Coirnav. Hands down. Right?

Vishimtar

Overall, I'd have to say Naggy. It was a hell of an introduction to raid tactics and game mechanics.

Naggy gave me my first taste of raid leading and was one of my favorite events but NTOV comes in first bye a nose.

Orc pawn.

You never forget your first.

My first ghoul. It drove me my Troll warrior to find a langseax and hunt down every one from North Ro to EC.

Grimfeather. As a lowly level 5 barbarian shaman trying to get to Freeport.

That bitch was such an under-con even into my 40s.

Oh wow. I don't know. So much nostalgia around so many different things.

Those fucking brownies in LFay...oh my god. My first encounter with, "THAT'S NOT FAIR!" things.

Pretty much any ghoul. Those guys were such assholes.

And, of course, basically all of Guk. =D

The ring war.

There was nothing so BIG and so "holy crap this is COOL!" that I ever experienced. Add in all the quest work you had to do and everything leading up to it. I have yet to see anything that is as close to that whole thing

Yeah the ring war was pretty much the best.

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Yea, good call on that one.

Why am I drawing a blank on the ring war? That the Grimling thing?

No, the thing in Velious for the Coldain ring where the giants wanna beat up the dorfs and you have to beat up the giants.

Oh yeah. I was gonna say TOV - the whole concept and layout with HOL And then the harder parts. But the ring was pretty sweet, too.

Most of my favorite moments were from when I farmed illusion masks / items solo, like diving deep into Chardok with lulls and finding safe spots to pull. That Halfling mask is still one of the items I am most proud of.

Can't think of an amazing encounter but fucking Shadowmen were the bane of my existence for a long time....

Talk about cheap mob creation..."Let's drop the opacity on the human model to zero and give him weapons"

Crushbone Keep just because it was the first "raid" I did in EQ. I was fresh off the boat too, with like 4 days of playing (not 4 days played, just had been playing for 4 days or so). I knew from that point that I was going to enjoy EQ, and probably enjoy it too much.

Running thru Kithicor at night to RV or to EC at low level with no SoW and dieing 2 ft from the zone in

I also liked doing the Kobald area on the underside of Paineel (was it the Warrens?). That is where I learned how to run and kill in a dungeon.

Crushbone was good, that Kobald zone on the other side of Everfrost was a lot of fun, and I spent days in Crystal Caverns. Lots of good grouping in Velks and Kael. Learing to kite the Tundra Mammoths in Everfrost. Killing outside of the Ak'anon and having to avoid that damned werewolf.

That is one thing that I think WoW missed was putting the extreme target in the middle of newbie zones. Made it were you couldn't just endlessly grind an area as there was a risk of getting hit by a mob that would kill your whole group! Also, to get to so many of the places to group/grind you had to run through areas that could kill you. Back in the day you really had to pay attention to what you were doing even before you got to where you wanted to be.

That's a good point.

Remember Dorn B'Dyn in North Ro? Or Lockjaw in Oasis?

It definitely made it fun/interesting having an occasional tough mob in the middle of the newbie areas.

There was also Slate & the Griff in EC. And even WC had the rare Sand Giant that would make an appearance.

vindi, statue, idol, aow

Vindi was great. Ring War is definitely an awesome call.

I liked Vox better than Naggy.

I also liked Lady Vox better than Naggy.

The best part about all the random deadly mobs was training them on any jerks in the area!

That was one thing about EQ that was great, there was a lot of potential for various and sundry interactions. You never knew what some guy was going to do, if someone was going to train your Frenzy camp OR if some random guy was going to come in and help you with an out of control camp or something, etc etc.

Other games since then are so sterile in their level of interaction.

MW/SC kill of Rallos Zek (think that was the dudes name) to get to the elemental planes. I remember Mathi sending me a tell saying "don't worry if you don't get it your first time, it will be a learning experience" and then the insane adrenaline rush of the fight and beating it. That was definitely the high moment of the EQ years for me.

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Planes of Power was awesome after the Luclin shit-fest.

I came in too late to do the Velious stuff, so I can't comment.

Epic 1.0 quests were cool, with the exception of the tedious tradeskilling.

But dammit, if you were going to get a particle weapon, you had better be a damn fine cook/leathersmith/fletcher/brewer/etc!

I don't recall the need for tradeskills for my Epic. I remember needing tradeskills for the Solstice Earring and for Seru or whatever it was.

Whoops- you're right. Tradeskills were needed for the Coldain Prayer Shawl quests, not epic 1.0.

It's been a while, heh.

The rogue one was such a gimme too, if I remember right.

Gimme after the kithcor nerf maybe.

It could use a bit of a polish but the bard 1.0 is still my favorite weapon of any that I have acquired with any character in any game.

Wait they made Kith easier? I remember us bringing about 20 dudes to get my kedge and losing three tanks in about 15 seconds to the General. Oh EZ Mode EQ. I often think about reupping my account just so I can 2box+merc solo the old epics.

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Nagafen for the reasons Leo mentioned above. For many of us, it was the first "raid" feel scenerio, and was pretty unforgiving at the time (i.e. not a very fun CR).
Vox for whatever reason was done far less, and often a level or two later back then, so I experienced Naggy first.


On a personal level I'd also like to nominate the entire Velious expansion, as those were the most enjoyable experiences for me in EQ. The raids and factioning were great fun; Rangers finally became a ranged dps force to be reckoned with; NToV and Sleepers were amazing experiences; and the Ranger Mafia made it all the better, with the comraderie and competition we had with eachother. I can still vividly recall some of our Yelinak slayings where the Rangers would line up one side of the room, get fully buffed from a shaman, and then you'd see multiple "So_and_so's bow crackles with natural energy" as we all unleashed hell.
Man those were awesome times.

So_and_so's bow crackles with natural energy - Ahh I miss that feeling of opening the can o'whoop-ass

I was always a fan of Coirnav- the time limit, the rush, you always seemed to be under pressure to complete it within the time limit involved. One day before I permanently retire (who knows when that will be) I want to head on over and solo that for shiggles.

Favorite encounter was when TSO first killed Dozekar in ToV- our top three tanks all died within the first ten percent of mob health, then Barrel (who was probably our #4 geared tank) tanked that dragon all the way until like 55 when it *finally* got slowed. It was pretty spectacular from the healers and him to be able to tank it unslowed for so long, and keep him up via heals. When we finally killed it, it ended months and months of frustrations and of people telling us we couldn't kill that. A great moment for TSO.

Of some of the more modern events- Queen Sendaii I liked due to its obstacles and challenges... Vishitmar was nice because you needed everyone to be paying attention (no afk from anyone or raid might wipe)... Tower event #6 (Synacarana, the one before final one) is nice because it seems, to me, that everyone has a role and everyone has something to do on this event. Haven't tried any Underfoot raids, but I hear they are pretty darn cool in function and form... just insane DPS from the raid- 20k aoes, 15k dots, multiple counter curses that must be cured within 12 seconds or you die, and mobs that quad hit for 20k (potential 80k round!)...

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I think Vox gave me the most grief. Fear breaks if you count that as an encounter

Plane of Growth was fun, but so was Coirnav, the Ring War, the entire Plane of Time events, and so many others that it's hard to choose.

Not that it was a great encounter or anything, but killing Zland with 3 seconds left on duelist will always be a funny memory.

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Marauder Harabakc Goat

My favorite would have to be my first Plane of Hate raid. I was so nervous!

There's SO many though... some others that come to mind at the top of my list: Trakanon, Veeshan's Peak, Temple of Veeshan, Sleeper's Tomb, Ssrashkldsajhdsjlksdeshza, Raiding the Planes. Even smaller things like Guk, Sebilis, Howling stones. Man, so much fun!

The Planes idea was so good, it revitalized some of the game for me, but it all went downhill from there.

I was never too much a fan of raiding. My favorite place to go was probably Howling Stones. Quiet, and you would usually crawl through the dungeon rather than camp in one place.

Kedge Keep!

Hey EQ2? Why no awesome underwater dungeon? Booo.

FL dropping Avatar of War with the smoothest tank switches EVER and not resorting to that CHeal sword/mod rod faggotry. Fucking Nokk/Xan + healers wrecked that shit. Best part? First win we got, Nokk turned the mob on enrage. Hilarity and slaughter ensued.

Oh yeah I lost that screenshot. 1/3 of the raid dead in 1 second hahaha. Best moment in EQ ever! Bye bye dual weilders! Good thing I was doing crazy paladin DPS to finish off the monster...

Was also pretty fun to train AoW to the Wakening land zone and then watching people die as they zone in.

We were told to stay put and die but I didn't want to lose my new level! eheheh

It was all about the Secrets of the Planes quest. I talked shit about tradeskilling the whole time I played and then I did that quest right before I quit. I will admit after that, tradeskilling was kinda fun

Ele, don't forget about Tunare.

Sure, AOW required precision, but not much as far as tactics.

ToV would be my favorite. Worst would be Rathe Council.

I did enjoy that one dragon in ToV, though the name escapes me. I believe he was regarded as one of the toughest dragons in there, he was brownish and off to the left hand side in the main cavern area right after the flurry drakes (I think).

Did we ever kill Vulak in ToV? I vaguely recall something was changed about him by the time we got there which made him do something weird? I remember him having the shiny Ranger sword that I don't recall ever personally seeing. I also remember there being an update on Legacy of Steel about how they saw a couple of them drop with no Rangers in the raid (or they all had it) and thus they were destroyed. The title of the update was something along the lines of "And Rangers Cried Around The World".

Edit - Rallos Zek in the Plane of War (?) was the worst encounter.

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Kuwen Furyblades
Hunter of Memento Reejeryn
Champion of Faydark

OGRE WALL!!!! oh wait, that was Afterlife. Our use of CoH in that fight was fucking priceless.

So was nokk forgetting to hit defensive on the pull and dying in like two hits.

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World of Warcraft: Kallaystra, Gweila, Steakumn, Tarathia [ Feathermoon/Horde ]

Best encounter would be my first TSO raid on Lord Yelinak, I showed up to the raid with maybe 3 stacks of arrows, and the tank said that was not enough and loaded me up. I was surprised at the time that a warrior would have so many arrows on hand (what would they need those for!), and the nice ones! It was the first time I used true shot in a raid encounter. For the life of me, I can't remember who our raid leader/main tank was though.

I think the tank was Tamorfin, just came to me.

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Jake Rivers - Senex Legio
Get off my Lawn alliance

Rathe sucked... sorta, but there was definitely something epic about.

Emp SSRA is by far the worse as far as I'm concerned.

Personally I thought The Rathe was pretty cool. Long, annoying when an enchanter goes LD, but not "the worst encounter". How quickly people forget VT!

Coirnav was fun for the sheer zerg factor, plus let Aphelion into Time which is tough to beat in terms of "finally". But I think Rallos Zek (tactics version) was really was one of the best and well done encounters with having to go through it in the timed fashion. Very well made and certainly an excitement factor.

This is not a "greatest encounter", but more of a "funniest story I remember." I can remember one Saturday when we were planning on doing Plane of Growth, but Aste's guild (Iris) went there first. They spent ALL DAY in the zone trying to get to Tunare for the first time (we had it on farm by then). We kept pressuring Aste to either finish up or we'd go in there and kill Tunare. We gave them a set time when we were going to go in and kill her. The problem was, Iris kept wiping over and over again because they were trying to kill those dudes that you didn't have to kill (the ones that had millions of hitpoints). I remember him telling me that those guys were hard and they kept killing them, and I wanted to tell him that he didn't even need to waste his time killing them, but I was told to not say anything to him so we could kill Tunare.

Eventually, Aste gave up and told us it was ok to go in and kill Tunare, so we zoned in and proceeded to kill her while all of Iris looked on. I even got the wand or whatever it was that she dropped, which was the one item that Aste wanted for himself. And to top it off, after that, Aste and I dueled right there in PoG and I used Raise the Dead (or whatever it was called) to bring Tunare's corpse to life to attack him. Well, one of those glitches happened and I killed him during our duel and he lost experience. What a hell of a way to end a shitty day for him.

Ah, memories.

I remember that raid from the Iris perspective. It wasn't too fun :p.

One of my fondest EQ memories was in NTOV while Vita was watching us(Oryx) do Aaryonnar and them thinking we wouldn't kill it. Sorry Neesh!

Actually finishing Ring of Vulak, piss poor encounter design but it was satisfying.

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"I'm the best there is at what i do, bub, and what i do isn't very pretty"

You only killed it because I used Lifeburn at the end! Ok, maybe not.

Being told we couldn't do it, then doing it with only 1 death(a person who went LD during the fight) was even better.

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Marauder Harabakc Goat