Thanks for any tips/advice you can offer!

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Check out he post here:

http://www.eqclerics.org/forums/showthread.php?t=20876

T.

Lots of changes includes: level cap to 70, stats cap raised as well,
new gears and new spells, new bugs, (old bugs are still there though)
etc.  There is simply too much you should consider going to eq forum
at eqplayers.com and familarize with current issues.

As for moving, I think you can only move for free within 1 month from
merges so you are likely stuck on your current server.  But since you
haven't played for a while you probably don't have any reason to move
yet.

Part of the reason traffic dropped here on usenet is because there are
eq forums and many class specific forums like beastlords.org (not sure
about yours check around)

If you are serious on coming back, get the Titanium package you will
catch up to all but PoR for only $20.  I'd hold off getting PoR until
you refamiliarize with your characters and play styles.  Older
expansion are easier as they have been played more throughly and most
people can handle a rusty player or 2 while PoR is just a month old
and not many have figured out the strategy yet to handle all of the
zones and mobs.

I recently took the plunge and came back to the game after well over 18
months off.  I came back because I thought my child was finally old
enough to start playing with me.  That way we could spend time together
instead of me just staring at the screen by myself for hours and
ignoring them.  So far, we are having a lot of fun.  I did get the
Titanium package for $20 as a previous poster recommended.  Great deal
really!

I have a 59 rogue and other lower chars, but we lucked into the 2X
experience week, so we've gotten my child's chars up to the mid teens
with a minimum of effort.  It's been fun explaining how the different
abilities work and watching her learn the UI.  She is obsessed with
things that never really caught my attention, like languages, so we
spend a lot of time creating little macros to build our language skills
and such.

As for me, I've found most of the zones I used to haunt almost
completely empty.  You can still find groups in places like velks lab
and surprisingly I've actually managed to get a couple of great LDON
groups together.  I had never gotten flagged for any of the planes
stuff, but find no one in places like the plane of storms when go there
to see if I could raise faction (have all the stuff for the turn in).

I've always been kind of a loner anyway, so I'm going to try some of
the tasks from Omens of War and reconnect with my old friends who still
play.  And of course, play with my child most of all.  I must say
though, that the kill-and-pull vibe remains which I had grown really
tired of and it seems even though they merged servers that most places
are empty.  They are probably in the dozens of new zones I've yet to
explore.

In the end, if you've got the time, it's still a lot of fun, but
essentially unproductive when it comes to making things happen in your
reall life.  I had played since '99 when I quit and it feels like
coming home - most of the places you remember haven't changed, but they
just seem emptier without all of the people you remember.

Iceblossom wrote an excellent returning to EQ faq on the sony boards. I
will see if I can find the link.