remembering the good old days

[Blue Hasia]

how many of you can remember back even futher back befoore pre-merge about the life of a dragon. Those were the days the dragons now a days dont know how easy they really got it. For exampleif any of them knew the horror of the lvl 60 instant heal quest we Eldars had to do they be running around scared chicken... kill 100 reanimated dwarves...now that wasahard quest took me 5 weeks to do there was always a high spawn count and they loved to argo fresh young dragon meat not to menchen they were over the lvl 60 rating and the fact that AOP loved to talk walks through the RD's fort.... 5 blasted weeks of hunting them I was up to 20 kills on them then after a cry for help a bunch of poeple came to my aid and we got the rest of them killed that night.


and to top it off I did not start till i was at lvl 80 and it was still a great challange

these new dragons really got it easy. but funny thing is I really really miss all the old stuff even though they were a pain in a but it made are class stand out against the bipeds classes it said to be a dragon it was not just a mindless grind of killing monsters we had Really really hard challenges to get are special moves and to up are stats.

[Dragonboy]

The only thing I remember from "the good old days" as you call them is hunting stuff in Lesser Aradoth and on occasion around Dralk, Chiconis or Dalimond...
I was only lvl 30ish when all the large guild islands were added and the whole of istaria was changed...

Anyway I doubt if I would have enjoyed killing 100 reanimated dwarves...
Thats one big grind for sure...

Although I do rememberdwarven ghost like mobsbeing in the area Slightly north of Aughundel (the barrows), in the deep canyons were now large amounts of shadow spiders roam...
Were those the mobs you mean Blue Hasia?

I do have my own interesting story about the good old days...
Also an healing trainer or healing master quest, but it was to kill a strong named WA mob (dont remember the name) south west of Dalimond in the old graveyard... I tried her many times (and failed) before I saw someone else in the area with a higher lvl friendalso waiting for her...
After we joined up I finally got a chance to beat her and finish my quest...

[Cobal]

I so hated that 100 reanimated dwarf healer quest.
Occasionaly some named ghost with his entourage would walk along and casually make a dragon kebab out of me.
oh that was so bad, it was before Silver strike and gold rage got implemented.

another one I hated to bits was Fang the Tormentor.
I think I spend three weeks flying along his prefered patrol route, several times I was just in time to see someone else finish him off >.<

[Uro]

Hardest quest I remember ever doing was the one where you had to kill 10 or was it 15? Ebon guard golem leaders. I contacted every dragon back on the old ICE server who had the lvl's for that quest, and made a sort of an event out of it, still have some old screenshots from it. Back then it wasn't very many dragons who was above lvl 70, and we where only2 active dragons at lvl 100 by then, but we still had a very nice turnup with only 2 dragons of those contacted not coming as I remember.

Anyway even with 10 dragons, then sufice to say it was a huge slaugther on both sides. We eventually got the kills, but also a lot of deathpoints. This was while the Ebon guards was at their strongest before they where toned down, and long beforetier 5 techs,formulas and hoard aplenty, even though hoard abilities had just surfaced by then. A golem leader could kill a lvl 70 dragon with one multistrike back then, and they had up to 5 guards that could do almost as bad damage on their own.

It was a ton of fun to plan and participate in, buteven with10 high lvl dragons to back each other up, I have seldom seen so many deathpoints.

In my humble oppinion the dwarf healers while taking a long time to get done, wasn't nearly as bad as the golem leaders ;)

Another bad quest I remember was at lvl 50 to have to travel to the satyr islands and kill the satyrs there, that one gave a lot of DP's also, even in a group[:P]

Anyway will just wrap it all up concerning the good old days with 2 words: Hoard decay [:D]

[kengar]

..the lvl 60 instant heal quest we Eldars had to do they be running around scared chicken... kill 100 reanimated dwarves...now that wasahard quest took me 5 weeks to do

Ah, yes, I remember that one. Did it in two or three nights. Of course, I was a slow leveler, so I got the levels needed about two weeks before Gold Rage/Silver Strike went live. As soon as those went live, a few guild dragons and I headed out of Morning Light to do that quest. Every one of us blew through at least 100K hoard the first night. [:$]. And yes, I have great respect for anyone that did that quest before GR/SS.

The longest time it took me to do any dragon quests would have been (can't remember the reward, just the target), lets see. For time the quest was active, definitely the "wraith overseer." Ran into him at least once a week before I got that quest, but went over a month without seeing him once I got the quest. Found his corpse three times during that month, so it wasn't like I wasn't trying. Most time actively hunting would have had to been either the "Defiled Satyr" quest or the Aegror one. Spent several nights on Alged (I think) trying to pull those satyr out of a crowd of other undead, and spent days scouring the WD looking for the right type of Aegror before I gave up and farmed the spawn at the entrance to Alged.

Favorite dragon quest story: Talitha, without a doubt. A lvl 20 quest, if I remember right, which means I hit it as a hatchling back in Jan 04. Simple enough concept, kill a named ghost. Found the spawn area from a guildie, and camped that killing everything that spawned so that when Talitha turned up, I wouldn't have to deal with adds. After 2 hours, I got rather upset, and scoured the surrounding areas to see if she was up and around somewhere. Didn't find her, returned to the spawn location. Another two hours went by. By this time, roomies are getting on me to eat and do chores. Finally, I give up and recall. Head to Dalimond to quickly pick up something off a connie before logging, walk into town and who do I see, but Talitha. IN TOWN. Well, needless to say, I was all over her as fast and hard as my little no-rage-no-silver-strike hatchling self could. I'm fighting as best I can. And then the guard notices the fight, comes over, and takes Talitha out. The guard gets credit for the kill. I stand there shocked and upset for about three seconds before higher order brain functions resume functioning, and the thought goes through my mind. "Talitha dead. Talitha will respawn. GET YOUR BUTT BACK TO THE RESPAWN POINT!" I run back there, kill everything in the spawn, sit down to heal, and got about 30 seconds past full health when she pops first. I'm popping every ability attacking before her body guards pop, so I survive long enough to take her out. Roomies thought I had won the game with the yell I let out. I recall with hit points in the teens, log out, and do my chores with a smile.

[Ulkesh]

I both remember, and HATE with a passion, those damned dirty little healing dorfs. ugh *shivers* *flashbacks* *screams*

I did it before the hoard abilities, basically if you didn't time your tail swipe just right you had a long fight on your hands, and heaven forbid you got more than 1 healer or a healer and a spiritists. If you could even manage to find one healer that is.

But then I found the camp with the healers all around the top ledge, and 2 other dragons who needed it, and we only had minor problems when we rounded up more than 4 at a time.

And the AOP for another quest, that was fun.....

My story:
Going after the Aegis Lt. Is that one still in game?
3 hatchlings had gotten together with 3 other bipeds. Unknowingly we all got into the circle at the same time.... Just so happens a bug would cause a Lt to spawn for EACH person with the quest. So we had 3 Lt's strolling around with bone golems, ghost healers and spiritists as bodyguards. It was a bloody mess, but we eventually, with more help, wiped them all out.

[Goriax]

My dragon was created the day HZ released (thank you EB for gettingmy boxto me on time!). Yes I remember the good old days although I wouldn't call them good. Ah yes, the days of hoard leak and when it was not possible to graduate to adult -- there were level 100 hatchlings running around since every single player dragon was a hatchling. Then they released the ROP Friday evening and the mad dash throughout the weekend. By Sunday evening I was exhausted and had a splitting headache but I was all grown up. I wasn't the first on my server to ascend but I was one of the first dozen or so.I was essentially doing most of the ROP as if I were the first -- not knowingwhat was going to happen ahead of time and having to figure out most things on myown--and that thing with the bluish stone (figured out one of them was the spiral no problem, the other took me awhile).

There were some things which were easier back then. The spiral didn't have anything over level 60, and it wasEASY for a 60ish hatchling to run down and bump off Kaa solo. I soloed both Kaa and Lem and stuck around to loot both. Ieven took time on my Kaa run to kill off a few other mobs just for fun (plus I didn't want to start building a train so killed the stuff when it agroed). The marrows guarding Lem would have killed me if I stuck around, but not so quick as to keep me from killing Lem and running away. I didn't die on either even once.

I remember Tabitha. I was lucky.She was there when I arrived (apparently had been up for awhile amazingly)andI was able to run in, blow her away and run out before her buddies could kill me. It was a near thing but, as I was running out with low hit points and a bunch of nasties on my tail (literally), I felt pretty smug that a quest which was taking some people hours and hours I did in about 15 minutes.

Kliknick gave me more trouble. I think I died atime or two tryingto solo him before I could get someone to help me.

The adventurer task to kill a bunch of level 20 critters was easier back then. There was a place near Dralk where ONLY level 20 pygmies spawned.

I don't remember any great problems with the reanimated dwarves. II went to that ruined town near Morning Light. In the pathway circling the town just about the only things which spawned were reanimated dwarves. I spent a few hours there and had them. There WAS a named who would occasionally wander by, but other then avoiding him and his followers it wasn't all that tough. I had to run a few times but no biggie. No worse then many other quests.

Dragons were whining then even more then now. The causes change but whining is forever. Many people were openly doubting that there would ever be a rite of passage and were saying that the whole thing about flying dragons was a blatant lie by AE who obviously had no intention of ever delivering on that promise. They didn't believe the engine could even handle flight. I remember mentioning several times that you could fly a dragon in offline mode to general disbelief. Of course it wasn't just dragons back then.People was screaming about all sorts of issues, many ofwhich were real. I stiill remember stuck buttons and 5 minute lag spikes.

There is no doubt whatsoever that the game is more polished and runs smoother then it was back then.

One wierd thing is that areas which back then were low level are now high level since the merge. I find myself huntnig in areas as a level 100 which I once hunted as a level 40.

[kengar]

My dragon was created the day HZ released (thank you EB for gettingmy boxto me on time!).

Never again am I preordering a game from Amazon.com. They do good on DVD preorders, but by the time I got my copy, Energy and the other "late" servers had come up.

Dragons were whining then even more then now. The causes change but whining is forever.

They had more reason to whine back then. Still, I was the first person I know of to refer to whining as "the dragon's most used racial ability." My main at the time was a dragon, so I understood the issues, but still, people carried on like playing a dragon was like hot pokers in the eyes.

They didn't believe the engine could even handle flight.

And then, when a dev logged an adult dragon in and flew it around, at least one person insisted that limitations in the engine would mean that you'd never be able to have more than one dragon flying.

I remember someone laughing at me in the New Brommel copper & tin field because I said I was looking forward to the RoP and that it was sounding like it was almost ready to go live. She insisted that the RoP would never go live. Last laugh: that was less than 36 hours before it did get pushed live. [:)] And yes, I started my RoP that Sunday. Should have started Friday night, but I figured I'd wait out the initial insanity. By Sunday, every dragon I knew was working on it, I was feeling left out, so I gave in. Since most dragons were going Lunus and I was going Helian, and I missed the initial surge, I wound up going it alone on much of the content, and begging help for what I couldn't handle as a relatively low level hatchling.

I got lucky with Kaa. They changed the defenders to the various skeletons before I made it that far, at which point Kaa was a good bit tougher. On the other hand, I was able to tag along with a group of guildies that was hunting the spiral for the WD crystals. Many DP to be had for my hatchling, but still loads of fun.

I remember feeling remarkably feeble watching a druid/healer tank the crystalized golem while a bunch of hatchlings tried to help. Now, I am the druid/healer that helps hatchlings with that golem (O.K., not the only one, and obviously not the same character).

Solo'ed Lem twice because I logged out before killing Selena, and that part of the quest reset for some reason. I even managed to recall before his bodyguards got me on one of the attempts.

Yeah, the game had more technical problems then. It was also a newer experience with a larger population. Thinking of those times as the good old days might be disservice to the improvements in the engine, but that doesn't mean that there wasn't a feeling towards the experience that we don't have now. We're jaded, we've got a small fraction of the population we had then, and there have been bad experiences as well that some people choose to dwell on. I'm here for the fun, and I'm still finding it, but almost all my really enjoyable memories of the game date back at least 8 months.

[Varangaard]

Hundred reanimated dorf healers.... I feel a song coming!

"Oh, one hundred dorf healers on the wall, one hundred dorf healers! You take one down, push the corpse around, ninety-nine dorf healers on the wall.
Oh, ninety-nine dorf healers on the wall, ninety-nine dorf healers! You take one down, push the corpse around, ninety-eight dorf healers on the wall..."
(And watch out for Kalla the Pale!)
AAAAAAIIIEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!

It was the most mindnumbingly boring task in the entirety of Horizons. Nobody complained that it was hard, oh no (except for the fact that Kalla visited the wall at one end, you had to be careful at that one spot). You had to be a real pushover to have a dorf healer with a club to seriously threaten you. But they had heals. Oh yes, they had heals, and they liked using them on each other. If you were of about equal level, the battles could be insanely long. They also fancied their shield blocks, yes they did. Comparing the sucky T&C progression of dragons to twinked mob skills, they blocked a lot.

I'm so glad those days will never return.

Another insane task was the satyr hunts. Back in those days the satyr islands had little else but satyrs, but they had a lot of those. Satyr skeletons. Satyr ghosts. Unkempt satyrs. Defiled satyrs. And of course those wraiths (named inhibiton, palsy and so on; sound familiar?). Satyrs were about levels 40-80 and wraiths either level 60 (small ones) or 80 (large ones). Of course, they were a mixed spawn with all types and levels present. Doing these tasks solo was certainly possible, but it would have taken ages. The satyrs never formed groups, but they really didn't like one of their own being pulled so it was very likely your (non-AoE) pull netted a bunch if they were close enough to each other. Grouping up was the only way to have it done this decade.

The combat lag... argh! I participated in destruction of the latter two Machines on Ice server (inhibition and famine, I think). Several times, we got hit by the very very nasty combat lag thing that basically had any updates to combat cease. On your end, it seemed as if everything had just stopped dead, while at server-side you were just standing there like a fool while foes beat you to death. The whole ******** army (four full groups and then some) of some of Ice's highest-level players got wiped and we had to recall and regroup at pad after two failed rescue attempts. That wasn't the worst though. I was not there to see the wraith of extreme doom, a level 80 wraith that had buggy programming. When it spawned, it started spewing out commands to its cohorts at a rate enough to choke the game down. See combat lag death, above.

Enough of the bad stuff. Even with all the problems of the early client, I managed to find enough fun to do to stay in game (of course; else I wouldn't be here writing this). The whole satyr liberation saga was really something, crowned by the destruction of the last Machine. It was a definite 'take that and choke on it, Withered Aegis!' moment. Of course I rolled a satyr alt soon after; eternally grateful for his liberation, he now serves in Imperial ranks as a battlemage.

The Rite of Passage, that was great fun. There was a problem specific to Ice server that made Lem not to spawn, and we had to wait two days for a fix. We weren't even sure what was the matter, so we kept looking for him... Luck was with me as I logged in on the day the fix was rolled in, and spawned almost atop of a group of hatchies waiting for Lem pop. Short story even shorter, we became the first adult dragons on Ice. [:)] Me, Rhadamenth, Rdeedfrey, Eclipse, Derlik, Ravenscale and Polaris.

Well, enough reminiscencing... *sits back to his rocking chair and strokes his beard*

edit: Oh yeah, one more thing. You there. Yes, you. No Rite of Passage? No flying dragons? No storage structures? All lies and spin? UP!!! YOURS!!! MWAHAHAHAHAHA!

[Ulkesh]

I didn't have much trouble with the dorfs, just as you pointed it, the heals and blocks made the fights insanely long. hence the flashbacks....

The satyr quests weren't that hard for me. I did them solo and helped a couple of other dragons do them. For some reason they couldn't seem to get the hang of pulling them without dragging the entire half of the island. It took patience and some skill, but it was completely doable, and man did those things suck hehe.

ahh the old memories.....

[Vahrokh]

I remember of a dragon passing days and days on the forums wailing about dragon heals working half their due.

Then month laters same thing - the hoard based moves (expecially gold rage) were not "working" well like they did not deal the right kind of damage.

Same for other bugs, always being tagged as a whiner because of pointing out explicit bugs or bad database entries.

That dude was me and I don't regret a moment of that "fight".

More than that, killing the 100 healers was not that hard even before having hoard based moves - just painfully long.

I liked the fair amount of death points gotten doing the Bone Leaders quest (and then killing those skellies again for the splinters for the alternate breath). Possibly I was one of those with Uroloki in those nice DP rich days. I recall of Shula too and Daedra and Ruth and... too many beloved extinct ones to name them...

Likewise I recall the killing of sathyrs.... well, their killing at us [:D].

Golden days, when I still felt the thrill of danger in Horizons.

[oluviel]

I can only agree that young dragons have it easy compared to those who started when the game opened, but the weaknesses didn't cause me to like the game anymore.I would rather challenge myself by my own means than be overwhelemed and have to run for biped aid at every step of the way.

[Sharduk]

Pre merge , pre CS, :

ahh 211 completed imperial tasks < kill cursed wolves >

I ran the wolf track so often iwas perpetually dizzy.

Sharduk

[Varangaard]

100 Crushing Ogres!

********, how could I forget this one? Oh wait, maybe in fact I was trying to. [:D] It was another grind grind quest, but at least the blighted Feladan had a decent spawn.

Another silly one was doing the dragon augmentor's sole quest - burning embers crystal - after Feladan was freed. You had to kill 10 crushing ogres for that, and of course they did no longer spawn in the liberated city. For a good long while, the only place to find a crushing ogre was the Aughundell waterfall, where a single ogre was guarding the tunnel entrance. Respawn was 15 minutes, so you had to camp that spot for 2½ hours to complete the quest.

Some other fun moments were exploring both the blighted Feladan and blighted old Rachival with some hatchling friends. Back then Rachi had just gnomish undead about, and we managed to sneak all the way up to Project X (the undead were too high for us to handle). We promised to return some day and kick the massive automaton's butt. A promise wich we later delivered. [:)] Feladan was another fun place, elf undead, grey scavengers and grey sacrificers (tarantula mobs) guarding the approaches and some crushing ogres and more undead closer to the city. We decided to dash through the ruined city and see who'd make it alive through the blight (there was no world map in those days, so we were essentially navigating blind). While fleeing a crushing ogre and trying to take some good screenies I ran straight into the named elf ghost - Leanea the Corrupted I think - and her entourage. A level 21 hatchie didn't survive long.

[Ulkesh]

oh yeah the 100 crushing ogres. ok that one didnt take me to long, just the spawn time on those things in feladan used to be quite annoying.

however the fights werent to bad, of course that was back when several of our skills werent removed with quest upgrades. ie spiked scales stacked. talk about overpowering i could take on like 5 crushing ogres at once with all 4 of my spiked scales on and refreshing breeze.....

[Goriax]

Oh yea the crushing ogres. How could I forget them?

I remember really dreading it from all the complaints I was hearing but as it turned out I was fine. It took awhile but there were some nice drops (although now I can't remember what they were) to take away some of the pain. In fact I liked hunting crushing ogres so much that they were my favorite hunting grounds for awhile afterwards.

By the way, Palsy, inhibition and the others are still wandering around the Satyr islands. I avoid them because I don't want to fool with satyr scales.

Yes, I also soloed the satyr quests. It's not like they were all that tough if you single pulled and were very patient. It appears that many people just don't understand the technique for single pulling or why it's important. Heh, I sure saw enough people who's idea of tactics was to rush into the middle of the pack, flail away, and hope they didn't die.

I had words to say about the cursed wolf quest and using it as the primary means of getting experience above level 60 or so. Especially if you then bragged about how you knew everything there was to know about playing a dragon. I won't repeat those words now.

[Takora Drakan]

or as pre-merge the novo mashine was discovered, and wind, ice and earth worked against to see who was the first was able to finish it. All worked together, dragons transported the novo thingies to the machine and builded it in because they have had the highest igunety skill...

oh and that spion from ice that had appeared.. we thinked first it was a wm ^^

Pic1


Pic2

[Firedragon]

Ah yes...

Hoarding gems just outside Dalimond.
The awful hoardleak
Crystals.
The guy at Dalimond docks collecting Soul Fragments and all the IBMs you got in return.
Crankenspanks tomb.
The deathtrips to the Satyr-machines.
The feeling of first flight.
Zymosis Morbidae and all the bipeds standing in line for a cure.
Camping the T3golemspawns.
Cursed wolves and Wraiths.
The old TP system.
No ingame map.
AoP.

Time passes quickly...

[Levity]

I'll add in from the biped point of view: the warm glow of pleasure as a happy dragon thanked me for a couple of hours of making fine iron two handed swords in upper iron, getting him or her the princely amount of 25K hoard ... the fun of gang-killing any Golem Keeper foolish enough to interrupt us hard-working crafters ... and seeing my first dragon fly, coming in for a landing in upper iron, that was a jaw dropping moment.

It's no longer needed for me to do the craft-some-hoard grind, but the same spirit is with me now: I will always make free steel rune styluses for any dragon in need of one for the Khutit quest.

-Levity Merrel, Crai Aisling, Sans AoP by Aiya's Pad, once in Felathien_Expanse
100 Blacksmith/100 Fitter/45 Mason/45 Carpenter/14 Weaver/13 Enchanter
100 Reaver/61 Ice Disciple

[Varangaard]

Hmm yes, back in the olden days crafted items had wildly varying hoard values. As a rule of thumb, most biped-crafted stuff had a lot better values than anything dragons could make. I think gold jewelry pliers was in very high regard in value-versus-ease to craft. There were certain spells that had a very favorable resources-to-hoard ratio, too. Although the current system takes away the excietment of figuring out good hoardables, it is much more sensible on the longer run. It also equalizes dragon and biped craftables on their hoard values.