The Tattered Notebook: The insider's guide to Erollisi Day
As EverQuest II gracefully ages, it's become a game that's rich with content. That's especially true of the in-game holidays, like the current live event, Erollisi Day. And now that Erollisi herself has returned, the holiday is cause for celebration rather than remembrance.
The event is winding down, but there are still a few days left to participate. In this week's Tattered Notebook, we'll highlight some of the many things to do during Erollisi Day, including something old, something new, something borrowed, and something.... Gnome!
Something old
As with many of the holiday events in EQII, most of the quests and items from previous years are back. It means those who missed out on previous holidays can still get the rewards, but it also means there's now a plethora of content for each holiday.
Back are Steven and Douglas, who have an eerie resemblance to the head-banging Butabi brothers from Saturday Night Live. If you can wade through their cheesy pickup lines, you'll find lots of things to craft, like roses, the pink unicorn mount, perfume bottles, elegant furniture, and romantic clothing. Even the special crafting components are fun because they're love notes and heart candy that drop from any sentient creature, and each candy has a funny message from various races in Norrath. The clockwork love note, for example, is 01001100011011110111011001100101, while my all-time favorite candy heart is the the evil eye candy (Eye Heart U).
Something new
Each year, there is a new book of crafting recipes, and this year marks the arrival of volume V. It's sold in town by Steven, and inside are recipes for cupcakes, taffy sticks, pillows, and couches. But for decorators, what's really exciting are the new red and pink garlands and fairy lights. I'm sure we'll see them used in all sorts of creative ways!
For the dungeon-makers, there are several new avatars activators and spawners, purchasable from Douglas in town. In order to purchase them, you need Erollisi coins; to get the coins, you need to convert your heart candies and love notes into barbarian love notes by visiting Heartgar MacInnes and then converting those into coins by talking to Liannya Heartswell.
Old quests like Love Lines and Find 'em a Find are back, but they return with new Othmir plushies as rewards. And there is a new quest inside the Shard of Love, which now gives out the Cloak of the Sisterhood because Erollisi's return has made the former quest irrelevant.
Another event that's slightly different is the Heart's a Flutter contest. In the past, you had to wait for multiple participants to join up in order to run the event, but this year, it's been revamped and is similar to the Frostfell race. You can talk to the NPCs outside of town in the Commonlands and Antonica, and once you step on the nearby portal, your job is to run through as many heart nodes as possible in the allotted time. The multicolored hearts seem to give you a little speed boost, so if you spot one, run through it. There are tiers of prizes depending on how many hearts you collect, and many of the rewards are the flowers from the previous Heart's A Flutter contest. New this year, though, is the Lover's Wrap cloak.
Something borrowed
OK, they're not exactly borrowed, but fresh-cut roses are back once again, and out of all of the Erollisi Day quests, this one is my favorite. You start off with one rose, mailed to you by your secret admirer, and you can hand it to someone by targeting him and clicking on the rose. You can then head to the Enchanted Lands to harvest more roses to pass out. When this event first appeared, players discovered that as you hand out roses, you can earn some interesting titles as well. Hand out 25 roses and you can earn the title "The Flirtatious," while 100 grants you "The Romantic." There are a handful of others as well, with the highest being "The Prurient" at 2,000, which means "having or encouraging an excessive interest in sexual matters." If you decide to go with that, you probably should look to see whether the Marketplace sells one of those creepy brown raincoats as well.
Something Gnome
Even though I'm not exactly a fan of Gnomes, their tinkering has produced some pretty neat stuff in the past. And during Erollisi Day, players with a high enough tinkering skill can create gold and silver mechanosynthetic roses. Recipes for the roses come from Romantic Gifts to Craft, which is sold by Steven in town. You can place them in your house or guild hall, and they're perfect for that Midas-touch theme. If you don't have a high enough tinkering skill, don't worry; tinkerers can trade or sell them to other players.
And it wouldn't be an event without a special shiny collection. Gnoob the Gnome will be happy to know that special Erollisi shinies are located all over the world, and the reward is a passion veiled screen, which is gold-framed and gives your home a nice touch of privacy.
If you're planning on checking out the festivities, be sure to visit EQ2i, a fantastic resource for quests, items, and locations. If you're a crafter, stock up on necessary materials because even though the event ends on the 20th, you can still craft the recipes if you have the right mats later. On the other hand, if you have a stockpile of coins, make sure to spend them while the event is live or else you'll be stuck with them for a year. In the meantime, if you see a trench-coated Halfling with a strange smile and a handful of roses headed your way, run as fast as you can!
From the snow-capped mountains of New Halas to the mysterious waters of the Vasty Deep, Karen Bryan explores the lands of Norrath to share her tales of adventure. Armed with just a scimitar, a quill, and a dented iron stein, she reports on all the latest news from EverQuest II in her weekly column, The Tattered Notebook. You can send feedback or elven spirits to karen@massively.com.
