The Ikkinz 4 raid requires making Engraved Rune (research, min skill 200, trivial 200). Please consider removing the minimum skill for this combine. Leaving the trivial of 200 in place still incentivizes skilling up as high as possible to avoid failing the raid on a combine attempt, but removes an enormous and unnecessary road block in actually requiring a researcher to be that high. Reason #1: I can't find any info anywhere online that states there is a minimum required skill for this combine. EQProgression says to have a 200+ researcher loot and do the combine, but doesn't mention a min skill. Rasper's Realm doesn't mention it at all. Zam says explicitly at the top of the quest writeup "no skill required." EQ Might says you should have a 100+ researcher, but doesn't mention min skill Bonzz mentions 200+ researcher but not a min skill Reason #2: It seems that in the past out-of-era recipes were available to skill up research past 200 relatively easily (following a guide like this) but now getting to 200+ research is extremely time prohibitive. So this 200+ research road block used to be a minor time / plat sink, but now it's a huuuugge and unintended hurdle to progression. Gathering enough pages to skill research to 200+ for exactly 1 progression step in the game is simply not worth the time. It makes Gates of Discord progression either not worth the time required and you just skip to Omens, or you get the help of someone else to tag along who is already 200+ from, most likely, the previous implementation of out-of-era recipes.
Just as an FYI, You can make swatches to 152, it's a lot less time/plat sink. There are books sold that will add recipes to your research book recipe list. Past that yeah it's a grind.
Hi all I haven't been playing for a while so not sure what changed. But these are the research recipes I used to skill up. Vendor items all in PoK. They are Original & Kunark era, so they should not have been removed? # SKILL PATH 1-21: Train at GM 22-54: Vial of Pure Water 5x Empty Vial (Eric Rasumus) 4x Water Flash (Eric Rasumus) Gnomish Heat Source (Eric Rasumus) /echo [332] autobuy "Empty Vial"|100/"Gnomish Heat Source"|25/"Water Flask"|80 55-102: Aqua Regia (ALSO SOLD IN POK 146p) Aqua Fortis (71p) - Eric Rasumus Vial of Muratic Acid (75p) - Eric Rasumus /echo [332] autobuy "Aqua Fortis"|100/"Vial of Muratic Acid"|100 103-203 Vellum Parchment Solution 3x Gnomish Heat Source (Audri Deepfacet) 3x Gold Bar (Audri Deepfacet) Platinum Bar (Audri Deepfacet) Vial of Pure Water (subcombine) - SEE ABOVE Aqua Regia - SEE ABOVE / WHEN YOU RUN OUT JUST BUY MORE DONT NEED TO MAKE /echo [438] autobuy "Gnomish Heat Source"|360/"Gold Bar"|360/"Platinum Bar"|120 /echo [332] autobuy "Aqua Regia"|120
These recipes were implemented with a big overhaul to research in the Depths of Darkhollow expansion, haven’t found a date or patch notes yet but it’s mentioned at the top of this page
There are a bunch of combines using game-wide drops (runes, words, pages, other random stuff) to make swatches. Abrogation Scried Swatch, Ellipse Runed Swatch, etc But these only go to 152. Past that you gotta actually make spells by collecting rare or random drops.
Ah, I see. Item was added to live and scraped by lucy in 2005-09-24 (Depths of Darkhollow): https://lucy.allakhazam.com/itemhistory.html?id=93505
you also have option from 0 to 182 to do research runes (Practice, Training, Journeyman, Study, Expert, Master and Magi) but I find them to be a pain as the sub combines don't show up as a recipe so you can't use /autocombine on it. So I just search for best spell that I can get drops for and just farm it as much as possible. "What type of swatches to 152? Mind clarifying that a bit more?" Etched, Runed or Scribed Swatches, they are used for robes for certain races but you only need 1 drop to get skill ups (+ bought quill and parchment) there is 30+ of them, skills 92 to 152. Again buy the swatches book (I forget who sells it) and I think the recipes get added to your tradeskill window. Some classes you can find easy items for skill ups. Example Mages can make Spell: Scars of Sigil to 196 which is quill, parchment, Bolts of Tallon and Words of Domination. Words of Domination drop alot in Sirens grotto and Chardok. Bolts of Tallon drop like crazy in Temple of Cazic Thule.
According to eqtraders the trivial is greater than 190. Engraved Rune item|sources|full list Recipe(s): Spell Research Components: Runed Glyph: Aexit, Runed Glyph: Grexit, Runed Glyph: Noxit, Runed Glyph: Truxit In: Phantasmal Tome, Arch Magus Grimoire, Warlock's Book of Binding, Sorcerer's Lexicon Yield: 1 This combine may only be made by Select classes, see notes below Notes: This combine can be made by int casters in their class specific container. Trivial at: <=190 http://www.eqtraders.com/items/show_item.php?item=13056&menustr=035000000000
"Trivial at: <=190" This means "less than or equal to 190". All that confirms is that someone at research skill 190 attempted the combine and got a notification that they could no longer skill up from this combine. This would confirm that 200 is too high of a trivial.
Lots of datapoints: 2010: https://web.archive.org/web/20100823150751/http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=56039 2015: https://web.archive.org/web/20150922134744/http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=56039 Current: https://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/recipe.html?recipe=21257 - This shows the Minimum (number) and trival separate as well as the first date entry on zam. EQProgression calling out 200+: https://www.eqprogression.com/ikkinz-raid-trial-4-antechamber-of-destruction-gates-of-discord/
+1, appreciate the transparency and I think it helps understand the decision making. Even current ZAM shows "minimum skill required 200": https://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=56039 So it seems like it's always been this way.
Hate to see it haha. The outcome is still a bummer for an emu server where the economy for tradeskill items is vastly different than live, but thanks for sharing those sources
