also very deadly, especially those downward ramps that did not have roped handrails. I disagree that it was easy to find your corpse. Early on we did not have an in-game map nor a compass. The world felt very big. In fact it felt HUMONGOUS. Moving around felt like a dangerous ordeal, it was so easy to get lost or never find your corpse again. There used to be many /ooc "Has anyone seen my corpse?"
Actually it’s four if you include Ak’Anon
I will always remember the first time I zoned into lesser fay... Fking Brownies man.
@@stephanebessette6471 feel this, also there’s a hotkey to target your target’s target, and in the heat of battle I would frequently click it twice… luckily I was just a ranger and the heal didn’t change much 😆
I have to disagree on Cabalis. The field of bone is an amazing newbie zone complete with one of the best first dungeons in the game with Kurn’s Tower. I had a blast leveling a monk and necro through these areas. Then there’s Warsliks woods with groups and the giant for and the brute caves (amazing non social static spawn camp, with good drops for plat)
I agree on both points! I praised FoB in the video and have done multiple videos on Kurn. I also caveated my critique of Warslik by saying I liked it for later levels, but not for 1-5ish
He's right about West Cab though, although I enjoy all the water. Empty space isn't always wasted space.
Yeah Cabilis is terrible even for shaman spells. Field of bone is S tier and Cab is D tier or F.
As a new player this was really fun to watch through and learn about all the other cities, especially as an ogre who isn't exactly welcome in most of them. Very comfy video too. Excellent job!
How far are you as an ogre
Ogre is life!
Great video by the way. This got me back into playing on P99 Blue. ;)
I think it was in 2000 when I made a Human Shadowknight following Innoruuk. Yes, a blind human. But when I went to Neriak, woah, all those neon signs were so beautiful. Dark elves may have ultravision but never truly see the beauty of Neriak like a human can. These videos are making me nostalgic and I want to start playing once again, after 23-24 years!
@Stephane Bessette Project 1999 Green Server. Am playing 8 years after last playing on P99, and that was 13 years after I quit in 2002.
Ooh. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen Neriak through human eyes. Might be something for me to try.
Same! This video is so awesome and the comment section is too. So many memories. Loving the nostalgia!
Do a countdown on the best EQ Dungeons please.
I started playing on Rallies Zen back in '99, as a Barb. This video sent me back big time. I miss the old world, and don't regret any time I spend playing, which was substantial. From when I was trying to figure out how to get from Halas zone to EFP over and over again because I couldn't see, to my guild being one of the few that killed the Sleeper, the journey was amazing. Thank you for this amazing video!
I hear a lot of complaints about Halas and Everfrost's difficulty and remoteness, esp with the lack of night sight, but I agree with your assessment of it. I personally am biased towards the music, and Kelethin's just gets me.
And those are legit critiques. I actually think it's easier to see in Everfrost than Tox Forest because the white ground reflects torches/lanterns better.
Everfrost is actually quite newbie friendly and it has a linear element to it that makes it a great zone - you just slowly make your way out of the frozen hills
Then you have blackburrow - it's actually really good.
Not even sure how this landed in my recommended videos but I sure did enjoy it. I started playing EQ in Beta I and ended up working for Verant (later SOE) some time prior to RoK's release for about five years. Haven't played since then, though. Your video brought back a lot of fond memories, thanks! Oh and you rated Rivervale WAY too low! 😀
What a cool job! Thanks for all your work. Did you work on Velious at all?
@@SageFreke1 Yes and then SoL. Moved to Star Wars Galaxies after that. 😊
I started in the Qeynos, Surefall, Halas area. Doing blackburrow and the Karanas and all that. It was a lot of running. Through the huge plains zones, then up the mountain into the highpass zones, then into kith forest, and finally into the common lands to barter. That was such a journey as a new player. I loved it.
So happy to see content from you, easily one if not my favorite EQ p99 content creators
Let me start out by saying awesome video. Brings back a whole lot of good memories. Subscribed.
When you got to #2 I was going through my head trying to figure out which city was left to be #1. When I realized the only one left was Halas I almost fell out of my chair. The city itself isn't so bad other than the annoying ferry to get out to Everfrost. I always thought Everfrost Peaks was a nightmare as a new player especially. No night vision wandering through those paths in the snow. The Vengeful guys wandering through leaving newbie carnage were always fun too. Not my favorite at all.
I think either Kaladim or Felwithe would be my favorites.
Your description of running across the Karannas reminded me of when I first started the game. I created my first character in Qeynos and my co-worker who got me into the game was playing in the Freeport area. So one night after work he starts running me from Qeynos to FP. I think we got SoW before we left but of course that ran out. So we are running and running for like 45 minutes or so and I got killed a couple of zones short of FP. It was tragic but I was in awe of the scope of the world at that point. I think the next night he paid someone to port me instead of trying that again lol. Good times.
That is such a classic EQ story! The developers totally intended it to be a social game to help make it feel less scary in those big new zones
Fantastic video man! Food for thought to be sure.
Never played EQ before till last night when I decided to try P1999 as a wood elf. The amount of accidental deaths falling from those tree platforms just looking for the bank.. It was actually a thrilling experience to search for my body at night to loot back my gear.
I fell in the hole as a newbie too lol. Being young and desperate I put in a petition for a GM to help. They told me "no" in a nice way and offered to give me a "starting kit" which consisted of a few basic weapons/armor for a level 1-2. I didn't necessarily appreciate the gesture at the time but looking back I'm really glad they took an extra step towards trying to help without breaking the rules.
Subscribed for your love of Snow Zones and Halas. I feel yah
I started playing EQ just before Kunark launched, age 13. I was playing on a gateway PC, pentium 2 processor (333mhz), 8mb video card, 16 mb of RAM, and a 10 gig hard drive.
Always stuck to dwarves and wood elves for their starting areas.
I didn’t know it at the time but I was experiencing the golden age of gaming.
I played in EQ Beta, and my first character was a Gnome, I spent a long time just trying to find my way out, finally gave up and rolled a Half-Elf Ranger
I really wish they would remake this entire game now
Kaladim was a great newbie city. The layout was very intuitive and easy to navigate. Plenty of newbie quests like the scarab quests, skellie bones, Aviak talons, etc, to break up the usual monotony of early levels. It was always very easy to not only hit level 4-5 (when you can really start to branch out), but also get most of your armor slots filled up as well. It just really felt like Kaladim had a bigger emphasis on the quest aspect of Everquest.
Ha, I love this. I also played on Tunare and am so glad someone else remembers when gfay was the auction house.
Was the same on Solusek Ro. :)
I loved it!
Ah I knew there was at least one other server that did it that way
I am still a little shocked this was a thing. 😅
Povar native here and there was an auction 'house' in GFAY for years all the way until the literal Bazaar came about.
Kelethin higher on my list. The ambiance, being up above the canopy, the dark forest in all directions. i think they nailed the simple, all wood archetecture. Yes it's kind of a maze in the trees, but once you get used to it and know your way around, it's wonderful. And above all the music captures the mystic, hidden city in the forest essence so well. Takes me back every time i hear it.
I played a lot of characters in Kelethin, of various classes and loved it. When the game first released, I wanted to play a monk, but all of my friends were playing elves, so I ran over from Freeport. That was an awful experience. To see the trail, I had to look straight down. Frankly, many of the starter zones are way too dark, but this one was terrible.
@@justinsellers9402 lack of infravision or ultravision was a serious disadvantage to the human class. And yes that was a dangerous run!
I started in Kelethin in 1999, it was mind blowing. The most amazing thing I have played. I think it's sad what has happened since.
High level players used to pay us to have races through kelethin after they made us drink mead. I never won but I did have a lot of corpses on the forest floor. Was hard to run drunkenly through there back then.
As someone who is new to EQ, and only done 3-4 cities Rivervale is by far my favorite so it being just "fine" was wild to me! I find it the only city I wasn't constantly lost in
Right? Also the rogue guild is pretty fun
One thing you missed about Odus is the Warrens, which is one of the more fun places to level through part of the teens if you can actually find anyone to group with (which is admittedly, and quite unfortunately, rare). That is in my top 5 favorite low level dungeons. Other than your bashing of Cabilis , I mostly agree with this list. Halas and Qeynos were always my favorite starting zones, but I may be biased due to starting the game with a barbarian warrior.
I loved Cabills, and its an evil brutal Vinice. I felt that it gave so much character to the iksar
Iksars found dead XD. I had a friend who played an Iksar necro and drowned in the blood pool in the guild. It's totally a nostalgic favorite for me though, great video!
Qeynos is tied for my favorite city as far as aesthetics and "underground" goes...... the false walls to the rogue's guild and evil/corruption was so cool to me. Feels like an outcast city and kinda was. I also loved that it was a throwback to the original creators of the game (SonyEQ backwards). Then you add in the proximity to blackburrow and the train fest that place is, the gnoll teeth questline giving massive xp, the scroll quest from splitpaw too..... such a good city.
Kelethin was my other favorite city for the community it included..... whether grouping up with other lvl 1's to rush those early 3-5 levels, then heading over to the orc hill and then clan crushbone; the progression of the zone was fantastically designed and certainly as someone who has had bad internet, the single zone for most of the early grinding and selling was so nice to have instead of waiting for zone loading. I also can't even begin to praise the devs on their music for the city as well, it is by far the best in the game and creates such a peaceful feeling being amongst the treetops. the whole city creates such a nostalgic feeling.... so good.
thanks for your list!
Man, It sounds like you actually pronounce Qeynos like I have since 99 though if I am honest nobody pronounces it correctly but I think our way sounds best and is the closest to the correct way among the most common mispronunciations. Thanks for the video!
Haha! My friend groups have always been divided on this! Key-nos VS. Quay-nos, it's always a light hearted jab/argument with all of us. 😅
Thank you! As a one year newb, I'm still on the low end of the learning curve. This gave me a lot of insight. ❤
My very first character was a Wood Elf Warrior. And you're right, I LOVE Kelethin as a result. I love that city so much, it would personally be my highest ranked city, and it's fine that it wasn't yours, but man I love Kelethin. Also, I played on the Xegony server which also used Gfay as its trading spot. Most everyone gathered at the Wizard spires, I dunno about on your server, but that's where the trading was done. In hindsight, kinda sucks for evil characters, lol, but hey that's what it was. But I digress, yeah, Kelethin is #1 for me.
This video took a ton of work and just cozy as you remembered everything from back-in-the-day, I don't agree with ALL of your picks, but I learned a few things too!
no way, paineel is absolutely amazing. So close to the best early level dungeon in the game!
I'd only ever make gnomes. I'm pretty sure I'll know where every single NPC is in there on my deathbed after I forget everything else.
Same I Played Ogre Shaman , Sk and War. Because I knew the City so well. Later I Started a Necro, Cleric and WIZ Dark Elves . As a Ogre I played in Nerick a lot and got familiar with the city.
You just spoke to my heart with saying you played on Tunare(might have spelt that wrong). I played an Iskar monk named Phryer Tuk. So many memories. Le sigh. Miss it so much.
I fondly remember Neriak, it was otherworldly and ornate, it had little secrets and one of my favourite features was the bar which looked out underwater. When training swimming I used to go down there and look in the bar hoping to catch a glimpse of all the random evil characters exploring the place. The music was memorable too, from creepy ambience to the bombastic theme of the Halls of the Dead. The dark elf king and queen hated each other (a recurring theme) and the lesser casters had their own faction which was literally called The Spurned. I mained a Rogue way back when (they were agile, dexterous, intelligent, had a natural hide ability and perfect night vision - that would make them the best choice right?) and the Ebon Mask was one of the best outfits in Norrath.
Nektulous Forest had its problems, but the “newbie log” gathering point gave many a young dark elf their first taste of cooperation, and there were plenty of places to go afterwards. Hopefully the algorithm will drop this nostalgia bomb into more people’s feeds.
My first city was Neriak. I made a DE necro on Tunare around March of 2000. I got lost looking around the city, and then I fell in that tiny mote with bridge to those rooms with the troll in the back of 3rd gate. I drowned! That got me out of the city. I later moved to Vallon Zek, where I made a DE rogue. I had the idea that I would be picking the pockets of the opposing teams. I love Neriak and its atmosphere as well as the twists and turns and especially the secret tunnel to the foreign quarter from the commons. It has an ok newbie area in the zone outside the city.
My next favorite is a tie between Qeynos and old Freeport. I desperately hate the revamped Freeport. Old Freeport had such style to it. The newbie zone was much better than Neriak, (No zoning to sell), and West Freeport had no surprise high-level mobs waiting to pounce you. When I first logged into Vallon Zek with my Rogue, there were no less than 80 people in each of the city zones, and the newbie area was over 100. Since I started on Tunare, I was a little familiar with the game
I couldn't find any mobs to kill with so many people that I went to Travis Two Tone and grabbed a letter to the bards guild in North Freeport via the tunnel. I actually got to 2nd level with the quest. Since it was a PvP server, I got jumped my 3 human warriors. Exiting the bards guild, but since DE started with the ability to hide, I managed to escape the chase after I rounded a corner and hit hide. I was sweating bullets when they came around the corner. Back then, you got no message if you succeeded or failed to hide or sneak. I succeeded!
The tunnels in west Freeport were brilliantly placed. The north tunnel allows the paladins to get to their guild hall as well as the bank, and the south tunnel ends in the evil guild halls to the left or you could get to the rogues guild or docks to the right. All this was underground out of sight, too. I exploited the hell out of this on the PvP server.
Qeynos was just as good as Freeport, but it was the nicer city of the two. They had much better, friendlier quests than Freeport. The sewers and the rivalry of good vs. corrupt guards gave it more of the fantasy epic city feel. You could navigate through the sewers to the docks here, too, but with a lot more difficulty. You didn't need to leave the city walls to make it to 2nd level here with some quests! The newbie zone here is my favorite. There are only two mobs that will agro you that will kill a level 1. Once you figure that out, it's easy to avoid them. Again, no zoning to go sell, too! Qeynos has a more heroic adventure feel to it than the other starting cities. I guess I like it more than Freeport, maybe, but only by fractions.
I started in January of 2001 and you started outside the city no idea what to do luckily I had a person give my Paladin bronze armor and a decent sword and led me to the guild hall. I have tried to pass that on but I started out in Butcherblock and loved it was very challenging at the time, Then we went toward Crushbone different story. The game used to be way harder and challenging.
It’s a good day seeing a hour long video by Sage
Glad to see long-form content still has a home 🙂
Right off the bat the Cabilis rant killed me. So good.
Excellent ranking of the cities! Thanks for getting so much footage of them all! Qeynos area is among the best for me, I somewhat like that it is insulated from the rest of Antonica by the vast plains of Karana. Have you considered doing a ranking of the dungeons, either by nostalgia, or high end grouping adventure, such as Lower Guk, Mistmoore, Unrest, Befallen?
I had not thought about ranking dungeons, interesting idea!
can confirm I started in 2000 as a woodelf ranger and yes, kelethin was magical and when I think of EQ music, it's the opening/loading song and kelethin music.
My first time playing EQ was on P99 few yrs ago and a Barb Shaman was my first toon and I did the same thing in Halas
First time running from Everfrost to Freeport was a journey👍
my first char was a Dark Elf Shadowknight.... took me about 5 hrs trying to find my way out. I didnt even know there was a damn forest outside. I DIDNT KNOW THERE WAS ANYTHING OUTSIDE!!!
also agreed Cabilis is dumb AF
Everyone knows you start as a gnome for any class and then immediately go to Qeynos
Keep in mind that when Kunark came out the game was at the height of its popularity, many folks wanted to try out iksar. At the time and for sometime after, Cab was packed. Splitting into 2 zones alleviated the server load, even then they'd crash occasionally. FFXIV has the same issue even today, sqeenix will add more instances of an area to keep it stable.
And I hate to be critical of someone's opinion, but I'm still passionate about EQ after all these years. However, many of your complaints are what made the game exciting as a new player back then. MMO players have it way to easy now. Everything is handed to you on a silver platter. Maps, quest journals, easy newbie areas where its nearly impossible to die...all these things take away from the sense of wonder that EQ gave you. EQ has added some things over the years, sure, but from 1999-2001, EQ was the pinnacle of feeling like you were on a true adventure, cheesy deaths and all.
Easy to tell who the true EQ vets are with statements like this.
This is amazing!
I played on Tunare as well in the good days. Glad to see your vids man.
~Tippin
I remember the name!
Cabilis wasnt bad imo. Everything was easy to find except the necro spells like you said in the video. FoB is arguably the best newb area. I remember back on live alot of people getting a bind near cab just to use the FoB to level and making iksar alts to sell and bank. Made a bunch of plat as a newbei iksar selling all them bone chips to higher level people working on their iksar faction with trooper mozzo.
Kelethin being rated so high even though you could fall to your death and lose hours of leveling was surprising for me. Back on live there was no restriction to losing exp at lower levels so it was a terrible city considering in 1999 most people using a dial up connection that could drop at any time a phone call was answered.
All the cities with multiple zones like Qeynos, Freeport, Neriak could be very confusing and felt bad as well when you had to wait minutes between loading back in 1999.
Imo Felwith and Kaladim were the best with decent newbei areas and close by starting dungeons that were very popular. Crushbone, Unrest, and Mistmoore all being close by was great to get new players started.
Ooh good call, I hadn’t considered the loading issue between zones on dialup
Qeynos area is my absolute favorite. It's got the best rogues guild, and evil casters guild by far. Its got the most life and feel to it, its got a hippy guild across the way tucked away in the woods. And it's got the best music IMO
On Drinal we used to use North Freeport as the player trade zone. Evil races would stick mostly to the sewers while a majority of the trading was done behind Jade. I liked it MUCH better than EC tunnel.
When I started in 2000 Qeynos was pretty busy. That whole western region was fun to explore. Busy enough to get groups together, but not so busy it was crowded.
Back then, on the role-playing server where you could only have one character, Qeynos had a homey feel to it. You see the same folks everyday and it was easy to make friends.
This is the first region I logged into, and it blew me away... from blackburrow, surefall, and the terrifying catacombs beneath the city, the area really felt alive to me (Still does... leveling there in p99 now)
Great list! It is low hanging fruit, but a listing ranking the Epic quests would be fun. Not necessarily the Epic items, but the quests & lore. Which ones had the best tie in with the lore of their classes. Which ones where fun, gave you some unique bonus rewards, and which ones where absolutely brutal. I'd focus less on the Epic Weapon rewards themselves, because everyone already know which ones suck and which are essential.
Great idea!
i do believe that Kithicore was once always a newbie zone but then they did the battle of bloody kithicore event and it became cursed after that point. So it made sense back then but afterwards .... not so much.
I understand the Qeynos ranking, but man I always got so lost there before maps that I hated the few times I had to go there when leveling.
What made you think elves are the oldest and wisest playable race? Dwarves are the 2nd oldest race, after dragons. Friendly ghouls aren't just in Neriak, there is a ghoul assistant in the paineel library that helps organize books. The thing with Dark Elves, Ogres, and Trolls is that the trolls and ogres fear the dark elves, which tolerate them for their usefulness in their evil plans. A big chunk of Trolls even worship Innoruuk, mainly their Shadowknights and Shamans, which can choose Innoruuk as a deity. There's even a dark elf ambassador in Grobb which sends Innoruuk worshipping trolls off to Neriak to serve Innoruuk. But the Ogres see through the deceit of the dark elves. There is an ogre in Neriak who tells you that he wants to go back to Oggok because the dark elves are trying to trick him and are mean. There is an Ogre Warrior quest where you are sent off to intercept an orc runner which has a note revealing how the Dark Elves are ditching the Ogres in favor of an alliance with the Crushbone Orcs, to expand their reach in Faydwer. They are preparing to kill every Ogre in Neriak, and then invade Oggok. Upon showing this note to the questgiver, you are sent to assassinate the Dark Elven ambassadors in Oggok and Crushbone, and you become a Craknek hero. Trolls are more cooperative with Dark Elves, but the Ogres don't even worship Innoruuk at all. In Ogre society, Rallos Zek is above all, though a few Ogres worship Cazic Thule. A few ogres, such as Clurg and Marda, have become close in intellect to their race before their curse. Now time for me to argue with your ratings! If you haven't guessed already, I am an Ogre main, so I'll start with Oggok. The situation in Oggok is that there are 2 rival guilds, the Greenblood Knights and the Craknek Warriors. The Shamen of war are allied with the Greenbloods. Clurg, the famed creator of Ogre Swill and the Flaming Clurg, and one of the few smart Ogres, created the Bouncers after seeing them in bars across the lands he travelled, which serve as Guards, peacekeepers between the warring guilds, and of course they beat up rowdy drunkards as the name suggests. So for the levelling path, you have a lot in the Feerrott. 1-6 you can kill low level roamers. 4-7 you can do the lizard camps east of the river/bridge, 7-11ish you can do undead stone henges, roaming mobs, and lizard camps west of the river/bridge, 9-14 you can do the lizard island outside the temple of Cazic Thule (mobs will vary in level like 7-11ish I think), 10 - 13 you can do greenblood zombies swimming in the river, and 14-22 you can do crocs in oasis, 3 zones away. The Dark Assassin only roams the side west of the bridge, generally near the path to Rathe Mountains. There is a bouncer that will roam along the river and along the path to Rathe Mtns if you get in trouble. They will attack the dark assassin but usually die. There is another bouncer that roams along the southern area of the river, who will steamroll through the lizard island and kill a lot of the mobs up to the temple entrance guards, so you can get a free and safe escort to and from the temple by following this guard. I think it was recently discovered that the dark assassin was never kos in classic so on p99's next patch, they might no longer be an issue. South Qeynos was the first zone btw. Think that's all I wanted to say.
Good point about the dwarves! They were before Tunare put the elves on Norrath. Regarding the Oggok path: I agree it's viable, but I don't think it compares well to a lot of the other paths for new players. It's not the worst, but it's middle of the pack for me.
This was amazing, thanks for sharing!
I started playing EQ late in the game so my first character was a vah shir from Shar Val. I didn't mind that as a starting city. The spell merchants and melee tomes were easy to find, banking was available and once you've been there 1000 X's it gets easier to run through without using the game map.
Halas is actually one of my worst because of location, that stupid raft to get in. was honestly surprised that water part you have to cross didnt knock halas down.
Honestly, Neriak, and Felwithe would probably be my top two, with the only knock on neriak is the size can be daunting, and felwith being that the better part of gfay is near kelethin. Kelethin will always hold a special place in my heart, it's big knock is that can be confusing at first to navigate.
It’s great to see all these comments confirm how polarizing this topic is!
I was happy to see that you seemed to have put a lot of thought into this. I was surprised that Halas was your top choice, but i understand why. I started out as a Barb Shaman, and didnt make a 2nd character until the last weeks of vanilla ( and it was a Barb Rogue ). So I am as or more biased than you.
I was going to mention Surefall Glade ( I started the comment before i got the the wrap up at the end ). You did miss Shar Val.
Haha thank you! I purposely didn’t do Luclin. I thought I mentioned that somewhere in the video but I may have just thought it
Back in the day Freeport was 3 zones. As a human Paladin you had to run EFP because you were kos to the guards. NFP had the bank and where our server had its market, WFP was great newbie zone... and EFP was between the two.
I spent 1 hour awing over Neriak 3rd gate when i started in May 2001 as a DE Necro, such a cool place.
I agree. And the music really sucks you in
I noticed that most of the players who are super nostalgic about this game all played on the Tunare server (myself included). I think we had a unique experience compared to all of the other servers because you didn't really have to be part of a Guild to raid; the server was really inclusive and had a large sense of community when compared to other servers. We were also one of the most over-populated servers in the game, even after the merge to Drinal.
Definitely! I think Talisman was the main Uber raid guild and they weren't huge dicks about it. There was another one early on that I can't remember the name of, but they fizzled out. Krieger maybe?
My first character was an iksar necro. Had lots of fun learning that layout.
I started in Kelethin and I was in awe
Originally Kithicor forest did not have the super scary night time. It was a pretty easy place to level in low levels. Then there was an event for the introduction of Plane of hate which turned it to a night time danger. Part of me wants to say I remember later on EQ added a portal to PoH in Neriak, but not sure. I do know that you had to get the soul stone (I think it was called) from the cleric guild in 3rd gate to get to PoH. I had a Dark Elf Cleric after my paladin which ended up being my main and I thought I was hot shit when I got all my planar cleric armor back then lol.
You had to get a wizard to port from the wizard spire outside of Neriak to get to plane of hate
Deep dive city tour could be really fun. Like really explore what every NPC, shop, quest, etc in each city.
I just started playing P99 and though I agree with most of your rankings, I think Qeynos edges out Halas by just a bit. The Vengeful Lyricists and cast have been such a nightmare for my low level Barbarian and the twisting paths of Everfrost are extremely easy to get lost in even for an intermediate player like myself.
I love that you pointed out the creepiness and the beauty of Neriak though. It’s an extremely underrated city that is my nomination for the best city for the evil races.
Zoning in my home city (Neriak in my case) gave me this profound sense of relief I never felt in any video game, online or otherwise. I was safe. I lived to see another day. I had loot to sell or quests to turn in. EQ was the only game that made me feel this way.
I’ve played EverQuest on and off since the very beginning and I never knew that the wood elf city was named anything other than Greater Faydark 😅.
I was reading the comments wondering how no one else liked gfay and where this kelethin place was.
Also that’s where I started. Woodelf druid, and it immediately hooked me.
My most successful character was a Woodelf Warrior. I had a habit of bouncing back and forth between Kelethin and Qeynos. Luckily when I started, around 2001, you could get a Druid port straight into Surefall Glade. I think my best memories were running back and forth between Kelethin and Kaladim turning in those wristbands and shoulder pads.
39:40 I still remember the old layout. Good times. Glad i get to see it again in this video.
my first city was Grobb. I loved the swamp.. it really felt unique compared to all the "fancy" cities..Then running into guk being to scared to venture far in.. then finally making it out to oasis. I didn't know I had it hard at the time :D I also didn't know about xp penalties for races either LOL
Classic experience!
I’m a new player to EverQuest haven’t played once until last week. Started as a wood elf Druid and I have to say this tree city is such a pain to navigate lol and it haunts me to know there are “worse” cities
Cool video. I've been trying a bunch of races as I unsuccessfully try to get into P99/EQ. Problem is I like the evil cities best, but then you're evil. For example, Paineel is a cool as heck city to me, but trying to leave is a hassle (and you're likely to get murdered the moment you set foot in Qeynos). Felwithe, Kaladim and Kelethin are pretty good overall I think although I've always found Felwithe's newbie area to have barely any mobs. My personal favorite has always been Qeynos as it has basically everything you need, and has a progression path wihout any major surprises (killing an animal near Holly notwithstanding) as opposed to say East Commons where you can easily run into an invisble high level elemental or a griffin.
As an outsider looking in, a lot of their decisions make little sense even coming from a traditional RPG background.
Yeah I really think they screwed low level evil Erudites. Best bet for Qeynos is jumping off the boat before it docks and swimming into the sewers. There you can run underneath Qeynos and pop out near Qhills
Yoooo!!!!!! Fellow Tunare player here. I found it so weird when I started playing P99 and everyone used the tunnel.
I know I mentioned this on another video, but on Xegony the auction zone was Gfay at the wizard spire. It took me a while when I first started playing way back that Qeynos was SonyEQ backwards lol
Neriak has always been my favorite city. Followed closely by Qeynos.
Its a heck of a task to bring a DE Rogue's faction up to walk freely in Qeynos. Just watch out for Hansl, he's an ass.
Man i love me some EQ
I feel like i just went through the motions and touched the tip of the iceberg on the zones
Cant wait to go back and check everything out
My order from favorite to least favorite:
01. Freeport - The iconic city of classic EQ imho. Large variety of stuff to do in nearby zones as well: Orc camps in wc,ec & oasis, derv camps in nro, crocs in oasis, undead in befallen. Just a lovely area with tons of stuff for newbies. Hands down my favorite starting region.
02. Halas - I love snowy zones. The dungeons blackburrow and permafrost are classic as well. Loved the frozen river. Only gripe is that it was easy to get lost trying to find blackburrow or halas.
03. Neriak - Awesome city. Nektulos forest is meh, but thankfully wc or nro is close enough. Many great dungeons nearby: befallen, najena, sola & solb. Lavastorm was cool as well.
04. Rivervale - Lovely town & Misty thicket is fantastic. Runnyeye is kind of meh, but thankfully highpass is nearby. Kithicor was horrible but Misty thicket makes up for it.
05. Qeynos - Overall nice city with solid nearby xp zones. Never got the hang of qeynos catacombs, but I feel like it could have been a great zone if it was slightly less complex and had better areas to group. I always lived to concept of the catacombs, but not the implementation. Also I never stopped searching for Pyzjn & the GBS. Never got it though.
06. Felwithe - Easy to navigate city that's close to CB. Was never a fan of High elves though.
07. Kaladim - Neat city. Close crushbone & unrest too.
08. Ak’anon - City was kind of dreary but I loved the clockwork theme. Steamfont was a great newbie zone.
09. Oggok - Nice design of the city. Newbie zone was kind of bad imho. Never cared for Temple of Cazic. Always lvl'd my ogres in uguk & lguk when possible.
10. Erudin - The city itself was nice, but toxx sucked. Until the warrens was added there was no great newbie dungeons on Odus unfortunately.
11. Cabalis - City design was bad, but boy did I love Field of Bones. Lake of Ill Omen was decent as well. A shame about WW & SoNH though.
12. Kelethin - The amount of time I got lost looking for the bank here incalculable. Or the amount of times I accidentally fell. Really loved crushbone though.
13. Grobb - Feels like the city was rushed. Bad newb zone, but uguk & lguk were great.
14. Paineel - Doesn't feel like much of a city tbh. The newb area included in the zone was decent though, as well as the warrens. Nothing makes up for the difficulty of figuring the key thing or falling into the hole though.
Neriak #1. Just great execution on mood and atmosphere. And dark elves rule.
Cabilis hands down there worst. Agree that West cab is pointless, and OMG the canals. Would be ok if it wasn't such a PITA to find and use the ladders to get out. Would have been hugely improved if the walls were angled so you could get out wherever
Just finished watching the video , and the memories that came back was insane. Somehow I knew Halas was going to be number 1 as it’s my number one also … I remember barb warrior . Everything you said was so true walking out of the ice caverns to the frozen tundra. Seeing giant spiders and wooly mammoths … making your way to blackburrow. Some of my best times on a game. As for my least favourite I’d have to say oggok even the trolls city never care much for em .
PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD MORE VIDEOS FROM YOU!!!!!!!!! Thanks :)
Erudin is my favorite zone, unfortunately I never visit. One feature I liked playing on a TLP was the origin AA to teleport back to your home city with a long cooldown, if that was on p99 I definitely would have made my chanter an Erudite.
The reason Erudin's port has a sign mentioning Velious is because EverQuest was supposed to launch with 5 continents, Antonica - Faydwer - Odus - Kunark - Velious. But time constraints and whatnot made them have to launch without Kunark and Velious. That's a big reason why both of those expansions, which featured HUGE amounts of content, were able to be released so quickly after launch, alot of the work was already either done or partially complete before EQ even launched.
Both Tallon Zeke and Emarr had heavy trade in Kelethin. Real good place to be a brand new player back in the day.
An interesting note on King Akanon: He was originally a naked human male, because they gave him a texture that wasn't in the zone file. It went several months before they fixed it in a patch.
Qeynos is the best, it is the most productive area for someone fresh on a server with no gear help or higher level friends. There are so many quests and upgrades(esp for int caster) in Qeynos, catacombs, Qeynos hills, and Black Burrow. The experience generation is great in every zone either through zems or quest drops, and the starting zone has the bonus of a npc that will heal you for bone chips or small coin donations. There is a boat that leaves Qeynos and stops at an island with the most lucrative lower level mob to farm in the game, wisps, with the highest density of them.
If you started as an Erudite magician and migrated to Qeynos (easy boat ride), by the time you were level 16 you could very possibly have 160+int, and well over 500 platinum, which is just a gross amount for a low level to get, basically enough to bank roll all the important spells to 50 or buy some nice starting gear. Enchanters would get all that plus they could snag a quest part of the Stein of Moggok quest before they left.
The only real issue is there is basically little reason for higher level players to be there other than to power level people or they are passing by to Everfrost from the druid port in Surefall glade, so you won't get as many bonus buffs, and it can be a pain to get to the better mid level zones if you have to cross the Karanas at a lower level with no travel spells.
This is why I would say if you don't mind getting help and the server is established, it's probably a better experience to start near EC/WC, and ask for buffs from higher level characters. More likely to get gifted junk starting gear as well.
The most difficult is probably a Erudite Shadowknight. You are already frail, low stamina/strength, which in general is not good but really not good if are relying on a bigger mana pool to shore up the difference. Unless you get an invis or port out you are pretty much SOL and leveling in one of the worst areas. The added hole drop and gate lock out is just icing on the poop cake for that character.
Thumbs up, I do have a soft spot for the Iksar city but for sure never understood why it was 2 zones, one zone is empty
Felwith is the best starting City,. It is the easiest to get around, the newbies own outside is possibly the best in-game, and Crushbone nextdoor is possibly one of the better higher end starting zones.
My first love for characters is a Wood Elf Ranger, I have to admit falling off those ramps was annoying....
FYI: my main character is a High Elf Cleric....
lol Most common direction when asked. Follow the wall till you hit the first tunnel then go in and keep to the left side wall and follow it all the way through. lol Everything was done by following right or left sides. I had maps printed out and used them quite a lot. In fact I still have my map and quest binder for EQ.
EQ had Prima guides for Kunark when it was released. Mine looks like several college students took the course using the same book, since each new character needed different parts of the book. EQ before printed maps off of allakhazam was tedious, but it also taught me how to navigate mazes and judge my distances away from things. I rarely lose my car in a parking lot and if someone guides me through city streets on foot, I'll find my way back to where I started with no help from them or GPS. Needless to say, I don't get lost in-game either. Though I think I'd have to relearn Kelethin or Paineel. lol A refresher after 17 years since I last played would be necessary. I need no such help for most any other city.
BTW - I still have those guides and printed maps in storage. They are as much a part of my history as all the other pictures and items I've gathered while traveling all over Europe!
I think the Prima guide was the one I had too. I wish I still had it, mine was marked up too!
I loved that guide, my was basically falling apart. I started EQ young, I would take that book to 5th grade every day and read about all the classes and races and just daydream about playing eq again.
Fun fact : Kithicor forest originally was a normal newbie zone. But then they added the undeads after an in game events whose lore I don't remember and for some reason they kept them after the event was done (my memory is very blurry I don't remember well)
It's possible they split Cabilis up to reduce the max visible polycount. I remember that, back in those days, EQ didn't have proper occlusion culling. It caused issues on low-end PCs in some other zones (e.g. Rivervale). Also Cabilis is really dumb and they could have put the entire city in field of bone, Kelethin style.
If you're a druid, Rivervale is the only S tier city because it's the closest bank to a druid ring.
If you're an agnostic human mage, those ghouls in Neriak will attack, and the guards will assist them.
IMO the most important feature of a city is the bank, and Surefall Glade doesn't have one.
I started EQ in early 2000
After my first character started in Freeport, my dad and his guild/friends introduced me to Halas. Nearly every other character I made got there asap, for the bears and bones alone.