Show Notes

• Karen has the PAX pox?
• What we liked and did not like about EQ1 raiding.
• EQ2 raiding, the good and bad.
• Suggestions for EQ Next raids.
• You make the call in rapid fire.

Acknowledgments

A special thank you to Trion Worlds, Scott Hartsman, the Rift’s staff and to several others for making our lives a bit better in gaming!

Show Notes

• Where have we been?
• What happened at Fan Faire and Dragon Con?
• EverQuest II Extended thoughts!
• You make the call!
• Adam is making a sales pitch? Lame!

Acknowledgments

We would like to shout out to Green Armadillo, Chris from Game by Night, the SOE community staff, and several other people who deserve some love! We’ll step back in soon with another show and a guest!

Show Notes

• What have we been up to? Here is a hint, starts with EverQuest and ends with 2.
• Adam gets ganked in Eve Online. Not shocking.
• Karen goes to camp! Has she been drinking? She suggests she is being followed by a marshmallow.
• Adam chases pink rats.
• Contest winners! First Prize Winner: Matt
• Runner Up Winners: Anonymous, Peter, Harrymanback, and Amanda
• Best Contest Name: Matt (A different one)
• Best Contest Reason to play: Dan Hogarth
• Best Contest Questions: Kyraine the ranger, Darth Adams, Green Armadillo (who passed to…), Tayluka
• Karen and Adam answer your questions!

Acknowledgments

Thank you to everyone who submitted questions! We really appreciate them and hope to hear feedback from you on how our answers went!

Show Notes

• We take a moment to talk about what we’ve been playing while Adam rudely eats. I thought we were over that!
• Morgan has been spending time with both EQ2 and single player games. He is in Europe and according to Adam it is a weird place!
• Listener feedback: We hear from Citadelli on Guk and get onto the subject of Battlegrounds. How do we feel about the new armor sets and what is their effect on overall itemization?
• Podcast Spotlight: Check out 16 Bit Radio, a podcast from Tim “Youngblood” and company. If you’re interested in hearing honest opinions about games you’ll enjoy it!
• Interviewing Feldon! We put him on the hot seat!
• The ultimate question: What do you think about Sentinel’s Fate?
• What is the deal with raid progression?
• Nobody likes Icy Keep but Ferrel? That is a shame!
• Expansion rumors! Velious is the next expansion? It might even be out at Christmas? Is that enough time?! Velious is serious business and can’t be done poorly!
• Nobody wants to go to Odus. Nobody went to Odus in EverQuest! Adam is after random areas!
• Living up to the expectations of Velious. Was it the greatest EverQuest expansion ever made?
• Lets talk about large open dungeons. They haven’t been done right in a while and were previously a big portion of Velious. Will this be an issue?
• Are we going to get an incomplete Velious spread over a few years? That might not be such a great idea. What will be the Destiny of Velious?
• Erollisi Marr story line spoiler alert!
• What would we like to see in game down the road? Morgan is looking for something more than the usual progression methods.
• Creating a golden path for grouping and raiding. Lets revitalize that old content! We should also have another look at the experience penalty with mentoring.
• Really looking at EQ2 Wire. Where did it come from? How did it get started?
• You make the Call: This week’s question comes from Mike Emeny. His question is about enforcing rules equally. It was a wonderful question! You’ll have to listen for it and the answers though!
• Don’t forget to submit your “ask a guild leader” questions. You can win some Fallen Earth goodies if you do. Check out the details in the acknowledgments.

Acknowledgments

We would like to extend a huge thank you to Feldon and EQ2 Wire. The amount of secret information he brought to the show was great! We love to dish about EverQuest II and he really allowed us to do that.

Thank you to Tim “Youngblood” for being our partner in pod-casting! We appreciate your efforts!

Adam would like to express his great appreciation to Icarus Studios for supporting Epic Slant in the Fallen Earth Epic Contest. If you’d like a chance to win some Fallen Earth game time, a boxed game and/or some swag follow the link and submit a question!

We would like to shout out to the EQ2 team for all the good things they do.

Morgan would like to shout out to Deathdealer for doing work on EQ2 Wire! He would like to shout out to Thorian as well!

Karen thanks Citadelli and would like to hook up from some BGs! She also touched on shouting out to all of her BG buddies.

Show Notes

• It has been a while. Where have you guys been? What are you doing?
• EQ2 Minute: Oasis merging? Maybe? Battlegrounds? Rabble, Rabble!
• Green Armadillo’s Question.
• Gavin’s Question.
• Autymn’s Question.
• Ferrel’s surprise ambush Question!

Acknowledgments

Thank you to Green Armadillo who has been a good friend to us and the show. We are grateful for the way you support us and keep us on your blog. We hope you find something interesting in our answer to your question. I also highly recommend reading Player vs Developer, Green Armadillo’s blog. It is highly insightful and well written.

We would also like to acknowledge everyone who sent in questions. Thank you to Gavin for the continued support and to Autymn for a very well phrased question that made us think differently. You’re both great!

Show Notes

• What has been going on lately? Adam (at the time) was about to leave for Germany!
• We’re discussing EQ2 and we’ve been playing a lot of it lately!
• Battlegrounds are still not for Adam but Karen seems to enjoy them!
• Is the Oasis server going to die? It sure feels like it.
• Sentinel’s Fate instances. Are they good, bad or ugly?
• Two group raids are harder than four group?
• The EverQuest 2 producer letter. Follow Brenlo’s road map with us!
• Humping polar bears? What…?
• Talking Point: What is missing for guilds? What do we need to bring to them?
• What would you like to see added to guilds?
• You make the call: How do you handle leaving a short or long period of time as a guild leader? Please send in your questions. We’ve started to get a few but we need more!

Acknowledgments

Karen and I would like to thank Vagary TV for hosting us. We’re thrilled to say we might be getting a new look on our site here shortly!

Shout out to Gavin for taking the time to send us fan mail and send us some nice tweets on Twitter!

We shout out to Randolf again! Thank you for the thank you note!

Karen shouts out to Mike Emeny who is our guest on our next show and to Shay from EQ2. Shay is currently working on the Hardly Casual blog!

I would like to thank the United States Air Force for treating me kindly!

Show Notes

• Ferrel we hardly knew you and we will miss you! Please someone, find Ferrel!
• Guest Topic: Allod’s Online and RMTs. The developers aren’t out to just screw you! They could if they wanted to though!
• Why buy the cow if you can get the milk for free?

Acknowledgments

Karen and I would like to thank Brian Green once again for joining us for the show. He was a wonderful guest and we really appreciated his insight!

Show Notes

• What have Karen and Adam been playing lately? The answer won’t surprise you! One of these two hosts even plays during the show! How rude! For something less obvious, find out what Brian has been up to (it isn’t EQ2, despite my attempts)!
• Sentinel’s Fate gets a thumbs up.
• The interview with Brian “Psychochild” Green. Karen and Adam put Brian on the hot seat and try to raid him for knowledge. Listen to share in the wonderful loot that they found!
• Dealing with loot as a guild.
• Weekend Design Challenge! What guild management feature should be standard in all MMOs that is not standard?
• Crunch Time! Working or raiding 60+ hours a week? No sweat right? Find out the value (or lack there of) of crunch time for your guild or development shop.
• You make the call. When you’re fed up, burned out and ready to go, how do you leave your guild when you’re one of the most important people in it? How does the guild handle your loss? Find out here!

Acknowledgments

I really have to thank Brian for coming on the show and being a wonderful guest. We’ve worked together on a few things in the past and he has always been supportive so, once more, thank you sir for being willing to share your time and expertise.

Thank you Hi Rez for a great business model and SOE for a great EQ2 expansion!

I would also like to thank Karen for being a great sport and wonderful co-host. She does a whole lot to make this show happen and doesn’t get the thanks she deserves. Help me thank her for finding time to do View from the Top with me!

Brian would like to extend his thanks to all the fans of Meridian 59 over the years. He would also like to that Kat for being great!

Karen would like to shout out to her guildies!

Show notes

• What are we up to? Karen, Adam and Stephanie discuss what they’ve been up to in the MMO sphere. Find out what Stephanie isn’t playing!
• EverQuest II Sentinel’s Fate releases on Tuesday. Are we excited?
• There is no snow in Canada?!
• Give an MMO a fair chance. We discuss going past the first 10 levels before making a snap judgment on a game.
• What games are guild friendly? Who is the most friendly company when it comes to player organizations? Stephanie tells all!
• What do hardcore and casual guilds share in common? Perhaps they’re not as different as people think!
• We couldn’t do VftT without talking about EverQuest II. We look at the state of guilds in that title!
• You make the call! How do you take a casual raid guild to the big time and become a bit more serious?
• Guest Topic time! General features that every MMO should have!

Acknowledgments

Thank you to our guest Stephanie “Stargrace” Morrow for being such an excellent conversationalist. You should check out her blog MMOQuests and her work for Beckett Massive Online Gamer!

We would also like to thank Adam for eating for the last 10 minutes of the show and for accidentally plugging Multiverse, his general MMO Podcast.

A big shout out to Syp, one of the finest bloggers around! Check out his work at Bio Break!

As always thank you to Vagary TV for providing both hosting and support for a View from the Top.

Stephanie would like to thank all of her readers and fans! We thank you too and want to send a line out to April Love! We hope you stay warm this winter.

Finally, thank you OT for submitting a question! We had a few come in this week and it made our month. Please submit your questions so we can answer them during the show! If you have a issue that needs solving with your guild why not Ask a Guild Leader? Your question might just appear on Epic Slant or on the A View from the Top Podcast!

Show notes

• Current whereabouts. Where exactly have Karen and Adam been? What dubious activities have they been up to? How about Buuncha? What does he do?
• A moment with Buuncha. Learn the history of this most noble ogre. Find out how he went from rugby jock to nerdy ruby jock who really likes MMORPGs and shooters!
• Three things any new guild should do. Karen, Adam and Josh (Buuncha) each outline three activities that they think a new guild should do almost immediately. If you plan to start your own organization you can’t miss this!
• You make the call. What happens when you make a loot decision and the loser does not like it? Find how what our hosts and guest had to say about this situation.
• A call for questions. Ladies and gentlemen we need questions to solve! Even if you don’t have a problem now and you want to ask a hypothetical please do so! We could use the practice.
• Guest Topic. Ogres like 2H weapons that they can dual wield!
• Shout outs! Multiverse Podcast, Josh’s Mom

Acknowledgments

Thank you to our guest Josh “Buuncha” Somethingoranother! You were great.

As always thank you to Vagary TV for providing both hosting and support for a View from the Top.

We want to send out a shout out to the SOE Community Podcast! We enjoy your show and thank you for providing us with useful information and entertainment! Also, if you haven’t become a fan of EQ2 on Facebook yet you still have a little time!

Have a issue that needs solving with your guild? Why not Ask a Guild Leader? Your question might just appear on Epic Slant or on the A View from the Top Podcast!