Good stuff coming in GU58.

Game Update 58 for EQII will bring a lot of nice additions to the game. When the update notes are posted, you'll see just how many things we've fixed and added over the past few months.

In the meantime I'll give you a little preview of the things I've been working on.

NPC Casting Bars

Casting bars have now been added to the target and implied target windows that will allow you to see exactly what spells that NPC's are casting. You've always had this information in one way or another normally by viewing particle effects or reading the spell text that appears in your chat window. This would allow tools like ACT to parse the data and give you the information, but for most people that don't use these tools, it was more difficult to understand what the mobs were doing. Hopefully with this new feature you'll be able to better time your stuns, stifles and interrupts.

Mount Appearance and Inventory

We've added a Mount tab to your character window, right behind the Appearance Tab. You can now store up to 50 mounts in this special inventory window and get them out of your normal inventory. In addition, you'll be able to define which mount is your "Equipped" mount and which mount is your "Appearance" mount. Following in the footsteps of appearance gear, the Equipped mount will provide the buff and stats, but the appearance will be overridden by the Appearance mount. We've also create a new "Summon Mount" ability that appears in your knowledge window as well as the bottom of the mount tab. Clicking this button will automatically summon/unsummon the equipped mount combination.

Currency Window

Behind the mount tab on the character window, we've also added a new Currency tab. Currency tokens and items will now be stored in this window freeing up even more inventory space. You can drag tokens to and from this area, so tokens can still be tradable or placed in your bank. When purchasing items from vendors that require tokens, the vendor will consume them directly from the currency window. Also, when acquiring new tokens, they will be deposited automatically into this window.

We also have a huge list of fixes and features that came from Fan Faire so I hope everyone really likes this update. We have a bit longer cycle between GU58 and GU59 since 59 is the launch of Velious but we are planning for a few things to be released in hotfixes between now and then. We also have 3 holiday events happening between 58 and Velious so hopefully there will be plenty to keep you busy!

We've also just announced that character slots will be going on sale through the in-game marketplace at a price of 10 dollars (1000sc) per slot. When you buy this slot, it'll be permanently added to that account and won't increase your monthly fee.

Thanks for reading and thanks again for being a Norrathian citizen! :)