Zebuxoruk Server (Official Serious Buisiness)

[Jibbatwinkers]

Firstly if you don't know me I am Jibbatwinkers and I'm a Mechanic Engineering major at Ohio State and that means there are sure to be 10+ grammatical mistakes in the post.

On with the shhow.

Zebuxoruk Server. We'll it's officially coming back and better than ever (hopefully). For those of you that don't know anything about the Zebuxoruk server I'll fill you in. I started it late 2005 with a few friends, was put on a dedicated server in early 2006 and I had to bring it down mid 2007 due to a move to an apartment with shared internet use :( so I couldn't host anymore. But I'm back in my old place and so is the good type of internet!

Zebuxoruk is a legit, custom server. There are over 1000 custom items, over 100 custom quests, and a whole bunch of awesome stuff in between including over 30 custom spawned and loot-tabled zones for you to explore. When the server comes back up in the next few days I will be locking everyone to the Nexus only as we make changes to the content and code behind the server. The proposed changes will be outlined in the next few days at the new server website. Ivanho a GM and content developer for me before will be helping things move along more smoothly.

I welcome all the old faces back and expect to see a lot of new ones. The new server website is zebserver.com (http://zebserver.com) (zebuxorukserver.com was lost, and also impossible to spell). Please just on the forums and express your opinions freely as I look forward to hearing from you.

zebserver.com (http://zebserver.com)

[trevius]

To anyone that hasn't played on Zebuxoruk before, it is no joke! That server has some serious custom content, and is probably my favorite server of all that I have played on. There are quests for epics up to 3.0, and we are not talking about killing a mob over and over again to get a note to hand in for your epic, these quests require you to kill multiple named spawns in multiple zones. His shield/back item quest series has 10 levels of upgrades for that slot and ranges from very low levels (15ish) up to 70, so you can work on the quest as you level.

His boss encounters will probably need some adjusting due to changes in how certain things work in the emu since he last updated it. But, that is no worry, as Jibba is very skilled at making encounters for Solo, Groups, or even raids. Not just melee bosses, but bosses with AE mana drains, AE knockback, etc etc.

If you want to try something new and different (if you have never played there before), I would urge you all to try out Zebuxoruk when it comes up.

I played there for 6 months and experienced almost all of his content. It will definitely take a while to get through everything. I used to GM on his server, but I have my own up and running right now. I will definitely log in his server when it comes up. I still have 3.0s to complete lol :P

[onurisgfx]

This is awesome news. Played on Zeb when it first came out and had 3 toons on there. Bruenor, Openn, and Bruinor. Great content. Good to see you are coming back Jibba. You know you will see me running around again. :)

[Secrets]

If there's one thing I respect Jibba for, it's his dedication to making content... I still dunno how he can balance college with all of this.

Good luck on coming back :)

[Jibbatwinkers]

Changes that will be made on the Zebuxoruk server this time around have been finalized. There will be a lot more changing than this but the major decisions have been made. Let us know what you think and read what changes are being made at zebserver.com (http://zebserver.com)

[Jibbatwinkers]

The server is now up. Currently we are considering this a "beta stage" so any progress you make with a character during this week will be lost. The reason is there are going to be exp gain and quest changes at the lower levels. Once those fixes are done the server will release and we will work on the higher-end material at that point.

Make sure you can log in and check out the forums at zebserver.com (http://zebserver.com)for all the updates.

[bowmaster]

what makes ZeB a unquqe server?

[bowmaster]

right ,. been on 2day , decent server , Xp may need to be rised , on live , How it is these days , Btyw the time i got lvl 3 , i wouldt of got easy lvl 10 :)

[Jibbatwinkers]

Thanks for checking us out bowmaster. Keep in mind the server is currently in a "beta" type stage and a lot of changes are taking place including changes to the experience gain. We are still tweaking pretty much everything. I encourage you and everyone that gives the server a try to give us feedback at our forum www.zebserver.com/forum (http://zebserver.com/forum) The server is built for players to have fun and if something isn't as fun as you think it could be let me know there and I will deffinately make some changes.

Thanks for the feedback and helping the Zebuxoruk Server get that much closer to a relaunch. See you around :D

[Jibbatwinkers]

Launch date has been set! Here is the post from zebserver.com (http://zebserver.com)

That is right, the end of beta is coming! The server’s characters will be wiped Thursday night and on Friday the server will officially launch fresh. The development will continue but we feel we have gotten the server to a stable enough point to go ahead and open it up. The feedback from the community has been awesome and thing week we’ll be putting the finishing touches on everything to make sure things go smooth.

A lot of you have been waiting for the Zebuxoruk Server to go up for good and your wait is over. Stock up on Mountain Dew and Pizza Rolls and don’t forget to bring your favorite helm because it will be raining Ice Comets!!

[Soulofsin]

This is honestly one of the best servers I've ever played on. It's actually a challenge to become geared up, and level. Not like OMG I GOT 1 KILL AND AM 5! IM SO UBA 1337! So I reccomend this server. My chars name is Nightbane.

[Sanity]

Awesome to see you back Jibba! Hopefully I can find some time to play.

Mozzer/Igmod/Rook

[joedan]

Is this server laggy as hell or just me?

[Aramid]

Is this server laggy as hell or just me?

I tried it out this morning and yes, there is something going on.. It's like the server would freeze up and then after a few seconds (15 or so) I would get a message saying something like the ability I was trying to use was not available. I was only Melee'ing and kicking (Monk), and then it would resume.

[Jibbatwinkers]

A lot of people were having this issue on Saturday but it seems like this hasn't been much of a problem since then. There have been some isolated events in certain zones with lag but I'm trying to nail down what is causing that.

[Gattsu77]

What about everquest gold edition will that be good enough to re-install and play on the server?

[Secrets]

What about everquest gold edition will that be good enough to re-install and play on the server?

No no nope. Titanium is REQUIRED to play on EQEMU. Nothing else. Sorry but you're out of luck.

[mattmeck]

Join Date: Oct 2003

And still cant read stickies?

[Gattsu77]

Nope stickies are to hard to read sorry

[Angelox]

Nope stickies are to hard to read sorry

You really don't have a leg to stand on here, If by now you still don't know we can only use Titanium, then you must have been in some other planet all this time.

And with this post, ends another "Do I really have to use Titanium?" discussion. This is about Zebuxoruk Server, so lets stay on topic.

[Secrets]

This is about Zebuxoruk Server, so lets stay on topic.

Good plan. I played there last night (I was recovering from going to the hospital, long story) and I'd have to say, minus the lag I was impressed.

Same Zeb, with a few things tweaked. Keep up the good work!

[Jibbatwinkers]

I went back to build 1070. For some reason builds 1080+ give me really bad pathing errors (mobs don't pathing they just twitch 5-10x a second) which was causing insane lag in some zones when more than a few people logged on. It took me a while to figure out what was causing it because it was so obscure. I'm not sure if this is a known issue or just unique to my database. Anyways since I changed that yesterday things seem to be running so much smoother.

Also two new cusom zones since launch date. Tower of Frozen Shadows is now home of the first epic quest, and Kael just went in yesterday with over 100 new custom items. Enjoy the custom content.

[Gattsu77]

I have to agree once in a while I'll get a lag spike but other then that everything else is running smoothly keep up the good work and thanks :)

[Jibbatwinkers]

Just a few updates, mostly for an excuse to bump the thread up a bit. A little over two months since I came back up with Zebuxoruk and things are going really well. I've repolished every custom zone and made them really great. The lag issues I had very early on (which seemed to get a little notice on this thread) have been worked out, plus a few hardware upgrades for extra good performance.

Right now I'm working on "Finalizing" (if there is such a thing in MMO development) the custom content that I have out at this time. I've finished or nearly finished all the things on my massive checklist for all the "leveling zones" and have started on the infamous Zebuxoruk end-game. Because the majority of the end-game is starting to re-open I've upped the experience rate (and will continue to do so as more progression content is established). Also the zone spreadsheet (http://zebserver.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=104) has been updated.

Lots of old players have found us again at the bottom of the server select and hopefully a few more new faces will peek in or maybe give it a second chance. Come have fun with me :-D Updates and info at Zebserver.com (http://www.zebserver.com)

[Sanity]

The return of the Zeb server made me come back to EQEmu and I am glad I did! Jibba has the server running smoothly and the content is better than ever. The player base is returning and new players are coming aboard which is nice. One of the great things I love is that although there is a ton of content at lvl 70, there is almost too much to do at the lower levels. By the time you work through a custom zone, you are ready to move on to the next. This equals ZERO grind.

Great work Jibb!

[trevius]

To anyone who hasn't checked out this server in a while, or every before, I wanted to mention that there have been many changes going on with it. The experience has been increased quite a lot. I think the low experience rates were probably the main reason the player-base has stayed considerably small.

Jibba was waiting until he could open some more of his end-game content again before he increased the experience rates. He didn't want players to level quickly and get bored because there was nothing to do at the end game. He has a ton of custom content and lots to do for the end game. He had to rebalance all end game encounters and revamp some of his zones before he opened them back up. Now that he has most of it open, I think the player base will start rising steadily. But he also still has quite a bit of custom end game stuff that he is still working on. There will be plenty of stuff to keep people playing for months very soon I am sure. Right now there is already a ton.

I wanted to make this post so some people might give his server another try if there was something they didn't like about it before. He had so much work to do that it took a while to get most of it done.

His was by far my favorite server of all that I have ever played on back when it was originally up. He has done quite a few changes on the current Zeb and they all sound great! If I wasn't dev'ing my own server full time now, I would be playing on his lol.

I imagine he was waiting to make another post here until he got even more work done, but I wanted to let you guys know of the cool stuff going on. I think you will find it as a much different experience now. He does regular updates, so expect things to only get better and better.

[billiameo]

I'm excited to see the uniqueness added to servers here. I've played on Storm Haven for a bit (thanks Trevius) and have been thoroughly enjoying it, I will try Zeb's as well as it sounds like he's put a lot of effort into his. How the heck do you do it with College? I'm in college (studying abroad in China- learning Chinese) and find it somewhat difficult to find time to play, kudos to you! Also since there seem to be many dedicated server peeps on this thread I wanted to toss an idea.

I've been toying with the notion of suggesting a stronger role for DIETIES. They are picked at server log in still and seem to do little more than cause agro. (as faction relationships on some servers don't work). If there could be a way to reward a player's devotion to their diety via their in-game actions (the dieties have very specific descriptions to help aid in this endeavor) that would bring a hitherfore untapped dimension to the lore.

When I say "in-game actions" I'm not simply referring to quests, but rather to their actual character action/reactions that occur on a regular basis. This is a very loose idea with not a lot of algorithm to it yet, but I am hoping some others may adopt this new dimension as not simply another way to produce/obtain leet gear, but to actually affect the status/representation of a character in-game.

By affecting the status I mean a possible character permanent augment that has some sort of affect on others either visually or physically. For example: A paladin follows Rodcet Nife and his beliefs (randomly buffing non-grouped players, improving diety faction ect...) then he receives at some point a PBAOE heal that emanates unhindered from the Paladin. The effect would be visible (like a heals graphic on the passerby that receives the benefit of the radius). This effect would naturally start out small and increase with devotion/rank in the diety.

I have thought of some of the dangers associated with adding this element and the biggest one I can see is the possibly ease of play. This can be mitigated by the careful testing and implementation of diety abilities that will be balanced across the dieties. The abilities themself are not designed to significantly impact player solo performance, but rather to augment a player's ability to enjoy in-game content and perhaps appreciate some of the lore associated with their diety.

Agnostic would have no ability as it also has no negative consequence to faction. This could be tweaked but I'm not sure what to apply.

Also, there should be some kind of reward for those of the same diety (strongest cumulative affect) and those of like diety (next strongest cumulative affect) that are grouped or in a raid together. This ratio would be congruent to the overall ratio of like/unlike and good/bad dieties. Anyway a lot of possibilities here! Also, eventually, if this takes perhaps a class and a race paradigm could be added making for a very large pool of possible affects.

So in short, some sort of way to benefit those that care about their diety and possibly encourage others to read up on the lore of others so they can appreciate quest content even more.

Any and all feedback is appreciated!!

-Billiameo-:cool: