The classic I never knew

[utenan]

Been doing a little light reading lately.
http://i.imgur.com/n4XKOrJ.jpg
You know, just for fun.

And it turns out theres a lot about classic everquest that I was unaware of... Even though most of you are probably well read, I thought I'd share this very important knowledge about classic EQ that I've discovered. Are you ready to learn?

http://i.imgur.com/uouCmWt.jpg
How dare you all just look the other way and pretend like you didn't know about the level requirements needed to join a group! Shame on you

http://i.imgur.com/VxYKxAF.jpg
The Thurgadin guards are way ahead of us on this one.

http://i.imgur.com/5MQjcYK.jpg
Wow! Apparently you couldn't type, move, see, or interact with the game at all while you were meditating in classic - but at least you could hear....people around you? the devs must have been feeling very generous that day.

http://i.imgur.com/382Bsn7.jpg
I never knew how complicated auto attack was and I'm sure all the melee on the server have been in the dark as well.

http://i.imgur.com/HQqfSAY.jpg
I don't know where the term pulling came from but it's not classic. Here's an example of the proper term being used: "You should lure mobs that are near your level; lest you end up at your regeneration point". If I have to petition one more person for using the term "pulling" I'm going to scream.
http://i.imgur.com/L55iOcF.jpg

[Jaleth]

Ah yes the old "book in front of your face" meditate. At least we got to play gems!

And I agree, "pulling" is so non-classic.

[Muggens]

Fun read - gonna make a Lure macro right away "Great news party, I've lured %t away from the rest of his troublesome gang and towards us instead!"

[Lisset]

Ah yes the old "book in front of your face" meditate. At least we got to play gems!

And I agree, "pulling" is so non-classic.

Pretty sure gems came after meddling while sitting.

[Itap]

A dual wield button? What the fack

[Secrets]

Pretty sure gems came after meddling while sitting.

Gems is 2002-era EQ. It was actually the result of a programmer who got fired for coding gems into the game because he got a writeup for playing Minesweeper (which was removed from all SOE PCs after) and needed his makeshift game fix on company time.

Remnants of the GemsGamWnd code on EQMac reference the petition UI; this was actually causing a crash when zoning on the EQMac client with GM status on. If you didn't have the petition files in the client, it'd try and reference them and crash in GemsGameWnd. The original programmer had left some code there to render the GemsGameWnd in the same function as the 'screenshot' they'd take of employees' client screens to make sure they weren't doing something they weren't on their shift.

After he got fired, they decided to just keep it in the client and add it as a regular feature for players because they thought it was amazing that someone would waste their time on something like this.

Other programming oddities from classic include the "Who's your daddy?" line in the EQ Client. This was eventually going to be expanded on to reset a network connection, and the sequence contained three strings:

"\r\nwho's your daddy?"
"\r\ndaddy?"
"\r\nI'm your daddy"

Once they were received in order, the network connection will reset and attempt to reconnect without kicking you to character select. Additionally, these strings are present in 2002-era eqmain.dll which contains leftover strings from the server implementation of this code.

[Secrets]

Oh, how can I forget my favorite story? There's a 2003-era .map file that was leaked onto the testeverquest patcher in 2002 and was left there until late 2011 (lp4 switch removed it)

.map files contain a list of functions and their addresses for a built executable. They're like debugging symbols without class information and help a programmer understand what function is being called at an address.

One of those said functions is this precious function:

http://puu.sh/ks02c/644a590481.png

Later, SOE had another screw-up and leaked a 2008-era eqgame.exe and eqgame.map file - we later learned that this function was changed:

http://puu.sh/ks0f1/7448bf74f7.png

I was pretty sad but it was probably done in the partial engine rewrite they did in 2007.

[bloodmuffin]

I don't know where the term pulling came from but it's not classic.

Having rolled a monk during classic release I'm pretty sure everyone knew what pulling was right off the bat and they were using different phrases like (lure, bringing, grabbing, ect) but none of that stuck. Pulling was just used by the majority, there were the few that would say something else but using the that funky sub window and 1 chat box I would frequently tell my group "pulling" instead of the other terms. You can find tons of people using the phrase pulling as far back as 1999-2000.

[Kafter]

I vaguely remember the /loot function in early classic as a function to allow someone to loot your corpse, instead of dragging. My father, who played at the time, got pissed off one day because a rogue looted his corpse and then camped down in Sol b.

They didn't keep that function in for very long if i remember correctly.

[Monty405]

Does any one have a .pdf of an classic in box manuals?

There was a thread on reddit of someone scanning the Kunark manual but he never posted it. I would very much like to read it again.

[am0n]

I vaguely remember the /loot function in early classic as a function to allow someone to loot your corpse, instead of dragging. My father, who played at the time, got pissed off one day because a rogue looted his corpse and then camped down in Sol b.

They didn't keep that function in for very long if i remember correctly.

Yeah, back then /consent was a risky proposition. You had to really trust the person.

And when it didn't show what you looted from a corpse. "Oh, man, he must be bugged. He didn't drop anything!"

[Ahtex]

Gems is 2002-era EQ.

I knew this wasn't right because I quit before 2002, but remember playing gems. Gems is Classic: March 6, 2001 3:00 am

http://everquest.allakhazam.com/history/patches-2001-1.html

[Ménage à trois]

I knew this wasn't right because I quit before 2002, but remember playing gems. Gems is Classic: March 6, 2001 3:00 am

http://everquest.allakhazam.com/history/patches-2001-1.html

Also - http://www.tski.co.jp/baldio/patch/20010306.html. Gems was definitely early 2001.

[JboxCSU]

I need my dual wield button. My DPS will skyrocket!

[Sirken]

ahh sweet gems

[Skunkranger]

I have that very same book and have read it 100 times and never noticed the inaccuracies you sited, LOL!

Right hand vs left hand...clicking X...hot-keying dual wield WTH is all this? LOL!

[kennymack007]

I got the 2001 Prima guide to EQ, "Pulling" is a term talked about in it. So at least we know it was used by then.

[Jimjam]

I read the Kunark manual extensively whilst installing. After a few hours of confusion I realised to forget everything I had read and instead learn by asking for help from veterans.

I'm pretty sure a tonne of stuff made it into the Kunark Manual that was never even in live, so they must have not bothered updating some of the content since beta?

I probably still have the disc, box and book somewhere in my parents' attic, but I no longer live with them so can't scan it, sadly.

My friend that got me into everquest made me really jealous when he showed the world map he received with his vanilla copy; I started at RoK release and my box included no map (beyond diagrams of the cities), which made navigating between cities almost impossible!

I remember one gnome on Tallon Zek offering escorts to BB. I was playing on my ranger in faydark, and remembered from my previous character on druzil ro that BB was Black Burrow, and was good xp at my level. So I sent him a tell asking to be taken to black burrow, and he said yea sure, meet me at the lifts. He took me into the middle of the forest, then set his pet on me! Fortunately I had a bow and arrow and was able to shoot him down. He called off his pet and ran away.

[captnamazing]

steep me in this deep immersion

[astronaut]

I remember when being consented to drag a corpse I would always loot it just to look at the gear and decide if it was worth becoming a thief or just to drag his corpse up to the entrance. If I was feeling especially fair I would hand back his copper.

[astronaut]

Also tallon zek was so insane fun back in the early days. No one who didn't play there will ever understand. Item loot was just a complete rush. I cried. At 13 years old when I lost a bronze bracer to a naked Dark elf wizard who wasn't KOS to gnolls.

[Voland]

I don't know where the term pulling came from but it's not classic.

Did you know that the original "pulling" was done by Han Solo?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OIuKWhWzYis
(video cuts off, but he basically aggroes the stormtrooper and brings him back to the rebel group).

[captnamazing]

Did you know that the original "pulling" was done by Han Solo?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OIuKWhWzYis
(video cuts off, but he basically aggroes the stormtrooper and brings him back to the rebel group).

that's a great example of a rogue using sneak tag to lure a single enemy to camp

[JboxCSU]

Did you know that the original "pulling" was done by Han Solo?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OIuKWhWzYis
(video cuts off, but he basically aggroes the stormtrooper and brings him back to the rebel group).

Han Solo does sound like a monk name...

[myxomatosii]

Does any one have a .pdf of an classic in box manuals?

There was a thread on reddit of someone scanning the Kunark manual but he never posted it. I would very much like to read it again.

Is there a pdf copy around? If not I have a hard copy I could convert with a little research. I'm big into preservation of things like this and I keep my manuals in perfect condition, not a single torn page after 15 years.

http://i.imgur.com/EXwVkTT.jpg

[Galimar]

http://www.scribd.com/doc/53542242/48825912-EverQuest-the-Ruins-of-Kunark-Revised-Expanded-Prima-Official-eGuide

[sacman08]

BWow! Apparently you couldn't type, move, see, or interact with the game at all while you were meditating in classic - but at least you could hear....people around you? the devs must have been feeling very generous that day.

Originally in order to meditate you had to have the spell book open, so in the classic interface you would see nothing of the game space just your inventory, spells, and open spell book.

[myriverse]

Having rolled a monk during classic release I'm pretty sure everyone knew what pulling was right off the bat and they were using different phrases like (lure, bringing, grabbing, ect) but none of that stuck. Pulling was just used by the majority, there were the few that would say something else but using the that funky sub window and 1 chat box I would frequently tell my group "pulling" instead of the other terms. You can find tons of people using the phrase pulling as far back as 1999-2000.
Indeed. The term "pulling" predates the existence of EQ.

[Monty405]

http://www.scribd.com/doc/53542242/48825912-EverQuest-the-Ruins-of-Kunark-Revised-Expanded-Prima-Official-eGuide

Thanks!!

[Barrier]

Originally in order to meditate you had to have the spell book open, so in the classic interface you would see nothing of the game space just your inventory, spells, and open spell book.

I don't know if it was classic, but on ding at level 35 I believe when I was playing, your spellbook would just cover part of the screen and you could "look over" it to see if anything was coming.

[Daldaen]

Levels 1-8 on a Paladin/SK/Ranger you would have 0/0 Mana.

When you dinged level 9, your mana would slowly start creeping up. Man do I remember being so immersed in my Half-Elf Paladin in a Blackburrow seeing that mana bar start to fill. My character is so magical now!!!

[Fuggers]

Yeah, at 35 you no longer had to look at the book. It was heaven!

[Charlievox]

I would love to be able to make one of my characters
Left Handed.

[NegaStoat]

I vaguely remember the /loot function in early classic as a function to allow someone to loot your corpse, instead of dragging. My father, who played at the time, got pissed off one day because a rogue looted his corpse and then camped down in Sol b.

They didn't keep that function in for very long if i remember correctly.

While the command allowed another person to loot your corpse was still in the game, it had deeper repercussions as a mechanic. After the Guise of the Deceiver had been nerfed but before the /consent mechanic changed, a person could kill their character to make an equipped corpse. Then you log to character creation screen. You delete the character. You then make a brand new level 1 character with the same name. Enter the game, and you could loot the corpse of the previous character, INCLUDING NO DROP items.

For some people this was a big deal in that they got a Guise on a character that they had 'buyer's remorse' over and really wish they were playing a different class entirely.

[keysmash]

Fun read - gonna make a Lure macro right away "Great news party, I've lured %t away from the rest of his troublesome gang and towards us instead!"

Wizards confirmed best pullers... I mean, lurers.