The Magician's Tower

Hello everyone, I am returning to EQ after a *long* break, and had a few questions I hope anyone can help me out with. My main character is a 73 Mage(hopefully my Magelo shows up), and I am going to be 2 boxing a 67 Mage as well, so with that said...

1) My play time is going to be quite limited till the end of the year, so odds are I am going to be soloing it unless things change. My big concern is getting any gear upgrades I can manage, but I really have no idea where to start or what I might be able to manage with my character set up. I seem to remember DoN had a way to farm crystals to turn in for gear (or another expansion, it's all fuzzy at the moment, lol), is this still viable, or has something new taken its place? Or will I need to be farming from mobs?

2) Regarding spells, I recall OoW had rune turn ins for spells, have the later expansions changed this, or is it gonna be farming as well? I did see some for sell in the bazaar, but I assume that won't be the best way to get upgrades.

3) For mercs, I'm probably gonna run with 2 clerics once I figure out a plan, but I was wondering if anyone can clarify the confidence level of the mercs? I'm using an Apprentice 5 merc, but I know the Journeyman one has better heal options but the level I can hire has a low confidence. Will the low confidence be a deal breaker later on, and if so can anyone point me to some info on how to get a higher tier one?

Any other advice will be much appreciated!

Glad to see you back and that you found us at our new home!

1) Defiant is better than anything now and easily obtainable. The stuff that drops is found in the bazaar easy enough and usually pretty cheap. The stuff that doesn't drop (jewelry and focus stuff) can be bought for a much higher price off vendors over by the Crescent Reach portal in POK. Some old friends or new friends you make will probably pass this along to you as well. Defiant drops randomly from level appropriate mobs in all zones so you'll come across plenty while xp'ing and doing quests.

2) Spells can be researched now, rather easily, all the way up through the TBS spells. No need to buy runes or farm them unless your spell is not available at the bazaar. Once you hit 71, most spells that are rank 1 are vendored, rank 2's come from drops, and rank 3's are from runes looted in raids. That all changes when you hit 76 where rank 1's are all vendored, rank 2's are on faction vendors or dropped, and rank 3's are raid looted runes. Further changes when you hit level 81 where rank 1's can be from faction, progression (zeb in the void), or on general vendors and the same for rank 2's and rank 3's are looted as runes at raids. For spells 75 and below, I suggest looking in the bazaar or finding someone to research them. Since you are on my server, you can even look me up. Most are like me and will just charge cost because, if we wanted profit, we could sell in bazaar; but some will charge a higher price as a type of convenience fee (after all, it's not a snap and they are spending time making spells for you when they could be doing other stuff).

3) Confidence is a non-issue. I am quite convinced the confidence mechanism is broken as I have never seen nor heard it kick in (I watched someone pull 6 reds to camp and the merc started healing and kept healing as we wiped...done to test confidence). As long as you have a Tier 5 Journeyman, you are set and having two is the way to go as pets (as a sad commentary on how broken tank mercs are) tank better than merc tanks and RL clerics tank better than tank mercs too. The way to get a tier 5 is just to do the Rathe Theme progression in SoD but I don't know if those missions are available at your 67 level.

A good way to get a few easy upgrades is doing the hotzone tasks. The NPC is in PoK, get the level apporpriate for you and go to the hotzone and kill mobs he asks for. Once you finish, you'll get a nice non-visable piece of defiant gear (which you can preview in the reward window).

I wouldn't say that confidence is completely a non-issue, but it's pretty close. I have had my merc flip out and go hide in the corner a few times, but it's always been when I'm killing a LOT of light/dark blue mobs at once. I can think of twice offhand: once when killing the weak elementals in Katta (had about 9-10 on my pet) and once while I was beam kiting spiders in DSH (which I really didn't need my merc up for anyway). I think both those times I had the journeyman I merc. When I used apprentice V I never had the merc freak out, and I don't think my current journeyman V merc ever has either.

Also with your level and I assume gear I highly suggest running the tower missions in Dragon Scale Hills (human on the first floor by the tower entrance). He gives pretty good xp and faycitum as a reward, and the faycitum can be used to buy the energized wire coil, which is a pretty good focus at 75 (I don't think you can wear it before that). Check my post here for details (second post on the page).