Sub-50 Solo Challenge Giveaway
 

Someone in my "yay I have a million platinum" thread suggested I do a giveaway to celebrate. I poo-poo'd his poetry idea, but seeing as I'm such a big fan of soloing stuff, I thought maybe a lowbie version of the Solo Arist Challenge would be a fun giveaway.

For anyone who does't know, the SAC is a for-fun challenge where players try to solo a variety of 50+ NPCs that are sorted into tiers of difficulty. Because of the nature of EQ and the rules of the challenge, enchanters and shamans dominate the SAC, although several different classes have participated, and the people reading the stories understand that a wizard killing a "disciple" tier mob is actually a heck of an accomplishment, even though an enchanter or shaman might be able to kill that mob in his sleep.

Anyway, I was thinking I'd host a solo challenge giveaway for sub-50 players, where players pick the zone and specific mob (or camp) that they will be soloing, and then they go solo that while taking video or screenshots and write up a post in the thread I create telling the story of their kill(s) from start to finish. I would judge which of the stories I like the best, considering everything from the class doing the soloing to the zone/camp/mob(s) they're dealing with to their gear to their former experience with p99 to how well presented their story/SSs/videos are, etc, and award a 1st prize of 10k, a 2nd prize of 5k, and a 3rd prize of 1k.

I'm (somewhat) open to suggestions of how to do the challenge within these general guidelines, and will think a bit more about the specifics before I host the actual giveaway. I know that this challenge will STILL favor some classes over others, because no matter what level a warrior or a rogue is, they just aren't going to be able to make as interesting of a story killing nameds solo as casters can... but I'd love to be proven wrong! I'll double the prize number for underdog classes that win, if any!

Thoughts?

Sounds blue

So what are some good mobs for a 15 magician to try and solo? lol

That's the idea.


I think I will make a post that is a walkthrough for this, to try to help anyone who is interested in trying to find something appropriate for them to try to solo... like screenshots of using the wiki to find the right level zones and links to maps to use and stuff. Basically all of the things I used to get a lay of the land when I was doing the SAC myself.

Sounds pretty cool. You might want to make a stipulation that people with high-level mains can't enter. You WOULD get more interesting stories from people who have the resources for leet equipment, clickable potions/whatever, etc., but the prize money would be wasted on them. Maybe an exception would be that these people could only enter if they donated their winnings to someone who could actually use them :p. (Obviously all this would be somewhat based on the honor system.)

I'm up for it - will there be an "official" thread to start it or is this the thread?

Yeah, I'd ask for a screenshot of inventory screen at the start of a story, and like I said, I'd be taking into account what gear a person has when judging them so that the winners aren't just people who had the best twink.


I'll make an official thread after I work up a how-to walkthrough.

I'll probably do consolation prizes for everyone who has an entry too. Maybe the 1k will be consolation prizes.

Really blue

It may be a pain in the butt, but maybe you could make another SAC sheet with possible named mobs to solo. Such as named 10-20, named 20-30, etc. I know there a bunch of named mobs in this game so it would probably be a lot of work to figure them all out, just a thought though. Of course it would probably be easier just to let people pick out their own otherwise everyone will be crowding all the named mobs that are on the sheet. I don't know, I'm just rambling now, sorry I'm tired.