The Planes of Prophecy expansion in EverQuestII will be released on November 28, 2017, at around noon Pacific. This article is a clearinghouse of information for this expansion that WILL likely still change a bit during the first week or two of launch. A list of changes is included at the bottom of the article to help folks see what has been added or updated since their last visit.

This expansion includes a level increase to 110 for both adventuring and tradeskilling, and a level cap increase for ascension abilities to 15.

As we found out during the prelude event, the wizard spires have been imbued with some extra magic. While at first Norrathians may have only seen some extra visual effects, now the spires have opened up a totally new destination -- the Plane of Magic -- courtesy of the goddess of Magic, Druzzil Ro.

Traveling To and Fro

The Plane of Magic overland zone is available from any wizard spire. You will find it at the bottom center-ish of the wizard port map. (Since fast travel was not enabled on beta, I am unsure if you will be able to fast travel directly there or not.)

Once you are in the Plane of Magic there are seven teleport pads to activate for in-zone travel. The first one is down the path a bit from your arrival point on the Scintillating Spires island.

If you want to hit them in clockwise order:

• Scintillating Spires: /way 1113, 771, -1456
• Khali'Yrzu: /way 100, 583, -720
• Khali'Vahla: /way -114, 574, -727
• Pakiat Bluffs: /way -840, 83, -163
• Valor's Roost: /way -756, 345, 1027
• Zivier's Reach: /way -127, 206, 742
• Stratafold: /way 811, 44, 500

As you step on each one to activate it, you unlock the ability to travel to that port pad. (So if you only bother to activate 2 of them, you can only travel between those two spots.) Since it makes traveling around much easier, I recommend unlocking all seven even if you don't plan on adventuring out there any time soon. You will get an achievement for unlocking all of them complete with lovely xp and all that jazz.

Don't let that be the sum total of your tour around the zone, though, as there are quite a few gorgeous sights to take in along the way!

Experience and You

For both adventuring and tradeskilling above level 100, the only real way to level will be via questing with new content. The xp curve is so huge that doing old quests (or just killing mobs, or just grinding items) won't make any noticeable dent at all. For adventurers that means doing PoP quests, including the Legacy of Power signature line, faction quests, missions, etc. For crafters it currently means level 100+ writs/rush orders. There will be a crafting line, no matter what the nay-sayers say, but it isn't ready for us yet. More on that in a later section, but really crafters, grinding items or KA or earlier crafting quest content will NOT be how you're going to level. (So when you hear someone inevitably complain that at the rate they're going, it'll take them 1000s of combine per level, tell them to go do level 100+ rush orders, k?)

Harvesting

There is a new tier of harvestables in the Plane of Magic. At the end of beta, examining the nodes stated that a skill of 600 is required to harvest rares (50 points over an unmodified level 110 maxxed skill), but folks had reported receiving rares at a a modified skill of 550 or so. Regardless of which it is, a modified skill of 600 is very easy for a crafter to obtain with solstice earring, cloak of the harvester, Far Seas tradeskill prestige ability, harvesting tools, etc.

As you can see from the below, there is a smaller variety of harvestables than in the past tiers for stones and foodstuffs, and the common root comes from both the root node and the fungi node:

• Dens: Plumewit Hide, Greatmole Meat, Cnidcara Hide (rare)
• Fish: Nightmare Cichlid
• Fungi (food): Deadly Mushroom, Rock Fern, Storm Stalk, Matron's Heart (rare)
• Ore: Etherium, Rubicite Ore (rare)
• Roots: Storm Stalk, Strand of Ether (rare)
• Stone: Golden Ember, Darkstone (rare)
• Wood: Gnarled Entwood, Storm Ent Heartwood (rare)

All nodes also bear a chance of producing a "Planar Energy" that is used for level 11-15 ascension spell upgrades.

Harvester NPCs

The news on the harvester upgrades is a bit of a mixed bag, and I'm going to let Caith explain it:

The goblin will not be getting any more updates.

The Kunark Ascending houseplant will be updated to offer a reward from the new tier of harvests.

The Artisan's Pack Pony will not be updated until the crafting timeline goes in.

We do not have any plans to update the guild harvesters until later in the expansion cycle.

For the most part, we want players out and experiencing the content in the expansion zones, not cycling through a dozen (or more) alts sending out NPC harvesters, at the very least at the start of the expansion cycle. While harvesting is more difficult at lower level, and should be, there should be plenty of spots where you can avoid the NPC's to harvest. The increase in harvest node spawn-rate should also help with that.

Now, first off, when he mentions that the Kunark Ascending houseplant (Obulus Frontier Garden) is updated to offer a reward from the new tier of harvests, it is (at least as of this moment in the last hours of beta, giving a solid chunk of resources.

I poked the garden I copied over for testing and in a single visit, and received not only an Obulus rare, but "a bushel of harvests" that expanded into:

• 16 deadly mushroom
• 91 etherium
• 127 gnarled entwood
• 93 golden ember
• 47 greatmole meat
• 125 nightmare cichlid
• 40 plumemwit hide
• 30 rock fern
• 84 storm stalk
• 1 storm ent heartwood (rare)

We will have to see how it all plays out as this goes live, as the number of harvest nodes was increased quite a bit and the number of resources needed by the recipes was reduced a bit.

If you feel the need to feedback about it once you test it out on the live servers, please remember to keep things civil AND provide actual numbers for them to work with. ("Harvested for X amount of time with Y skill, and Z boosts, and received AA of the following resources:" sort of feedback, not just "we need more resources than we're getting")

In other harvest-related news, resource stacks are now 800 units, instead of 200.

Recipes

Beta stopped getting updated a few days before launch. The devs were still working on things, so when you see a "late beta note" about something askew, it may/may not be fixed when the live servers are patched with the expansion. If it isn't fixed then, at least the bug reports and queries are in the queue to be addressed.

• Alchemists - will make combat arts for fighters. (Tank experts will require 2 rubicite each.) They will also make potions and poisons. (There do not appear to be new remedy potions, and we put in bugs on that. Red poisons and reprieve spells also are not for alchemists to make. From Mum: See the "Other Recipes" section below for what happened with them.)
• Armorers - will make chain and plate armor for the new tier, as well as mercenary armor. Crafted Armor Stats
• Carpenters - While the recipes use more materials than we're used to, the result is worth it. Complete the fourth progress bar, and you get two of the furniture item for handcrafted and five of the item for mastercrafted, and they stack up to 10! Images can be found here.
• Jewelers - will make jewelry, scout combat arts and merc accolades. Scout Expert CAs will require 2 darkstone each.
• Provisioners - provisioners can now make snacks that are short-duration buffs that you can consume in addition to your normal food and drink. Currently there is only one rare food and no rare drink. Food, Drink and Snack Stats can be found here.
• Sages - Will make priest and mage spells. (Darkstone for priest experts, Rubicite for mage experts.) We haven't heard/seen anything about notebooks for this expansion
• Tailors - will make leather and cloth armor, belts and cloaks. (Note the belts use roots, the cloaks will use pelts this time around.) Crafted Armor Stats
• Weaponsmiths - will craft metal weapons, throwing weapons and metal shields. (Late-beta note was that 2-HS weapons were missing from WS books, and they also did not get arrow recipes this time. Bug reports were submitted, and hopefully the missing weapons at least, will be seen at launch or soon thereafter.)
• Woodworkers - will craft wooden weapons, including bows, arrows, crossbow bolts and thrown weapons. We have not seen any consumables (totems). The KA recipe books are also updated so that there are Twark and Bloody Tooth crossbow bolt recipes for those who have the preorder crossbow.

Other crafting:

As in past years, there is quite a bit going on behind the scenes, so we aren't sure if any of the following was changed after they stopped updating beta.

• Adorning: We will only have one rarity level of white adorns (instead of lesser/greater/superior), and they will require all 4 qualities of transmuting materials. There were no distillations or dilutions recipes on beta, but we've asked for them. The Planar Adorning book has gone missing from the guildhall recipe vendors, even if you have 550 skill. Has anyone seen it anywhere?
• What about those "red" poisons and reprieve potions? - Apparently the recipes are artisan recipes purchased from the Valor faction vendor. More "soon" with details.
• Tinkering: Apparently some tinkering recipes ended up on the Valor faction vendor. The 12/5 patch notes also mention some for normal vendors More "soon" with details.
• Infusing: We are able to salvage for infusing mats, but there was no word in beta on if there was a new tier of infusers.
• Refining: Some rares refine into slag, some won't refine at all - refined recipes don't work. I'll be re-testing stuff after the Thursday patch and will put in a /bug on the ones that are slagging, as none of them should allow refine to be cast if gear has no refined stats.
• Grandmaster and Ancient Spells: There will be crafted grandmaster and ancient spells, BUT we don't yet know how to obtain the recipe books.
• Ascension Spells: There were recipe books for creating the various ranks of level 11-15 ascension spells, BUT we don't yet know how to obtain those recipe books.

Crafted Fashions

The new tier of crafted armor comes with it's own distinct look, including some lovely animated bits for the mastercrafted. You can see details on the PoP Crafted Armor Fashions page.

Tradeskill Questing

The tradeskill signature line IS coming, but after expansion launch. As Caith said:

Unfortunately the tradeskill quest timeline for Planes of Prophecy was not coming together in a way that would make it fun and engaging, so we have decided to push it back until after launch. While this is disappointing to us all, we believe that delivering a rich and engaging tradeskill quest timeline is more important than delivering what would be a sub-par experience on the expansion launch date. Utilizing the extra time granted by pushing the tradeskill timeline back will allow us to deliver a more fully featured tradeskill experience for us all to enjoy. The tradeskill timeline will be our top priority once the rest of the expansion content and systems have been locked in.

In addition there is some Planar crafting achievement now showing up for PoP, with a reward mount, but it was tested internally, so players could have the fun of discovery once the expansion is launched. From the looks of what the achievement says, I'm guessing that it is something that would require both adventuring and crafting both. Be aware, though, that this is NOT the promised TS signature line, but something separate.

There are also, of course, writs and rush orders to 110. As of the end of beta, this meant level 100 work/rush orders using ToT (Maldura) recipes and materials until you hit level 101, then rush orders and writs labeled "level 110" that use level 101 essentials recipes and PoP harvests that you can then do all the way through the rest of the tier. (I either misunderstood, or it simply fell by the wayside in beta, the plan to update those writs a bit more, but will give folks a level up path, at least.)

Random Reminders

Remember to dig out your items to help with tradeskill leveling, including your coldain prayer shawl, mark of the far seas, and your censer of containment. Your progress potions and innovation potions from your apprentices are also handy things, as is your hammer of adept hands to reset your tradeskill vitality.

Other Eye-Candy

There is buyable furniture from one of the adventuring faction areas and some from the Plane of Valor. Details on faction requirements, final costs, etc. are included along with the eye-candy on the Buyable Furniture page. (FYI, this furniture is also stackable to stacks of 10 in inventory, just like the new crafted furniture.)

Furniture rewards have been added to many quests as well, and you can see more on the PoP Quest Furniture Rewards page.

Are You the Answer Person?

Do you get hammered with questions on launch day from lost friends and guildmates? I'm sharing the contents of my playermade notebook for my guildhall and others should feel free to copy it as needed: Planes of Phophecy FAQ

From the Patch Notes

• Many stackable items have had their stack size increased to 900. From Mum: We saw stacks of 800 for resources on beta, so I am unsure if this is a typo, or if the stacks were increased more.
• Expendable Tinkering items have been converted into stackable items. Recipe outputs should now grant the same number of items as the tinkering baubles had charges. From Mum: I didn't catch this in beta (if it even hit beta), so it could use some eyeballing from folks to make sure the yields are happy.

Bug Tracking

Stuff for me to watch for a few days, and hope for hotfixes.

• There is apparently an issue with fuels not fitting in the crafted fuel depot. (The player was going to submit a /bug)
• Favor of Innovation is returning the wrong tier of resources from PoP combines
• Recipes for Expert spells and CAs are bugged right now. ETA Tuesday (Dec 5) patch for the fix.
• Carpenter-made "Decayed Lamp" still has the art bug that was supposed to be fixed by now.
• Planar Adornments (recipe book) seems to have gone missing.

Page Updates

• Nov 4, 2pm-ish: Basic page created without any real details, carpenter furniture page created, but it currently contains only the handcrafted stuff. (Mastercrafted due Nov. 5 or 6)
• Nov 5, 3 am, erm, 2 am (Daylight Savings, and I don't know what time it is anymore!): Mastercrafted furniture hit beta with the 12:30 a.m. patch, and I've got it crafted, tested, bugs posted, AND all the contortions done to get the images into the carpenter furniture page. I'm going to finish this glass of "liquid painkiler" (Irish Mist) and sleeeeep for a bit.
• Nov 7, 3:45 p.m.: Added a section about harvesting, a section about questing, and added more information about class recipes.
• Nov 7, 5:15 p.m.: Added information from the devs regarding harvester upgrades
• Nov. 8, 3:49 p.m. Added more about the harvester upgrades and a heartfelt request for help.
• Nov. 10, 2:15 p.m. Added a section at the bottom of the carpenter furniture page with links to furniture walk-through videos from Ocarinah.
• Nov. 13, 4:00 p.m. Armorers will make merc armor. A crafted armor fashion gallery has also been put together, including a video preview by Ocarinah.
• Nov. 14, 1:14 p.m. Carpenter yields changed for handcrafted items - completion of the 4th progress bar will now yield 2. (Mastercrafted yields stay as they were, with a yield of 5, and the recipes require 5 rare wood.)
• Nov. 15, 4:23 p.m. Updated the leather/cloth images in the crafted armor fashion gallery now that the mastercrafted cloth appearance has been fixed. Added waypoints for the seven teleport pads in Plane of Magic above.
• Nov. 15:, 7:03 p.m. Added a page for Buyable Furniture
• Nov. 16, 2:15 p.m. Valor buyable furniture has been added to the Buyable Furniture page.
• Nov. 17, 1:40 p.m. A lot is still going on in the background (re-re-reverifying items, recipes, etc.) that I won't talk about. However, I've managed to add more eye-candy today. The Buyable Furniture page has had housepets AND video tours by Ocarinah added. A new Quested Furniture Rewards page is also in-progress, and will be for a while.
• Nov. 19? Oh, it's after midnight, isn't it? Added a few more images to the Quested Furniture Rewards page.
• Nov. 19, 8:24 p.m. Resources can now stack to 800 on beta, instead of 200.
• Nov. 22, 10:20 p.m. Ocarinah kindly got me screenshots of all the crafted armor stats and now that I'm mostly finished poking at the Frostfell testing, I'm finally done coding it. :)
• Nov. 23, 3:35 p.m. Happy Thanksgiving to those celebrating it today! Potions and poisons were added to alchemist books, and I could use a few extra eyeballs on the stats on them. I also added a couple more house items to the Quested Furniture Rewards page, and will be working on adding more in the next couple days, as I grind through the quests again to find them.
• Nov. 23/24. Added a couple more bits to the quested furniture rewards page.
• Nov. 24, 4:04 p.m. Valor-purchased furniture had pricing changes. Edit: Whoops! So did Vahla!
• Nov. 26, 1:22 p.m. A LOT is still going on in the background before I add much more to this article, however, here's a tidbit that I promised the folks on /antonia_bayle.homeshow: A Planes of Prophecy FAQ that is suitable for placing in your guildhall to handle the inevitable questions that will pop up for the first few days of expansion launch.
• Nov 26, 4:08 p.m. Food, Drink and Snack Stats page is done.
• Nov 26, 7:11 p.m. Updated the Purchased Furniture page with Yrzu housepets and their prices. Also added a couple more items to the quested furniture page.
• Nov 26, 10:58 p.m. Added 3 more lovely house items to the Quested Furniture Rewards page
• Nov 27, noonish. Updated the "Other Crafting" section a bit. More to come later. I still need to check a few things while beta is still up.
• Nov 27, 2:30 p.m. Finished off another questline, so I could add one more house item to the Quested Furniture Rewards page
• Nov 27, 7:55 p.m. I've logged off beta for (hopefully) the last time, with one last house item to add to the Quested Furniture Rewards page (this one from a last bit of faction grinding). I'll work on fleshing out various sections of the text above in a bit. I am going to go snag one or two more prelude quest completions before the questline is removed in the morning, then I'll be back to writing.
• Nov 27, 9:49 p.m. Added a small section about experience. More incoming, but I'm going to be saving/publishing this document a lot tonight, so I don't lose anything to a finger-flub.
• Nov 27, 10:19 p.m. Checked my Obulus Garden on beta, and included the results of that check in the harvesting section above. Yum!
• Nov 27, 10:42 p.m. "Frain bry" has hit. I have cleaned up and/or clarified more information in this article, and it is likely I won't update again until after the expansion launches. Once I have time to get my bearings, I'll be verifying various things and making updates here as neccessary.
• Nov 28, 11:23 a.m. Things seem to be pretty much on schedule, so the servers should be up fairly soon. I also added a couple snippets above from the patch notes, along with comments on them.
• Nov 28, 12:31 p.m. The servers came up on-schedule, and, as expected, I've already had to bite one guildmate who asked me questions clearly covered in the HUGE notebook containing the FAQ placed at the front of the guildhall. Rarr. Meanwhile ... KNOWN ISSUE Stats on gear are askew. The devs are aware and working on it. New Surprise ToT and KA recipe books are now on guildhall recipe vendors - no need for faction or tokens, just coin.
• Nov 30, just after midnight. On top of slowly adding to a bugs section, I've also added to the recipes section now that I've found out what happened to the "missing" tinkering recipes, red poisons and remedy potions.
• Dec. 1. It's not as good as I'd hoped, but I saw on Discord that they're tentatively aiming for the end of January for the tradeskill timeline. So, it looks like it may be hitting at about the same time as I am testing Erolissi Day on Test. Wheee
• Dec. 5: Tomorrow's patch "should" address a chunk of PoP bugs, including the expert spell issue. Meanwhile, I've put together a quick reference guide for PoP rares. It might be handy to dump in a notebook and stick on top of your guild harvest depot. :D