So I'll jump into the fray - I have quite a few awesome memories of this game. I've been playing since I was 11 years old, watching over my Uncle's shoulder during beta until I felt brave enough to face the big bad orcs by myself...
I played around, scared to death - so it took 2 full years for me to get my first character past level 30, even though my level 20 had something like 300 played days in the first two years...lol. I made the 'mistake' of making my character on Rallos Zek - my Uncle and his friends all started there, and they were talking about how it was the 'Manly' server, unlike the 'blue' servers... I had no clue wtf they were talking about, I just wanted to be part of the club...
That is until I met Jookie. This level 10 rogue in Flowers of Happiness that had de-leveled with full epic 1.0 and other raid gear just to 'gank' the low level people (aka, me). They especially loved to do this, because gear used to drop from your corpse - any one piece they wanted after they killed you. This alone was scarier than all the orcs of crushbone combined. Emperor Crush was nothing compared to this jookie A-hole.
So 2 years pass, and I'm finally out of level range of these Flowers of Happiness fellows, I'm above level 30 (something like 35ish) and I'm running a bard instead of a monk so I can zoom away from the PVPers, and so I can run my resist song to keep them from rooting me and ganging up on me... Since I was so over-confident, I pooled ALL my plat from the past 2 years of sitting around buying and selling in Kelethan (RZ's version of East Commonlands) to save up and buy myself one of the original Fungi Tunics. I also had full blue diamond gear, hp rings, you name it - I was DECKED out. Quite the proud 13 year old. I didn't think anyone could root me with my 170+ MR, not including my song. I didn't think anyone could kill me before I could take off my 75hp rings and kill myself....so I was feeling great about exploring and getting into the game FINALLY!
I'm playing with my best friend, who is playing a druid at the time, and we're goofing off in Dalnir trying to level up when all of the sudden a rogue comes in, all shroud of stealth'd up, and starts hitting me when Im fighting a couple Sarnaks. No big deal I think to myself - I tell my friend he needs to succor us asap. He does and we poof to the zone-in.
... Did I mention I was 13? Well that means it was the time of Dial Up internet. I was playing EverQuest while running NetZero, because my parents were broke and didnt want to pay for internet, and I was saving my money for something cool...like a big stereo lol. Back to the story...
So by the time my friend and I zone back in at the zone-in. That fucking guy is ALREADY at the zone-in just waiting for us.
Immediately he starts attacking before I even see my character screen.
My heart is pounding, my hands are shaking, im trying to take off my gear as quickly as possible and put it in my bags. BUT WAIT! THE BAGS ARE FULL FROM XPING! So I'm drastically trying to throw things on the ground/delete them so there's room in my bags for my gear, all while running to the zone-line to zone.
Loading...please wait.
I come out of the zone...he's already there before me. Fucking netzero. I turn around, and zone again. I yell to my friend playing in the other room "PORT ME WHEN I ZONE IN! PORT PORT PORT!"
my friend says something but I'm not sure what he said.
I load in, hoping to have the port spell half way through casting... and instantly see two large ogres just waiting for me. They both target me, and hit Harm Touch.
I instantly die, fungi tunic still on...
I started crying IRL. I was DEVISTATED. Two years of work, taken in a few minutes of gameplay. I decided that day, I'd quit EQ. (of course, I came back after about six months to a year).
... 15 years later, I'm 28 and on a sales call for one of my early companies. I sit down at starbucks waiting for my client to show up (I was selling Credit Repair services at the time, and needed to know more about the situation and packages etc - that doesn't really matter though). After about five minutes this young man shows up, about my own age, and we start chatting. Weekend plans come up, general hobbies etc - and somehow, out of the blue, he tells me he played Everquest. I was shocked to meet someone else who played - so excitedly I asked him what server? I've played for years!
He says Rallos Zek, he used to have a badass rogue but got tired of raiding so he just PVP'd. We start telling each other fun RZ stories, and then he tells me this one crazy story about how he made a couple hundred dollars in one day by killing this twink with a Fungi tunic on and selling it the next day. He goes on to tell me how he was in Dalnir, and zoning back and forth, but the guy zoned sooo slow (he laughs) but he still couldn't get the kill, so he had to call in friends to help but he still got it! It was one of the best days of his young life....
I just smiled and said "I was that bard". and then I told him the name.
I think we both just stared at each other for a good two minutes not believing the coincidence. The awkward silence being the only thing that felt right.
I glance down at his credit report, see the bankruptcy and missed payments racked up and realize one of the best lessons I've ever learned...
Sometimes, your worst moments exist - so someone else can have a moment they desperately need - and absolutely everything works out in the end.
I bought his coffee and said no hard feelings. I cried as a kid over it, but I'm not upset over the way things went down.
That one lesson taught me to save and to value my time more than a preconceived value of what my time had gotten me. That's what made me decide to never wear/use my products again if it risked a devaluation or even worse, risked the product entirely - instead, id work to let someone else wear it, use it, and enjoy it. I'd live vicariously through their enjoyment, but my payout would be the selling of that item/thing/widget/whatever... And that's eventually what lead to me being where I am today.
Oh god I remember being a kid with just a druid to my name and those beautiful lowbie Thorns runs. God that was slow exp. But it was sooo fun! (I've been a power leveler most of life so of course I have years of these experiences! And I miss all these strats! RIP MY LOVES!)
