More Changes!

The Server Goddess (praise Mysti) has tweaked NPC settings to reduce overall server load and keep the challenge level what we are used to. She consulted the AI Goddess, and tweaked various config settings for the weave, fixed divine being teleports, and made things whole again.

The biggest change was to the NPC spawn rate. Where the single-player game tends to have more NPCs that hit normally, the server adjustment she made was to make fewer NPCs that spawn a touch slower, and she made them hit a little harder. The challenges of group pulls will remain the same.

For a heavily-modded RP-Progression-Decorating server, the NPC tweaks are a needed change for server stability for those who like to adventure. There will be fewer NPCs that stay dead longer, but they will hit harder, so the "pull groups" will keep the same difficulty.

Goddess Mysti does not want a boring game! The world is a harsh, difficult place.

But she does wish the weave to remain stable to avoid people getting all kicked out, because there are thousands of NPCs in the world causing desyncs for everyone, whether building, roleplaying, or adventuring. As this is now, the challenge is preserved while maintaining the stability of reality.

Specialized graphics settings have been restored! Those do not affect server ticks; they are client-side factors, so you can set your graphics to maximum here and enjoy the lush, beautiful world.

There is a balance to the weave, and she will make tweaks as needed as people test and report their adventures to her Seraphs.

Please enjoy all that has been built for you.

Images: Lanyth's First Outfit

The Sybarite Lanyth, dark elven rogue with a pair of wickely sharp blades, is seen today in an outfit looted from the caves of the ruins, shortly after the first Iron Hyena run.

As her companion Shintou noted, "Lanyth does not play."

This run generated excellent crash logs, which Goddess Mysti analyzed with her AI tools and made many fixes to the weave, improving the world's stability. We will repeat this run on Wednesday to continue monitoring crash logs, making fixes, and improving the stability of the world so that everyone in the Fancy Community can enjoy it.

The Seraphs: Silver, Sera, and Ivory continue to grace the world and act as her ambassadors, helping take information from those assisting in the effort to stabilize the world, and keep this reality intact for all who live there.

Server Event: Hyena to Iron Run, Wednesday 1/21, 8 p.m./5 p.m.

Our server Goddess and mystic repair avatar, Mystaria, informs me she wishes to observe a repeat of Shintou and Lanyth's adventure, which took them from farming iron at hyena camps to a dangerous cave in the wastes.

The first run started on Monday night, and this resulted in two server crashes in the caves, which we had to recover from. Mysti will collect logs and check if any more crashes occur, and she will report back on her findings. We need to be able to repeat the crashes or see if they don't happen to narrow this down.

The server is in beta, so this kind of testing is critical for identifying issues and improving stability.

We are not in a launch state yet, so please be prepared for complete server wipes, mod changes, and other major configuration adjustments as beta continues! Any work you put in now may not be preserved!

If you were given a password and contacted Silver for verification, thank you for joining and helping us test. We need to hear about any server crashes or issues you find. Notes from Mysti:

There was a tweak to the NPC spawn rate. Check the hyena-iron camps and fight them as a sword and shield user versus a dual-wielder, solo and paired. If they are too weak, we will need to up the difficulty if there are fewer NPCs. Like to improve their health and increase damage by 10-20%, if we need to.

We will know more during your Wednesday run and keep an eye on how difficult we want the fights to be and how easy it was compared to the last time. 

Oh! Thank you for your heap in fixing the weave! We want people to thrive and survive here, but not be bored.

The event will begin in the starter river area, Wednesday 1/21, 8 p.m./5 p.m., and reach out to Silver on Discord, or Lanyth or Shintou in the game as they repeat the run for testing.

Images from the Wastes

Two souls find each other, pick up sword and bow, and venture forth upon the world.

Soon, those who prowl the wastes shall know the fury and vengeance of the Dark Elves.

How Do I Customize My Character?

In the intro, there aren't many options until you spawn in and can access the customizer. So get your sex & name set to start. Then, when you are in the game, Shift+B to bring up the customizer.

Click on the head icon after the little tutorial, and that gets you into character editing, where you can pick a head, hair, and set skin color.

I would stop there since even in the customizer, the clock is ticking. So head to the river area, to that sandy island with the rabbits, and then you can have water and food to finish your customizations. Shift+B again, then work where it is safe and where you have food and water nearby.

Here is a step-by-step tutorial. Log in to the game, and you will first choose male or female.

From here, you will be taken to a sample character all tied up; this is the basic creation tool. You can't do much here, but you do have infinite time to play in this area.

My suggestion is to get your head and hair right here, and your basic sliders. Let's make our dark elf character! For race, choose anything that's close enough to your background. Religion is the same; get it close enough. Choose the voice you want next.

Let's focus on the head. The elf heads are later in the selections, so find those near the end. We will get to skin after we are in the game. Get it "close enough" for now.

Eye color is in the next section, face details.

Body features include your height, bust, and physique. Stick to average heights if you are average! EQ2 has a strange height system where you need to crank it to maximum for dark elves, don't do that, we need to let ordinary people be average and save the taller heights for the truly tall.

Click on Finalize Character, and this is important: SET YOUR NAME HERE! Press Edit and type it in. We are making Lanyth, so I named her that, and I can now press confirm.

We are now in the game, but the clock is ticking. Let's play through the tutorial!

Get to the island here; this is a safe place with food and water, and no enemies to bug you. M brings up your map. From this point, you will need an admin to grant you VERIFIED status, which will allow you to use the character editor. Get in touch with Silver, get her to log in, and she will grant you permission.

The video above explains how to press Shift+B to open the character editor. Go to town and have fun at this point, and you are now in the game!

The Goal of the Server

We don't want to reduce participation in other venues on Antonia Bayle in EQ2; we want everyone to spend time with the community and support them!

We also want to continue the great roleplaying and shows at the Maidens' Fancy on Thursday nights, on the AB server, in EQ2, at 8 p.m./5 p.m., and keep the wonderful stories and shows going. Please drop by and see a show! Join RPLFG for the location announcements and venue!

The Maiden's Fancy is more than an EQ2 guild; it is a gaming community. We have amazing players and storytellers here! Why not have another place to share in? I promised Kurzou this would not take away from our fun with the community and the Fancy. Our shows, stories, and all the fun we have are still in EQ2! This is a game to play instead of "other games" which we often play alone.

So, why start a Conan Exiles server set 500 years in the future of a ruined world of EverQuest 2?

Storytelling

From a storytelling perspective, where players can explore their DM and storyteller sides, this is a wonderful place. We can explore end-of-the-world themes, the new forms of the classic gods, a ruined world, and feelings of loss and survival in a harsh landscape. We can create unique characters and customize them, and take them through stories in a sandbox where we can find their futures. While Conan Exiles has very few quests and storylines to speak of, it is up to the players to tell them together.

We can bring our EverQuest experience and lore knowledge into the game, using it to help our characters explore. Since this is a meld with the Conan universe, alliances have been made between gods, some may go by different names, and the nature of the greater powers has changed. Some of the races are gone, and we need to deal with that loss. While the world has lost so much, it is up to those who remain to rebuild and make the world what it once was, and what it should be.

Also, we can explore stories and themes here that will make it back into our characters in EverQuest 2. We never want to abandon the more community-supporting side of the Maidens' Fancy gaming community, as our friends there are just as important as the new home. This is a server for our gaming community to share.

Cooperative Sandbox Play

Instead of playing alone in sandbox and survival games like Minecraft and others, we have created our own place to explore, build, and survive. Also, the time you spend in ARPGs could be spent here, too, and you could level up your character to an insane degree, as we allow progression to level 600 through mods. There are epic and legendary-level crafting lines. There are over a dozen expansions to explore. You can build a city with thralls. There is a high-level game here, with higher-level games on top.

Also, we have character customization and outfits that rival games like Second Life, so we can craft some really unique characters. We can make new races and write lore for them, like Desert Elves! Whatever you want, this is both a sandbox in progression play and storytelling. Enough time has passed, and the world has changed so much that it has created all sorts of wild stuff.

The level of crafting progression and farming here exceeds many ARPGs when you get past the starter areas. To make the good stuff, we will need to form groups, set up camps, and get out there.

Challenge

The server difficulty is set to high, so we will need to work together and help each other. We are not in easy mode, and this helps us need each other. I don't want a creative mode server where all the fights are easy, we can solo until endgame, and nobody feels like they need anyone else. Like EQ1, there should be a challenge to this world, but we should have a chance if we work together and learn the game.

If it is too hard, I can always make adjustments! Communication is key!

But I want people to need each other. We need our scavengers, armor crafters, bow makers, weapons smiths, and even our cooks and farmers! If you take on a role, you should feel needed. One of the worst trends in modern MMOs is logging on, realizing nobody needs you, and logging off after you solo a few monsters with basic equipment and getting bored because the game is so easy.

EQ1's higher challenge level and the game's need for people to work together are my design goals for the server's settings. We should feel like the world is dangerous, and we are asking others to log on and help us. This builds a community.

Compared to Other Servers?

I asked my AI to rate my work, and it said we have over 1,000 hours of progress, just in crafting. This is an S+ Tier pack for a small group of friends. There are Godlike levels of customization, and the configuration is a near-perfect, launch-ready masterpiece.

In RP and Immersion, we rate a 10/10!

For progression, we rate a 9.8/10!

For group play, a 10/10!

For stability and performance, a 9.5/10, but Funcom spent all last year patching the game, so the stability has drastically improved. I used my AI to sort my mod list, look for missing dependencies, and point out conflicts; it found none.

This is a God-Tier RP server.

Another Game to Play Together

But hype and AI-fluff aside, this is a place where we can play dress-up, survive, fight, and craft better weapons and gear. We can rely on our friends to make better items for us. People can specialize as builders, farmers, scavengers, warriors, casters, armor makers, weapons crafters, and many other specialties. We can have alts for RP!

But this server is for you.

I wrote some lore to get us started and to bridge the gap between the Conan Exiles lore and EQ2 lore, and there are many areas where they overlap. Most of it is up to all of you in the end, but this can get us started on our own ideas. Perhaps the gods of each world were so weak they made alliances, or perhaps Set is Innoruuk by another name. Do the gods wear many masks, with one people calling them one thing, and another group calling them another? Are the lost gods "whispers on the wind?" What happened to the missing races?

It is all up to you.

This is a place for your stories.

Maybe you can write one about your character here and tell it on the stage at the Fancy! Who knows?

This is your place to play with however you want.

Fates of the Races in the Remade Norrath

Survivors and Shadows of the Exiled Lands

In the aftermath of the Divine Reckoning, Norrath's diverse peoples faced annihilation as the gods' war tore the world asunder. Continents fractured, oceans boiled, and the very fabric of reality unraveled, fusing shattered shards of Norrath with the primal echoes of the Hyborian Age. The planes of existence—once gateways to realms like the Plane of Hate or Underfoot—collapsed inward, sealing off all planar travel forever. Luclin, the shattered moon, became an unreachable scar in the sky, its debris woven into the cursed bracelets that bind exiles to the remade lands. No mortal can ascend to its ruins or draw upon its faded magic; attempts invite only madness or dissolution.

This cataclysm culled the weak and reshaped the strong, favoring adaptable bloodlines while dooming those tied to fragile ecosystems or fallen gods. The remade world, now the savage Exiled Lands, is a brutal mosaic of deserts, jungles, tundras, and volcanic wastes, where survival demands cunning over civilization. Magic, once a bridge to other realms, is a tainted whisper, its planar roots severed. Below, the fates of Norrath's races are chronicled: the survivors who endure as playable lineages, scarred but resilient; the lost, whose essences linger as echoes, monsters, or forgotten legends; and the rare adapted or merged forms born from the chaos.

Surviving Races: The Enduring Bloodlines

These people weathered the Reckoning through divine favor, innate adaptability, or sheer ferocity, evolving to thrive in the Exiled Lands' unforgiving wilds. Their gods' merged aspects provided scant protection, allowing remnants to rebuild as nomadic tribes, cunning exiles, or predatory clans. Playable on the server, they represent the core of RP possibilities, with modded models (e.g., Ghompsty's Beastie Parts) enabling their distinct features.

Humans: The most versatile survivors, humans emerged from the rubble of swallowed cities like Qeynos and Freeport. Their patron gods—Mithaniel Marr (valor) and Karana (storms)—melded with Mitra and Crom, granting resilience in the face of indifference. Scattered across the Exiled Lands as branded wanderers, they form opportunistic bands, scavenging ruins for relics of old Norrath. In the remade world, humans embody pragmatic savagery, building fleeting alliances amid eternal strife, their numbers bolstered by interbreeding with half-elves.

Elves (High Elves and Wood Elves): Tunare's children, once guardians of Faydwer's forests, saw their verdant homelands petrified into twisted jungles or scorched badlands. The Reckoning's fusion with Ymir's frost preserved slender cadres in hidden enclaves, where they adapted to nomadic life. High elves cling to arcane echoes in crystalline ruins, while wood elves hunt as feral rangers in overgrown wastes. Their grace endures, but tempered by loss—no planar communion with Tunare's realm means their magic is a fading art, prone to corruption.

Dark Elves (Teir'Dal): Innoruuk's spiteful progeny thrived in the shadows of the cataclysm, their underground city of Neriak partially spared by merging with Set's serpentine malice. Emerging from cave-ruins as pale, red-eyed schemers, they excel in the Exiled Lands' intrigue, forming cults that sacrifice thralls at venomous altars. The sealing of planes severed their ties to the Plane of Hate, forcing a more visceral hatred—now channeled into tribal vendettas and sorcery that risks self-destruction.

Kerra: The feline wanderers of Kerra Isle fused spiritually with Vah Shir Kin during the Reckoning, their seafaring heritage warped into desert prowling. Karana's storms, blended with Crom's stoicism, shielded prides in highland shards, where they evolved sharper claws and keener senses (modded cat-like heads and features). Cut off from Luclin's lunar pull, kerra shamans interpret earthly omens, leading packs that hunt in the wilds, their agility making them unmatched scouts in the savage expanse.

Vah Shir: Lionine warriors from Shar Vahl's mountains endured as proud nomads, their moon-tied essence redirected to Karana-Crom's earthly tempests after Luclin's inaccessibility. Bulkier than kerra, with mane-like fur and roaring prowess (via beastie mods), they roam highland tundras, forging warrior codes amid ruins echoing their lost citadels. The planar collapse ended their astral journeys, grounding them in brutal honor—prides now test strength through survival rites, viewing the remade world as an eternal proving ground.

Half-Elves: Born of human-elf unions, half-elves bridged divides during the chaos, their mixed heritage (Marr twins melded with Mitra) allowing survival in fractured borderlands. With subtle elven features (pointed ears via mods), they wander as diplomats or outcasts, scavenging swallowed academies for diluted lore. No planar escapes meant relying on mortal wits; in the Exiled Lands, they form versatile clans, mediating between purebloods while harboring resentment for the gods' abandonment.

Iksar: Cazic-Thule's reptilian empire-builders from Kunark adapted to volcanic badlands, their fear-god's essence fused with Yog's flesh-horrors preserving scaled hordes in lava-ruins. Lizard-like traits (snouts, tails via mods) evolved for arid endurance, but the Reckoning's planar seal ended Void incursions, leaving their cults to primal terror-rituals. As cunning predators, iksar raid for thralls, rebuilding scaled hierarchies amid echoes of Cabilis, their savagery amplified by the world's curse.

Lost Races: The Fallen and Forgotten

These lineages perished or dwindled to irrelevance in the Divine Reckoning, their gods weakened or shattered, ecosystems destroyed, and essences scattered. Absent from playable options, they serve as lore hooks—haunting ruins as spectral echoes, mutated monsters (modded NPCs), or rare quest apparitions—reminding survivors of the apocalypse's toll. No remnants allow for revival; their fates underscore the brutality of the remade world.

Dwarves: Brell Serilis's stout crafters were entombed when the Underfoot realms imploded during the Reckoning, their god's forge-essence buried without Hyborian meld. Kaladim's mountains collapsed, sealing dwarves in eternal darkness; planar access to Brell's plane vanished, dooming any survivors to starvation. In the Exiled Lands, their fate lingers as golem-haunted mines or fossilized axes—whispers of a buried people, occasionally spawning as cursed automatons in admin events.

Ratonga: Bristlebane's scurrying tricksters, tied to unstable undercities, were drowned in the cataclysm's floods or corrupted by Bertoxxulous-Yog's plagues. Their god's mischief, melded with Bel's thievery, couldn't save them from sewer collapses; no planar escapes to mischief realms meant total submersion. Echoes persist as vermin swarms in ruins, or twisted rat-beasts (modded foes), embodying pestilent warnings to delving exiles.

Ogres: Rallos Zek's brutish warmongers fell to their own fury, the Warlord's shattered power (no meld) inciting self-destructive rampages amid crumbling citadels like Oggok. The Reckoning's quakes pulverized their strongholds, and planar wars sealed off Zek's battle-realms, leaving ogres to devolve into mindless hulks before extinction. In the remade wilds, their bones litter arenas, or rare "echo-ogres" emerge as boss encounters, symbols of unchecked conquest.

Frogloks: Rodcet Nife's amphibious zealots from Gukta drowned in boiled oceans and arid shifts, their healer's essence unable to counter the Reckoning's desiccation. No Hyborian fusion saved them; the planar ties to growth realms were severed, leaving them vulnerable to an environmental purge. Spectral croaks haunt swamp-ruins, or modded frog-abominations lurk in oases, representing divine abandonment in the water-scarce lands.

Trolls: Cazic-Thule-Yog's grotesque regenerators, kin to iksar, were consumed by fear-plagues and volcanic eruptions, their resilience failing without planar regeneration from Thule's domain. Grobb's swamps solidified into salt flats, entombing them; survivors mutated into feral horrors before fading. In the Exiled Lands, trollish remnants appear as raiding bands of undead thralls or boss variants, eternal slaves to the savagery that claimed them.

Adapted or Merged Races: Echoes of the Remaking

Rare hybrids born from the Reckoning's chaos, these aren't core playable but can inspire custom RP proposals (admin-approved). They blend lost essences with survivors, filling niches in the lore.

Erudites and Gnomes: Intellectual humans like Erudites merged into scholarly human subclans, their arcane pursuits diluted without Druzzil Ro's planes. Gnomes, Brell's tinkers, fused remnants into inventive half-elf outcasts, their contraptions now corrupted relics in ruins.

Barbarians and Halflings: Barbarians integrated into human tribes, their Karana-Crom worship unchanged. Halflings, Bristlebane's folk, scattered as elusive human variants, their mischief surviving in thief-guilds amid swallowed Rivervale.

Sarnak and Other Beasts: Dragon-kin like Sarnak evolved into Iksar offshoots, their Gorowyn citadels' volcanic graves. Fae or Arasai dissolved into ethereal elf whispers, while Freeblood vampires lurk as dark elf curses.

Aerakyn and Others: Winged aerakyn plummeted when skies tore; any survivors grounded into vah shir hybrids, their flight a lost legend.