SOE Fan Faire 2007: Legends of Norrath

by: Tony "RadarX" Jones

Rumor had told us quite some time ago what would be announced at Fan Faire, but it's fairly certain most people didn't realize exactly how this product would work. Many were just thinking "Eh...a card game. Ok." but it turned out there was a lot more to it. If you missed the announcement an EverQuest trading card game built right into the existing EverQuest 1 and EverQuest 2 clients is on the way. Not only will it allow you to play matches against others and collect cool cards, but some of them can actually be traded for loot in game.

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EverQuest has a Sphinx?

We sat in on an entire roundtable dedicated to this new feature. Senior Producer Clint Worley lead a panel assisted by a few developers and EQ2 Producer Scott Hartsman to brave any questions players and media attending Fan Faire wanted to ask. The first question right away asked about the status of cards. Could they be traded? Were they tied to an account or to a character? Clint stated most certainly that the cards would be tradeable but only after the account reached a minimum purchase level (which he believed was $3.00). Questions about the cards dropping in game came up next and Worley and Hartsman stated booster packs will make their way to the loot tables meaning a green con or higher in EverQuest 2.

Some interesting numbers Worley shared next was there would be 33 loot items being put in EverQuest 1 and another 33 in EverQuest 2 providing a fairly decent chance of finding something frequently. He also stated it was their intention "for their to be something in every pack" meaning you should be able to find these items. Hartsman went into what the loot cards were aiming to provide. He stated they were "Like Veteran Rewards. They are cool and they're neat, but not so strong and able to be used so frequently they would have to change the entire environment." It sounded like they didn't want to have nerf things later on and were conscious of what little items like this can do. They soon provided everyone a few card samples similar to what you can see here.

Discussion soon began regarding the launch and when beta would begin in both EverQuest 1, EverQuest 2, and the downloadable client. Scott Hartsman stated beta at least for EQ2 would begin this week possibly on Thursday. While the cards wouldn't be dropping in game until mid-August it would allow players to test out the system and see what they could break. Everyone with a Station Account will receive a Starter Pack free consisting of 55 cards including an Avatar. While the rules associated with the game weren't discussed in detail the difficulty was described as on par with Magic the Gathering.

One widely known feature of the World of Warcraft Trading Card Game (which is still not online) is the ability to raid with other players by combining decks or using specific scenarios set for multiplayer. Of course everyone wondered if this would be the case with EverQuest and the answer Worley gave was "Maybe." Have to love the developer maybes. The technical difficulties regarding online play across multiple games would provide SOE Denver some unique challenges but I was encouraged they didn't dismiss the idea entirely and take it off the table.

The session had a few more questions like "What does TCG stand for?" and we forgive those people. Wrapping up it seemed SOE is prepared to make a fairly radical shift in their MMO by adding a trading card game. While similar to Vanguard this is a much more advanced system and is designed to work not only stand alone but across games. Expect to see more news about this game very soon and watch for the beta beginning this week.