EverQuest II Newbie Guide

A Ten Ton Hammer Resource

Guide By: Savanja

 

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Welcome to EverQuest II! Those of us here at Ten Ton Hammer know how difficult it can be to get started in a new game, or even return to one that you haven't played for a long while. To make it easier on you, we have put together this newbie guide for you to explain the basics of how to get going in EQ2.

 

In the Beginning

EverQuest II has some system requirements that go a bit above and beyond what a lot of the current MMORPG market have, so real quick I do want to add what those are. Technical issues arise once the game is installed and quite often occur simply because the system the game is running on does not meet the minimum requirements.

To run EQ2 your system must have: Windows OS 98/2000/ME/XP, a 1ghz processor or higher, 512 MB RAM, DirectX 9 compatible video card with pixel shader and vertex shader support with at least 64MB of texture memory, a DirectSound compatible audio hardware, 56k or greater internet connection, 16x speed CD-ROM/DVD-ROM drive, 6gigs hard drive space (more if you are adding expansions) and DirectX 9.0.

If you are having troubles installing and running EQ2, the best place to go for information would be the SOE EQ2 forums. They have a tech forum with techs available to answer questions, and the players that post there are also very helpful.

 

All Systems GO!

So once you are installed and loaded, it is now time to create your character. There are more race and starting zone choices than there had been previously, which makes it fun for those that are returning to EQ2 after a long hiatus.

You start by selecting your race. Don't worry too much about the stats, and simply find one that appeals to you! Your only real concern should be whether you'd like to play on the good side of things, or with the evil. To help you along in this, our race guide gives you an overview of each race and their stats.

After you've chosen your race, you choose your starting city. For neutral races, you can either start in the Freeport of Qeynos, but what isn't clear during character creation, is that which city you choose determines what classes you may choose. Because of this, you might want to research classes ahead of time, otherwise you'll be flipping back and forth during character creation trying to figure it all out. These class guides will also help you further down the road with class progressions, so keep that link handy.

So you have your race chosen, you've picked your class, and you are being dropped in game in some unknown area and left to fend for yourself. Depending on what race and class you've chosen, you will either end up on the Queen's Colony, Outpost of the Overlord, The Nursery of Greater Faydark, or Darklight Woods near Neriak.

I very much recommend doing the quests and taking advantage of the newbie areas to learn how to play your character. And there are tutorial NPCs in the newbie areas that are great for explaining various basic elements of EverQuest II gameplay.

 

Riding off into the Sunset

Once you have the very basics down, you'll need and want to know more to develop your character. If you are landing in Qeynos of Freeport, you might want to check out the racial quests to learn more of your character's heritage, gain some experience, and get to know your new home. Find where and how to equip your character without spending a lot of coin early on with the many armor quests.

After that, you have so much to learn about Norrath and all it's many splendors. Learn of the many enemy inhabitants by doing the Language, Lore & Legend and Collection quests. Gain status for yourself and your guild, and score some great items by doing the many Heritage Quests.

We have basic beginner's guides for several in-game aspects, including combat guides. If you are guilded, or looking to become guilded, please do check out the guild guides. The writ info is helpful for all of those who are looking to make some status. Things like mounts and housing come much cheaper if you have a little bit of status under your belt!

 

We hope that the resources listed for you will help you in your new adventures. This guide will be added to as we come up with more information that is relevant to the new player, and if you have any questions of requests please do post on our forums! There are always Ten Ton Hammer people around, happy to help, and players that have some great words of wisdom.

Happy gaming!