EverQuest: The Serpent's Spine Preview : EQ1 EverQuest 1 News

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September 8, 2006 - With The Serpent's Spine, Sony Online's twelfth expansion of the original EverQuest, players can expect even more tweaks to the now seven year old game world. The expansion delivers a new character class, the dragon-like Drakkin, along with the starting city of Crescent Ranch. A total of 13 new zones are included with purchase, with two zones featuring giants and dragons for high level players. In an effort to let mid and low level characters experience some of the engaging raid and group combat available primarily to high level players, Serpent's Spine is dropping in a bunch of mid-level static outdoor boss encounters and dungeon areas, along with some new armor sets. The level cap is also being kicked up to 75 from 70.

When it releases on September 19, the rest of the EQ universe will undergo a few worldwide changes separate from the expansion content. The developers at Sony Online are trying to make their world more user-friendly, akin to what they dubbed the "modern" MMORPGs out there. In an attempt to minimize downtime out of combat, the regeneration rates of health and other parameters will be dramatically increased. For high level players, this will mean standing around for about three minutes, as opposed to the exorbitant amount of time required before for inter-battle breaks. Death is also being given some attention; it'll now involve less needless zoning. As another tweak, the skill purchase system, previously available only to high level players, will be accessible to lower levels, appropriately scaled down.

The build we saw was running The Serpent Spine's beta server, and we got a chance to check out bits of Crescent Ranch. Players can expect a bunch of new quests and merchants there. It's apparently an abandoned ogre city, so much of the architecture is colossal compared to the players running around. Players can even visit some titanic dragon lords who've taken up residence in a section of the city. Most of those running around had picked the Drakkin race. Being the first characters created using the updated graphics engine from two years back, they're more detailed than most other EQ races. Each has scale-like patterns along their ribs, horny protrusions along their foreheads, and significant tattoo patterns. The color patterns of all the features can be altered in the character creator, depending on which dragon sire players choose to align their character with.

More than anything, Sony Online was stressing how this expansion is poised to bring together lower level characters for intricate boss and dungeon encounters. We checked out a dusky, craggy zone called Direwind where a gnoll stood amid a series of totems. This wasn't an instances boss encounter, rather an outdoor, static raid or party target. In order to take down the gnoll, players had to interact with the totems while conducting the battle. These kind of fights where parties are forced to manipulate environmental objects while in combat is repeated in numerous other areas. In the Blightfire Moors, a zone just outside Crescent Ranch, there's a tower encounter, again non-instanced. This time, it's a bunch of torches against the room's walls that need to be manipulated in order to prevent the phantom boss from summoning more allies.

Destructible and puzzle like elements will come into play throughout the expansion's two high level dungeons as well. Frostcrypt, a frozen den of undead giants, will come in static and instanced varieties. The instanced variation will pit players against tougher enemies, recommended for only the highest levels. From what we saw, the dungeon was extremely large. Ice-lined passegeways hooked together cavernous rooms packed with giants. As players progress toward the end, they'll find an ice maze, which will require lots of environmental manipulation and destruction. Though it wasn't clear how, players could also break through the floor of the maze, landing them in a chill dungeon below. Ashengate, the other high level dungeon and home to dragons, is structured the same as Frostcrypt with static and instanced variations. Though we saw only brief fly-throughs, it seemed just as expansive as the giants' frozen abode. Statues of dragons, spouts of fiery rock, and gigantic, multi-chromatic dragon scales decorated Ashengate's dour stones.

One of the more interesting areas Sony Online showed off was a bixie dungeon, called Stone Hive. Definitely the most colorful environment of any others, the Hive itself resembled the Moscow's Kremlin in some respects. Its spires were instead crowned with tear-shaped hives. Inside its walls were vast sparkling chambers and the occasional fountain of flowing honey. Located right off the Blightfire Moors, Stone Hive will be a static dungeon ideal for the 30 - 40 range.

Available on September 19th, The Serpent's Spine will retail for 29.99, and be available only for digital download. If the June kickoff of the progression servers rekindled anyone's interest in EQ, this one may be worth checking out. Screens below.